Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[s_bushido]

Ultimately, if you have an established audience for your product because you are making an iteration of an existing IP in a new format, such as a videogame>film or book>film then deviating from that existing story is going to be disparaging to a subset/majority of the audience. This is a given, it's also indicative of fairly major hubris to take a super established work like the one that basically laid the foundation of modern fantasy and re-arrange it. It implies that you know better and the original author did a bad job, otherwise you wouldn't need to change it besides the concessions you may have to make to transform its medium from paper to film.

I don't think I could disagree more...

On one hand, I'd be willing to bet that the percentage of the audience in an adaptation (at least one that's intended for a mainstream audience) who know/care about the source material beyond vague generalities is much much smaller than people assume.

On the other, it's not hubris or "thinking you know better" to acknowledge and try to deal with the realities of taking something that was written for one medium and translating it into another. Especially in this case when there was barely anything written...at all. Case in point for the billionth time: Tolkien purists (up to and including the man's son) are notorious for shitting on Jackson's first trilogy, and yet they're viewed in much the same way that you described the books they were adapted from. "The foundation of modern fantasy" filmmaking.

[WaltherLeopold]

I don't think I could disagree more...

On one hand, I'd be willing to bet that the percentage of the audience in an adaptation (at least one that's intended for a mainstream audience) who know/care about the source material beyond vague generalities is much much smaller than people assume.

Really, because for a long time everyone had read Lord of the Rings, it was one of the most translated and sold books ever written. I tried to explain above why I think some alterations to the works are tolerated and why others aren't. Primarily I believe it's holistic, as in a dramatic change to an event in the books is tolerated if the overall adaptation follows the same beats as the original work and/or does not impede on said beats.

On the other, it's not hubris or "thinking you know better" to acknowledge and try to deal with the realities of taking something that was written for one medium and translating it into another. Especially in this case when there was barely anything written...at all. Case in point for the billionth time: Tolkien purists (up to and including the man's son) are notorious for shitting on Jackson's first trilogy, and yet they're viewed in much the same way that you described the books they were adapted from. "The foundation of modern fantasy" filmmaking.

I don't think this applies here, there is enough source material to structure the story to actually fit into the existing zeitgeist of Lord of the Rings, whether that means you have to copy the style of Peter Jackson or follow the source material more stringently. It also begs the question why you would set your story in such a well established IP if you don't think you have material to work with, at some point the onus is on you as a producer of said adaptation to accept responsibility.

It's also very, very evident that the Rings of Power project is not on par with or will be considered on par with the Peter Jackson adaptation of Lord of the Rings, I don't even know why you are trying to compare the two, Rings of Power will not be a leading show in modern fantasy showmaking.

[s_bushido]

Really, because for a long time everyone had read Lord of the Rings, it was one of the most translated and sold books ever written.

Then I think someone needs to update the wiki, because that has it down between Twilight and Fifty Shades at around 150 million copies. I think people vastly overestimate the relevance of the books themselves in pop culture...at least in the past couple decades.

I don't think this applies here, there is enough source material to structure the story to actually fit into the existing zeitgeist of Lord of the Rings, whether that means you have to copy the style of Peter Jackson or follow the source material more stringently. It also begs the question why you would set your story in such a well established IP if you don't think you have material to work with, at some point the onus is on you as a producer of said adaptation to accept responsibility.

There's nothing about RoP that conflicts with the "existing zeitgeist" of LotR. And they chose this setting presumably because it's what they could get the rights to. If you don't like that they're so limited in what they can actually draw from, have a conversation with the Tolkien estate.

It's also very, very evident that the Rings of Power project is not on par with or will be considered on par with the Peter Jackson adaptation of Lord of the Rings, I don't even know why you are trying to compare the two, Rings of Power will not be a leading show in modern fantasy showmaking.

I never said it was on par with Jackson's trilogy. I make the comparison because people have somehow convinced themselves that RoP is uniquely irreverent to the source material, even though people have said the exact same shit about those movies, despite how well-received they were.

[rhorle]

There's a distinct difference between the author of a work revisiting their story and a new author changing the existing story.

