Lord of the Rings TV Series Purchased by Amazon

[Triceron]

The head of the studio addressed it a little bit in her Mipcom interview. Why would they need to repeat the affirmations from before the finale afterwards? Why would they suddenly no longer like how the show has performed? Why do they need to address rumors at all in order for the show to stay "successful"?

They don't. Addressing rumors has nothing to do with staying successful. Again, why are you taking my comments out of context and conflating different statements together?

I'm curious if you remember defending the show as popular. Why suddenly would Amazon view the show as a failure?

I never said the show was a failure. Again, this is an argument you accused me of which I'm denying I ever made. That's why I'm saying your accusations are fucking dishonest.

You understand this, right?


The show can be considered successful and the execs can still be scrambling because the show may not have met their expectations against the competition. If all you're boiling things down to are failure and success, then you're being anal retentive here.

You don't sound like you even know what rumor I'm talking about. Perhaps you should look into correcting that before commenting about the House of the Dragon and Rings of Power metrics. You know, for contexts sake.

[Biomega]

Just think about that - Tolkien and Lord of the Rings, one of the most beloved series anywhere, and they couldn't even be bothered to find actual fans of the show to do the review!

I get your overall point and you probably didn't intend this to come across that way, but DAMN this is just such a misrepresentation of the problem.

It's NOT that they "couldn't be bothered" to find fans - it's that it seems abundantly clear that any "real" fans SIMPLY WOULD NOT ENDORSE THE SHOW. That's a far, far more damning turn of events. Of course they could have found fans, they're not idiots and know how to use YouTube and Google. They DID find fans, and they either were outright told to fuck themselves, or thought that there would be no way the marquee fans would endorse it or, at best, not endorse it the way they wanted.

Instead they turned to milk-toast "influencer" fans with a fantasy portfolio of whatever flavor that they could get to provide suitable fake enthusiasm as PR and advertising vehicles. Note because they "couldn't find" anyone else, but because everyone else WOULDN'T PROVIDE WHAT THEY WANTED.

Remember: they are not interested in reviews. They are interested in advertisement they can LABEL as "reviews". Their goal is not to get the most comprehensive, most in-depth, most balanced and unbiased assessment of their product. FUCK NO. Their goal is to have people with reach and consumer confidence and broad market appeal create positive buzz about their product. Never forget this.

[rhorle]

They don't. Addressing rumors has nothing to do with staying successful. Again, why are you taking my comments out of context and conflating different statements together?

So then the silence, and lack of addressing them, is not deafening. So the show is popular but Amazon is panicking about the performance of the show at the same time? If Amazon thinks the show is successful why would they be scrambling? They would have to view the show as not successful to be scrambling due to a lack of a success.

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It's NOT that they "couldn't be bothered" to find fans - it's that it seems abundantly clear that any "real" fans SIMPLY WOULD NOT ENDORSE THE SHOW.

Wouldn't real fans have hated the Jackson movies because they didn't keep the spirit of Tolkien? Lets not pretend that "real" fans has any meaning other then a gate keeping tool. There are no "real" fans. There are only fans. So like the show for what it is. Some do not. There isn't a separate class because of that.

[Triceron]

So then the silence, and lack of addressing them, is not deafening.

It is deafening to me, and you choosing to believe otherwise doesn't change that.

So the show is popular but Amazon is panicking about the performance of the show at the same time?

Why is this so hard for you to grasp? Honest question.

Do you think that because a battle was won, so has the war? I could (figuratively) say that they took the lead for the first quarter of the race, then House of Dragons ended up taking gold. And Rings of Power maybe took silver or bronze. So yes, they were successful. They succeeded on winning a medal. But it still didn't manage to meet what aimed for, and that has caused the coaches to go into a panic because big daddy Bezos expected a gold medal.

