Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[Syegfryed]

Being better than everyone is pretty much how Galadriel is written.

By a good writer, like tolkien was, it is good.

by some amateurs like the show writers are, it gets bad

they made everyone look less powerful/important, and dumber, so he can look smarter, and that, i repeat, is not a Galadriel problem, this is the writers' problems, they can't write her in an intelligent way and have to dumb down everyone else in the show

Does anyone else find it tiresomely predictable how if a female character isn't perfectly nice and has flaws that representnl challenges get along with others a certain type of person will have to constantly point out what a massive bitch she is, using the word repeatedly in a single post?

Yeah my dude, every shit pointed out in the show thus far, in episode one alone, and we dislike the show because its a woman, that is not fucking obnoxious, she just have flaws... no, she is being called a bitch because she is acting like one.

For your knowledge, we use a "bitch" for males too, so don't get too much work on it, Elrond pretty much looked like a bitch the entire episode

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The first two episodes have her failing almost every thing she does other then a single fight with a troll.

Like how every motherfucker elf is dumb and think Sauron - the Maiar - is gone for good, despite being a Maiar, and she of course, is the only one who think he still out there, find proof of him? what else did she fail? in convincing then? that is more to do with others being morons than her failing

Plus, she nailed miles of swimming till that wreckage

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I don't understand the complaint about Clark's acting. It's great, in fact the acting in general is quite good. If you don't like the direction of the character, that's one thing, but don't disparage the actress for doing a good job with what she's given.

While i agree its not her fault for amount of shit they put her to say, but a lot of lines in the show looks like they are just reading a script and not acting or trying way too hard to be epic, but again, not the actors fault

[hulkgor]

Im just watching some reviews about it, and one contains a interview with the show runners who actually said "It was hard work building a world from NOTHING" They actually said that?

yes hard to build a world from nothing

Couldn't that just be about literally having to build and make everything from scratch? Sets, costumes, assets etc? As in, not having anything done before production started?

keyword - "building".

it might not be, but i feel like that would make sense, especially taking into account their series projected budget and how much of it is used on the first season alone.

[rogoth]

Most likely that's just Musk trolling Bezos, they do that to each other. I wouldn't put any stock in it even if you consider Musk's opinion on anything to be worth anything.

i despise Elon Musk as a person, i think not only is he a total moron most of the time, his treatment of family members and his stance on certain other things being bottom of the barrel make me view him as a walking joke, that being said however he is a massive LOTR fan, he is well versed in the lore and is very passionate about any media put out surrounding this great world, he's not just some normie jumping on the bandwagon and despite my stance on him overall, this statement he made is something that i pray will bring this mess crashing down around the utter shambolic showrunners and their identity politics riddled bullshit, for the first time maybe ever i am championing Elon Musk, let that sink in.

[minteK917]

Watched the first episodes, honestly its just okay. My biggest problem is that it feels they wanted to make an 8h movie and they decided to cut it and then release it bit by bit. Fuck all interesting happened in that episode, I have no interest for anything so far. If you are gona have a movie structure, launch them all at once. Otherwise you need to have a kind of hook in the first episode, which this doesent have.

Its not like amazon dont know this, the first episode of the boys was a fucking good intro. Made the wait much better, gave you some anticipation right off the bat.

[rogoth]

Couldn't that just be about literally having to build and make everything from scratch? Sets, costumes, assets etc? As in, not having anything done before production started?

keyword - "building".

it might not be, but i feel like that would make sense, especially taking into account their series projected budget and how much of it is used on the first season alone.

the quest that was asked that led to that response was specifically talking about the in universe world, and that was the response given to the question, he made it seem like every single piece of media that came before this tripe didn't exist and this is the first time seeing middle earth on screen.

[Adamas102]

A historical handler/rider of a war elefant did have a hammer and a spike, so he can kill the elephant fast (by driving the spike into ito the top of the head) if the elefant is out of controll.