To an extent but not in the way you are using it. Amazon hasn't even changed a story because one doesn't exist for the second age. The lore they have changed hasn't even been published by the original author because it was constantly changing and being revised. It shows that you, and others, are giving it this sacred status just so you can label something else as an insult to it.

[WaltherLeopold]

Then I think someone needs to update the wiki, because that has it down between Twilight and Fifty Shades at around 150 million copies. I think people vastly overestimate the relevance of the books themselves in pop culture...at least in the past couple decades.

My use of past tense here is intentional. However Lord of the Rings was and still is an immensly popular & influential book series.

There's nothing about RoP that conflicts with the "existing zeitgeist" of LotR. And they chose this setting presumably because it's what they could get the rights to. If you don't like that they're so limited in what they can actually draw from, have a conversation with the Tolkien estate.


I never said it was on par with Jackson's trilogy. I make the comparison because people have somehow convinced themselves that RoP is uniquely irreverent to the source material, even though people have said the exact same shit about those movies, despite how well-received they were.

I think this is a bit contrived since Amazon bought rights to almost everything pertaining to LotR.

"We have the rights solely to The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, The Return of the King, the appendices, and The Hobbit,” Payne says. “And that is it. We do not have the rights to The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, The History of Middle-earth, or any of those other books.” That takes a huge chunk of lore off the table and has left Tolkien fans wondering how this duo plans to tell a Second Age story without access to those materials. “There’s a version of everything we need for the Second Age in the books we have the rights to,” McKay says. “As long as we’re painting within those lines and not egregiously contradicting something we don’t have the rights to, there’s a lot of leeway and room to dramatize and tell some of the best stories that [Tolkien] ever came up with.”

https://lrmonline.com/news/what-mate...ower-answered/

It shows that you, and others, are giving it this sacred status just so you can label something else as an insult to it.

What is this strawman you're attempting to build?

[rhorle]

What is this strawman you're attempting to build?

You tell me since you are the one inventing it. Didn't you say that Amazon is insulting Tolkien by changing his story?

I think this is a bit contrived since Amazon bought rights to almost everything pertaining to LotR.

They aren't adapting Lord of the Rings though. They are adapting the second age which without full rights to all that content they are limited. They specifically say they have the rights to everything they need from the Second Age which is different from all the rights to the Second Age material.

[rogoth]

No all you have is opinions none of the facts back up your own opinion stating the show has done bad or is a bad show.

Reviews still mean nothing, most reviews are around 1% of the actual ppl who watch the show, the only numbers that actually matter is who has watched the show, RoP is pulling between 40-50 million just from when the last episode released, far higher than other similar shows such as house of the dragon, numbers who have watched the show by now it far larger than that now.

Completion rate also means nothing, those who watched it will still watch the rest at some point and do you have completion rates for all the other shows because without that it still means nothing, there is no comparrison to say whats good or not, going by the numbers for house of the dragon with only 9.3 million watching the last episode its completion rate is around 33% since they stated it tripled its viewers. Pretty much every single show has half its viewers not watch it all the way through as soon as it releases.

You are in denial, the show is a success and its good, not the best show in the world but a solid good show.

since you lack the reading comprehension necessary i'll repeat it in simple terms:

the show has a DOMESTIC completion rate of 37%, the industry average is 55%+

the show has a GLOBAL completion rate of 48%, the industry average is 55%+

almost unanimously the 'viewer' ratings for this show are below a 4/10 average on every site excluding the heavily censored IMDB which RESTRICTED the ability for people to give less than a 5/10 on this show EXCLUSIVELY, no other show or movie on the site has had this level of censorship and oversight from the site owner Amazon.

critic reviews from those who actually watched the entire series have rated the show a 5/10 - 6/10 as the best scores seen, and staggeringly almost 90% of those who gave a 'pre release' score didn't actually watch the full series, they watched the same 2 episode release that everyone had access to and did not go back to watch the remaining episodes after giving that paid for favourable review.


