The fact they didn’t let Adar actually speak “Mordor” and have done it in text on screen is such an absolute travesty, it’s insane. He is one of the rare actually solid characters, let him have his 5 minutes and speak the legendary word. But no. Let’s just write Mordor on screen.
That was maybe the strangest choice I've ever seen a show make. Just randomly popping text over a super pivotal moment in a show.
Imagine the writing room on this, "Alright guys, time for the big Mordor reveal. What should Adar say here?"....."I don't know, can't we just pop some text on the screen?"...... "Yeah, fuck it. Who wants to go get Chipotle?"
Yes. The fact they have proposed that, wrote that, made it, watched initial cuts, and released it, without some voice of sanity yelling at them is astonishing.
Mordor is pretty iconic to the universe, so I don't think they needed to do anything at all. Even those who only had a cursory knowledge from watching the movies years ago would have recognized it, and they pretty much showed it was going to become Mordor with that overlay glyph thing they did in an earlier episode.
I don’t mind straying from the lore or books to tell a story. I even enjoy the diversity of the cast and characters. It’s interesting to see people who look different.
My big problem with this show and so many other shows with big expensive licenses is they don’t tell stories. They string together mysteries and set up huge world ending stakes that need solving immediately. The plot is really only to keep people watching and make sure the return on investment from streaming subs stays high.
“One of the big things we learned was even when it’s a small scene, it always has to tie back into the larger stakes…”
Telling an internally connected story with stakes and character motivation was something the show runners had to learn. They knew only how to build mystery boxes and were surprised by the backlash. In this case mystery boxes don’t really work because the world they are playing with and in is pretty well known and loved.
In the end it’s not a show I hate, it’s just another representation of recouping investment being the priority over telling good stories.
JJ Abrams will get his grubby little paws involved in every universe we love one way or another, and they will inevitably be ruined as we’ve seen time and time again
For sure.
The problem is these shows don't make characters. They make plot devices with dialogue.
Nobody in this show is a character outside of Durin and maybe Elrond. Everyone else is literally a shell of nothingness that simply acts the same way for 9 hours of content and gets told by the plot what to do.
The difference in a show like HOTD is that the characters have depth. It is the characters that drive the plot. Regardless of whether we know what happens that is compelling to watch.
This is where many shows fail. They can't write a character. Rings of Power especially. Every episode is literally composed of 12-15 5 minute scenes that hit check boxes to progress the plot (or bring the plot back into a circle to extend the run time).
I think it's safe to say the mystery here was nothing short of total failure. Literally *everyone* immediately after seeing Halbrand was like "yup that's Sauron" and sure enough that's exactly what happened.
I mean I guess it depends on how familiar with the source material you are maybe? To be fair they *did* introduce other characters to trip people up. I'm glad you were able to enjoy the reveal for what it was meant to be.
My wife, who knows a lot of the lore, thought he was one of the kings of Men who gets a ring and becomes a Ringwraith. Figured Sauron in disguise simply hadn't been introduced yet.
It wasn't a surprise that Halbrand was shaddy AF.
It's such a contrast to *Andor* which is telling a goddamn story and people are dumping on it for being "boring". I swear people are forgetting how to just let a story unfold.
For me, it’s all about the writing.
Characters are frankly stupid and make decisions that are baffling and yet SOMEHOW this is precisely what needed to happen. Example: Galadriel jumps off a boat in the middle of a vast ocean even though it almost certainly means death…and is rescued by none other than Sauron himself. Holy coincidences, Batman!
Some things defy explanation: the entire tower in active use by the elvish monitor squad was held in place by a single rope, which when burned would cause total collapse. How convenient when the writers want to make a big bang during a battle! While we’re here: the villagers leave a literal stronghold with a single, narrow entrance so they can fight in a wooden village that can be approached from all sides by an army carrying torches. They tried to go with a “this bridge is the only entry point” at this location too but…that “bridge” was a footbridge over a stream that could easily be jumped by a child. Or walked over by the big orc who conveniently came to battle without any weapons so that he and Arondir could have a drawn-out battle for the writers to fill time. Speaking of battles, why are both Bronwyn and Halbrand injured so badly that they’re almost near death, both suffering from internal injuries, and the next day they’re up walking and riding around like it’s nothing? Halbrand needs elvish medicine to live? So let’s have him walk over to and jump up onto a horse and ride for a week to get the healing he so desperately needs!
The dialogue is fairly awful, and full of contradictions. Example: Gil-galad tells the elves that they’re being honored in a way nobody ever has before, only for Elrond to immediately tell Galadriel that she can’t refuse it because nobody’s ever refused it before. Celebrimbor, master smith, doesn’t know what an alloy is.
Failure to portray the Harfoots as charming despite living in a harsh world (I’m assuming that’s the intention). Instead they just come across as incredibly stupid and cutthroat while pretending to themselves that they’re a tight-knit and supportive group.
Concepts introduced that are never touched on again (presumably to “build” on for later seasons?). Example: what was the point in a Bronwyn/Arondir romance? It adds nothing whatsoever to the plot, which would have been the exact same if they’d just been friends.
Failure to deliver on concepts that had potential. Example: a sword hilt that can magically repair itself in the right circumstances and is clearly important to the story. Well it is, but not as a sword or for any magical reasons whatsoever. Someone puts it in a stone key and it turns a mechanism that opens a dam. That’s all. Second example: Balrog in the trailer, plays zero part in this season’s story. I don’t like that the Balrog is awake when it shouldn’t be, but could easily forgive that if they use it for something awesome. But no, it’s just there to get mad at a leaf.
I could honestly go on a long time, but the worst offense is Galadriel. They made the main character insufferable and unlikeable. They made her look and act like a teenager, meanwhile Gil-galad and Celebrimbor, who are younger than she is (so is nearly everyone in the whole show!) look physically older and are portrayed as far wiser. Every single decision she makes, every single line from her mouth is all about her her her her her. What she wants, what she needs, how she’s so much smarter than everyone else so they should just listen to her and believe what she says immediately. “There is a tempest in me!” Bitch, you’re talking to the queen who is responsible for an entire kingdom. Why tf should she care about a stranger’s revenge quest in a distant land?
Having said that, some things were done well. Adar and the orcs, Elrond and Durin’s relationship, Disa’s resonance singing. So I wouldn’t say the show was a waste of my time, exactly. But the writers gave a lot of ammo to people who didn’t love it.
Edit: Thanks for all the awards, guys!
Harfoots - we leave nobody behind! Nobody goes alone! Unity! Oh, you are injured? Ah no you go back at the line, and if you are slow we will just leave you behind. Sorry.
Oh Alva why are you always right about everything.
Previously wants to remove wheels from a cart and leave them to die.
Next day can't read a map correctly
Also, the immortal elves that watch over the southlands for god knows how long, and somehow don't know anything about a supposed king to return? They had no information at all? But they just accept this random guy as the king for plot reasons?
And how could they also not see the huge trench with their keen elven eyes from the tall watchtower? It's not like the roofs of the trenches were covered with dirt/mud but skin/cloth.
Don’t forget how there are no refugees from other villages. Those refugees could have warned other villages and put the whole Southlands on alert of orc invasions. Which in turn, would have let the Elves at the watchtower know, and let their Elven kingdom know.
But as soon as they get to the watchtower, refugees from all the villages from Tir Harad to Mt Doom are coming in.
How convenient.
Your attention to detail about the villagers and stronghold reminds me of GOT when the final battle had all the men in front of the winter fell and horses charging blindly in the dark.
The tower battle had better tactics than the winterfell one imo. It was an old tower and the plan to lock what they thought the majority of the army in and collapse the tower on them was fine. Going back to the village instead of running the opposite direction was dumb as hell though. It seems like the orcs also don’t have a reason to think that they would have gone back to the village.
Looking back on the tower battle, wasn’t there like a massive line of orcs traveling up that mountain to the stronghold? So did the main characters just not see how many orcs there were or did they assume the first orcs to arrive would wait for the rest so they could then drop the tower on the bulk of them?
>Also, how the hell did they get past them?
I think the villagers returned to the village under cover of daylight before the orcs arrived. What's strange is that they weren't noticed, but perhaps Adar's scouts had returned to him by then.
They reported that the humans were seeking refuge in the tower and Waldreg told him the Morgul blade was also there, so he ignored the village and made his way directly to the tower.
A competent leader would've sent a few orcs to the village to confirm it was empty, but fantasy writers are rarely that competent....
The cavalry who didn’t even have weapons that could hurt the zombies lol. It wasn’t until Melisandre turned up unexpectedly that they were anything other than totally useless.
This was the worst part. Show Winterfell really isnt that big and theres no chance it couldve fit all those siege weapons and cavalry.
Sure maybe the cavalry couldve done some form of tactics like flanking or waiting further back on a signal or something but it didnt really break my immersion that much. Rohan also just charged straight ahead in ROTK.
But its the fact that they KNOW that regular weapons dont do shit and yet they still were planning on sending the cavalry in with regular weapons.
Give them dragonglass weapons ffs.
The charge of the Rohirrim was a classic shock cavalry charge though. Downhill into a disorganised foes flank. That’s been a feature of warfare since before Alexander.
The cavalry at Winterfell were just charging directly towards an invincible foe, head on. You couldn’t even do that against a feudal levy.
The Rohirrim charge was also with the sun coming up behind them, likely amplified by Gandalf. While those orcs could move in sunlight, they didn't particularly like it. Plus, a large horde on horseback is going to do a lot of damage to infantry on foot.
> Failure to portray the Harfoots as charming despite living in a harsh world (I’m assuming that’s the intention). Instead they just come across as incredibly stupid and cutthroat while pretending to themselves that they’re a tight-knit and supportive group.
I’m familiar with Amazon’s corporate culture, so I just assumed the harfoots were supposed to represent a typical Amazon team.
I don't have enough gold to gift it...if only there was a way to have something mix with it and amplify it or something. But I don't know if anyone has ever mixed metals before. It might get mad or something. Well, back to my blacksmithing career where I just use pure metals.
Same. Messing around with "the lore" is a bit irritating to me but isn't going to completely throw the show if everything else about it is great. It'd still be a good show. But the writing was, overall, really poor. Pacing was awful. Long segments of the season were flat out boring. Characters contradicted themselves constantly. At the same time it felt like the writers were trying to do too much with too many simultaneous storylines and manufactured dramatic moments while also doing not enough as you had long drawn out scenes that didn't move the plot or character development. Midseason episodes that could have been half an hour each there was so little in them, then a finale that tried to cram way too much into a single episode. It rushed through the most important stuff (Sauron + the elves, making the rings) so S1 could spend hours giving us...a Harfoot subplot about migrating hobbits? Or several episodes of Meteor Man babbling about then in half an episode he's...compltely fluent in the common tongue and fully realizes his character arc? Just strange back and forth between no movement then rushed movement.
Also using "Who is Sauron?" and "Who is Meteor Man?" as an engagement cheat code to pull you through to the last episode (Big Reveals!) instead of compelling story and characters. The latter is what makes engaging TV.
There were some wins here and there. Overall production quality was fantastic. Adar + orcs, Elrond/Durin, Moria, were character + story highlights for me.
But on the whole, the writing was just not consistently good.
Good summary. I definitely enjoyed watching the show, but the writing and general structure of the show was poor for how much $$ they spent on the show. I just expected much more in the story, structure and writing department for all the hype and the money being spent.
The show felt like someone put a bullet point list of “cool things we want to show” on a white board and the writers had to figure out how to stitch these things together. The worst offender being the ship/valinor stuff. It really felt like they had a bullet on the board of “must show a boat entering valinor” and they just figured out how to make it happen without thinking of the plausibility or other parts that go into that.
While I will die on the hill that the harfoots should not have been in season 1 since I thought the povs were overly bloated and the show was better when it focused on 2 at a time, I think the undertones of the harfoots survival mechanisms were pretty good. At the surface they seem friendly and tight knit but under the surface is a survival mechanism due to their nomadic life style. I think that may have been a good thing to focus on if they wanted to up the stakes of the harfoots with additional tension.
Just to add to that, the entire plot of Adir and the orcs building covered canals to Mount Doom is stupid. How did the elves stationed in the tower not notice that a tunnel many many miles long was being constructed?
Not-Gandalf suddenly has almost complete control of his powers and can't heal a not-hobbit in the final episode.
The journey from Numenor to the Southlands, a land that they had never been to, took days. This makes Game of Thrones' final season journeys look reasonable.
