Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[Mace]

Right. You've already acknowledged that it is dumb for them to have compressed time. What point is there complaining about each individual count where time is compressed? They haven't hidden the fact that they are diverging from Canon in order to keep the same non-elf actors through out the series. It is also silly to say it has to do with "agenda pushing" when again it is only so they could keep the same non-elf actors through out the series.

I don’t like that they condensed time either. Unnecessary and it casts the show firmly out of being based in LotR Tolkien world. Especially when they don’t have rights to a lot of the books. They should have stuck scrupulously to canon.

Cast your best actors as elves - famous names and as you moved through time you have other really famous actors play the roles of humans and other races that don’t endure.

Or make up something interesting if you are sticking to a time frame.

You just end up pissing more people off by such drastic changes and then ask them to accept this is the same world.

I hate it when show runners needlessly change established lore. Vast majority of the time it’s unnecessary and the changes are bad very few times are the changes good and even fewer times (especially on well written and know. Works) are the changes actually necessary.


For LotR films for example, on a film setting I understand why Arwen rescued Frodo, but if this was a series and planned pet of a greater set of series, spin-offs, movies and mini series, then you’d have put Glor-findel in there for sure and used him in other stuff.


That substitution didn’t detract from the work, but enhanced it, I don’t feel it was absolutely essential, but it worked well negating the need to add more scenes to make Arwen/Aragorn feel like a relationship most people would connect and engage with

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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.”

and yet at every turn so far they have EGREGIOUSLY and BLATANTLY contradicted all established lore, and not only that but flagrantly done so to push the stupid agenda they are trying to push and self insert to every character, so how does that work?


edit: if that's the justification then it just shows how bad the writers are and how unprepared they are for a project of this magnitude, out of their depth is being kind.

This imo is why people hate the show.

And rhlore doesn’t understand this. The show isn’t that bad on its own, it’s above average either as it’s own work.

But for LotR - you can’t claim that title and make that level of changes and expected a 70+year generation spanning well loved piece of fiction to be liked.

People see that they are intentionally changing things to push their point of views and they hate that.

It’s actually turning people off a lot of things regardless of their content - they go “not LotR too! Is nothing safe from this cult”

And hate it more because of that than anything - and they have a right too. To add insult to injury to call everyone that hates this racist and bigoted is further confounding their problem because they are polarising then condemning a large portion of their customer base they should be trying to appease.

Why do that? Because they are religious ideologies, not business people (while others are trying to use things like that to make excuses to their bosses as to why their work failed).


All WB needs to do is commission it’s own LotR Tolkien world based series and do a Peter Jackson grade job for half the amount and it would destroy this completely.

Except Amazon is trying to buy WB’s rights now to save their calamity.

[tikcol]

From Tolkien himself, about adaptations. Letter 210. His response to a movie script

I would ask them to make an effort of imagination sufficient to understand the irritation (and on occasion the resentment) of an author, who finds, increasingly as he proceeds, his work treated as it would seem carelessly in general, in places recklessly, and with no evident signs of any appreciation of what it is all about. [...] The canons of narrative an in any medium cannot be wholly different ; and the failure of poor films is often precisely in exaggeration, and in the intrusion of unwarranted matter owing to not perceiving where the core of the original lies.

Regarding time passage

Here I may say that I fail to see why the time-scheme should be deliberately contracted. It is
already rather packed in the original, the main action occurring between Sept. 22 and March 25 of
the following year. The many impossibilities and absurdities which further hurrying produces
might, I suppose, be unobserved by an uncritical viewer; but I do not see why they should be
unnecessarily introduced. Time must naturally be left vaguer in a picture than in a book; but I
cannot see why definite time-statements, contrary to the book and to probability, should be made.
....
Seasons are carefully regarded in the original. They are pictorial, and should be, and easily
could be, made the main means by which the artists indicate time-passage. The main action begins
in autumn and passes through winter to a brilliant spring: this is basic to the purport and tone of the
tale. The contraction of time and space in 2 destroys that. His arrangements would, for instance,
land us in a snowstorm while summer was still in. The Lord of the Rings may be a 'fairy-story', but
it takes place in the Northern hemisphere of this earth: miles are miles, days are days, and weather
is weather.
Contraction of this kind is not the same thing as the necessary reduction or selection of the
scenes and events that are to be visually represented.