all of these things are both immutable fact and are objective reality as to what has happened with this show, not just that but from a potential view pool of 220 million people, less than half of that even bothered to check it out despite the product being FREE TO VIEW for those people, meaning that the show was so piss poor that people either didn't know about it, or didn't care about it to even bother checking it out, valuing their time spent watching other media.

i also find it hilarious you're trying to compare a show, with a potential viewer base of ~90 million total HBO max subscribers, if you compare that as a %, then house of the dragon has a SIGNIFICANTLY HIGHER viewer count than rings of power, an order of magnitude higher than this Amazon funded abomination, and something that house of the dragon did every episode was increase viewer count over the course of its run time, rings of power did the inverse by losing viewers every episode over its run time, to the point that the show lost more viewers from the first episode than watched the finale episode in total, as stated by industry insiders in several different articles posted in both magazines and online, this show is seen as a failure both commercially and critically, but you keep telling yourself it was a 'solid show'.

[rhorle]

the show has a DOMESTIC completion rate of 37%, the industry average is 55%+

Completion rate doesn't seem to mean much. Arcane has near perfect score and a bunch of awards but it is reported to have only had a 60% completion rate. It is time to let this one die and add it to the pile of past goal posts that also indicated the show was a failure.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

There's no suggestion that Sauron has any power over the ring (or rings) if they're not in his possession. It won't be until the One Ring is made and its influence is felt that the plot will be uncovered.

no clue if this is touched on or not any where, but do the elfs still have there rings post one ring destruction and would they still have power?

Actually would the dwarf and human ones still be a thing? In the Jackson movies all the orcs drop dead so I’d assume the ring wraiths did to but that’s not the case in the book I’ve heard so would the wraiths still be around like the orcs are?

[s_bushido]

In the Jackson movies all the orcs drop dead so I’d assume the ring wraiths did to but that’s not the case in the book I’ve heard so would the wraiths still be around like the orcs are?

They didn't Phantom Menace the orcs at the end of Jackson's Return of the King. Most of the orc army fell into a convenient sinkhole caused by the tower's collapse/explosion (to resolve the immediate conflict that would have killed Aragorn and company otherwise), but you can see a ton of them simply fleeing the battle.

No idea about your actual question, though. I'd assume the remaining Nazgul would have faded with their connection to the ring permanently severed...but I have nothing to back that up.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

They didn't Phantom Menace the orcs at the end of Jackson's Return of the King. Most of the orc army fell into a convenient sinkhole caused by the tower's collapse/explosion (to resolve the immediate conflict that would have killed Aragorn and company otherwise), but you can see a ton of them simply fleeing the battle.

Ah I must just be miss remembering then with not having touched the movies in years.

[WaltherLeopold]

You tell me since you are the one inventing it. Didn't you say that Amazon is insulting Tolkien by changing his story?

What do you think insult means? You're putting words in my mouth, hence strawman.

They aren't adapting Lord of the Rings though. They are adapting the second age which without full rights to all that content they are limited. They specifically say they have the rights to everything they need from the Second Age which is different from all the rights to the Second Age material.

They have the rights to the LotR trilogy, hobbit, and most importantly the appendices. This means they are lacking some crucial bits from the Silmarillion (which is why our view of Valinor is so limited). I think it's a folly to argue that Amazon does not have the rights to enough material, when the majority of the relevant characters of this era are also talked about in the LotR trilogy, as well as a lot of the 2nd age is showcased in the appendices.

There is plenty of materiel in for instance the trilogy & the Hobbit as it pertains to the personalities of Elrond, Galadriel and the wizards, so there is not much of an excuse to characterize them wildly different or contradictory to how they have been previously established.

Ultimately they figured that their vision of these characters and settings trumped the existing works and this is why a lot of people dislike the show, because their direction doesn't align with peoples' vision.

[Valerossi]

- "Attracted more than 100 million viewers worldwide to the first season of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, making it the most watched Amazon Original series in every region of the world, with more than 24 billion minutes streamed," Amazon announced it its Q4 2022 earnings report.

You can at least attempt to back yourself up with some relevant information but you cant even be bothered to spend 2 mins to find accurate information that completely debunk anything you say, RoP is very successful and already proven to be a good show for all that watched it.