Hell, the rumors about the panic isn't even all that negative. None of the rumors I'm talking about implies that the show is a failure. Again, not sure why you're jumping to this unreasonable conclusion. Gonna repeat - You don't sound like you even know what rumor I'm talking about. Perhaps you should look into correcting that. You know, for contexts sake.

[SpaghettiMonk]

I get your overall point and you probably didn't intend this to come across that way, but DAMN this is just such a misrepresentation of the problem.

It's NOT that they "couldn't be bothered" to find fans - it's that it seems abundantly clear that any "real" fans SIMPLY WOULD NOT ENDORSE THE SHOW. That's a far, far more damning turn of events. Of course they could have found fans, they're not idiots and know how to use YouTube and Google. They DID find fans, and they either were outright told to fuck themselves, or thought that there would be no way the marquee fans would endorse it or, at best, not endorse it the way they wanted.

Instead they turned to milk-toast "influencer" fans with a fantasy portfolio of whatever flavor that they could get to provide suitable fake enthusiasm as PR and advertising vehicles. Note because they "couldn't find" anyone else, but because everyone else WOULDN'T PROVIDE WHAT THEY WANTED.

Remember: they are not interested in reviews. They are interested in advertisement they can LABEL as "reviews". Their goal is not to get the most comprehensive, most in-depth, most balanced and unbiased assessment of their product. FUCK NO. Their goal is to have people with reach and consumer confidence and broad market appeal create positive buzz about their product. Never forget this.

Sometimes I wonder if this is what getting old feels like. We are no longer the target audience for people who work at Amazon, so they are trying to bastardize the content we like and find a way to make it appeal to the younger generation. That means YouTube influencers, regardless of whether they have even read the books.

Then for the next part, they demonized all the people who opposed the series, saying it was a largely racist/sexist backlash. Listen, I don't give a fuck if they have a black dwarf or a black elf, or beards or whatever. It doesn't matter to me one bit. It didn't bother me when they added the female elf warrior in The Hobbit either (although those movies were terrible). Yes, it bothers me that they made Galadriel a warrior, but that's more because they just messed up her character completely - as I outlined above, in the end they made her character weaker than she is in the books. But for them, it's smart PR because it makes it harder to oppose the series, which probably contributed to the balance of reviews being lukewarm positive, and getting that 85% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

It's all so fascinating and infuriating. Yup, I will keep hate watching it as long as it's on. But with the Peter Jackson movies, I made arrangements to go see them with friends. I watched them with family members, I talked them up at work, and generally having a fan like me like the movies helps them bring in the casual fans. I'm utterly silent about Rings of Power when I talk to casual TV watchers right now. Only time it has come up outside this website is when I met up with a few old coworkers (who all worked in technology, and are, unsurprisingly Tolkien fans) and we talked about how we all hated it and one guy said his wife liked it because she had never read the books.

[Biomega]

But with the Peter Jackson movies, I made arrangements to go see them with friends. I watched them with family members, I talked them up at work, and generally having a fan like me like the movies helps them bring in the casual fans.

That used to be the standard go-to strategy for "genre" products (at least in theory): get the "real" fans onboard, and have them push the product to the casuals. Didn't quite work out, apparently; maybe it's the rise of general influencers and their culture, maybe it's platforms like YouTube, maybe it's the negative backlash from never being able to please nitpicky nerds... who knows. But they seem to have shifted towards a "fuck the fans, they'll never be happy anyway, just grab the random popcorn Andy he'll shill over his cash and not ask too many questions" mentality in more areas than just fantasy and science fiction.

Yup, I will keep hate watching it as long as it's on.

I guess this is where we differ. I just stop watching when I'm reasonably sure it sucks. I engage in the meta commentary, partly because it interests me, partly for professional reasons; but I rarely if ever "hate-watch" even things that are big in the public consciousness at the time (excepting things I'm directly working on, which is why I had to torture myself with things like Bright ).

[xChurch]

Crazy how long one person can keep a thread going...