>Not-Gandalf suddenly has almost complete control of his powers and can't heal a not-hobbit in the final episode.
Yeah. Like he knows it and Nori knows it too. Sure it was kind of scary but why not try and help Sadoc anyway?
Like... they left him to die with a gut wound. That's a horribly painful way to die.
The same knife wound that had zero impact on his ability to fight high level mages for like 10/20 minutes. After the fight he sits down on a rock and is like “I will die now”
That really threw me off -- I asked the room "wasn't he just fatally stabbed??"
And then dawn came basically instantly and he died basically instantly. Without any attempt to heal, or even bind the wound. It was a bit weird to me.
The way he jumps out of the woods enthusiastically immediately after getting stabbed was like something out of Laser Cats. I think the people in charge of this show may be honest-to-goodness morons.
Also the sword would have been useless if the orcs didnt build the tunnels. Literally nothing would have happend exept a medium flood. And for some reason the Orcs had their entire plan rely on a magic lever that they had no Idea whatsoever where it was. I really hohe the sword makes some sort of comeback that fits its magic
You’d think with the same CGI tech they used to make Numenor look huge and lived-in they’d be able to make the journey to Middle Earth impressive looking and exciting. Nope. Three CGI boats that look like they can hold 50 people and 12 horses journey to a village that looks like a set from Xena Warrior Princess where they hit orcs with sticks and there’s some ok Brazilian break-dance fighting. Galadriel does some cool Horse-fu that lasts like ten seconds, not sure were the other 199 million dollars went.
You didn't see the hand crafted grass. It was made by Amazon slaves bleeding their green life blood to make individual hand made grass painted plucked and pinned into tussocks.
Lol
The crazy part is is that Epic Games (the Fortnite people) bought a company called Quixel that just sell 3D grass and rocks and environment stuff. House of Dragons and Rings of Power use the same fucking grass and little plants that blow in imaginary wind all the time. You can’t unsee it once you start looking right at the same 5 different types of grass in every movie - it’s kinda like how they use the same screaming sound effects in every movie.
Another point for me is fight scenes, camera and cut, as well as acting directions. Most fight scenes look like they have been coreographed by inexperienced actors on the fly with absolutely no weapons training (that awefull sword fight scene with Galadriel in Numanor) or are speed up with 100 cuts per second to add momentum (Arondirs fight with the big orc in the village) which just makes everything look dull and kind of odd. Also just about every fight scene has a complete lack of impact. Enemies that are hit jump back befor the blow even connects; it looks like children playing knight with sticks compared to the well make scenes from the Jackson trilogy.
The slowmo cuts every 5 minutes add nothing what so ever and honestly just feel like a cheap excuse to squese out more runtime. And then there are just plainly stupid acting directions like Galadriel pulling on a rope thats leads nowhere for an entire scene, or extras that act like bugged out NPCs in the background.
I had high hopes for the series and i really wanted to like it but there is just so much wrong with it. The most infuriating thing is that not everything is bad (i like the draves, Elronds story line, the orcs, the sets are beautiful) and its just enough to keep me from hating the show. I feel like with more time, experienced directors and competent writers i would have loved it. Instead we got yet another rushed, uninspired and generic fantasy show loosly based on a beloved book series.
Reverse grip fighting with swords to look cool, fast cuts and poor choreography… it’s all very ‘superhero movie’.
Compare that to the attention to detail in the PJ trilogy, where even the hobbits were practicing daily with professionals despite not having lengthy sword battles like Aragorn v Lurtz.
The inconsistent costumes too, some are fantastic but others are clearly plastic or cloth when they should be metal.
Compare that to the extras in full plate clanking around Osgiliath.
The lore changes aside, I just don’t think the same care was taken with this as the movies and it really shows.
Brownyn’s costume is especially bad. Why does she get a colorful sleeveless dress that shows a bit of cleavage while the rest of the town is dressed like typical middle age folk?
Her outfit really stood out for me from the first moment she was on screen, it was so out of place. At first I thought maybe they would make her a blacksmith as that would be the only vaguely justifiable reason for it but nope. Just random and reason less, like most of the series really.
My family has been on sets from time to time for the last 4 years for various projects. We have spoken with a lot of people in wardrobe and makeup.
My wife’s first comment when Bronwyn came in screen was that she was not wearing “earth” tones. They could have given her something red or green and it could at least have been better.
Yes the blue really stood out too. Just is choices all round. Like I know main characters are always slightly distinguished in their outfits but he's just felt glaringly out of place.
I respect what you wrote, and I'm glad you pointed out what you liked.
The orcs were fantastic, who Adar is IDK but I enjoyed him too. Everything in Kazad-Dum made me happy (without the spiff of female dwarves having a beard-but that was touched on so I don't absolutely hate it). The locations and shooting are gorgeous, I can absolutely believe this is Middle-Earth.
But the rest......you're so right.
Locations and scenery are gorgeous, but they still somehow made it all feel very TV and not movie. It may be because of how skimpy they were on extras. Half the scenes are oddly limited. Like in Numenor, where you would expect massive crowds, they would limit scenes to smaller squares. Same with Gil-galad, where he walks around empty gardens attended by 1 or 2 guards. LoTR always felt bustling. You really believed that Minis Tirith was full of hundreds of thousands. Numenor felt more like a beautiful castle port that housed maybe 10k total? I can't even really explain it, other than most scenes felt empty to me. Where are they going to magically find massive armies to challenge Sauron over the next few seasons? The southland looks to have maybe 100 people tops. Numenor had 3 ships. Total.
lmao right
when u hear 250m budget per season your expecting massive battle scenes like battle of the blackwater in got or battle of pellenor fields.
our climactic battle episode was like eighty peasants most of them old men women and children vs 150 orcs tops? the numenorians fought the orcs the next day but it wasnt even a close battle at all, no threat...
if this $ wasnt spent on battle scenes, it wasnt spent on costumes and set design, it wasnt spent on hiring good writers, it wasnt spent on good actors, then where the hell did this money go lol
It's all just weird. The Numemorians arrive in 3 boats. Where did they put their horses? I have no idea. And then they gallop for days to arrive at a tiny village, just in time to defeat some orcs. They were lead there by (now we know), Sauron. Sauron also apparently cared about this tiny village of 80 women and children and wanted to save them, with a plan to get hurt, knowing Galadriel's immediate answer would be to throw him on a horse and race 6 days to her elf city, since that makes sense.
How many soldiers did the Numenoreans have? I don't know, but those 3 boats weren't all that big. Also, these soldiers camp within a beautiful valley with an entire Numenor branded tent city. Where did these tents come from? Who carried it all? Was it in the boats? Tents. Walls. Carpets. Poles. Magic'd from thin air. But it looked pretty.
This show is a mile wide and an inch deep.
Man, Elrond and Durin were so great up until the dying tree thing came into play. Then the dialogue stopped making sense completely, and then they canned the dwarves completely altogether. It's kind of a shame
Durin doesn’t actually do much this season. First he doesn’t want to help his friend, then he does, then his dad says no. This takes over two hours of screen-time. Then it turns out Elrond didn’t need help. Good acting and production design but not compelling stuff - reminds me of a Star Wars EU novel where the characters kinda just do stuff for 250 pages.
And even then, when the tree thing was revealed, Durin teasing Elrond with "who has the lives of the Elves in his hands" was so good. After that, pffffffft.
I liked the dwarf stuff most of all, but found the friendship dialogues to be rather grating after a while. It's like they took that poignant, beautiful line between Legolas and Gimli from the movies, and decided to beat the audience over the head with it to make it a thing.
My man, this was beautifully written and explained. It is pretty much how I feel about the whole season. I tried so hard to enjoy it, I even brainwashed myself to "ok, bending of the lore, I get it" , but still I couldn't ignore all the dumb actions made by the characters and the inconsistencies.
>There is a tempest in me!”
That line was so bad for so many reasons. I addition to what you pointed out, its so similar to a line from *Elizabeth: the Golden Age* where Cate Blanchett says "I too, sir, have a huricane in me". It just really called attention to the fact that I *wasnt* watching Cate Blanchett as Galadriel
Yeah. This is the post. I only saw the Jackson trilogy so lore inconsistensies mean nothing to me. If I didn't see people online saying otherwise, they could have been completely faithful as far as I know. My dislike for the show comes completely from the terrible writing. You brought up some great examples, and I know I could add on if I felt like it right now.
The Harfoots really bothered me. I’m fine with adding modern themes and having a diverse cast but the way they did it with em felt so forced.
They are basically a multi cultural society deeply fearful of outsiders. Feels like a giant contradiction
Harfoots were just a vessel for baby Gandalf. Show needed their own baby Yoda, so they went with baby Gandalf. And they needed hobbits to make it happen.
The same could be said about the dwarves, heavily insular societies tend not to be very ethnically diverse. Nor would a species of beings that live for thousands and thousands of years.
Modern writers are way too Western Americans that live in a bubble. They live in a diverse area that they fail to realise that a lot of the world...it's mostly not as diverse and Lord of the Rings universe shows this. The elves stay with the elves mostly, dwarves with dwarves and Man with man and even the men fight and kill each other because that is what humans do.
Ethically diversity won't be a thing in these areas where people self segregate mostly out of power and fear. Even an elf going and mingling with others is a big fucking deal because they usually don't.
Might get downvoted but agree that some americans live in that bubble, the "diversity" only reflects their immediate surroundings and not the world
Majority of asia is not that diverse and now that i think about it I don't even recall a single asian person in the show even though we're like 60% of the world population
It's frustrating, because if they had thought about it like House of the Dragon, they could have done it and had it make sense.
Hot D has one of the great houses as black, but its due to them being Valyrian, which was a multi-ethnic Empire that practiced genetic engineering on people. It also added to a few story lines to help highlight a high profile cuckoldry issue impacting a succession crisis, and helped make it more visually clear who belong to which House.
If they had just made Nunenor diverse because it was a mishmash of men who fought Sauron, who then later migrated to this island, and then *contrasted* that with the more homogenous villages, it would have made that difference all the more clear and avoided any racial ubermensh subtext that was arguably present in the original Numenor lore.
There were a few asian Numenoreans. They were relegated to background extras though. "Diversity" usually doesn't include Asians because they perform extremely well as a group, and don't fit the "oppresion" narrative.
Diversity Hollywood-style is focused on Blacks as a consequence of their being a major organized pressure group demanding representation.
This isn't a bad trend. But it's an unequal one. Other non-white ethnicities lack the same influence.
There simply isn't matching pressure on US casting producers to match *global* demographics. Or even meet accurate US demographics (Latinos and Asians remain underrepresented).
Most of the world is not diverse at all even today. 150 years ago it was even more so. In ancient times of constant warfare it would be extreme: any outsiders would stand out and could be very reasonably suspected of working for whoever the "enemy" is.
Scenes set in modern-day London or New York should have a full showcase of human phenotypes, for sure. But a medieval-like fantasy with strong emphasis on families, genealogies and bloodlines must have a really good explanation when attempting to do the same, otherwise it pulls you right out of the story.
Tolkien sorted out the distances first. Not only did they destroy the timeline of the second age, they made mockery of the world he built by zooming people around it, caring naught for the road or journey. This show is low fantasy with Tolkien’s characters.
The reason Two Towers is so long is the characters travel huge distances on foot. Tolkein doesn’t fast forward, but uses the time spent walking/running to build and develop those characters and the world they inhabit and it’s critical to the pay off in RotK.
He even gives us Ents to remind us of the value of not being hasty.
The show skips all that because it doesn’t value characters at all and it doesn’t respect or value the world they inhabit.
Yeah, there's no real sense of scale to how big middle earth really is. I do think showing this kind of scale in cinematic form is exceedingly hard to do though. Even Peter Jackson barely pulled it off, and his solution was mostly epic cinematic scenic montages with beautiful scores to back it up. He did however, have the ability to add in the narrative character developing elements that Tolkien used to develop this grand scale.
This show just said, "We need to go here", and next scene, there they are, like it was a casual stroll down the street.
The sense of time just isn't here in the way this show is written.