The latest episode not only is below average entertainment, it also is murdering the lore. Murder you say? Isn't that too strong a word?

Let the man answer that himself

Z .... has intruded a 'fairy castle' and a great many Eagles, not to mention incantations, blue
lights, and some irrelevant magic (such as the floating body of Faramir). He has cut the parts of the
story upon which its characteristic and peculiar tone principally depends, showing a preference for
fights; and he has made no serious attempt to represent the heart of the tale adequately: the journey
of the Ringbearers. The last and most important pan of this has, and it is not too strong a word,
simply been murdered.

That's how he felt about adaptations that disregard completely his legendarium.

[Dhrizzle]

From Tolkien himself, about adaptations. Letter 210. His response to a movie script

Regarding time passage

What parts do you think actually apply to RoP?

[tikcol]

What parts do you think actually apply to RoP?

Considering the show isn't respecting the lore in anything at all besides names, everything. Also, read the first quote and try not to be too dishonest about that.

[Mace]

They haven't contradicted all established lore. They are not pushing an agenda with every character. What agenda is there with Sadoc? Or Poppy Proudfellow?

That’s because you are only associating race changes with woke agenda - intersectional feminism that drives such changes is the larger work issue than diversity and the terrible critical race theory proponents.

Changes were made to reflect that ideology - Faladrial is changed to a type B now - no man can support or help help, she has to be right and do everything, lead everything - that’s why she becomes a gladiator Aragorn type Thant what Tolkien or Jackson’s movies portray her to be.

You are thinking. Who is to say Galadriel wasn’t all those things in the show. Because there are so many gaps - while true, the specific direction taken with her and the “small” changes align perfectly to fit their world view and is very much not Tolkien.

The spirit of the show is t Tolkien nor is it the Lordnof the Rings despite all the numerous similarities. Get the spirit wrong because you are interpreting through your own world view, even with a minimum number of changes it will not feel the same to anyone who knows or loves Tolkien.

Now some willl be okay with that and not mind too much, others will hate it for doing that again and feel there they go again, changing stuff to preach their world view. On us. Especially those that don’t agree with the silliness of intersectional feminism.

This is why it is bringing social politics into entertainment in the most crass of ways.

It is one thing if you made your own fantasy world and preached your own values through it like many shows do, including some very good ones, it’s another thing entirely when you co-opt someone else’s work and change it to preach your message.

Not many people will notice for lesser known writers. But Tolkien and Robert Jordan are two of the biggest names with the biggest fantasy series in the genre. Only George R Martin comes close to them in terms of well known and well liked or highly rated fantasy epics.

You change stuff on such well known and loved works, you have millions of fans who will notice. And it’s up to them to decide whether they like it or not and share their views on either side.

[Adamas102]

Nope, stop right there. Scientification of his fantasy was definitely something Tolkien didn't like. Elves and Men didn't have evolutionary history, they awoke fully formed at a time appointed by Illuvatar. For the Elves decent account(s) exist of these early days but for Men it's left a mystery, though almost certainly they would have come under some sort of influence of Morgoth or Sauron from which they gained their dread of death (and for some a belief they were supposed to be immortal like the Elves.)

You missed the point entirely. What I'm saying is the idea that fantasy peoples of different skin tones must be segregated into separate cultures and societies is based purely on OUR human evolutionary history (and only a relatively recent and oversimplified part of it). What I'm saying is that for these fantasy races (including the humans) that DON'T share our specific history, evolution, societal development, geographic placement, etc. there is no reason why different skin tones couldn't exist within the same group.

[Dhrizzle]

Considering the show isn't respecting the lore in anything at all besides names, everything. Also, read the first quote and try not to be too dishonest about that.