[Shadowferal]

Amazon Bribing People To Watch Lord Of The Rings Series As It Continues To Underperform

It may sound like a bad joke, but Amazon Prime Video is reportedly offering free food to Brazilian viewers if they’ll watch their floundering Lord of the Rings series, The Rings of Power. According to a new video by YouTuber George The Giant Slayer, a visit to the Prime Video Brazil Instagram account reveals an offer for a coupon to iFood, a food delivery service that is Brazil’s version of DoorDash or UberEats. The catch: you have to watch the first episode of The Rings of Power to get it.

George the Giant Slayer shared screenshots from the Amazon Prime Video Brazil Instagram account, promising the iFood coupon will be emailed to Prime subscribers after they watch the first episode of The Rings of Power. While that sounds like great deal, it should be noted that the coupon offers viewers 30 rials, which converts to about $5 in American money. That’s not even enough for a fast food value meal in America, but maybe Brazilian restaurants offer better deals.

Bounding Into Comics detailed how it is just the latest attempt by Amazon to get someone – anyone – to watch the show, which started off with promising ratings after its September 1 premiere. However, according to various tracking services, viewership declined in subsequent weeks. It rebounded for the October 14 season finale, but the bad buzz surrounding the series has loomed over the show like the clouds over Mt. Doom in Mordor.

George the Giant Slayer, in typical YouTuber fashion, has his own hot take on why the series has flopped, as he blames the show’s “woke” mentality. Even for those who embrace that argument, it’s hard to pin the show’s struggles on that factor alone.

Although Lord of the Rings fans took issue with many of the aspects, themes, and characterizations in the show, it had some promising and pretty entertaining elements. Ismael Cruz Cordova’s portrayal of the elf Arondir, who leads the fight against the Orcs, was excellent, but the series as a whole seemed too disjointed, and failed to bring the many parallel storylines and multiple characters together by season’s end. Even the most die-hard Tolkien fans admitted they had trouble following the multitude of characters and deep references to the mythology, so even casual viewers were often lost as to what was going on.

By contrast, HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel series House of the Dragon faced a similar challenge in attracting viewers for a series no one really asked for. While Dragon often stumbled in its first season, with time jumps and character recastings, its focused storyline and entertaining episodes won skeptics over. As a result, House of the Dragon is pulling in far more viewers than The Rings of Power.

It seems the promotion is an effort to keep viewership engaged as the season ends and viewers’ attention is pulled elsewhere. Disney+ is trying a similar tactic with its Star Wars live-action series Andor, by offering the first two episodes on cable TV to attract viewers.

Bounding Into Comics also mentions a rumor that Amazon is considering totally rebooting The Rings of Power, attempting a total do-over in season two that may see an entirely different storyline or even characters. Given the hundreds of millions Amazon has committed here, that rumor is either complete nonsense or a desperation move to save the series, and sadly, both seem plausible at this point.

[Kumorii]

The show can be considered successful and the execs can still be scrambling because the show may not have met their expectations against the competition. If all you're boiling things down to are failure and success, then you're being anal retentive here.

You don't sound like you even know what rumor I'm talking about. Perhaps you should look into correcting that before commenting about the House of the Dragon and Rings of Power metrics. You know, for contexts sake.

Doesn't even have to be that.
It can be successful but they can also see the reactions and the reception to try and foresee the future and what they need to take the show next. It's quite common to look at the market and try and see what the future holds rather than focus on what happened now.

We recently had the Morbius incident where they thought the higher numbers in engagement meant they should do a re-release... only for it to flop again.
High numbers isn't everything when you ignore context of those numbers. It's why there are fields of expertise in number crunching because it's not "NUMBERS HIGH, NUMBERS GOOD".

Hell, Amazon even have conflated numbers with their prime. So there's an even higher expertise in research required since a lot of people who watch will watch "just because" there's nothing else and they already pay for it. It's the same with any streaming service really. There's lots of things people watch just because and it's a factor any researcher have to take into account to gauge the popularity and success of a show.