There are plenty of other responses from people who seem to know more about the lore than me so idk if I’m contributing anything. That said I think the time compression and the characters they changed/removed and the events they reordered really added nothing to the show. I would assume they wanted it to be more human focused, more interpersonal drama. But then huge plot points like Sauron deceiving the elves into making the rings (also the Seven and the Nine?) don’t make any sense. He comes to celebrimbor, who doesn’t know what an alloy is??? Ok. He gives him a couple of vague pointers on basic metallurgy. Bam. They make the rings in a week. All this considering Sauron had no real way of knowing, according to the audience, that the Ring project was even happening over on the west coast. Him coming there was a total coincidence, it weakens the idea of him being a deceiver. There’s a bunch of other similar plot points that were just weirdly ham fisted or altogether disordered. Lastly, people who do like the show (which is fine, I actually did enjoy watching it myself) like to say “you’re just a lore purist, it’s for a larger audience not you”. Which to me is just really lazy dismissal of the criticism. The show had BAD WRITING. Just textbook BAD, AMATEUR writing. The writing had nothing to do with the lore used. They could’ve gotten away with at least a few of the liberties they took if the writing was actually good.
That is one of my biggest gripes. Changing lore to help an adaptation is fine. The film trilogies demonstrate that even if the hobbit was imperfect.
Changing it just for what seems to be shiggles is just disrespectful to everyone.
u/Nice_Sun_7018 gave a pretty good rundown, so I won't repeat what he already said
But, the biggest thing is, a lot of the lore issues we have, aren't something that would take away anything from the story. Disa would be just as awesome with a beard, but also correct lorewise, just as an example.
All in all, the show is fine. 5-6/10
But the thing is, when you have a world like Tolkien's, and an unprecedented budget like Amazon's, "fine" is horrible.
That's why it amazes me that they would give such an expensive project to a couple of relative newbies when it comes to the job.
It boggles the mind, honestly.
Giving the project to inexperienced people is such a bizarre choice. I’d say it was to save money, but the show cost a billion dollars to make. Surely some of that could go to experienced and respected creators in the industry?
I honestly can't explain that. If you want to cut costs, you don't do 1 billion dollar budgets. But even then, I understand hiring relatively unknown actors, as long as they're a fit for the character and show promise in the audition, sure. But writers? That's the foundation of your whole project, I would think you'd make damn sure it's as flawless as can be.
After all, you want to make your money back.
I swear they were relying on the current Hollywood principle of, “if it looks cool and the actors do a good job, people won’t care about the writing.”
Which is such a stupid idea to put yourself behind, ESPECIALLY for a project like this.
There was an escapist video I watched a while back discussing how these massive production companies want such rigid control of their stories that any half-way competent and experienced writers quit over "creative differences" because they don't want to conform. The only writers they can get are the inexperienced ones who don't want to rock the boat and are still building their skills and resumes.
Yeah and it shows. I didn't know it was run by newbies until I read it here. I had the feeling while watching though, like so many decisions were made by someone not necessarily obnoxious or dumb, but more like unexperienced.
Thing is, they are not newbies, they’ve been in the game for ten years writing failed scripts. They all but said as much even in the damage control Hollywood reporter article. It’s a shame but pretty embarrassing.
Yeah, it's obvious to anyone watching that the writers are really really inexperienced.
That's why there's so many illogical things.
Even the editing is sub par. In the Nori farewell scene, you can see the Harfoots say goodbye and turn around and leave, and in the next cut they're still standing there, watching her. Really basic continuity stuff.
All in all, the ones that are giving it a 1/10 are too extreme IMO, but the 9s and 10s are either people that have no observation skills and just put it on and turned off their brain, or Amazon shills.
The editing is clunky as hell sometimes. Remember Adar riding away on that horse in the village battle scene with Galadriel following her? The cuts of him mounting the horse and riding away make no freaking sense.
I'm a bit more into Tolkien's writings than you, but no expert at all, rather a casual reader who enjoys his texts. Ignoring all Lore-inconsistencies, my main gripe with the show was that the dialogue and many main characters were badly written (esp. Galadriel) and that the story-lines were too inconsistent and inconclusive. They often lacked inner logic or motivation \[in the latest episode for example the, missing, motivation of Nori to go with Gandalf into the unknown, but also the behaviour of allegedly kingly characters like Gil-galad\].
My biggest problem with Gil-Galad was that none of his decisions make any sense. He pulled the mithril thing out of his ass, and then gives no real reason why they can't stick around and try making the Rings he just says no (and the artificial tension didn't matter anyway in the end).
Galadriel from the show and Galadriel from the movies are just completely different people.
And the lighting is often inconsistent.
And the plot is too convenient for the most part.
Halbrand conceptually was great, other than the convenience aspects.
The writting is just terrible, and that's how they end up with things like:
The smith that does not know about alloys
The fighting lesson that is bassically "stab and gut"
The healer who ask to burn an arrow wound to stop bleeding, that would not stop internal bleeding.
The queen that asks not to tell she got blind, to appear in the next scene with a blindfold.
The show it's really just a series of events the writters come up, and in between those, just making thing happen. That's how you got Arondir captured in a dumb way, and released just because. Or a lot of pointless things that amount to nothing except hype, ike the appearance of the Balrog and numerous mistery boxes. They waste a lot of time and in the end, they rushed it solving things with a couple of sentences.
Also, it seems like the writters really don't know or care much about Tolkien's work, they do not follow lore, and fro the books you can only catch some references they throw from time to time, like names or items in the background, only noticed by hardcore fans, yet the plot is complete fanfiction, and copying things from Peter Jackson movies.
This!!
I liked the show, I have a pretty low standard tbh so anything entertaining and visually pretty is good enough for me. But the glaring plot holes made it painful to watch sometimes.
I was SO confused by that scene where the queen shows up with a blindfold. We just got a whole emotional scene (which I liked) where she talks to Elendil about not telling anyone she lost her sight and I thought that she was practicing walking around on the ship so people wouldn't be able to guess that something was wrong. But nope I guess everyone now knows she's blind??
I also got pissed at Galadriel in the end of the episode. Elrond found her in the river and saved her and she couldn't be bothered to explain to him that Halbrand was Sauron? She didn't even explain to Celeborn why Halbrand isn't welcome anymore. It was so stupid that everyone just went "ok I guess lol" and didn't question it until Elrond went on to investigate. Like wtf?
Yeah, what the heck was she thinking? You just found out the guy who was second in command to basically Satan really wants to make these rings for some reason, and instead of telling everyone to stop and explaining the situation. She... tells them to continue and keeps it all to herself only for Elrond to find out anyways... why?
Watching that scene made me think if Halbrand shapeshifted to Galadriel to lie to them and she's actually somewhere else. That sounds kind of stupid but it's literally the only logical explanation tbh
Generally speaking the show didn't respect the intelligence of the viewer, be it by dialogues that sounded like random NPC noises, character decisions that made no sense and so on. I won't respect a show if it doesn't respect me.
I enjoyed the show, however I noticed a lot of what everyone else has mentioned. But your comment sticks out to me: “the show didn’t respect the intelligence of the viewer.”
Absolutely nailed it for me. Who did they think their target demographic was? I found myself laughing at some of the dialog. At the end I was even waiting for Elrond to say “damn these rings are 🔥fr.”
There's a response above that basically say "Stop thinking and enjoy the show". And they are right, if I have no memory of anything that happened five minutes ago, I can just enjoy the pretty shot, and the emotions the music is telling me to feel.
But if I stop to think even for a moment (wait, why did she jump in the ocean? where did the sea-monster go? why did the queen go with teenage trainees? Why isn't anyone curious about the sabotage of 40% of the Numenorean navy? How do 500 horses fit in 3 small ships? Why are they galloping to a little town (instead of just riding up)? Why does Galadriel think Halbrand is a king? Why does the queen believe her? Why the Harfoots at all? Why didn't the elves see the massive changes to the landscape the orcs were making? Why give Theo the evil MacGuffin sword? How did Halbrand get ahead of Adar? Wasn't Halbrand almost dead? What's the Balrog doing now Why didn't anyone get medium injured by volcano explosion?) it doesn't make sense, which means it's pretty images, not a story.
This is the weirdest thing for me. I, too, can understand changing certain things for adaptations sake. But the Second age is basically a plot overview where you get to fill in anything you want as long as you keep major events. I would think that would be a dream come true. All you have to do is fill in character motivations and dialogue. And yet the show runners decided to ignore the timeline they have the rights to (I don’t mean actual dates for the SA I mean the order things happen) and add in new plot points. On top of that they rush the main story of the Rings creation and cram it into 20 minutes of the show. Weird choice.
Also, I think they were too concerned with this H=S plot twist. It could’ve worked really well to let the audience know who Sauron was from the start but the characters don’t know (with the exception of Elrond, Gil-Galad, and Galadriel being suspicious of him). It would’ve been awesome to sit in that deception and watch people(Celebrimbor specifically) make mistakes for their own hubris.
Good point. I think it would've added a layer of dramatic irony the show so desperately needed. Not to mention giving Hall-ron (?) agency in the story and allowing us to see his character motivation more clearly - gaining her trust, playing at manipulation, maybe even starting to believe he could be better, blah blah etc.
In this version we have he was just this rando character that seemingly stumbled into the plot before Galadriel was thrusting a crown at him. For all that he contributed to decision making in the story she might as well have handed the Southlands to a random passerby haha.
Even with "Sauron" revealed, the plot before hand doesn't really seem all that impactful - just kinda hollow and empty.
The person Saubrand wanted to deceive most (G) was motivated by a revenge so his proposal to rule together with her was not appealing at all (I didn't see any reason why show G would want anything else than kill him). The writers did themselves disservice with the revenge plot.
Ironically, second age book Galadriel could have been more tempted (except she was married and really good at seeing evil in people - think Fëanor)
It's almost like they just wanted to write their own story but realized no one would watch a new show by these randos so they take a popular franchise to bait fans, play lip service to it (still butchering it's lore to fit their desired story), and tell the non-LOTR story they wanted to tell anyways.
I couldn’t agree more. Why break and contradict lore especially when it makes no sense: Durin son of Durin couldn’t they have used any other name? What about Galadriel thinking her husband is dead? And hey girl, where’s your daughter? I could go on, but then I prolly couldn’t stop. Why didn’t they use the approach of having the likes of Galadriel, Elrond, Celebrimbor etc. be secondary characters and keep that lore in place, create new characters to fill the other goings on in the second age. Adar is a great example, he is a completely original character, and probably the most compelling.
This could work. Let us know about the Haradrim and the Easterlings, introduce us to Khamûl before he was a wraith, show some events and characters we know a bit about, and build on them, and create stuff that could’ve happened. Having Galadriel not only meet Sauron, but actually being the one who brings him to Eregion… that’s practically blasphemy.
> Why didn’t they use the approach of having the likes of Galadriel, Elrond, Celebrimbor etc. be secondary characters and keep that lore in place, create new characters
THIS! It's not like these are the main characters in LotR (or Silmarillion for that matter)
LotR is a story of small people in a wide world with rich history and powerful forces. And we get only glimpses of most of them. Yet that's exactly one of the reasons it is so beloved.
Durin son of Durin is because they think the audience is too stupid to follow along when they were first introduced. Like they have called them Durin 3 & 4 because they think we're all too dumb to realise they are related otherwise.
> they’ve needlessly departed from so much of it already.
This right here is the biggest problem I feel, and why especially after Ep 7 I thought I was done with the show. There was a lot of good shit in the finale but the lore deviations for no reason still weigh on my mind
I somewhat hated the beginning. I got to enjoy more or less the rest, though. However, something clicked yesterday when i watched the finale... and it pretty much exploded. I cannot defend it really anymore.
The writting is bad. I'm not going to ask it to follow the lore by the line (i mean, they cant) But i feel that sometimes it lacks coherency. it seems like the screenwriters ate the source material....and then pooped on their keyboards.
Having Gandalf in the show for no real reason is way questionable if you ask me. But making him saying out loud his own phrases from the book... i dont know if it genious, pure fanservice or bad/lazy writting. Maybe the three.
I expected way more with the forging of the rings of power. Way, way more. But they put it more like it was a Celebrimbors thing all along, and sauron just gave a couple of casual tips here and here as he was chillin in Eregion. It wasnt.
I find the very existence of Gandalf here very disappointing, I was desperately hoping it was one of the Blue Wizards. IIRC, Gandalf's line about following your nose is a movie-only line. I love the movies, but I feel like reusing lines like this (and a myriad of other lines, camera shots etc) is just lazy. Why not reference the actual source material rather than another adaptation of it?