I've read it and the rest of the letter so I know the kinds of changes Tolkien was talking about. What I'm asking is how you think those words about Lord of the Rings - a novel that was worked out and reiterated several times while Tolkien got the detailed story just right - can be applied to Rings of Power.

[Triceron]

Every argument? Can you indicate in what lore Minas Tirith has a waterfall on its point? Lmao. It is crazy how people lie just because they can't handle someone that disagrees with their opinion.

Oh looky, more shit posting.

How absolutely not surprising.

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If they wanted to make a show that doesn't care about the source material, why not create their own then? Oh, yeah, because they couldn't create an interesting universe and characters to save their lives. Because they need brand recognition to get people excited. That's why they create Red Herrings about tie-ins to other famous events and characters in the movies at literally every corner of the show.

Heck, at this point I'd take a reimagining of the actual LotR story as a space opera over this series. Because this schizophrenic reinterpretation of Tolkien's work is just painful to watch. If they wanted to make an original story around existing characters, fine. Do that. But with a series centered around the forging around the Rings of power, one of the decisive points in the history of Tolkiens work, and the series named 'the Rings of Power', you know, I'd expect them to actually use what little is know about that period in Middle-Earths history and build around that, not changing events and characters by 2000 years because they need as many recognizable names and events as possible to draw people in.

The whole point os banking on an established franchise otherwise it'd be as pointless putting this much money into something no one has ever heard of.

Despite how people feel negatively about the series, it's getting plenty of talk and eyeballs on the project, and it won't go away any time soon as a flagship title for Prime video.

At most it would get budget cuts of it doesn't perform well.

[tikcol]

I've read it and the rest of the letter so I know the kinds of changes Tolkien was talking about. What I'm asking is how you think those words about Lord of the Rings - a novel that was worked out and reiterated several times while Tolkien got the detailed story just right - can be applied to Rings of Power.

Just because it wasn't published doesn't mean he didn't write everything as he wanted them to be. The legendarium exists, things happened in a correct sequence and this show isn't only condensing the timeline beyond belief. It's actively changing how everything connects together and changing how those characters exist in his writings.

The most egregious part to me are the Harfoots. They're creating an origin story for the Hobbits when there is none. Now, Harfoots are written about but there's no detailed story about them. They're writing it from scratch while introducing another non-cannon element that's just making a mess of things(meteor man). It's the kind of thing Tolkien showed time and time again that it would irritate him the most. The Hobbits do not have an origin story because there isn't one. Tolkien didn't forget about it. He didn't write it.

Who exactly is this show for I ask. As a fan of the books I'd rather know before hand what's going to happen in the show than get surprised every week with a new deviation.

For someone that has no knowledge about the books, they're non the wiser about anything. So they're actively changing what Tolkien wrote and the order of things. The hubris to think people will enjoy their story more than his own.

[Nurasu]

I knew it was going to happen, but Isildur even still felt out of left field with Numenor still kicking. It's disappointing that racists and sexists completely drowned out legitimate criticism of the timeline. I feel like if the community had been more focused, they may have taken some of it into consideration. Probably not, but one can dream.

[hulkgor]

It's almost as if it's an adaptation... and they have to move things around to fit a story spanning a millennia.

Give it a rest, if it bothers you so much, stop watching it, holy hell.

Take it for what it is, a tv show adaptation.

[rhorle]

It's the kind of thing Tolkien showed time and time again that it would irritate him the most.

So are the Jackson movies bad for the same reason? Isn't it strange how a lot of these problems that keep being brought up with RoP are subjectively applied depending on if a person likes the work or not? If something is seen as "good" changes to canon, etc aren't an issue. Yet when it is seen as "bad" those things are suddenly used as issues for why it is bad.

Hubris has nothing to do with this as evident by the Jackson movies. It increased exposure to Tolkien's work. Some probably read the books if they already have not. Others likely got more story (canon or not-canon) consuming the ancillary products like Lego LotR and all the other Tolkien-inspired video games and products.

