Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[Hansworst]

As a buddy of mine said, they move quickly to another scene so they can do nothing of importance. Like I get world building, but you have to make the watcher invested in the world with some hook before you build it around them. I guess they were trying to make that Galadriel, but the way she is portrayed is so unlikable it doesn't work. The only character I have really liked is Elendil (though he has some bad dialogue too, no fault of the actor), with the dwarfs being fine too (Duin III seemed perfect, but he only got like 2 lines). Halbrand is okay, but think he just gets elevated by the rest being stinkers.

The show does a lot of telling and not a lot of showing somehow. Like we see Arondir get captured, fair, but then suddenly every single elf in his troop was captured what the same/next day? After they all missed the swath of trees being cut down, and they were basically (the ones we know of at least) taken alive just to be killed later in the episode? I know they wanted to raise the stakes and make use feel something, but honestly I just didn't care as I had meet the characters once. You can tell that Payne and Mckay had some clue about what to do, but no clue how to pull it off.

Why do people think a next scene is immediately taking place after the previous one?

[Triceron]

The scene where Galadriel is in super slow motion riding a horse with an excessive smile on her face was just too ridiculous and so unnecessary. Don't know what they were thinking with that one.

That one scene took me out of the enjoyment I had taking in the beautiful scenery. It felt so out of place.

[bledgor]

Why do people think a next scene is immediately taking place after the previous one?

I mean I never said that? I was implying the lack of them showing anytime passing, how it certainly doesn't help when we have no time/time scale in the show to guide us to anything.

For the Arondir situation we are never shown him as prisoner for a time period adjusting then the Elves coming in later, we just see him and behold they are there too (again was more pointing out the lack of showing vs telling than complaining about things happening at the same time).

Things happen, we move to the next scene, and we have to infer how much/little time passes. They don't even give us snow or changing of trees to signify seasons. As a watcher you have to guess how much time is passing, as you never get ANY CLUES even to get a reference, things just happen, quite a bit off screen, and you get to infer (because the writers couldn't be bothered to develop a script that even subtly informs us) everything in between the scenes.

[Mace]

3, Beren and Luthien, Tuor and Idril and Aragon and Arwen, though I think there were another 1-2 that mentioned relationships but not marriage. They did go something new in the show in that they finally had a male elf and female human pairing with Arondir and Bronwyn, but man if they even go through with this shipping of Galadriel and Halbrand they are subtly implying it will be so fucking bad, and if he is Sauron, I think I will take that as proof Payne/Mckay actually hate Tolkien and want to destroy his characters.

The sad thing is that they believe they ar doing him justice, and enhancing his work.


The culture of subversion is ripe and now is the standard and even expected amongst the Hollywood bubble, and it is indeed a bubble.


Subversion, like JJ Abrams loves to do, works well when it is the un expected exception to the normal canon - often in a place where the nromal line is done badly or the majority of things that use the classic trope are either unimaginative or just over done - so doing a subversion comes off well.

Subversion has never been good, it's only buzz was it's novelty, but when everything now subverts, it's actually boring and just plain ol bad,. They think though it's great, so they 're doing all this mixing thinking it's a good thing and enhancer, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if they don't even know why this is bad, or failing.


Anyway, the sort of mixtures they have in the show, would have made much more sense in a world AFTER Lord of the Rings, not one set before, which has some rather clear defining lines, and needs to be established in the original canon completely, to show the wonder and detail of Tolkein's work, before you start thinking of doing subversions or "re-interpretations".

My point is people don't know what the original established stuff is well enough before now going to throw in their kinks.


And thanks for the elf/human couplings - After seeing Arwen/Aragorn, i would have focused on more showing the usual, an elf/elf romance which is the norm, and which we've never seen.. but I'm glad they did not, because they totally miss the elves - without much, look how different the LotR trilogy elves come off compared to these ones.

[Villager720]

The scene where Galadriel is in super slow motion riding a horse with an excessive smile on her face was just too ridiculous and so unnecessary. Don't know what they were thinking with that one.

I’ve been neutral on the show thus far (which surprised me honestly, thought I’d have come down hard either way by now) but that scene and some others in episode 3 were deeply cringe. And bewildering. Well beyond anything thus far.