[rogoth]

That's me - I mean, I'm not sure it's unhealthy, but I'm obsessed with and furious at how terrible and cynical a production it is. Here's my backstory:

I read LOTR for the first time in middle school - it was my favorite book ever. My dad had a policy that he wouldn't let me reread books I had already read, and this was prior to the internet, so I got it from the library, read it, returned it, and that was it, except for two things -

1. I used to go to the library in high school during my study hall and read the copy they had there.
2. I got a gift certificate to buy a book, and my dad let me buy the Silmarillion because I hadn't read it yet. So I read that book obsessively for years, just open it up and read a section occasionally. I've probably read it 15 times.

As an adult I obviously bought the series, watched the Peter Jackson movies and loved them. I remember being mildly annoyed at the changes in The Two Towers, and I understand the Tolkien family's critique that they made some of the characters a bit too "heroic" compared to who they were in the books, but I generally loved the movies. I watched Return of the King at a midnight showing and went to work the next day totally exhausted.

From the first moments it was obvious that this was going to be bad - Amazon paid some influencers and called them "superfans" and had them do a review of the show, and it was fawning and sycophantic and also, painfully obvious that these people were not actually fans of Tolkien (one of them was later asked on her twitch stream what she thought of it and she said that she hadn't watched it yet because she was watching House of the Dragon). One of the other "Superfans" was a big Percy Jackson fan but his entire youtube channel didn't have a single mention of Tolkien, and his website where he reviewed fantasy books didn't mention it either. This was repeated worldwide, as there were complaints about the videos in other countries and languages.

Just think about that - Tolkien and Lord of the Rings, one of the most beloved series anywhere, and they couldn't even be bothered to find actual fans of the show to do the review!

This series comes out, and sure it looks nice, and it has a fairly generic fantasy plot, but from the first episode it's an absolute mockery of Tolkien's work. So yes, the actual fans are angry - a megabillionaire thought he could just write a big check to buy the big IP, then ignore that IP's fanbase completely in order write a 2022 fantasy plot (ELVES WILL TAKE OUR JOBS!!), and it would somehow still be successful. This is a fight against these kind of dumb manipulative things pulled by big corporations, where they are ruining something that is great.

And while we are the underdogs - Amazon gets a lot of lukewarm reviews from various reviewers, many of whom have some financial incentive to say that it's good (like The Ringer, which gives seemingly warm reviews just before Payne and McKay to show up as guests), and the show has an 85% positive ranking from critics - we are making progress. That 39% rotten rating on Rotten Tomatoes hasn't budged, thank god. They deleted a bunch of reviews from Amazon early on (including mine) to try to keep the score higher, but hopefully they know internally that their show sucks balls. Hopefully the next shoe to fall is the Emmys, where House of the Dragon cleans their clock.

At this point we have to win. We have to beat them, and make it clear that bullshit like this is not how you handle content that is beloved by fans.

except they did find 'fans' to review the show, they found the perfect set of 'progressive', 'brave', 'diverse', to push the woke agenda that this show was built upon, the very foundation of this story was allegory for modern world politics and economics, it's a bastardisation of epic proportions, but don't think for one second they didn't bother spending any effort on these kinds of things, if anything i would bet they spent THE MOST effort on making sure they had the 'right' mouthpieces in place to parrot 'the message', and would refer back to that marketing as a shield against whatever criticism they face like they did with that laughable and pathetic twitter bullshit where they paid some of the actors of the PJ films to wear a t-shirt that was all about 'inclusivity' or whatever bullshit narrative they tried to push.

these showrunners and the overall management in charge all signed off on this kind of sycophantic, pandering behaviour, and endorsed it as much as possible not only throughout the entire marketing campaign, but also throughout the entire 'plot' of the show, everything is crafted to sell you 'the message', and in so doing they have pissed on the grave of Tolkien.

[rhorle]

It is deafening to me, and you choosing to believe otherwise doesn't change that.