[tikcol]

So are the Jackson movies bad for the same reason? Isn't it strange how a lot of these problems that keep being brought up with RoP are subjectively applied depending on if a person likes the work or not? If something is seen as "good" skin tone, changes to canon, etc aren't an issue. Yet when it is seen as "bad" those things are suddenly used as issues for why it is bad.

Hubris has nothing to do with this as evident by the Jackson movies. It increased exposure to Tolkien's work. Some probably read the books if they already have not. Others likely got more story (canon or not-canon) consuming the ancillary products like Lego LotR and all the other Tolkien-inspired video games and products.

The Jackson movies aren't a perfect adaptation, but if you're trying to put them on the same level of disrespect for Tolkien's work then you're just being disingenuous about it and there's nothing more to discuss with you

[Nurasu]

It's almost as if it's an adaptation... and they have to move things around to fit a story spanning a millennia.

Give it a rest, if it bothers you so much, stop watching it, holy hell.

Take it for what it is, a tv show adaptation.

I'm enjoying it quite a bit actually; such major changes to the timeline are a bit jarring to anyone who has read the books is all. I would have fleshed it out into more stories about more people through the different centuries, but that's just me I guess. That still has its issues in becoming too elf-centric as the series progresses. Quite a challenging adaptation to make, and with no useful feedback from the community.

[bloodkin]

Just because it wasn't published doesn't mean he didn't write everything as he wanted them to be. The legendarium exists, things happened in a correct sequence and this show isn't only condensing the timeline beyond belief. It's actively changing how everything connects together and changing how those characters exist in his writings.

The most egregious part to me are the Harfoots. They're creating an origin story for the Hobbits when there is none. Now, Harfoots are written about but there's no detailed story about them. They're writing it from scratch while introducing another non-cannon element that's just making a mess of things(meteor man). It's the kind of thing Tolkien showed time and time again that it would irritate him the most. The Hobbits do not have an origin story because there isn't one. Tolkien didn't forget about it. He didn't write it.

Who exactly is this show for I ask. As a fan of the books I'd rather know before hand what's going to happen in the show than get surprised every week with a new deviation.

For someone that has no knowledge about the books, they're non the wiser about anything. So they're actively changing what Tolkien wrote and the order of things. The hubris to think people will enjoy their story more than his own.

One can buy hubris off with enough money and misguided ideals, this show has proven that.

There are people saying there isn't an agenda yet agree with the new moral ideas the writers and cast are forcing into the story. You can't have it both ways, either they have an agenda and are enforcing it or there isn't one and this production is utterly ignorant of some/most of thel egendarium.

I personally think don't have a problem with the ideals that seem to be so important here that they want tell people about, but I absolutely loathe the fact that it's being forced into this series.

[rhorle]

The Jackson movies aren't a perfect adaptation, but if you're trying to put them on the same level of disrespect for Tolkien's work then you're just being disingenuous about it and there's nothing more to discuss with you

You are just proving my point. You talk about how Tolkien did not like adaptions changing things and how terrible it is when a show does so. Yet defend the Jackson movies as not being "bad" when they did those same things. So why not bring up the parts of RoP that are bad rather then the parts that are only bad because you don't like the show? What is the point of the Red Herring criticisms?

[Dhrizzle]

Just because it wasn't published doesn't mean he didn't write everything as he wanted them to be. The legendarium exists, things happened in a correct sequence and this show isn't only condensing the timeline beyond belief. It's actively changing how everything connects together and changing how those characters exist in his writings.

The main reason it wasn't published is Tolkien didn't get things how he wanted them to be and kept changing things up until his death. Finrod's status as Galadriel's brother was one of several origins Tolkien played with and I think it was in the last few months of his life that he changed the story of Galadriel and Celeborn so he was actually an Amani Teleri (giving him a nice promotion to Caliquendi) and the two of them met before sailing to Middle-earth.

The most egregious part to me are the Harfoots. They're creating an origin story for the Hobbits when there is none. Now, Harfoots are written about but there's no detailed story about them. They're writing it from scratch.