[eschatological]

From an outside perspective you appear to be going backwards though, you say black panther was celebrated, but the first successful comicbook hero was Blade. You have huge stars like will smith and Morgan freeman that have been around forever, but looking back to when I was young we got Wesley snipes and Eddie Murphy as cool action stars. Did you guys suddenly forget about them or what happened?

I generally don't think representing real life in a fictional world is a good idea, it's made to take you out of the real world, escapeism. I wouldn't want a Trump/Biden joke in my fantasy movies.
But there are many problems, look at the fresh Buzzcuts, or Celebrimborn being old enough that he needs to thinking about the retirement home, those things also take me out of the fantasy presented.

Forever, lol, they've been around since the late 80s. That's in most of our lifetimes.

Sidney Poitier is probably the earliest example you can find of a black leading man, and he was one...in the 60s. Then cinema, seeing that black people loved Sidney Poitier, instead of incorporating them into mainstream Hollywood, spun off a whole industry of blaxploitation films, trying to keep black cinema "separate but equal (but not really ever equal as the name blaxploitation implies)" from Hollywood. Even major sitcoms were separated this way. It wasn't til the 80s that black actors started finding success mainstream. And it wasn't til The Cosby Show and Fresh Prince that white people really started watching shows compromised mainly of black actors.

This isn't some old, long-healed scar. This happened recently.

[ringpriest]

I'll be curious to see what the (few) stans will say now.

Their usual excuse is "there's very little material to work with, they have to invent new characters and storylines!!!", but we already know that Sauron during the Second Age assumed the form of Annatar, Lord of Gifts, to deceive the elves.

We also know that he avoided Galadriel at all cost, since she was the only one who could sense he's an impostor.

So what excuse will they use this time for coming up with this generic asspull no name character like Halbrand when they could have just used Annatar? Will they still say that they had to pull stuff out of nowhere? But how is that valid excuse in this case? And I bet they'll come up with a romance plotline where Galadriel, the strong independent womanzzz that she is, will try to change him (meanwhile the men will all shun him and try to kill him). Even though in the source material Annatar avoided Galadriel.

And for the record, Sauron's illusion form in the SA most definitely did not look like a filthy homeless hobo. Quite the opposite in fact. The elves trusted and revered him for his beauty, after all. It's hard to be trusted and revered if you look like Halbrand.

Annatar wasn't an illusion, a casual disguise Sauron could put on and take off like a Scooby-doo villain's rubber mask. To become the Lord of Gifts and successfully fool Celebrimbor, et al, Sauron had to truly invest himself in the role. Sure, he could keep his dark purposes hidden in his heart (which is why a keen judge of souls like Galadriel would have nothing to do with him), but it was a very thorough guise.

One of the questions in the lore (which I sadly suspect will go completely unexplored in the show, along with much other potential) is why, after the (hilarious) flop of his Ring-scheme, it takes Sauron the better part of a century to actually go to war with the Elves. The answer is in the recently published The Nature of Middle-earth. While Annatar was a brilliant form for deceiving elves, it was a terrible one for ruling Orcs and Men as a dark lord. When Annatar tried to go dark-lording on the sly while on vacation from Eriador, he got laughed at. By orcs. Sauron had to abandon his "life" as Annatar and take on a a new and more terrible aspect in order to become the Dark Lord of the Second Age.

When I first heard about The Rings of Power, I was hoping that they'd focus on the Annatar-Sauron deceit and transformation. We should like Annatar. He should genuinely be friends and collaborators with Celebrimbor. And that should make his betrayal and subsequent acts all the more horrific. Instead, I fear Sauron/Annatar is going to become a mystery-box, where the mystery is far more important that the contents.


On a tangential note, if Halbrand is Sauron (as I hope he is not, though they certainly seem to be hinting pretty hard), then episode 2 should be seen as Ulmo doing his best to kill him.