Do I think a bow can do the same? No, do I think a fantasy elf who have a fantasy bow can do it.... maybe....but it puch the suspension of disbelief.

Yeah if it were a normal elephant then maaaaaaybe I could put it in the realm of possibility, but when you multiply the size of the animal by like 4 or more then I’d say that puts the feat firmly in the “impossible” category.

[Gumble]

There is no possible way to call Galadriel a Mary Sue in this unless you just don’t know what Mary Sue actually means even in the looses sense. The first two episodes have her failing almost every thing she does other then a single fight with a troll.

I would agree she isn't a Mary Sue. Blantant author self inserts don't tend to be stoic warrior characters who have very bland personalities.

Galadriel feels more like the writers going "we don't know this kind of person, so we will just make her act like a vague crappy male hero". It is hard to write a compelling character if you don't know anyone to base the character off of.

As far as the "she has experienced hardships and failures".... I had an idea that kicked around my head for the past day or so about this. This is not only related to Galadriel, but a common theme I've noticed for a lot of female protaganists in the past few years. Their "hardships" they have to overcome before they turn into the amazing-perfect-heroine remind me of a movie trope that I'm sure a number of older people will be familiar with.

Do any of you recall the trope of "the super dorky unattractive girl played by super attractive actress in glasses with messy hair"? I immediately think of "She's All That" and Rachel Lee Cook, however the trope was used A LOT.

That trope reminds me of the trope of female heroines now, where they are really the perfect badass but are made to endure a pair of glasses or a messy hair bun until they can show just how awesome they've been the entire time. Much like the trope I'm comparing it to, it feels empty and shallow, like the writers/directors think the audience isn't very bright or wouldn't buy into a deeper story.

Why they do this to female heroines, eh, I'm sure everyone has plenty of answers. Agendas, laziness, lack of faith in the audience, or something else, but it definitely is a pattern/trope that has sprung up over the last decade and I can't wait until they get rid of it. It makes for caricatures instead of characters. Cardboard you can't empathize with or root for.

As much as there are plenty of other problems with LOTR, I think that might be the worst one.... the titular character isn't someone the audience can like, empathize with, or root for, because the we don't get to see real struggle. We need to see them in pain, see them lose, see them struggle..... otherwise when they win its just empty.

[Triceron]

She's not a mary sue, she's just not very relatable to most people.

The unfortunate thing about her characterization in RoP is that she's written to be 'Woke', and show the struggles of 'wokeness'.

Her story is about seeking revenge on those who killed her brother, recognizing that there is evil in the world, and seeking out to destroy every last remnant of it. In her struggles, her character is never truly considered flawed or wrong. All of her struggles are against her environment, which seemingly 'protects the evil' that still lingers in the world. She is the one character who is aware that Evil still exists, and all her attempts to 'waking people up to the awareness that it still exists' fall on deaf ears. This is how I see the writers taking the direction the story for her character.

And the problem with this direction is that it is only really relatable to people who align with this type of story and ideal. Otherwise I'd say her character isn't really all that interesting, and I'm not sure why the writers decided to go with this direction with her story rather than spend the time to properly develop her character into something that is actually relatable to a general audience.

I use John Wick as an example of how it's done right. At the outset, John Wick is a skilled, cold-hearted killer who is out for revenge. But he's a likeable character because they made him relatable. His entire goal for revenge wasn't built on exposition. They literally show you the events that lead him on his path of vengeance, and it is absolutely relatable at a human level. And his struggles with his environment are ones of circumstance that are also relatable.

Galadriel is a skilled warrior who has become commander of a company of troops bent on revenge and sent to rid the world of the last remnants of evil. But she is never established as a likeable or relatable character. Her struggles are primarily with her own allies who are written to be ignorant, sometimes intentionally so. And the first time they establish her skills, it's in the most unrelatable way possible - effortlessly taking down a creature that every other Elf we see struggle to deal with. Her character is so far removed from any humanization that it makes it difficult to see what is actually interesting about her character. In the first 20 minutes of the movie, she's brought nothing to the table about who she is or why we should care. Cuz certainly, her party doesn't seem to care about her at all; why should we?