Facts are your opinions on the show dont matter, i cant be bothered watching house of the dragon yet or several shows but im not going to claim any of them are bad just because i have little interest in watching them.

I watched it ( 3 episodes then I couldn’t stand it anymore) and it was shit.

[s_bushido]

Ah I must just be miss remembering then with not having touched the movies in years.

Yeah...I had to look it up myself. "How did the movie get rid of all those orcs?" was my first thought when I read your comment.

[rogoth]

They didn't Phantom Menace the orcs at the end of Jackson's Return of the King. Most of the orc army fell into a convenient sinkhole caused by the tower's collapse/explosion (to resolve the immediate conflict that would have killed Aragorn and company otherwise), but you can see a ton of them simply fleeing the battle.

No idea about your actual question, though. I'd assume the remaining Nazgul would have faded with their connection to the ring permanently severed...but I have nothing to back that up.

this highlights yet more evidence you don't know the source material, this was done as a VISUAL REPRESENTATION to show the destruction of the evil that Sauron perpetuated, it was also a VISUAL REPRESENTATION to show that everything made with that power and tied to that power was defeated, the reason the orcs and trolls were running away is because for the first time in their lives most likely they were no longer under the sway of Sauron and had some degree of free will, and they were simply responding to the primal urge of self preservation, something they had not had the luxury of before.

[ringpriest]

They didn't Phantom Menace the orcs at the end of Jackson's Return of the King. Most of the orc army fell into a convenient sinkhole caused by the tower's collapse/explosion (to resolve the immediate conflict that would have killed Aragorn and company otherwise), but you can see a ton of them simply fleeing the battle.

No idea about your actual question, though. I'd assume the remaining Nazgul would have faded with their connection to the ring permanently severed...but I have nothing to back that up.

There's a strong suggestion that they went out with Sauron, in the following exchange between Gandalf and Merry about the fate of the Nazgul at the ford:

`I thought they were all destroyed in the flood,’ said Merry.

‘You cannot destroy Ringwraiths like that,’ said Gandalf. `The power of their master is in them, and they stand or fall by him. We hope that they were all unhorsed and unmasked, and so made for a while less dangerous; but we must find out for certain….’

There's also a passage in HoME, that was an early draft for the appendices of LotR,

After a lapse of 969 years Aragorn, son of Arathorn, 16th chieftain of the Dunedain of the North, and 41st heir of Elendil in the direct line through Isildur, being also in the direct line a descend ant of Firiel daughter of Ondohir [> Ondonir] of Gondor, claimed the crown of Gondor and of Arnor, after the defeat of Sauron, the destruction of Mordor, and the dissolution of the Ringwraiths. He was crowned in the name of Elessar at Minas Tirith in 3019. A new era and calendar was then begun, beginning with 25 March (old reckoning) as the first day. He restored Gondor and repeopled it, but retained Minas Tirith as the chief city. He wedded Arwen Undomiel, daughter of Elrond, brother of Elros first King of Numenor, and so restored the majesty and high lineage of the royal house, but their life-span was not restored and continued to wane until it became as that of other men.

There's surprisingly little material on the topic. Here's one more ambiguous passage from a draft for Return of the King in Sauron Defeated that has Sam slay a Ringwraith who tries to stop his and Frodo's escape after the Ring has gone into the Fire, in a very 80s action-movie sort of scene (that Tolkien decided to cut)).

Fire goes mad. Frodo is like to be destroyed.
Nazgûl shape at the door. Frodo is caught in the fire-chamber and cannot get out!
Here we all end together, said the Ring Wraith.
Frodo is too weary and lifeless to say nay.
You first, said a voice, and Sam (with Sting?)
stabs the Black Rider from behind.

[Fabinas]

- "Attracted more than 100 million viewers worldwide to the first season of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, making it the most watched Amazon Original series in every region of the world, with more than 24 billion minutes streamed," Amazon announced it its Q4 2022 earnings report.