[Orby]

So I rewatched episode 3, and I just noticed there was a part where one of the Númenóreans called Galadriel, 'knife ears' as a slur. The RoP writers big fans of Dragon Age it seems :P

[Triceron]

So I rewatched episode 3, and I just noticed there was a part where one of the Númenóreans called Galadriel, 'knife ears' as a slur. The RoP writers big fans of Dragon Age it seems :P

I think they use that slur once in the southlands bar in the first episode

[Orby]

I think they use that slur once in the southlands bar in the first episode

Its the first time i picked up on it. Was trying to think has that term been thrown around in other media or even in Tolkien before? Because I know it specifically from Dragon Age. If it hasn't then someone in the writing team loves Dragon Age. :P

Which is a compliment to the dragon Age franchise if I must say :P

[Kumorii]

I think they use that slur once in the southlands bar in the first episode

Yeah, it's the first line said to Arondir in the bar from the young guy.

[Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang]

You clearly see the whole romance plotline too - but Galadriel ahs a husband doesn't she, and she's a Noldor too, also weren't elf-human relationships like only 2 ever happened? [fine you could argue many more could have been around and only two reached marriage status, but the way Tolkein framed it, made me feel ike the rare exception of 2 is all - and that was because the human halves were truly exceptional, enough to impress elves, Elrond's parents being the first, and Aragorn/Arwen the second).

Ifat least Annatar appeared as an elf and caught Galadiriel's attention, the romance vibes may have been more in line, but then canonically, isn't she supposed to have a husband

On human-elf relationship, beside Beren-Luthien and Aragorn-Arwen, the most notable that is often forgotten is the other half of their common lineage, that of Tuor-Idril, the latter being a Noldor princess born in Valinor during the Years of the Trees, resulting in the often referenced Earendil, which was the father of both Elrond and Elros, the latter being the first king of Numenor.

Another that is much lower profile but also has direct lore links with LotR is that of Imrahil of Dol Amroth's ancestor with a silvan elf which was a follower of the lost Nimrodel.

[rhorle]

Things happen, we move to the next scene, and we have to infer how much/little time passes. They don't even give us snow or changing of trees to signify seasons. As a watcher you have to guess how much time is passing, as you never get ANY CLUES even to get a reference, things just happen, quite a bit off screen, and you get to infer (because the writers couldn't be bothered to develop a script that even subtly informs us) everything in between the scenes.

Time isn't really passing. The things we see are all happening "in real time" in relation to each other. This really seems like a complaint that is there just to find something to complain. It is a problem that isn't really a problem and not even indicative of a bad script. Not to mention the Harfoot migration is likely that "subtle clue" since the Meteor Man was shown falling in all viewpoints.

- - - Updated - - -

Anyway, the sort of mixtures they have in the show, would have made much more sense in a world AFTER Lord of the Rings, not one set before, which has some rather clear defining lines, and needs to be established in the original canon completely, to show the wonder and detail of Tolkein's work, before you start thinking of doing subversions or "re-interpretations".

It doesn't subvert. It just exists. There being different skin tones changes little to nothing about the world of Tolkein and it is crazy to keep making the argument that Tolkiens work is some how harmed because it isn't as white as it was before. Even elf human offspring is not a subversion of the lore since Half-Elves exist and were given a choice to keep their immortality or become mortal.

- - - Updated - - -

Its the first time i picked up on it. Was trying to think has that term been thrown around in other media or even in Tolkien before? Because I know it specifically from Dragon Age. If it hasn't then someone in the writing team loves Dragon Age.

It might have originated from Dragon Age but it has long since entered common usage across many different stuff that has "pointy-eared" characters. It has been 13 years so it was bound to diffuse.

[Dhrizzle]

The setting I would agree with, but themes and nature seem way off.

While I do watch it, it doesn’t feel anywhere near the distinctiveness of Tolkeinni read in the books or that Jackson successfully captured in his movies.

Using the same accents doesn’t make it work imo

Jackson made some huge changes to the way characters were portrayed which really detract from it feeling like the books. I did really enjoy the films when I watched them but each read (or listen) to the books lowers my opinion.

[Zero3]

So Galadriel was wrong for hundreds of years, until a man showed her how to read a map lmfao.

[Dhrizzle]

I'll be curious to see what the (few) stans will say now.

Their usual excuse is "there's very little material to work with, they have to invent new characters and storylines!!!", but we already know that Sauron during the Second Age assumed the form of Annatar, Lord of Gifts, to deceive the elves.