And I wouldn't say her character is completely unrelatable, because as I said above, her character is written in a specific way to relate to a certain demographic. Her story is 'Woke', and intended to relate to people who feel like they're living in a world surrounded by ignorant fools who can't see the real truth that they hold, and if only everyone saw that same truth then the world could be freed from evil instead of going through whatever tragedy the Rings of Power is set up to tell.

With John Wick, you can have a downward-spiralling action 'tragedy' be told while still having an interesting character. With Rings of Power and Galadriel, I'm not sure why the hell they chose to go in this direction with her character.

[bledgor]

...

Another issue is time, we have no reference for all the prologue and the travels she commences throughout ep 1 and 2. Like it could have been decades, centuries, or millennial since the war with Morgoth/her brothers day. We get told many things happened, but see only glimpses and get little indication about a lot. It leaves you with little to tether too, and mostly feeling apathetic to the elves in general.

I think one of the things that works about Durin IV is that he tells us Elrond has been away for 20 years/several important events, so we can empathize with him, and add in his wife being supportive and you get a family dynamic that is enjoyable. For the Elves you get no indications, and just a slideshow of things going on that makes me unable to connect in the slightest, and they are pretty much the primary driving forces in each of the groups (minus the Harfoots, they have some of this but I can't bring myself to care about them as they have other issues that cause me to disconnect).

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Like how every motherfucker elf is dumb and think Sauron - the Maiar - is gone for good, despite being a Maiar, and she of course, is the only one who think he still out there, find proof of him? what else did she fail? in convincing then? that is more to do with others being morons than her failing

Plus, she nailed miles of swimming till that wreckage

She fails at taking care of her men leading to them being fatigued and unable to go on.

She fails to convince her men that she found something of note leading to them abandoning her.

She fails at convincing her friends that darkness is still out there and that she shouldn’t be sent home.

She fails to swim to land.

She fails to get the humans to trust her and ends up pushed off there raft.

She anchors her self to the second raft and tells the human to tie him self to her, this leads to the raft snapping and her sinking as she tied her self to the broken piece.

She fails to free her self from the rope while sinking.

If you want to weight all of that against “she’s right about Sauron and can swim” and end up thinking she’s a Mary Sue there is no helping you.

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As much as there are plenty of other problems with LOTR, I think that might be the worst one.... the titular character isn't someone the audience can like, empathize with, or root for, because the we don't get to see real struggle. We need to see them in pain, see them lose, see them struggle..... otherwise when they win its just empty.

Almost every scene Galadriel is in for the first two episodes is her struggling to get people to see what she sees and failing to do so.

Her issues aren’t the same as the glasses trope where she Could get every thing that she wants with a super fiscal change, she would have to reshape her whole approach and personality to get her troops to stay with her and even if she did there’s no saying they wouldn’t still leave her and she wouldn’t be in the same boat of trying to convince her friends and king with nothing to back it up but a cheerier demeanour.

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She's not a mary sue, she's just not very relatable to most people.

The unfortunate thing about her characterization in RoP is that she's written to be 'Woke', and show the struggles of 'wokeness'.

Her story is about seeking revenge on those who killed her brother, recognizing that there is evil in the world, and seeking out to destroy every last remnant of it. In her struggles, her character is never truly considered flawed or wrong. All of her struggles are against her environment, which seemingly 'protects the evil' that still lingers in the world. She is the one character who is aware that Evil still exists, and all her attempts to 'waking people up to the awareness that it still exists' fall on deaf ears. This is how I see the writers taking the direction the story for her character.

Man I don’t think I’ve ever seen a better example of why the term “woke” is meaningless nonsense.

I mean really characters who are aware of evil and aren’t believed by those around them is woke now? Shit aliens, ghost busters, terminator 1/2, Chucky, ect ect ect, must all be hella woke.