You can at least attempt to back yourself up with some relevant information but you cant even be bothered to spend 2 mins to find accurate information that completely debunk anything you say, RoP is very successful and already proven to be a good show for all that watched it.

Facts are your opinions on the show dont matter, i cant be bothered watching house of the dragon yet or several shows but im not going to claim any of them are bad just because i have little interest in watching them.

I watched it ( 3 episodes then I couldn’t stand it anymore) and it was shit.

I watched ALL of it and it was more shit than you could imagine.

[Syegfryed]

Conversation circle:

“Rings of power is objectively bad”

- “Why is it objectively bad?”

“Gives several subjective reasons”

- “those are not objective reasons, so it being bad is your opinion, not a fact”

“Yes it is bad, that’s a fact not an opinion”

- “so explain, what makes you say that?”

And restart the circle.

Except... people gave, time and time again, objective reasons.

The show is badly written, its an objective argument that the lines were nonsensical full of non seguitur, the analogy of the stone of the boat is dumb as fuck. The plot is all over the place and doesn't make sense, it its forcer to the way the showrunners wanted in not an organically way, like how the elves didn't notice the orcs bulding shit, or how in numenor they had the enemy plan wainting for galadriel to find, and they finding it was a map just by turning the symbol sideways, and why in the fuck does sauron would mark her brother with a map so they could find him????

The casting and acting was objectively bad from most of the characters, like they were just reading the script.

The changing from the original story were objectively bad, with bs like magic juice mithril and Galadriel going to numenor and leading then, or Galadriel and Sauron love quarry. it is objectively worse than what Tolkien wrote.

The choreography and fight scenes were bad, plain and simple, there is multiple times they didn't even touch the enemies and they simple are defeated

figurine? mostly bad, especially the numenorians. Hell even the edit of the show is bad, with the scene showing then in one position, but you cut from another angle and they are totally different, also, the power point name changing to mordor lol.

No one who is arguing with good faith can say those are "subjective" most of those stuff is the skeleton of what make a show decent.

[Triceron]

Uh, no. It's not really an implication. It's a direct quote. You're not going to claim some moral high ground here by playing the victim after having your own words tossed back at you. It's not a game we're going to play. Moving on.

No where does my opinion imply that I would prevent Jeff Bezos making Rings of Power if I had the power to. He can do what he wants with his money. Nothing I say or do affects that whatsoever, and I don't intend to take any action on my opinion that they could have done things differently.

The logical leaps you've made are just fucking ridiculous.

All Annatar did was give the elves the knowledge to forge the rings. That is the entire extent of what the lore covers. What did he say to convince them? Don't know. What knowledge did he teach them? Don't know. Did he do anything else over those 300 years? No idea. Why did Celebrimbor make the three in secret if he was unaware of any deception? Who the fuck knows but it sure was convenient. There's truly very little substance to any of this Annatar related lore on the page.

You seriously don't think condensing thousands of years and rearranging the sequence of events changes anything?

I'll say that what they've done hasn't broken anything so far in terms of hitting the major events, but the alteration of it is significant to changing history in a way that it was not intended to. 'Lore Bastardization' is in reference to what Rings of Power is doing overall to the lore, not just any one cherry-picked talking point out of context of the greater picture.

Every time I explain the full picture, you come back at me with a cherry picked scene and saying it doesn't break anything. But if you look at the entire picture, what you get is a completely different telling of the same story with events shifted and altered to the point where it no longer resembles the same outline of lore as in the books; some of which were made for the sake of merely getting a character from Point A to Point B. Annatar is not a character who is thwarted at every turn with someone hot on his heels of figuring out that he's Sauron. We have characters who have their suspicions, but his deception is maintained for a very long time. This characterizes Annatar in a way that Halbrand simply can't live up to (nor should it have to). And what I'm pointing out is the change to the lore inevitably bastardizes it, because we're talking about a show that is intent on adapting this specific history of Tolkien's works, and it's chosen a path of liberal romanticization.