Right. We are discussing your comment. It still shows that the silence isn't deafening because they've addressed stuff a little bit after the show finale. They addressed stuff a lot during the course of the show. Why do they have to repeat similar things after the finale? Why do they need to address any rumor at all? Why does the lack of addressing a rumor make that rumor true?

[Triceron]

Right. We are discussing your comment. It still shows that the silence isn't deafening because they've addressed stuff a little bit after the show finale. They addressed stuff a lot during the course of the show. Why do they have to repeat similar things after the finale? Why do they need to address any rumor at all? Why does the lack of addressing a rumor make that rumor true?

And there are articles covering exactly your questions.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/startef...emmys_a119/amp

"I heard from someone who has a connect at Amazon that – if you wanna know – that effectively, they're going to be retooling," he explained (via). "And [Payne and McKay] are more than likely…they're not gonna be publicly fired, but their role will be reduced."

"Potentially just remaining in the writers room," Chris Gore clarified, "but my understanding is they're looking for more experienced showrunners."

And

Allegedly, Amazon wants to avoid overwhelmingly negative buzz, associated with such a decision, which will sink any hopes of The Rings of Power winning at least some award categories (via).


Like I said, you keep talking about things you have clearly zero understanding of. You keep talking without knowing any of the context. You keep accusing and asking questions that would easily be answered if you bothered to look, and make excuses that you are clearly wrong about like saying Amazon doesn't report on performance after a series is fully released. Like, you're so full of shit because you're not actually interested in discussing the topic of the conversation. I gave you fair advice to look into the runors before you reply, and you ignored that both times. You just argue the fuck out of anything I say here for the sake of arguing, trying to prove anything I say to be wrong.

Dishonest as fuck.



Again, I have not said any of these rumors are true, only that the silence and lack of addressing any rumor makes it possible for it to be true, namely because these rumors already outline this reasoning. There are plenty media covering these rumors, multiple rumors floating around. The ones i listed above are two differently sourced rumors.

The fact that you disagree with my opinion that the silence is deafening does not give you precedent to 'call me out' on somehow being wrong about said opinion. If you have a different opinion I can live with that, but I won't stand for the blatant gaslighting you're attempting here. I call that out for the dishonesty that it is.

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Hell, Amazon even have conflated numbers with their prime. So there's an even higher expertise in research required since a lot of people who watch will watch "just because" there's nothing else and they already pay for it. It's the same with any streaming service really. There's lots of things people watch just because and it's a factor any researcher have to take into account to gauge the popularity and success of a show.

Yeah, there has been plenty of manipulation on Amazon's part. I wouldn't be surprised since they literally have the money to do this.

[rhorle]

And there are articles covering exactly your questions.

That only explains the rumor. Not why you think every rumor has to be answered. Or why a show is seen as bad by the studio when not answering those rumors. If lack of addressing a rumor only makes it possibly true then silence is not deafening. Every rumor is potentially true. So it not being refuted doesn't mean anything. Seeing as how you are saying Amazon manipulated numbers and stuff wouldn't you just say they are lying if they said that rumor isn't true?

The best line from your article: Of course, this rumor comes from an "anonymous insider source", and it is published by people who are openly vitriolic towards The Rings of Power

[Triceron]

That only explains the rumor. Not why you think every rumor has to be answered.

Why does it matter to you what I think about rumors being answered? Why do you need an explanation at all? Surely I don't owe you one, considering my personal opinion does not concern you in the slightest.

Why are you gatekeeping, Rhorle? Why are you being so dishonest against anything and everything I say? I didn't poop in your cheerios, you picked it up and put it there yourself.

[rhorle]

Why does it matter to you what I think about rumors being answered?

That is what the topic of the discussion has been. It isn't gate keeping to ask you to explain yourself.

[Triceron]

I mean that rather compounds the point that your the one being dishonest because of last experience with Rhorle.

Just to follow up on this, I find it funny that after I've addressed this you've fallen quite silent. Like you only came out to point out my supposed dishonesty, but not address Rhorle at all.