[Triceron]

Man I don’t think I’ve ever seen a better example of why the term “woke” is meaningless nonsense.

I mean really characters who are aware of evil and aren’t believed by those around them is woke now? Shit aliens, ghost busters, terminator 1/2, Chucky, ect ect ect, must all be hella woke.

All of those movies you listed have main characters who are relatable, as humans. Ripley, the Ghostbusters, Sarah Connor etc etc weren't established as exceptionally skilled super-humans. They aren't depicted as being beyond human. They are complex, flawed characters, and that's what makes them interesting.

Galadriel's only flaw so far is that she was right.

[Kumorii]

All of those movies you listed have main characters who are relatable, as humans. Ripley, the Ghostbusters, Sarah Connor etc etc weren't established as exceptionally skilled super-humans. They aren't depicted as being beyond human. They are complex, flawed characters, and that's what makes them interesting.

Galadriel's only flaw so far is that she was right.

nah, she stumbled upon a raft... so she failed to swim...

[Monteverdi]

I liked the show. Seems to mostly hold up against established lore.

If people are losing their minds about this now, wait until Sauron gets involved in human politics, props up several demagogues who spew racism and hate against elves, and it leads to such destruction and an entire kingdom collapses. This all happens in the lore, of course, but people are gonna lose their minds over the real-world political lines they can draw from it.

[Gumble]

She fails at taking care of her men leading to them being fatigued and unable to go on.

She fails to convince her men that she found something of note leading to them abandoning her.

She fails at convincing her friends that darkness is still out there and that she shouldn’t be sent home.

She fails to swim to land.

She fails to get the humans to trust her and ends up pushed off there raft.

She anchors her self to the second raft and tells the human to tie him self to her, this leads to the raft snapping and her sinking as she tied her self to the broken piece.

She fails to free her self from the rope while sinking.

If you want to weight all of that against “she’s right about Sauron and can swim” and end up thinking she’s a Mary Sue there is no helping you.

What pain and suffering is caused to her, both externally and internally, by these struggles? Does everyone not believing her cause self doubt? Do her failures cause her to deviate from her task? Does she endure physical pain and hardship? Does she endure anything outside of "people don't believe me"?

I mean people die following her, do you get a real sense that that weighs on her? Or are they disposable because there isn't any characterization going on to where we'd care for any of these people?

She might not be a Mary Sue, I'd argue she isn't, but she is certainly a character that is hard to care about.

Almost every scene Galadriel is in for the first two episodes is her struggling to get people to see what she sees and failing to do so.

Her issues aren’t the same as the glasses trope where she Could get every thing that she wants with a super fiscal change, she would have to reshape her whole approach and personality to get her troops to stay with her and even if she did there’s no saying they wouldn’t still leave her and she wouldn’t be in the same boat of trying to convince her friends and king with nothing to back it up but a cheerier demeanour.

The other thing this reminds me of is Man of Steel. I LOVE Superman. My favorite character, bar none. I understand people's issues with him but I absolutely love the concept of someone who has the abilities of a god but chooses to be a mortal (I loved Hercules too for the same reason).

Man of Steel, like most Synder movies, made me feel hollow. I didn't realize it at the time, but after seeing more Synder movies, I finally understood that he hates superheros and spends his time trying to make them look as horrible as possible. He cannot see someone with power not acting selfishly. However, my BIGGEST complaint about Man of Steel was that it did the Superman story backwards and caused the audience to not care about Clark. Clark was an afterthought, he was just Superman in glasses instead of an actual persona. Good Superman stories make you care about Superman because you see the trials and tribulations he goes through as Clark, and then when Superman comes out you cheer for him because you already care about him.

Clark having to deal with Lois and the love triangle between her, him and Superman is really important for the story (hence why most Superman stories fizzle once Lois 'knows'). That combined with really seeing him AS Clark, and seeing him live AS human is really important.