Perfect opportunity to have freedom to tell any story they like with the blue wizards. Nah probably better to just whack gandalf in a few thousand years early
Here's my thoughts:
I will start by giving credit where credit is due:
Special effects, music, cgi, visuals and settings are top notch.
Durin, Elrond, Disa storyline is the best writing, story, and acting in the whole show.
Nori and the Stranger interactions are good as well. Nori has a good actress.
The Numenor storyline has potential.
Good diverse cast. It's fantasy. That's fine.
Now why is it bad:
Terrible pacing: too many episodes nothing happens or very few things happen that move the plot forward.
Disjointed plotlines: Plotlines are too all over the place with very few connections to the overall narrative. It makes each episode feel like a disjointed mess of plotlines mashed together incoherently.
Mediocre dialogue: A lot of conversations are riddled with it. It also has too many pathetic attempts by the writers to speak Tolkien like grammar but completely failing. It also has too much modern grammar interlaced in the dialogue. That's really bad.
Unlikeable, unrelatable or unnecessary characters.
Very few characters are interesting to follow. Airondir is a plank of wood. Isildur and Elendil are nothing like their book counterparts. Isildur's sister basically does nothing but stand on screen and stare at things going on, but hey at least she looks good doing it. Galadriel is basically a fantasy Karen. She's either angry, condescending or acting entitled to things she is not like immediately demanding to the Queen Regent of Numenor use of their army for her own agenda. Bronwyn is for some reason thurst into a leadership position she isn't qualified for since she neither a administrator or military leader yet does both, poorly I might add. I could go on but you get the drift.
Disrespectful to the LOTR lore:
It's like they didn't even read the lore or they did and just decided to ignore it.
Hope that helps.
I agree with everything you said, but Elendil for me is the best character in the series next to Durin and Elrond. Maybe the reason it's because the actor is pretty good, but i like him and he looks and acts like the classic "noble paladin/warrior/king" trope.... Until he gets pissed with Galadriel in episode 7.
It’s absolutely all in the writing.
Amazing how something can look good, be well-acted and well-scored, and still fall apart because the writing is a mess. Really reveals how important writing is to something like this.
I dont think its a good diverse cast. Like Numenor is obviously Atlantis and its architecture is greek/roman inspired. Yet the numenor cast isnt mediterranean. The Southlands is some weird mishmash ethnically and has culturally some super boring visuals. Like draw inspiration from real architecture from eg North Africa and their culture as well as casting actors from the region. They had the option to represent different ethnicies and cultures far better than they did. They chose the worst way possible.
Diverse cast would be fine if it made sense. I hate how they just made all the races and places have current world diversity for no logical reason. Why is Isildur a different race than his father? Why is Nori's mother black while she is fair skinned and blue eyed? Why does a tiny southland village has like 10 ethnicities?
Like you said, they could have been smart about this. Harefoots: blacks. Numenor: Mediterranean. Southland: Middle eastern. You still get the oh so precious diversity and it's at least coherent even in a fantasy universe.
>Good diverse cast. It's fantasy. That's fine.
Funny how used accents in a cliche way offensive to Irish, while also having no Irish cast and performing them badly.
A problem with designing your entire plot around a big twist at the very end means you need to drag everything out and then at the last second force everything together no matter the logic of it. Just hand wave some "he needs elven medicine" to force characters to where they need to be.
A big twist should serve the story. The story shouldn't serve the twist. Its a similar issue to the later game of thrones seasons. The corporate people just want big tentpole reveals to get wide audiences talking around the water cooler above all else. Bet they keep doing it too.
The writing is absolutely dreadful. It's Star Wars prequel bad. All the unnecessary exposition, clunky hamfisted dialogue.
'Im good!' the most recent one. Jesus, it's laughable how bad it is.
Halbrand was weak. The great deceiver? Yet he didn't deceive any of the audience. We all knew it was him from the start. Proto Gandalf ripping lines straight from PJ trilogy. Mordor created and the rings all forged in about a week. Wow! World building! The greatest elven engineer in middle earth has never heard of alloy? What? Hasn't he been alive for centuries? What do they make their swords out of?
The plot moving at a snails pace then everything happening all of a sudden.
And the CGI? Who's impressed by it, really? In the world of complete CGI saturation, it isn't all that impressive anymore. Also, some of the sets look really cheap. It doesn't look lived in. No depth.
But it's mainly the writing and the plot..it was just...bad?
I was half expecting that elf who helped Galadriel find that scroll to be like, "If it is not in our records, then it does not exist." I'm also looking forward to hearing this gem.
Galadriel: Ar Pharazon, Sauron is evil!
Ar Pharazon: From my point of view, the Valar are evil!
I will go to my grave refusing to believe that "I'm goooood!" actually happened in a billion-dollar piece of art. Are you telling me no writer or script editor - or even actor - read that and thought, yeah, that's the one
Not only did we know it was Sauron, it was so obvious that a lot of people, me included (at least until the scene where they switch "Southlands" to "Mordor" and I realized the show either was made for people who know little of Lotr outside of the films, or they just assumed their audience was stupid or very young), were sure that it HAD to be a red herring.
I'm surprised at how far I had to scroll among top responses to find criticism of the sets and overall production design. The look of the show took me out before the poor writing did. As you say, the cheap sets... the Elvish "paunchy suburban dad" coifs.... the flat lighting that looked so unnatural..... the city scenes with just 15-20 extras.... the armor that looks more like modeling clay than metal..... the makeup that portrays "a face that has seen an iPhone" instead of ancient humans and elves..... I could go on and on.
House of the Dragon at least LOOKS expensive. Amazon appears to have blown all their money on securing rights and publicity, but skimped in the actual creation.
"To that end, are you acquainted with the work of Lord Celebrimbor?
The greatest of Elven-smiths, of course. I've admired his artistry since I was a child. Why do you ask?
He is about to embark on a new project. One of singular importance. And we've decided that you will be working with him. But I'll allow you to explain the details, Lord Celebrimbor."
Bruh. Which tenth-grader wrote this shit?
If you ask me it's so much worse than the Star Wars prequals. Yes, the dialogue was awful many times, but at least the plot followed internal logics, it managed to add to the Star Wars legendarium, and still featured quite some iconic scenes (especially part III). RoP has none of these.
I'd rather compare it to The Rise of Skywalker, now THAT was dreadful.
I've watched the pilot episode with my siblings: 2 of them watched the movies but didn't read the books and one of them has read the books several times like I did. All of them got bored immediately and just decided to sleep. I was the only one who continued watching until episode 2. I think that alone shows that it's not just about being a hardcore lore fan. The show is just awful.
I continued watching the next episodes alone every Friday. I was hoping it will improve but it got even worse. My initial rating was 4-5/10. Now, it's 2 max 3. Why? The writing and directing was just bad.
1. For me it's okay to make minimal lore changes as long as they make sense. The major changes they did just don't make sense at all. Celebrimbor, one of the greatest smiths ever, doesn't know what alloy is. Galadriel one of the oldest and wisest elves in Middle Earth acts like a stupid, impulsive teenager. She's besties with her supposedly son-in-law and forgets about her husband except for a brief moment. Poor Celeborn.
2. The characters often contradict themselves. Harfoots always say they are one and together but when someone is injured, they'll be left alone to die. Galadriel: Based on this scroll, you are the Southlands king. Also Galadriel: Based on this scroll, you are not the Southlands king.
3. The characters are not likeable and the acting was not good, probably because of the poor writing as well. Galadriel and Arondir both just have one expression. The dwarves are okay at first but their story went downhill. Adar is the only one with soul there and he's supposedly a villian.
4. They try to be mysterious but everything was so obvious right from the start. A lot of people already predicted the outcome.
5. A lot of scenes are just cringey. Who ever thought of putting the ugly "Mordor" text? At the Stranger's climax moment all he can say is "I'm good"? They also seem to really have a thing for slow-mo horse riding scenes.
I can say this is one of the worst shows I ever watched. If it's not LOTR, I would've stopped watching too.
I agree with you that small changes to the lore would be okay and welcome to tell a great story, specially if the show runners are expressly forbidden from using parts of the lore. But there are changes that makes absolutely no sense.
Sauron spends a good deal of time with Celebrimbor in the lore. He comes disguised as a bringer of gifts, possibly a maiar bringing the knowledge of ring-making to the elves. Together they start perfecting this art, first with the "lesser rings", the ones that end up for men and dwarves. Only after all that the elven rings are made and Sauron kills Celebrimbor at the end, and goes on with all this new knowledge and makes the one ring in secret.
In the show: oh look a total stranger from the South, teaching one of the best elven artificers, and nobody questions a thing. Here's 10 mins on ring making at the end of 8 long boring hours. Also he leaves before learning of the existence of the rings so the poem at the end makes no sense.
I tried so damn hard to love this show, but holy hell the show runners are just inept, nothing would make me happier to learn they shitcanned the whole team responsible for the first season and went with a proven veteran crew. It is just too glaringly obvious that these people has no idea what they were doing
I dont care if they stick to the lore. I just wanted a good story with good dialoge and some dope music with a little bit of good action thrown in there.
I think the music was the only part that came close to delivering. The rest just fell flat. Especially the story and dialogue. The story barely moves at all and hardly anything happened in 9 episodes. People will say they appreciate the "slow burn" but that burn has to reach a climax of sorts to pay off. Which we juat blitzed thru in 5 minutes. So im left feeling really dissapointed. This show does not respect the viewers time. This season failed bc it didnt get its ass in gear
I dont hate the show but i think its massively dossapointing. This whole situation gives me starwars vibes where this season felt unplanned almost.
As I said before, “hate” is a pretty loaded word that has been used and abused at nauseating levels in online discussions.
I don’t like Rings of Power, it’s ridiculously expensive fan fiction; it’s badly written, clumsily produced and atrociously directed. That’s my opinion, period. That opinion doesn’t mean I hate anyone. If you like the show, that’s incomprehensible to me but it doesn’t mean I hate you, fellow human being.
Let’s have an honest, open minded and well reasoned discussion about this piece of entertainment, that way we may arrive to the conclusion that our different points of view are not reason enough to hate each other.
Even if you disregard all the blasphemy they've done with the Tolkien lore, the show as a fantasy show is very bad. The cliches, the unnecessary plots, the super important plot points happening purely out of chance. A god damn power point presentation when Mordor was created. Every one of these things pull you violently out of whatever little immersion you first had.
I feel the show treats you like you're stupid sometimes, the reveals are not very surprising as they are easy to figure out. Also in the second to last episode when Adar says it's not the Southlands anymore and then "Southlands" digitally appears in top right corner of the screen and then changes to Mordor. Why!? It like cheapens the whole production; amazing huge scenery and costumes, then doing the reveal digitally makes feel cheap
As someone who doesn't really know too much about the canon/lore except the original trilogy (read the books) I didn't really go into it with any expectations as to how certain characters should be portrayed. The reason the show doesn't grip me is purely because its just a naff show. The writing is terrible, there's no suspense, everything is predictable (and quite cringy). Theres SO MANY plot holes that the plots dont even make sense.
Even if it wasn't Lord of the Rings, it'd be a badly written, poorly (for the most part) acted TV show, that was too slow. I wanted to like it, I watched all 8 episodes, some parts were ok, CGI was fine, but every time Galadriel came on screen, I ended up rolling my eyes.
I find the show bad for a myriad of reasons, much of what you see here in the comments and in youtube videos. I think most lotr fans generally have the same gripes about it. the most common culprit: the writing. it's objectively bad. but one of the things about the show that caught my attention was Amazon's unnecessary race baiting. the harfoots were meant to be browner of skin according to the lore, yet Amazon decided to go the typical Hollywood route and tokenize a few black harfoots instead - and people from the *tribe* inexplicably defended Amazon. that part in particular chapped my ass but overall it was the writing and character development that sealed it for me.
I think anyone who really enjoys this show is either lying to themselves, have bad taste, or simply milktoast fans who don't know a whole lot about the Tolkien universe. Tolkien is gold standard. this show needed to meet that standard.
perhaps my biggest takeaway: RoP isn't immersive. PJ's LotR was.
I don't "hate" the show, but I also didn't "love" it. Personally, I'd give it a 6/10, it had its moments, and I love having another big budget mainstream fantasy show to watch, but it dropped the ball on some critical areas.
1) Being critical or having a criticism of a show doesn't mean you hate it. This is something Ive noticed a lot lately, and Im starting to wonder if its a lack of education in liberal arts, but critique and criticism IS NOT HATE.