It's not an origin story, it doesn't explain what the Hobbit's first ancestors were like when they awoke in Hildorien, when they split from the other Men or when they became halflings (if they didn't awake that way.)

It's the kind of thing Tolkien showed time and time again that it would irritate him the most. The Hobbits do not have an origin story because there isn't one. Tolkien didn't forget about it. He didn't write it. Full stop.

No what irritated him was making changes to stories he had spent a lot of time perfecting without artistic or technical reasons. At an earlier time he expressed a desire to create a grand mythology with some parts written in detail and others just sketched to allow "other minds and hands wielding paint and music and drama."

Who exactly is this show for I ask. As a fan of the books I'd rather know before hand what's going to happen in the show then get surprised every week with a new deviation.

It's for fans of Tolkien who want to see his world, characters and events brought to life.

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The Jackson movies aren't a perfect adaptation, but if you're trying to put them on the same level of disrespect for Tolkien's work then you're just being disingenuous about it and there's nothing more to discuss with you

I'd argue the Jackson movies showed more disrespect by making changes to a piece of work Tolkien spent so long perfecting with really egregious changes to the way some characters are portrayed.

[tikcol]

The main reason it wasn't published is Tolkien didn't get things how he wanted them to be and kept changing things up until his death. Finrod's status as Galadriel's brother was one of several origins Tolkien played with and I think it was in the last few months of his life that he changed the story of Galadriel and Celeborn so he was actually an Amani Teleri (giving him a nice promotion to Caliquendi) and the two of them met before sailing to Middle-earth.



It's not an origin story, it doesn't explain what the Hobbit's first ancestors were like when they awoke in Hildorien, when they split from the other Men or when they became halflings (if they didn't awake that way.)



No what irritated him was making changes to stories he had spent a lot of time perfecting without artistic or technical reasons. At an earlier time he expressed a desire to create a grand mythology with some parts written in detail and others just sketched to allow "other minds and hands wielding paint and music and drama."



It's for fans of Tolkien who want to see his world, characters and events brought to life.

So now that's he's dead you get to pick and choose and change what was written because he kept changing things up until his death? That's not very honest.

It is an origin story in the sense that's we're getting glimpses of the the Hobbit philosophy in the 3rd age of not getting involved with the "outside world" and that adventures are non-sense.

No what irritated him was making changes to stories he had spent a lot of time perfecting without artistic or technical reasons

That's what you just made up. It's a very skewed interpretation of the quote to fit this whole narrative of yours and you know it. Besides.. he did put a lot of time perfecting what is written. Be it published or not. If you do not want to view it that way then that's your problem.

It's for fans of Tolkien who want to see his world, characters and events brought to life.

RoP is not representing Tolkien's work, characters or events. So no, it isn't for fans of Tolkien.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

The Jackson movies aren't a perfect adaptation, but if you're trying to put them on the same level of disrespect for Tolkien's work then you're just being disingenuous about it and there's nothing more to discuss with you

In Tolkien’s own words “the failure of poor films is often precisely in exaggeration, and in the intrusion of unwarranted matter owing to not perceiving where the core of the original lies.”, and no one can truly say stuff like this isn’t exactly that.

[exochaft]

Just because it wasn't published doesn't mean he didn't write everything as he wanted them to be. The legendarium exists, things happened in a correct sequence and this show isn't only condensing the timeline beyond belief. It's actively changing how everything connects together and changing how those characters exist in his writings.

The most egregious part to me are the Harfoots. They're creating an origin story for the Hobbits when there is none. Now, Harfoots are written about but there's no detailed story about them. They're writing it from scratch while introducing another non-cannon element that's just making a mess of things(meteor man). It's the kind of thing Tolkien showed time and time again that it would irritate him the most. The Hobbits do not have an origin story because there isn't one. Tolkien didn't forget about it. He didn't write it.

Who exactly is this show for I ask. As a fan of the books I'd rather know before hand what's going to happen in the show then get surprised every week with a new deviation.