If you aren't given the time to care about your main character before they do the superman stunts, you aren't going to care about those stunts. You need to be given a reason to be happy for them.

Man of Steel reminds me of these super heroine shows/movies, in that it fails to make you care for the character before they are amazingly overpowered, so you feel hollow watching it because you have nothing to base the heroic moments on. Its like watching an anime in Japanese if you don't speak it. You can see the fight scenes, but unless you understand who these characters are, and why you should care about them, its just shiny pictures that don't mean anything.

[Triceron]

Failing =/= character flaw.

Superman failing to prevent the city from being half-destroyed by an alien threat does not somehow make his character more interesting. A character flaw is something internalized, not externalized.

[Makabreska]

Failing =/= character flaw.

Superman failing to prevent the city from being half-destroyed by an alien threat does not somehow make his character more interesting. A character flaw is something internalized, not externalized.

Debatable. In this case, it shows he is not omnipotent (as was often an issue with him), can and will struggle and fail, which may then lead to self-doubt and feeling of hopelessness. Something they forgot in Justice League. Like, superhero failing is a staple character progression tool.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

All of those movies you listed have main characters who are relatable, as humans. Ripley, the Ghostbusters, Sarah Connor etc etc weren't established as exceptionally skilled super-humans.

Ripely in aliens is established as hyper component being able to use military gear she shouldn’t have any background in with no issues and take on the Queen of “the perfect killing machine” with a factory tool.

Conner is also hyper component in the second movie having multiple dead drops of weapons she knows how to use and being able to track down the black inventor.

They might not be super human but they are both far beyond relatable in the skills they have and how effective they are with them with nothing on screen to support them getting said skills.

All of the characters in these movies may be more likeable then Her to you but if the difference between “woke” and “not woke” is that you like the “non woke” characters more even though the story archetype is the exact same that just puts on display how meaningless the term is.

Galadriel's only flaw so far is that she was right.

blatantly a load of shit.

Over pushing her men is a flaw, being unable to let go is a flaw(even if she’s right), being willing to sacrifice her people for her obsession is a flaw.

[Monteverdi]

Man of Steel reminds me of these super heroine shows/movies, in that it fails to make you care for the character before they are amazingly overpowered, so you feel hollow watching it because you have nothing to base the heroic moments on. Its like watching an anime in Japanese if you don't speak it. You can see the fight scenes, but unless you understand who these characters are, and why you should care about them, its just shiny pictures that don't mean anything.

Honestly, if anything the Galadriel in TRoP is *underpowered* compared to who she should be. I've largely enjoyed the first two episodes, but a complaint I have is that Galadriel and Elrond are too weak. I understand the narrative reasons behind it, but having Galadriel be this person with a personal vendetta with no real influence and no one who listens to her, and having Elrond be this junior politician-in-waiting, is a pretty big change for who these characters were by this point. At this point in the story, they're both incredibly experienced and powerful.

[Biomega]

Do you ever not create strawmen in order to defend yourself? I said the men in her squad should have been able to defend themselves without her against that troll, because they all should have been trained and skilled enough as members of this 'special' mission to find Sauron.

And I've pointed out that they're deliberately made to fail in order to highlight the exceptional skill and determination of Galadriel, which is a 100% standard and established storytelling trope that happens all the time in all sorts of stories. You're creating a special situation in which you try to invalidate this trope for no good reason.

And again, you love to argue that other people's are bad or invalid as if only your opinion counts.

And you have the gall to talk about strawman? I point out the flaws in your argument, systematically and precisely. But instead of trying to argue against it, your defense becomes "oh you just think my opinion is bad and invalid and yours is the only one that counts". Bring ARGUMENTS, not insults and petty whining.

Those other men in that squad should have been able to do a better job against the troll. They should have been depicted as much more capable fighters, even if Galadriel is better. This isn't a Tolkien issue it is a writing issue for this series.

Tolkien does the same thing in his writing, as do the sources he references. Heroes coming in to save the day, and/or heroes surviving and winning when no one else could are the bread and butter of heroic storytelling. It's everywhere. This is completely standard and established for this kind of narrative.