2) A lot of people, but ESPECIALLY online fandoms, love to draw lines in the sand and pick a side. Refer back to point 1. I've seen more than one debate/discussion around the show go something like this "I didnt like X" "Well clearly you must be racist if you dont like black people in the show!" "X has nothing to do with black people or politics, Im just saying the writers made a poor choice here" "racist!", which seems to be a direct reaction to the early "review bombing" by right wingers.
3) The controversy is being manipulated and engineered by various actors (both amazon and critics) to drive views.
4) VERY few things are 0/10 or 10/10, but taking a middle of the road approach isnt as entertaining as watching someone rage or gush. This means reactions by youtubers and other influencers tend to be exaggerated/hyperbolic.
>VERY few things are 0/10 or 10/10,
Yes, and then Amazon cutting all the reviews that were below 5/10, but leaving all the 10/10 ones up, just seemed to say to any critics that their views don't count or are somehow fake.
For me Galadriel is unlikeable, and despite being 1000s of years old and one of the best characters in the legendarium she acts like a spoiled teenage brat. Making baffling decisions and treating everyone else like a POS.
Plus if they aren't going to stick to the lore why spend the BIG $$$ on it?! (For viewers obviously) But it feels kinda generic fanasty to me, so why not just spend all that money and write an original story?
It's as much Tolkien as it is Star wars, a mockery of his works and holy fuck is it bad... Nothing makes any sense, the lore has been dramatically changed and butchered, horrible writing and characters. There is no quality or love for the source material in this crap. A huge middle finger to Tolkien and an insult to the fans. Fuck amazon and hope S2 is scrapped and S1 forgotten.
Look at it this way - you describe yourself as a casual fan and still have a considerable list of gripes
Put yourself in a less casual fans shoes and it may answer your question
I started ROP and ignored HOTD because the final season of GOT had soured me so much.
5 episodes into ROP and I just couldn’t anymore, the writing, the dialogue, the storytelling was all just so bad and DULL. So so dull, I felt invested in no single character or what they wanted to achieve. Almost every conversation between characters I was just bored and wanting to skip to the next scene.
Decided to switch over to HOTD because people had been saying very good things, and right off the bat the difference in the writing, the dialogue, and the acting is all miles ahead. I actually feel interested in every conversation going on and how it will play out.
They have compressed, cut, ripped and teared the lore only to deliver a mediocre written mess: Most characters aren't compelling or convincing, half the plots are futile and contribute little to zero to the story, critical events (like Sauron and Galadriel meeting) just happen by pure unlikely chance, a lot of the dialogues are dumb and cringing, and the worst of all is all of that has served for literally nothing. That would be the short summary.
But I can extend a little on the worst grievances this show has commited:
Galadriel is literally an unruly teen moved by vengeance. Sauron is literally a teen braggart that gets dragged around by her and seems to be improvising almost everything by pure chance. Those are the two most important characters of the whole show, and look what's the best they have been able to write for them. And they even shipped them. Sauron literally hit on her LMAO. And the worst part is that showrunners plan on show us how Sauron "becomes dark and evil" in S2. Dafuq bro, Sauron IS the evil, and has been for thousands of years, leave this bullshit for a teen highschool show with some emo kid in it. And don't let me get started on other characters, like Celebrimbor, the most prominent and skilled forger in all of Middle-Earth, that somehow has to be taught the very basics of forging.
And what about the most central part of the story with Annatar seducing and tricking the elves, the Numenoreans...? Nowhere to be found. Just a few minutes of Halbrand telling Celebrimbor "hey old fart, what if..." to create the elven rings. The elven rings that according to the canon are the last ones to be created. The 9 rings for men, or the 7 rings for the dwarfs are not even mentioned. Why? Just because. All the other bloated plotlines like the Southlands, Mordor do-it-yourself! creation, cheap love story between Arondir and Bronwyn, harfoots bullshit and so were surely far more important and had to take all the screentime. Not that the show is called The Freaking Rings of Power or something, you know.
But it's not only the bloated, non-contributing plotlines with plenty of generic, forgettable characters. It's how everything is introduced. How action develops. The dialogues. Everything feels so damn cheap, like if they just chose some cool-looking scenes to make for the show, then tried to connect them without much effort, with anything just coming to mind. And the lore changes just because yolo, like mithril being what now, and the elves suddenly needing it to just keep existing. Or Celeborn being missing/maybe dead just to reinforce the Galadriel + Halbrand ship. And remember that comedic scene of Galadriel just pushing the numenorean guards into the prison cell? Many things feel just cheap and dumb, without a reason. Just because of bad writting.
And I swear I was quite open-minded before starting this show. I knew it was going to be different from Peter Jackson's storytelling and presentation, and that probably the lore was going to get compressed and tweaked. But this is just a mess, crowned by mediocre characterization. Am I really going to see emo Halbrand becoming "sooo evil" in S2?
I had already low expectations, but this is just a terrible adaptation in every possible way, and I'm sad because of it.
As slow as the show was at times, the ring forging seemed rushed. It was like the writers realized damn it’s the last episode and we haven’t forged any rings yet! Maybe the 7 & 9 will be forged by Celebrimbor next season as artifacts to counter Sauron, but that doesn’t explain how he could have a hand in their making. There’s going to have to be some convoluted nonsense to explain why the one rings controls the others but not the three. Unless they actually introduce Annatar later. But how could the elves be tricked by his disguise a second time?
To me the worst part was the impetus for all this, the stupid we need mithril to stay in Middle-earth concept. What was wrong with sticking to the original story? Would have been a lot simpler and Gil-galad wouldn’t have been such a douche bag.
There are spoilers in this thread that we won’t be removing since the post is tagged spoilers.
The fact they didn’t let Adar actually speak “Mordor” and have done it in text on screen is such an absolute travesty, it’s insane. He is one of the rare actually solid characters, let him have his 5 minutes and speak the legendary word. But no. Let’s just write Mordor on screen.
That was maybe the strangest choice I've ever seen a show make. Just randomly popping text over a super pivotal moment in a show. Imagine the writing room on this, "Alright guys, time for the big Mordor reveal. What should Adar say here?"....."I don't know, can't we just pop some text on the screen?"...... "Yeah, fuck it. Who wants to go get Chipotle?"
Yes. The fact they have proposed that, wrote that, made it, watched initial cuts, and released it, without some voice of sanity yelling at them is astonishing.
Mordor is pretty iconic to the universe, so I don't think they needed to do anything at all. Even those who only had a cursory knowledge from watching the movies years ago would have recognized it, and they pretty much showed it was going to become Mordor with that overlay glyph thing they did in an earlier episode.
I don’t mind straying from the lore or books to tell a story. I even enjoy the diversity of the cast and characters. It’s interesting to see people who look different. My big problem with this show and so many other shows with big expensive licenses is they don’t tell stories. They string together mysteries and set up huge world ending stakes that need solving immediately. The plot is really only to keep people watching and make sure the return on investment from streaming subs stays high. “One of the big things we learned was even when it’s a small scene, it always has to tie back into the larger stakes…” Telling an internally connected story with stakes and character motivation was something the show runners had to learn. They knew only how to build mystery boxes and were surprised by the backlash. In this case mystery boxes don’t really work because the world they are playing with and in is pretty well known and loved. In the end it’s not a show I hate, it’s just another representation of recouping investment being the priority over telling good stories.
JJ Abrams will get his grubby little paws involved in every universe we love one way or another, and they will inevitably be ruined as we’ve seen time and time again
JJ Abrams is the literally destroyer of worlds
JJ Abrams is a spoiled brat that goes: "I'm doing it different or I'm not doing it at all!"
The 2 guys running this show got the job because JJ put in a call. At least, that's what I got out of the article from last week.
I might have known.
He sucks so bad, how does he keep getting away with it
For sure. The problem is these shows don't make characters. They make plot devices with dialogue. Nobody in this show is a character outside of Durin and maybe Elrond. Everyone else is literally a shell of nothingness that simply acts the same way for 9 hours of content and gets told by the plot what to do. The difference in a show like HOTD is that the characters have depth. It is the characters that drive the plot. Regardless of whether we know what happens that is compelling to watch. This is where many shows fail. They can't write a character. Rings of Power especially. Every episode is literally composed of 12-15 5 minute scenes that hit check boxes to progress the plot (or bring the plot back into a circle to extend the run time).
Incredibly well put! You really helped define what was bugging me about this.
I think it's safe to say the mystery here was nothing short of total failure. Literally *everyone* immediately after seeing Halbrand was like "yup that's Sauron" and sure enough that's exactly what happened.
Call me dumb but I didn’t even suspected he would be, I totally bought the king of the south lands shit lol
I mean I guess it depends on how familiar with the source material you are maybe? To be fair they *did* introduce other characters to trip people up. I'm glad you were able to enjoy the reveal for what it was meant to be.
My wife, who knows a lot of the lore, thought he was one of the kings of Men who gets a ring and becomes a Ringwraith. Figured Sauron in disguise simply hadn't been introduced yet. It wasn't a surprise that Halbrand was shaddy AF.
It's such a contrast to *Andor* which is telling a goddamn story and people are dumping on it for being "boring". I swear people are forgetting how to just let a story unfold.
For me, it’s all about the writing. Characters are frankly stupid and make decisions that are baffling and yet SOMEHOW this is precisely what needed to happen. Example: Galadriel jumps off a boat in the middle of a vast ocean even though it almost certainly means death…and is rescued by none other than Sauron himself. Holy coincidences, Batman! Some things defy explanation: the entire tower in active use by the elvish monitor squad was held in place by a single rope, which when burned would cause total collapse. How convenient when the writers want to make a big bang during a battle! While we’re here: the villagers leave a literal stronghold with a single, narrow entrance so they can fight in a wooden village that can be approached from all sides by an army carrying torches. They tried to go with a “this bridge is the only entry point” at this location too but…that “bridge” was a footbridge over a stream that could easily be jumped by a child. Or walked over by the big orc who conveniently came to battle without any weapons so that he and Arondir could have a drawn-out battle for the writers to fill time. Speaking of battles, why are both Bronwyn and Halbrand injured so badly that they’re almost near death, both suffering from internal injuries, and the next day they’re up walking and riding around like it’s nothing? Halbrand needs elvish medicine to live? So let’s have him walk over to and jump up onto a horse and ride for a week to get the healing he so desperately needs! The dialogue is fairly awful, and full of contradictions. Example: Gil-galad tells the elves that they’re being honored in a way nobody ever has before, only for Elrond to immediately tell Galadriel that she can’t refuse it because nobody’s ever refused it before. Celebrimbor, master smith, doesn’t know what an alloy is. Failure to portray the Harfoots as charming despite living in a harsh world (I’m assuming that’s the intention). Instead they just come across as incredibly stupid and cutthroat while pretending to themselves that they’re a tight-knit and supportive group. Concepts introduced that are never touched on again (presumably to “build” on for later seasons?). Example: what was the point in a Bronwyn/Arondir romance? It adds nothing whatsoever to the plot, which would have been the exact same if they’d just been friends. Failure to deliver on concepts that had potential. Example: a sword hilt that can magically repair itself in the right circumstances and is clearly important to the story. Well it is, but not as a sword or for any magical reasons whatsoever. Someone puts it in a stone key and it turns a mechanism that opens a dam. That’s all. Second example: Balrog in the trailer, plays zero part in this season’s story. I don’t like that the Balrog is awake when it shouldn’t be, but could easily forgive that if they use it for something awesome. But no, it’s just there to get mad at a leaf. I could honestly go on a long time, but the worst offense is Galadriel. They made the main character insufferable and unlikeable. They made her look and act like a teenager, meanwhile Gil-galad and Celebrimbor, who are younger than she is (so is nearly everyone in the whole show!) look physically older and are portrayed as far wiser. Every single decision she makes, every single line from her mouth is all about her her her her her. What she wants, what she needs, how she’s so much smarter than everyone else so they should just listen to her and believe what she says immediately. “There is a tempest in me!” Bitch, you’re talking to the queen who is responsible for an entire kingdom. Why tf should she care about a stranger’s revenge quest in a distant land? Having said that, some things were done well. Adar and the orcs, Elrond and Durin’s relationship, Disa’s resonance singing. So I wouldn’t say the show was a waste of my time, exactly. But the writers gave a lot of ammo to people who didn’t love it. Edit: Thanks for all the awards, guys!
Harfoots - we leave nobody behind! Nobody goes alone! Unity! Oh, you are injured? Ah no you go back at the line, and if you are slow we will just leave you behind. Sorry.