We also know that he avoided Galadriel at all cost, since she was the only one who could sense he's an impostor.

So what excuse will they use this time for coming up with this generic asspull no name character like Halbrand when they could have just used Annatar? Will they still say that they had to pull stuff out of nowhere? But how is that valid excuse in this case? And I bet they'll come up with a romance plotline where Galadriel, the strong independent womanzzz that she is, will try to change him (meanwhile the men will all shun him and try to kill him). Even though in the source material Annatar avoided Galadriel.

And for the record, Sauron's illusion form in the SA most definitely did not look like a filthy homeless hobo. Quite the opposite in fact. The elves trusted and revered him for his beauty, after all. It's hard to be trusted and revered if you look like Halbrand.

Sauron has always been capable of taking varied forms. Personally I'm hoping he turns out the be Halbrand, the wizardzzz dude, the crazy swordzzz, the corrupt looking elf leading the orczzz and Annatar. BTW in the Silmarillion Annatar didn't avoid Galadriel and she couldn't tell he was an imposter, she just got a bad vibe from the dude and he had to put up with her scorn with good grace.

- - - Updated - - -

My name is Deakus. I come from Jamaica. I came over in, uhm, a boat.

I grew up with him too. I do like him, but it's hard to get over the 'Lenny Henry with a terrible fake Irish accent' aspect of it.

They should have made the Harfoots speak with a Brummy accent, apart from anything else it would have been a cool nod to Tolkien describing himself as "a Hobbit in all ways but size" if the forebears of the Hobbits sounded like the people of the city Tolkien was raised in.

[Thelxi]

It's not getting better it's getting worse. The CGI is great. Expensive, tasteful and gives us a great overview of the scenery and setting of the story. Then it cuts to a regular set and the soap opera begins. Very uneven.

The writing is not great, and it needed good writing. Like why spent 5+ minutes of an ambitious 8 episode show like this, on one of the characters stealing a badge, getting drunk and then getting beaten up by a gang of nameless characters. Like god so much money and this is the most interesting thing to spend it on? the writing is no better or worse than any regular TV show, but looks very bad trying to do Tolkien.

And the costumes. So squeaky clean. It's like everyone is an elf. Even the shit Hobbits have in their wigs looks like polished plastic.

Speaking of elves and hobbits, the only thing that sets them apart are prosthetic ears and wigs. The people playing them don't lean one way or the other. I haven't read the books in almost 20 years at this point, but I sure remember Tolkien talking about elves and how beautiful and graceful they were, and I think it was Bilbo that had like a huge crush on them. The elves here are.. nothing of the sort. Ugly, average looking joes with pointy ears.

Not a fan of the orcs either. Basically this show is like Hercules/Xena with a big budget.

[hulkgor]

I really enjoyed the newest episode. The only aspect i disliked, and already mentioned often here, was the slow motion, close-up shot of Galadriel laughing\smiling\whatever while riding the horse. It just felt completely off.

Apart from that, i'm really enjoying the show so far.

[Biomega]

I really enjoyed the newest episode. The only aspect i disliked, and already mentioned often here, was the slow motion, close-up shot of Galadriel laughing\smiling\whatever while riding the horse. It just felt completely off.

That was some 1990s bullshit is what it was.

Who the fuck let this go through in 2022, on a AAA show. Film students would get their asses kicked by their professors if they turned this in for a class.

[Nerovar]

Its the first time i picked up on it. Was trying to think has that term been thrown around in other media or even in Tolkien before? Because I know it specifically from Dragon Age. If it hasn't then someone in the writing team loves Dragon Age. :P

Which is a compliment to the dragon Age franchise if I must say :P

It doesn't make much sense in a Tolkien context for several reasons the most important being that Elven ears are leaf-shaped (not knife-shaped) and don't look like the prevalent depictions of Elves we see today. I think the Peter Jackson movies actually did a decent job with this because you can clearly recognize Elves without ever looking at their ears and when you do see them they look very similar to human ears that just happen to be slightly pointy. They simply aren't supposed to be the distinguishing features of Elves. They're never even mentioned in the books. So calling them "knife-ears" is effectively just a weird case of flanderization working its way backwards through time to corrupt the image of the original.