And on top of that, we never see the "army" that she is supposedly leader of. What kind of army is 10 people? If she is a leader of an army she doesn't have to go to the High King and ask for permission to use her troops to find Sauron.

You don't use an army for scouting. That'd be moronic. I'm pretty sure I already went through the three steps: 1. Prove there's a threat 2. Find that threat 3. Defeat that threat. Steps 1 and 2 do not involve a massive army, because that would be inefficient and counterproductive. That's true for real-world military tactics, too. You don't use a 50,000-man army to gather intelligence or reconnoiter an area, either. What a ridiculous thought.

That is a contradiction is my point. It is not consistent with what is being shown or what actually happens. You don't decide to exile one of your best warriors because she is doing her job

And as I (and others) have pointed out several times, NO ONE IS EXILING ANYONE. They're not being exiled. They're being allowed to go home. They ARE in exile. ALL OF THEM. Can you please not ignore it when people explain things to you? You keep going back to an incorrect point after it's been corrected several times by several people. That's very annoying.

Here we go again with you trying to argue other can't have opinions.

Her we go again you trying to make me pointing out the flaw in your argument into me trying to prevent you from having an opinion. It gets old, man. ARGUE, don't whine. No one is trying to suppress your opinion when they're pointing out that your argument ignores the main motivating factor, and that it's no surprise if something seems inconsistent when you intentionally remove the thing that makes it consistent.

You can have all the opinions you like, but when you're doing something factually incorrect, people can point that out. Feel free to ignore them and just screech MUH OPINYAN, no one is trying to take that away from you.

What I am saying is they haven't shown her character flaws as being part of this story.

You mean something like, I don't know, her consistently putting her obsession over the welfare of her people, to the point where they actively mutinied because she was pushing them too hard and too far? Are you saying that they didn't show this, or that this isn't a character flaw? I'm curious.

And stop bringing up Feaonor. He isn't in this series at all and was never mentioned in the flashbacks.

You're just lying, now. Not only is he mentioned, they literally HAVE HIS HAMMER and talk about him while HOLDING IT IN THEIR HANDS.

Did you actually watch the show? Be honest.

I am talking about how there was no disrespect, getting into fights and being sent back to Valinor in the books.

Yes. As I've pointed out, there is basically no book material about the Galadriel of this period. I don't know why you want to counter this with "but what she did in the show isn't in the books!" when that's... the premise of my argument.

What is in this series is not a reflection of what is in the books at all.

Because THERE IS NOTHING IN THE BOOKS about the Galadriel from this time. THAT'S THE POINT I WAS MAKING.

Do you actually read my posts or do you just wait for your turn to speak?

It is a complete contradiction of what is actually in the books.

Now this is just blatantly false. It's not a "complete contradiction". There's incongruities, arising from the fact they inserted a new narrative; that's to be expected, and not uncommon for adaptations. But in no way do they "completely contradict" the books. That's a ridiculous accusation.

[Triceron]

Debatable. In this case, it shows he is not omnipotent (as was often an issue with him), can and will struggle and fail, which may then lead to self-doubt and feeling of hopelessness. Something they forgot in Justice League. Like, superhero failing is a staple character progression tool.

And that is if they depict him with self doubt and a feeling of hopelessness. That would need to be shown.

In the case of Galadriel, where is there any remorse in any of her actions so far? So far, her failings to protect her allies only redoubles her beliefs that evil is still out there. There is no internalized doubt or remorse for any of her actions.

It's only a flaw if it's internalized. Otherwise a failing is merely an externalization that doesn't actually make a character more interesting. I would argue that Galadriel's character hasn't become any more interesting just because she 'failed as a commander'. The story could continue without ever regarding this point at all and it wouldn't really change her current characterization. She's still as highly motivated to throw away all her rank and titles just to fight evil, and that still isn't a flaw to her character.