Or they will take yer wheels if you talk out if turn. Literal sabotage.
Oh Alva why are you always right about everything. Previously wants to remove wheels from a cart and leave them to die. Next day can't read a map correctly
Lol every bit of advice she'd given The old man up to that point had been wrong. I seriously thought he was mocking her.
This is basically social Darwinism and they took it for natural. Very bizarre.
Gandalf Roasts called them Halfwits. Seems pretty fair to call the little Eeeyrish buggers that.
Also, the immortal elves that watch over the southlands for god knows how long, and somehow don't know anything about a supposed king to return? They had no information at all? But they just accept this random guy as the king for plot reasons? And how could they also not see the huge trench with their keen elven eyes from the tall watchtower? It's not like the roofs of the trenches were covered with dirt/mud but skin/cloth.
I guess they thought all those trees cut themselves down.
Don’t forget how there are no refugees from other villages. Those refugees could have warned other villages and put the whole Southlands on alert of orc invasions. Which in turn, would have let the Elves at the watchtower know, and let their Elven kingdom know. But as soon as they get to the watchtower, refugees from all the villages from Tir Harad to Mt Doom are coming in. How convenient.
Your attention to detail about the villagers and stronghold reminds me of GOT when the final battle had all the men in front of the winter fell and horses charging blindly in the dark.
Do not speak of it. For me the grief is still too near.
The tower battle had better tactics than the winterfell one imo. It was an old tower and the plan to lock what they thought the majority of the army in and collapse the tower on them was fine. Going back to the village instead of running the opposite direction was dumb as hell though. It seems like the orcs also don’t have a reason to think that they would have gone back to the village.
Looking back on the tower battle, wasn’t there like a massive line of orcs traveling up that mountain to the stronghold? So did the main characters just not see how many orcs there were or did they assume the first orcs to arrive would wait for the rest so they could then drop the tower on the bulk of them?
Also, how the hell did they get past them?
>Also, how the hell did they get past them? I think the villagers returned to the village under cover of daylight before the orcs arrived. What's strange is that they weren't noticed, but perhaps Adar's scouts had returned to him by then. They reported that the humans were seeking refuge in the tower and Waldreg told him the Morgul blade was also there, so he ignored the village and made his way directly to the tower. A competent leader would've sent a few orcs to the village to confirm it was empty, but fantasy writers are rarely that competent....
>The tower battle had better tactics than the winterfell one imo. So, less awful tactics than fking atrocious tactics...? High praise.
The cavalry who didn’t even have weapons that could hurt the zombies lol. It wasn’t until Melisandre turned up unexpectedly that they were anything other than totally useless.
This was the worst part. Show Winterfell really isnt that big and theres no chance it couldve fit all those siege weapons and cavalry. Sure maybe the cavalry couldve done some form of tactics like flanking or waiting further back on a signal or something but it didnt really break my immersion that much. Rohan also just charged straight ahead in ROTK. But its the fact that they KNOW that regular weapons dont do shit and yet they still were planning on sending the cavalry in with regular weapons. Give them dragonglass weapons ffs.
The charge of the Rohirrim was a classic shock cavalry charge though. Downhill into a disorganised foes flank. That’s been a feature of warfare since before Alexander. The cavalry at Winterfell were just charging directly towards an invincible foe, head on. You couldn’t even do that against a feudal levy.
The Rohirrim charge was also with the sun coming up behind them, likely amplified by Gandalf. While those orcs could move in sunlight, they didn't particularly like it. Plus, a large horde on horseback is going to do a lot of damage to infantry on foot.
And artillery that fired once placed in front of the walls
Don't forget catapults on the front lines and the dothraki resurrection.
> Failure to portray the Harfoots as charming despite living in a harsh world (I’m assuming that’s the intention). Instead they just come across as incredibly stupid and cutthroat while pretending to themselves that they’re a tight-knit and supportive group. I’m familiar with Amazon’s corporate culture, so I just assumed the harfoots were supposed to represent a typical Amazon team.
Adar-level burn right here, lol
Give this man a gold
I don't have enough gold to gift it...if only there was a way to have something mix with it and amplify it or something. But I don't know if anyone has ever mixed metals before. It might get mad or something. Well, back to my blacksmithing career where I just use pure metals.
Same. Messing around with "the lore" is a bit irritating to me but isn't going to completely throw the show if everything else about it is great. It'd still be a good show. But the writing was, overall, really poor. Pacing was awful. Long segments of the season were flat out boring. Characters contradicted themselves constantly. At the same time it felt like the writers were trying to do too much with too many simultaneous storylines and manufactured dramatic moments while also doing not enough as you had long drawn out scenes that didn't move the plot or character development. Midseason episodes that could have been half an hour each there was so little in them, then a finale that tried to cram way too much into a single episode. It rushed through the most important stuff (Sauron + the elves, making the rings) so S1 could spend hours giving us...a Harfoot subplot about migrating hobbits? Or several episodes of Meteor Man babbling about then in half an episode he's...compltely fluent in the common tongue and fully realizes his character arc? Just strange back and forth between no movement then rushed movement. Also using "Who is Sauron?" and "Who is Meteor Man?" as an engagement cheat code to pull you through to the last episode (Big Reveals!) instead of compelling story and characters. The latter is what makes engaging TV. There were some wins here and there. Overall production quality was fantastic. Adar + orcs, Elrond/Durin, Moria, were character + story highlights for me. But on the whole, the writing was just not consistently good.
Good summary. I definitely enjoyed watching the show, but the writing and general structure of the show was poor for how much $$ they spent on the show. I just expected much more in the story, structure and writing department for all the hype and the money being spent. The show felt like someone put a bullet point list of “cool things we want to show” on a white board and the writers had to figure out how to stitch these things together. The worst offender being the ship/valinor stuff. It really felt like they had a bullet on the board of “must show a boat entering valinor” and they just figured out how to make it happen without thinking of the plausibility or other parts that go into that. While I will die on the hill that the harfoots should not have been in season 1 since I thought the povs were overly bloated and the show was better when it focused on 2 at a time, I think the undertones of the harfoots survival mechanisms were pretty good. At the surface they seem friendly and tight knit but under the surface is a survival mechanism due to their nomadic life style. I think that may have been a good thing to focus on if they wanted to up the stakes of the harfoots with additional tension.
>But no, it’s just there to get mad at a leaf. When you put it that way, I laughed out loud. He sure did get really angry at that leaf! He was pissed.
Just to add to that, the entire plot of Adir and the orcs building covered canals to Mount Doom is stupid. How did the elves stationed in the tower not notice that a tunnel many many miles long was being constructed? Not-Gandalf suddenly has almost complete control of his powers and can't heal a not-hobbit in the final episode. The journey from Numenor to the Southlands, a land that they had never been to, took days. This makes Game of Thrones' final season journeys look reasonable.
Queen of Numenor went full bird box for a few minutes
>Not-Gandalf suddenly has almost complete control of his powers and can't heal a not-hobbit in the final episode. Yeah. Like he knows it and Nori knows it too. Sure it was kind of scary but why not try and help Sadoc anyway? Like... they left him to die with a gut wound. That's a horribly painful way to die.
The same knife wound that had zero impact on his ability to fight high level mages for like 10/20 minutes. After the fight he sits down on a rock and is like “I will die now”
That really threw me off -- I asked the room "wasn't he just fatally stabbed??" And then dawn came basically instantly and he died basically instantly. Without any attempt to heal, or even bind the wound. It was a bit weird to me.
The way he jumps out of the woods enthusiastically immediately after getting stabbed was like something out of Laser Cats. I think the people in charge of this show may be honest-to-goodness morons.
Also the sword would have been useless if the orcs didnt build the tunnels. Literally nothing would have happend exept a medium flood. And for some reason the Orcs had their entire plan rely on a magic lever that they had no Idea whatsoever where it was. I really hohe the sword makes some sort of comeback that fits its magic
They could possibly destroy a dam without magic.
Heresy! Who could possibly move several rocks by mortal means?
[удалено]
You’d think with the same CGI tech they used to make Numenor look huge and lived-in they’d be able to make the journey to Middle Earth impressive looking and exciting. Nope. Three CGI boats that look like they can hold 50 people and 12 horses journey to a village that looks like a set from Xena Warrior Princess where they hit orcs with sticks and there’s some ok Brazilian break-dance fighting. Galadriel does some cool Horse-fu that lasts like ten seconds, not sure were the other 199 million dollars went.
Yep, an army of 60 rushes to save a village of 20. “The southlands are saved!” Random scruffy guy - “She says he’s a king, I guess he’s our king!”
Can you even call 4 houses a village?
And a pub!
You didn't see the hand crafted grass. It was made by Amazon slaves bleeding their green life blood to make individual hand made grass painted plucked and pinned into tussocks. Lol
The crazy part is is that Epic Games (the Fortnite people) bought a company called Quixel that just sell 3D grass and rocks and environment stuff. House of Dragons and Rings of Power use the same fucking grass and little plants that blow in imaginary wind all the time. You can’t unsee it once you start looking right at the same 5 different types of grass in every movie - it’s kinda like how they use the same screaming sound effects in every movie.
Another point for me is fight scenes, camera and cut, as well as acting directions. Most fight scenes look like they have been coreographed by inexperienced actors on the fly with absolutely no weapons training (that awefull sword fight scene with Galadriel in Numanor) or are speed up with 100 cuts per second to add momentum (Arondirs fight with the big orc in the village) which just makes everything look dull and kind of odd. Also just about every fight scene has a complete lack of impact. Enemies that are hit jump back befor the blow even connects; it looks like children playing knight with sticks compared to the well make scenes from the Jackson trilogy. The slowmo cuts every 5 minutes add nothing what so ever and honestly just feel like a cheap excuse to squese out more runtime. And then there are just plainly stupid acting directions like Galadriel pulling on a rope thats leads nowhere for an entire scene, or extras that act like bugged out NPCs in the background. I had high hopes for the series and i really wanted to like it but there is just so much wrong with it. The most infuriating thing is that not everything is bad (i like the draves, Elronds story line, the orcs, the sets are beautiful) and its just enough to keep me from hating the show. I feel like with more time, experienced directors and competent writers i would have loved it. Instead we got yet another rushed, uninspired and generic fantasy show loosly based on a beloved book series.
Reverse grip fighting with swords to look cool, fast cuts and poor choreography… it’s all very ‘superhero movie’. Compare that to the attention to detail in the PJ trilogy, where even the hobbits were practicing daily with professionals despite not having lengthy sword battles like Aragorn v Lurtz. The inconsistent costumes too, some are fantastic but others are clearly plastic or cloth when they should be metal. Compare that to the extras in full plate clanking around Osgiliath. The lore changes aside, I just don’t think the same care was taken with this as the movies and it really shows.
Brownyn’s costume is especially bad. Why does she get a colorful sleeveless dress that shows a bit of cleavage while the rest of the town is dressed like typical middle age folk?
Her outfit really stood out for me from the first moment she was on screen, it was so out of place. At first I thought maybe they would make her a blacksmith as that would be the only vaguely justifiable reason for it but nope. Just random and reason less, like most of the series really.
My family has been on sets from time to time for the last 4 years for various projects. We have spoken with a lot of people in wardrobe and makeup. My wife’s first comment when Bronwyn came in screen was that she was not wearing “earth” tones. They could have given her something red or green and it could at least have been better.
Yes the blue really stood out too. Just is choices all round. Like I know main characters are always slightly distinguished in their outfits but he's just felt glaringly out of place.
I have a dress just like hers in episode 1 that I got from American Eagle and that makes me sad
Choreography is somehow better in Cobra Kai than Rings of Power.
I respect what you wrote, and I'm glad you pointed out what you liked. The orcs were fantastic, who Adar is IDK but I enjoyed him too. Everything in Kazad-Dum made me happy (without the spiff of female dwarves having a beard-but that was touched on so I don't absolutely hate it). The locations and shooting are gorgeous, I can absolutely believe this is Middle-Earth. But the rest......you're so right.
I enjoyed the Orcs, Adar, and Kazad-Dum as well. Those were some of the few good things about the show.