Of course, some of these changes HAVE to be and are EXPECTED to be made in order to make an adaptation of the book to film. The book lore even has certain gaps and inconsistencies which wouldn't really work on film. It's technically unadaptable without breaking the history itself. In this very specific case, I would say that any attempt at making a character-driven narrative out of the 2nd Age is inevitably going to bastardize the lore. Let's be real here, there's really no reason for Harfoots and Gandalf to even appear in the historic tale of the creation of the Rings of Power.

It may not be the sole fault of the creators breaking lore in an attempt to adapt the 2nd Age, it may simply be the nature of adapting history into a singular narrative. This is why I express criticism on their choice to adapt the 2nd Age's history as a singular character-driven narrative. They don't have to adapt the history of the 2nd Age. They don't have to choose to adapt a timeline that spans generations. They don't have to attempt to connect disjointed sections of lore within a single narrative. Look at what War of the Rohirrim is aiming to do by telling a story set in Rohan during the time of Helm Hammerhand. It's taking one single setting in lore, and adapting it in a self-contained series.

And again, I'm not preventing them from making RoP with a condensed timeline since they have the freedom to. All I'm pointing out is that the process of choosing to adapt it into a singular narrative inevitably bastardizes the lore. So we can just accept it as what it is and move on, instead of trying to defend it for not breaking the very thing it's intentionally breaking.

Just like if we were to talk about an adaptation of real life history like Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, or Inglorious Basterds. Both are great movies. Both are loosely based on history. Both bastardize history to tell their unique stories. There isn't anything insulting about the use of 'bastardization' here, it's a word used to describe a diminished copy; and in this context we are talking about what these movies do to real life history. Of course, the difference here is no one expects QT to be faithful to real history for his films; his entire style is predicated on exploitation films and heavily romanticized drama. And in his defense, bastardizing history allows his films to be unpredictable and exciting.

But unlike Tarantino's movies, there is an expectation for RoP to be as faithfully adapted as the PJ LOTR trilogy had been (not to be confused with calling LOTR a faithful adaptation; it is not). There is a bar set by PJ's trilogy for a film of this specific genre, adapting this specific author's work. It may sound unfair to compare it to LOTR, since the 2nd Age is literally just a spattering of historic events, but that's also the nature of choosing to adapt a spattering of historic events.

Halbrand's scene meeting Celebrimbor already adds a lot more depth than what is in both the appendices and Silmarillion combined simply by them having dialogue and an actual exchange of ideas.

And that's fine. But that's not lore depth, that's plot depth.

We're learning more about their interactions and character relationships in those scenes, which is great for the story they want to tell. But it's not doing anything for the greater lore, where we literally don't know why Halbrand is even helping Celebrimbor at this point. We just know he's manipulating him, we don't know exactly for what purpose, since his actual motives are mostly kept secret. Did he plan to have Rings of Power created from the beginning? Did he just come up with the idea after seeing what Celebrimbor was attempting to create? Or was he just genuinely helping Celebrimbor to build trust for the future? We don't know. There is no lore depth because there is no lore. We literally don't know what actually happened here and how it fits into the greater narrative's history.

I would consider it adding lore depth if these scenes actually revealed key motives, rather than imply everything through subtext. All we glean from this interaction is that Halbrand manipulates Celebrimbor, presumably because it's a very 'Sauron' thing to do.

As for distributing the rings, there is absolutely nothing in the lore detailing that except for the one that is given by the elves to Durin. There's no detail on what form he takes to distribute the rings or why no one who takes one apparently knows that they're the entire reason for the obliteration of Eregion.

At this point they've rearranged the sequencing, so the 3 Rings are forged before the others.

Since this happened in the show yet, there's really nothing to talk about yet, only speculate.

[Adamas102]

So that's your approach? Just pretend everyone is dumb so you can avoid discussion? You're one of those guys who thinks there's an audience here that is agreeing with you, huh?

I'm not pretending. Nor am I saying you're dumb, you just don't know what "continuity" means when you say "if your series is substantially focused on things the writer didn't focus on, that breaks your continuity". How much screen time non-evil orcs get in a season has no effect on continuity in and of itself. Nor does you personally having issues with casting affect continuity because continuity doesn't care about your opinion, especially for events that haven't even happened yet.