For someone that has no knowledge about the books, they're non the wiser about anything. So they're actively changing what Tolkien wrote and the order of things. The hubris to think people will enjoy their story more than his own.

If there's a target audience for this show, it's the showrunners themselves. Basically, they're writing it for themselves, not for maintaining the spirit/letter of the lore, not for existing Tolkien fans, etc. Just going through interviews with the showrunners makes this patently obvious when anything that touches on straying from what's written (whether it's twisting/stretching the meaning or just creating stuff out of thin air) it's only done as a self-serving action. Amazon even saying they're trying to make the works of Tolkien more accessible is just ridiculous, considering how many languages Tolkien's works are printed in and how widely diverse the readers and fans of the franchise were and are before RoP was even a show pitch.

When it comes to the specific changes, I'm not sure what takes precedent in my mind. I suppose it comes down to either execution or intent of the changes. Harfoots are certainly a case of (as admitted by the showrunners) an addition because they're afraid normies won't know it's a Tolkien work without some form of Hobbit... which is kind of condescending, but considering their writing so far it evolves into something way worse. The Harfoots are very contradictory in their words and actions, whether that's intention or not doesn't really matter at this point. In essence, Harfoots are a case of where the execution and intent are both not good.

There's a bunch of other issues that are harder to talk about in a concise manner, but they all boil down to the intent and/or the execution are pretty bad. Even if we put intent aside, the execution of the writing, editing, etc. are very shoddy considering how much money is being thrown at this project. I heard from a little birdie on the inside (don't have to believe it, but don't be surprised when you start hearing about this in the future) that these productions are way more disorganized than most people probably realize. It's not just Amazon, this happens with Marvel/Disney... one just has to look at the behind-the-scenes and interviews with the content creators to see how widely disorganized and shoddy these productions tend to be when it comes to writing and execution. Expect more behind-the-scenes stuff to become known over time about RoP concerning these aspects, although some of it can be inferred from what's already out concerning the writing and what the actors talk about indicating issues with how the content was created.

Ultimately, the average viewer is probably going to notice something seems off with RoP, whether they're a Tolkien fan or not. If the writing and execution of RoP was done well and for the right reasons, RoP would naturally just be a massive success. However, from how Amazon was selling their product, you can tell immediately that Amazon themselves had very little faith in RoP before it even went live to the public. Turns out they were right, as even a normie with a slightly discerning eye for details will tend to notice that RoP is off in many aspects without any knowledge of the lore or what was happening behind-the-scenes. In the end, RoP is just a self-serving fan fiction of the creators with all the stereotypical pitfalls of a fanfic when it comes to dialogue/characters/etc., not a dedication to Tolkien or content created for Tolkien fans made in the spirit of Tolkien.

I knew it was going to happen, but Isildur even still felt out of left field with Numenor still kicking. It's disappointing that racists and sexists completely drowned out legitimate criticism of the timeline. I feel like if the community had been more focused, they may have taken some of it into consideration. Probably not, but one can dream.

To be fair, the racist/sexist angle is a marketing ploy that was perfected by Disney over the past few years and used by Amazon (and this has been done in politics for ages). It's kind of obvious when they put out stories about expect backlash due to racism/sexism well before the show is released while constantly talking up how talking up race and sex concerning their content. Basically, it's a method of controlling the narrative in an effort to deflect from real issue by using inflammatory rhetoric and non-issues. If you check out the reviews talking about what's wrong with RoP in the opinion of content creators, race and sex rarely if ever are mention as the writing and execution of RoP are the real issues. Unfortunately, when it comes to normies (like my wife), all they hear about all the stories of racism/sexism put out by the media outlets concerning RoP backlash... but even my wife noticed that there's no proof of it, just accusations. I'm sure there's a couple random people who have racist/sexist reasons to hate RoP, but they aren't the majority.

To get your wish, you'd have to change the paid media, not the people at the bottom fighting against the Amazon-bought media. That's not happening anytime soon, best you can hope for is people start seeing the paid media for what it is.