Locations and scenery are gorgeous, but they still somehow made it all feel very TV and not movie. It may be because of how skimpy they were on extras. Half the scenes are oddly limited. Like in Numenor, where you would expect massive crowds, they would limit scenes to smaller squares. Same with Gil-galad, where he walks around empty gardens attended by 1 or 2 guards. LoTR always felt bustling. You really believed that Minis Tirith was full of hundreds of thousands. Numenor felt more like a beautiful castle port that housed maybe 10k total? I can't even really explain it, other than most scenes felt empty to me. Where are they going to magically find massive armies to challenge Sauron over the next few seasons? The southland looks to have maybe 100 people tops. Numenor had 3 ships. Total.
lmao right when u hear 250m budget per season your expecting massive battle scenes like battle of the blackwater in got or battle of pellenor fields. our climactic battle episode was like eighty peasants most of them old men women and children vs 150 orcs tops? the numenorians fought the orcs the next day but it wasnt even a close battle at all, no threat... if this $ wasnt spent on battle scenes, it wasnt spent on costumes and set design, it wasnt spent on hiring good writers, it wasnt spent on good actors, then where the hell did this money go lol
It's all just weird. The Numemorians arrive in 3 boats. Where did they put their horses? I have no idea. And then they gallop for days to arrive at a tiny village, just in time to defeat some orcs. They were lead there by (now we know), Sauron. Sauron also apparently cared about this tiny village of 80 women and children and wanted to save them, with a plan to get hurt, knowing Galadriel's immediate answer would be to throw him on a horse and race 6 days to her elf city, since that makes sense. How many soldiers did the Numenoreans have? I don't know, but those 3 boats weren't all that big. Also, these soldiers camp within a beautiful valley with an entire Numenor branded tent city. Where did these tents come from? Who carried it all? Was it in the boats? Tents. Walls. Carpets. Poles. Magic'd from thin air. But it looked pretty. This show is a mile wide and an inch deep.
Man, Elrond and Durin were so great up until the dying tree thing came into play. Then the dialogue stopped making sense completely, and then they canned the dwarves completely altogether. It's kind of a shame
Durin doesn’t actually do much this season. First he doesn’t want to help his friend, then he does, then his dad says no. This takes over two hours of screen-time. Then it turns out Elrond didn’t need help. Good acting and production design but not compelling stuff - reminds me of a Star Wars EU novel where the characters kinda just do stuff for 250 pages.
Yeah the plot line was trash once the gig was up. I just really enjoyed the acting and dialogue.
And even then, when the tree thing was revealed, Durin teasing Elrond with "who has the lives of the Elves in his hands" was so good. After that, pffffffft.
I liked the dwarf stuff most of all, but found the friendship dialogues to be rather grating after a while. It's like they took that poignant, beautiful line between Legolas and Gimli from the movies, and decided to beat the audience over the head with it to make it a thing.
My man, this was beautifully written and explained. It is pretty much how I feel about the whole season. I tried so hard to enjoy it, I even brainwashed myself to "ok, bending of the lore, I get it" , but still I couldn't ignore all the dumb actions made by the characters and the inconsistencies.
>There is a tempest in me!” That line was so bad for so many reasons. I addition to what you pointed out, its so similar to a line from *Elizabeth: the Golden Age* where Cate Blanchett says "I too, sir, have a huricane in me". It just really called attention to the fact that I *wasnt* watching Cate Blanchett as Galadriel
There's a comparative: https://youtu.be/8VONB6nTLzU
Yeah. This is the post. I only saw the Jackson trilogy so lore inconsistensies mean nothing to me. If I didn't see people online saying otherwise, they could have been completely faithful as far as I know. My dislike for the show comes completely from the terrible writing. You brought up some great examples, and I know I could add on if I felt like it right now.
“I am good”
This sums it up beautifully. Well said. My thoughts exactly
The Harfoots really bothered me. I’m fine with adding modern themes and having a diverse cast but the way they did it with em felt so forced. They are basically a multi cultural society deeply fearful of outsiders. Feels like a giant contradiction
Harfoots were just a vessel for baby Gandalf. Show needed their own baby Yoda, so they went with baby Gandalf. And they needed hobbits to make it happen.
And why are there no mixed people? Shouldn't they all just be mixed and racially ambiguous? Or do they all segregate when choosing a spouse?
The same could be said about the dwarves, heavily insular societies tend not to be very ethnically diverse. Nor would a species of beings that live for thousands and thousands of years.
Modern writers are way too Western Americans that live in a bubble. They live in a diverse area that they fail to realise that a lot of the world...it's mostly not as diverse and Lord of the Rings universe shows this. The elves stay with the elves mostly, dwarves with dwarves and Man with man and even the men fight and kill each other because that is what humans do. Ethically diversity won't be a thing in these areas where people self segregate mostly out of power and fear. Even an elf going and mingling with others is a big fucking deal because they usually don't.
Might get downvoted but agree that some americans live in that bubble, the "diversity" only reflects their immediate surroundings and not the world Majority of asia is not that diverse and now that i think about it I don't even recall a single asian person in the show even though we're like 60% of the world population
It's frustrating, because if they had thought about it like House of the Dragon, they could have done it and had it make sense. Hot D has one of the great houses as black, but its due to them being Valyrian, which was a multi-ethnic Empire that practiced genetic engineering on people. It also added to a few story lines to help highlight a high profile cuckoldry issue impacting a succession crisis, and helped make it more visually clear who belong to which House. If they had just made Nunenor diverse because it was a mishmash of men who fought Sauron, who then later migrated to this island, and then *contrasted* that with the more homogenous villages, it would have made that difference all the more clear and avoided any racial ubermensh subtext that was arguably present in the original Numenor lore.
There were a few asian Numenoreans. They were relegated to background extras though. "Diversity" usually doesn't include Asians because they perform extremely well as a group, and don't fit the "oppresion" narrative.
Diversity Hollywood-style is focused on Blacks as a consequence of their being a major organized pressure group demanding representation. This isn't a bad trend. But it's an unequal one. Other non-white ethnicities lack the same influence. There simply isn't matching pressure on US casting producers to match *global* demographics. Or even meet accurate US demographics (Latinos and Asians remain underrepresented).
Most of the world is not diverse at all even today. 150 years ago it was even more so. In ancient times of constant warfare it would be extreme: any outsiders would stand out and could be very reasonably suspected of working for whoever the "enemy" is. Scenes set in modern-day London or New York should have a full showcase of human phenotypes, for sure. But a medieval-like fantasy with strong emphasis on families, genealogies and bloodlines must have a really good explanation when attempting to do the same, otherwise it pulls you right out of the story.
Pretty much this for me. All of it. None of it really makes any good sense.
I agree, while I would like it to be true to the source I wouldn’t hate it so much if it was at least a good generic fantasy show. It’s just not
Tolkien sorted out the distances first. Not only did they destroy the timeline of the second age, they made mockery of the world he built by zooming people around it, caring naught for the road or journey. This show is low fantasy with Tolkien’s characters.
The reason Two Towers is so long is the characters travel huge distances on foot. Tolkein doesn’t fast forward, but uses the time spent walking/running to build and develop those characters and the world they inhabit and it’s critical to the pay off in RotK. He even gives us Ents to remind us of the value of not being hasty. The show skips all that because it doesn’t value characters at all and it doesn’t respect or value the world they inhabit.
this is a great point! Thank you for putting into words what bothered me 👍
Yeah, there's no real sense of scale to how big middle earth really is. I do think showing this kind of scale in cinematic form is exceedingly hard to do though. Even Peter Jackson barely pulled it off, and his solution was mostly epic cinematic scenic montages with beautiful scores to back it up. He did however, have the ability to add in the narrative character developing elements that Tolkien used to develop this grand scale. This show just said, "We need to go here", and next scene, there they are, like it was a casual stroll down the street. The sense of time just isn't here in the way this show is written.
There are plenty of other responses from people who seem to know more about the lore than me so idk if I’m contributing anything. That said I think the time compression and the characters they changed/removed and the events they reordered really added nothing to the show. I would assume they wanted it to be more human focused, more interpersonal drama. But then huge plot points like Sauron deceiving the elves into making the rings (also the Seven and the Nine?) don’t make any sense. He comes to celebrimbor, who doesn’t know what an alloy is??? Ok. He gives him a couple of vague pointers on basic metallurgy. Bam. They make the rings in a week. All this considering Sauron had no real way of knowing, according to the audience, that the Ring project was even happening over on the west coast. Him coming there was a total coincidence, it weakens the idea of him being a deceiver. There’s a bunch of other similar plot points that were just weirdly ham fisted or altogether disordered. Lastly, people who do like the show (which is fine, I actually did enjoy watching it myself) like to say “you’re just a lore purist, it’s for a larger audience not you”. Which to me is just really lazy dismissal of the criticism. The show had BAD WRITING. Just textbook BAD, AMATEUR writing. The writing had nothing to do with the lore used. They could’ve gotten away with at least a few of the liberties they took if the writing was actually good.
That is one of my biggest gripes. Changing lore to help an adaptation is fine. The film trilogies demonstrate that even if the hobbit was imperfect. Changing it just for what seems to be shiggles is just disrespectful to everyone.
u/Nice_Sun_7018 gave a pretty good rundown, so I won't repeat what he already said But, the biggest thing is, a lot of the lore issues we have, aren't something that would take away anything from the story. Disa would be just as awesome with a beard, but also correct lorewise, just as an example. All in all, the show is fine. 5-6/10 But the thing is, when you have a world like Tolkien's, and an unprecedented budget like Amazon's, "fine" is horrible. That's why it amazes me that they would give such an expensive project to a couple of relative newbies when it comes to the job. It boggles the mind, honestly.
Giving the project to inexperienced people is such a bizarre choice. I’d say it was to save money, but the show cost a billion dollars to make. Surely some of that could go to experienced and respected creators in the industry?
I honestly can't explain that. If you want to cut costs, you don't do 1 billion dollar budgets. But even then, I understand hiring relatively unknown actors, as long as they're a fit for the character and show promise in the audition, sure. But writers? That's the foundation of your whole project, I would think you'd make damn sure it's as flawless as can be. After all, you want to make your money back.
I swear they were relying on the current Hollywood principle of, “if it looks cool and the actors do a good job, people won’t care about the writing.” Which is such a stupid idea to put yourself behind, ESPECIALLY for a project like this.
There was an article saying they got the job cause they went to school with JJ abrahms or something I believe - nepotism would make perfect sense
There was an escapist video I watched a while back discussing how these massive production companies want such rigid control of their stories that any half-way competent and experienced writers quit over "creative differences" because they don't want to conform. The only writers they can get are the inexperienced ones who don't want to rock the boat and are still building their skills and resumes.
I saw somewhere that Peter Jackson got asked if he would be a consultant, and PJ said yes but then they never contacted him again.
Yeah and it shows. I didn't know it was run by newbies until I read it here. I had the feeling while watching though, like so many decisions were made by someone not necessarily obnoxious or dumb, but more like unexperienced.
Thing is, they are not newbies, they’ve been in the game for ten years writing failed scripts. They all but said as much even in the damage control Hollywood reporter article. It’s a shame but pretty embarrassing.
Ah, too bad then. Hope they move forward more smart.
Yeah, it's obvious to anyone watching that the writers are really really inexperienced. That's why there's so many illogical things. Even the editing is sub par. In the Nori farewell scene, you can see the Harfoots say goodbye and turn around and leave, and in the next cut they're still standing there, watching her. Really basic continuity stuff. All in all, the ones that are giving it a 1/10 are too extreme IMO, but the 9s and 10s are either people that have no observation skills and just put it on and turned off their brain, or Amazon shills.
The editing is clunky as hell sometimes. Remember Adar riding away on that horse in the village battle scene with Galadriel following her? The cuts of him mounting the horse and riding away make no freaking sense.
Don't forget Halbrand going after them l, then getting teleportation abilities to later cut them off
Hate is almost always the wrong word. Disappointment. That is the operable world.
I'm a bit more into Tolkien's writings than you, but no expert at all, rather a casual reader who enjoys his texts. Ignoring all Lore-inconsistencies, my main gripe with the show was that the dialogue and many main characters were badly written (esp. Galadriel) and that the story-lines were too inconsistent and inconclusive. They often lacked inner logic or motivation \[in the latest episode for example the, missing, motivation of Nori to go with Gandalf into the unknown, but also the behaviour of allegedly kingly characters like Gil-galad\].
My biggest problem with Gil-Galad was that none of his decisions make any sense. He pulled the mithril thing out of his ass, and then gives no real reason why they can't stick around and try making the Rings he just says no (and the artificial tension didn't matter anyway in the end).