I wonder what this says about you, Lorgar.

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That is what the topic of the discussion has been. It isn't gate keeping to ask you to explain yourself.

You aren't owed an explanation. All you did was accuse me of expressing an opinion you happen to not agree with, for pages, and failed a gaslighting attempt. All you were looking to do was argue for the sake of arguing, something I've pointed out from the start.

[rhorle]

You aren't owed an explanation, and that has never been the topic considering you've accused me for pages before now asking something you could have easily asked at the start, instead of asking one after a failed gaslighting attempt in trying to tell me my opinion was wrong.

The topic has been about your comment that Amazon's silence is deafening from the start. Things weren't asked at the start because discussions evolve as participants contribute. If you don't wish to discuss then stop responding. This is why I said to put me back on ignore because you always start out with civil discourse but rarely stay there.

[Triceron]

The topic has been about your comment that Amazon's silence is deafening from the start. Things weren't asked at the start because discussions evolve as participants contribute. If you don't wish to discuss then stop responding. This is why I said to put me back on ignore because you always start out with civil discourse but rarely stay there.

It's not civil when your line of argument is "the silence is not deafening" and trying to gaslight an opinion that I've expressed. One that I've clearly explained to you that I am completely fine with mutual disagreement, and that your gaslighting attempts are pointless and trivial.

I don't need to ignore you, I'm fine with breaking down your bullshit right here in front of you. I mean, why would I give up the chance to throw the bullshit coming out of your mouth back in your face? That's half the reason I come to these forums.


Let's see what you've said so far. You made claims that Amazon doesn't say anything about their shows after the series release. After I pointed it out multiple times and you failing to put any effort into looking into something that was easily googled up, you admitted you were wrong.

So how did you come about to make the claim in the first place? Well I can tell you how. You bullshitted it, out of clear ignorance. If you simply weren't aware, then I gave you the benefit of the doubt and provided the example of the Boys. The fact you kept pushing it shows that you chose to double down on your bullshit.

You never confirmed your own claims. You didn't bother looking into it even after I told you about the Boys. You weren't regarding the conversation civilly at all. You were merely doubling down on your blatantly wrong excuse, and using it to perpetuate a pointless argument. At no point did you relent and consider that your own claims may be unconfirmed, you doubled down on it as if it were true. Now, what would happen if I didn't know about the Boys? If I didn't know about Amazon's own actions prior to Rings of Power? What you would be presenting in this argument would effectively be gaslighting with bullshit. Trying to pass off your bullshit as fact. This is dishonest as fuck.

You see? I don't need to put you on ignore at all. I can put stuff up like this right here in front of you. For everyone to acknowledge the bullshit that you're already full of. I already expose your attempts at twisting facts, pushing bullshit as fact, and gaslighting. Simply said, this was never a civil discussion because you came at this in bad faith from the start. You may have fooled Rageonit and Lorgar, but they seem suspiciously silent now and don't seem to be running to your defense.

[rhorle]

It's not civil when your line of argument is "the silence is not deafening" and trying to gaslight an opinion that I've expressed.

Having an opposite opinion is not gaslighting. Why is it that discussion can only happen when everyone agrees with you? If you are fine with mutual disagreement then stop attacking because we disagree on something. Lmao.

[InfiniteCharger]

It does not. Again, look at the date the article about his resignation was posted. You do know how to tell date and time, right? I'm not guessing about him being involved with the deal. I used another source, a person that was invited to Amazon events and got information first-hand, as evidence of him still being in charge when the deal was signed.

Again, the point was the same site you referenced contradicted themselves and you are basing your statement on an article from an unnamed and unverified "source". Whereas the article contradicting this has an actual verified source showing the date of resignation. You seem not to be able to grasp the fact that his being involved was unlikely if he "officially" resigned long before the deal was announced. He may have still had some role at the estate but no longer in authority to affect any plans or activities taking place.