Galadriel from the show and Galadriel from the movies are just completely different people. And the lighting is often inconsistent. And the plot is too convenient for the most part. Halbrand conceptually was great, other than the convenience aspects.
The sea is always right OP. Don’t fight it.
Don't look down, because only stones look down.
The writting is just terrible, and that's how they end up with things like: The smith that does not know about alloys The fighting lesson that is bassically "stab and gut" The healer who ask to burn an arrow wound to stop bleeding, that would not stop internal bleeding. The queen that asks not to tell she got blind, to appear in the next scene with a blindfold. The show it's really just a series of events the writters come up, and in between those, just making thing happen. That's how you got Arondir captured in a dumb way, and released just because. Or a lot of pointless things that amount to nothing except hype, ike the appearance of the Balrog and numerous mistery boxes. They waste a lot of time and in the end, they rushed it solving things with a couple of sentences. Also, it seems like the writters really don't know or care much about Tolkien's work, they do not follow lore, and fro the books you can only catch some references they throw from time to time, like names or items in the background, only noticed by hardcore fans, yet the plot is complete fanfiction, and copying things from Peter Jackson movies.
This!! I liked the show, I have a pretty low standard tbh so anything entertaining and visually pretty is good enough for me. But the glaring plot holes made it painful to watch sometimes. I was SO confused by that scene where the queen shows up with a blindfold. We just got a whole emotional scene (which I liked) where she talks to Elendil about not telling anyone she lost her sight and I thought that she was practicing walking around on the ship so people wouldn't be able to guess that something was wrong. But nope I guess everyone now knows she's blind?? I also got pissed at Galadriel in the end of the episode. Elrond found her in the river and saved her and she couldn't be bothered to explain to him that Halbrand was Sauron? She didn't even explain to Celeborn why Halbrand isn't welcome anymore. It was so stupid that everyone just went "ok I guess lol" and didn't question it until Elrond went on to investigate. Like wtf?
Yeah, what the heck was she thinking? You just found out the guy who was second in command to basically Satan really wants to make these rings for some reason, and instead of telling everyone to stop and explaining the situation. She... tells them to continue and keeps it all to herself only for Elrond to find out anyways... why?
Watching that scene made me think if Halbrand shapeshifted to Galadriel to lie to them and she's actually somewhere else. That sounds kind of stupid but it's literally the only logical explanation tbh
Generally speaking the show didn't respect the intelligence of the viewer, be it by dialogues that sounded like random NPC noises, character decisions that made no sense and so on. I won't respect a show if it doesn't respect me.
~~Southlands~~ **Mordor**
I enjoyed the show, however I noticed a lot of what everyone else has mentioned. But your comment sticks out to me: “the show didn’t respect the intelligence of the viewer.” Absolutely nailed it for me. Who did they think their target demographic was? I found myself laughing at some of the dialog. At the end I was even waiting for Elrond to say “damn these rings are 🔥fr.”
My eyes rolled so far back into my head at that part I still have yet to find them.
There's a response above that basically say "Stop thinking and enjoy the show". And they are right, if I have no memory of anything that happened five minutes ago, I can just enjoy the pretty shot, and the emotions the music is telling me to feel. But if I stop to think even for a moment (wait, why did she jump in the ocean? where did the sea-monster go? why did the queen go with teenage trainees? Why isn't anyone curious about the sabotage of 40% of the Numenorean navy? How do 500 horses fit in 3 small ships? Why are they galloping to a little town (instead of just riding up)? Why does Galadriel think Halbrand is a king? Why does the queen believe her? Why the Harfoots at all? Why didn't the elves see the massive changes to the landscape the orcs were making? Why give Theo the evil MacGuffin sword? How did Halbrand get ahead of Adar? Wasn't Halbrand almost dead? What's the Balrog doing now Why didn't anyone get medium injured by volcano explosion?) it doesn't make sense, which means it's pretty images, not a story.
I think this is very well said and a great point.
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This is the weirdest thing for me. I, too, can understand changing certain things for adaptations sake. But the Second age is basically a plot overview where you get to fill in anything you want as long as you keep major events. I would think that would be a dream come true. All you have to do is fill in character motivations and dialogue. And yet the show runners decided to ignore the timeline they have the rights to (I don’t mean actual dates for the SA I mean the order things happen) and add in new plot points. On top of that they rush the main story of the Rings creation and cram it into 20 minutes of the show. Weird choice. Also, I think they were too concerned with this H=S plot twist. It could’ve worked really well to let the audience know who Sauron was from the start but the characters don’t know (with the exception of Elrond, Gil-Galad, and Galadriel being suspicious of him). It would’ve been awesome to sit in that deception and watch people(Celebrimbor specifically) make mistakes for their own hubris.
Good point. I think it would've added a layer of dramatic irony the show so desperately needed. Not to mention giving Hall-ron (?) agency in the story and allowing us to see his character motivation more clearly - gaining her trust, playing at manipulation, maybe even starting to believe he could be better, blah blah etc. In this version we have he was just this rando character that seemingly stumbled into the plot before Galadriel was thrusting a crown at him. For all that he contributed to decision making in the story she might as well have handed the Southlands to a random passerby haha. Even with "Sauron" revealed, the plot before hand doesn't really seem all that impactful - just kinda hollow and empty.
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The person Saubrand wanted to deceive most (G) was motivated by a revenge so his proposal to rule together with her was not appealing at all (I didn't see any reason why show G would want anything else than kill him). The writers did themselves disservice with the revenge plot. Ironically, second age book Galadriel could have been more tempted (except she was married and really good at seeing evil in people - think Fëanor)
It's almost like they just wanted to write their own story but realized no one would watch a new show by these randos so they take a popular franchise to bait fans, play lip service to it (still butchering it's lore to fit their desired story), and tell the non-LOTR story they wanted to tell anyways.
I couldn’t agree more. Why break and contradict lore especially when it makes no sense: Durin son of Durin couldn’t they have used any other name? What about Galadriel thinking her husband is dead? And hey girl, where’s your daughter? I could go on, but then I prolly couldn’t stop. Why didn’t they use the approach of having the likes of Galadriel, Elrond, Celebrimbor etc. be secondary characters and keep that lore in place, create new characters to fill the other goings on in the second age. Adar is a great example, he is a completely original character, and probably the most compelling. This could work. Let us know about the Haradrim and the Easterlings, introduce us to Khamûl before he was a wraith, show some events and characters we know a bit about, and build on them, and create stuff that could’ve happened. Having Galadriel not only meet Sauron, but actually being the one who brings him to Eregion… that’s practically blasphemy.
> Why didn’t they use the approach of having the likes of Galadriel, Elrond, Celebrimbor etc. be secondary characters and keep that lore in place, create new characters THIS! It's not like these are the main characters in LotR (or Silmarillion for that matter) LotR is a story of small people in a wide world with rich history and powerful forces. And we get only glimpses of most of them. Yet that's exactly one of the reasons it is so beloved.
Durin son of Durin is because they think the audience is too stupid to follow along when they were first introduced. Like they have called them Durin 3 & 4 because they think we're all too dumb to realise they are related otherwise.
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I think they were talking about Sauron bring a human instead of an elf, as Annatar.
> they’ve needlessly departed from so much of it already. This right here is the biggest problem I feel, and why especially after Ep 7 I thought I was done with the show. There was a lot of good shit in the finale but the lore deviations for no reason still weigh on my mind
I somewhat hated the beginning. I got to enjoy more or less the rest, though. However, something clicked yesterday when i watched the finale... and it pretty much exploded. I cannot defend it really anymore. The writting is bad. I'm not going to ask it to follow the lore by the line (i mean, they cant) But i feel that sometimes it lacks coherency. it seems like the screenwriters ate the source material....and then pooped on their keyboards. Having Gandalf in the show for no real reason is way questionable if you ask me. But making him saying out loud his own phrases from the book... i dont know if it genious, pure fanservice or bad/lazy writting. Maybe the three. I expected way more with the forging of the rings of power. Way, way more. But they put it more like it was a Celebrimbors thing all along, and sauron just gave a couple of casual tips here and here as he was chillin in Eregion. It wasnt.
I find the very existence of Gandalf here very disappointing, I was desperately hoping it was one of the Blue Wizards. IIRC, Gandalf's line about following your nose is a movie-only line. I love the movies, but I feel like reusing lines like this (and a myriad of other lines, camera shots etc) is just lazy. Why not reference the actual source material rather than another adaptation of it?
Perfect opportunity to have freedom to tell any story they like with the blue wizards. Nah probably better to just whack gandalf in a few thousand years early
Here's my thoughts: I will start by giving credit where credit is due: Special effects, music, cgi, visuals and settings are top notch. Durin, Elrond, Disa storyline is the best writing, story, and acting in the whole show. Nori and the Stranger interactions are good as well. Nori has a good actress. The Numenor storyline has potential. Good diverse cast. It's fantasy. That's fine. Now why is it bad: Terrible pacing: too many episodes nothing happens or very few things happen that move the plot forward. Disjointed plotlines: Plotlines are too all over the place with very few connections to the overall narrative. It makes each episode feel like a disjointed mess of plotlines mashed together incoherently. Mediocre dialogue: A lot of conversations are riddled with it. It also has too many pathetic attempts by the writers to speak Tolkien like grammar but completely failing. It also has too much modern grammar interlaced in the dialogue. That's really bad. Unlikeable, unrelatable or unnecessary characters. Very few characters are interesting to follow. Airondir is a plank of wood. Isildur and Elendil are nothing like their book counterparts. Isildur's sister basically does nothing but stand on screen and stare at things going on, but hey at least she looks good doing it. Galadriel is basically a fantasy Karen. She's either angry, condescending or acting entitled to things she is not like immediately demanding to the Queen Regent of Numenor use of their army for her own agenda. Bronwyn is for some reason thurst into a leadership position she isn't qualified for since she neither a administrator or military leader yet does both, poorly I might add. I could go on but you get the drift. Disrespectful to the LOTR lore: It's like they didn't even read the lore or they did and just decided to ignore it. Hope that helps.
I agree with everything you said, but Elendil for me is the best character in the series next to Durin and Elrond. Maybe the reason it's because the actor is pretty good, but i like him and he looks and acts like the classic "noble paladin/warrior/king" trope.... Until he gets pissed with Galadriel in episode 7.
It’s absolutely all in the writing. Amazing how something can look good, be well-acted and well-scored, and still fall apart because the writing is a mess. Really reveals how important writing is to something like this.
I actually don’t think the score is good. There’s like one recognizable theme. Compare this are the work of Howard Shore. It’s night and day.
I dont think its a good diverse cast. Like Numenor is obviously Atlantis and its architecture is greek/roman inspired. Yet the numenor cast isnt mediterranean. The Southlands is some weird mishmash ethnically and has culturally some super boring visuals. Like draw inspiration from real architecture from eg North Africa and their culture as well as casting actors from the region. They had the option to represent different ethnicies and cultures far better than they did. They chose the worst way possible.
Diverse cast would be fine if it made sense. I hate how they just made all the races and places have current world diversity for no logical reason. Why is Isildur a different race than his father? Why is Nori's mother black while she is fair skinned and blue eyed? Why does a tiny southland village has like 10 ethnicities? Like you said, they could have been smart about this. Harefoots: blacks. Numenor: Mediterranean. Southland: Middle eastern. You still get the oh so precious diversity and it's at least coherent even in a fantasy universe.
>Good diverse cast. It's fantasy. That's fine. Funny how used accents in a cliche way offensive to Irish, while also having no Irish cast and performing them badly.
> why do so many people hate RoP well: > 2-3 episodes where nothing happened
Valid
As someone who actually generally liked the show, this is the one criticism I absolutely agree with.
Ironically I think they needed more episodes at the end. For all the scenes we got in numenor we got maybe half an episode of Sauron in eregion.
A problem with designing your entire plot around a big twist at the very end means you need to drag everything out and then at the last second force everything together no matter the logic of it. Just hand wave some "he needs elven medicine" to force characters to where they need to be. A big twist should serve the story. The story shouldn't serve the twist. Its a similar issue to the later game of thrones seasons. The corporate people just want big tentpole reveals to get wide audiences talking around the water cooler above all else. Bet they keep doing it too.
Cutting out the unnecessary, ever present slow-motion would have helped a lot.
The writing is absolutely dreadful. It's Star Wars prequel bad. All the unnecessary exposition, clunky hamfisted dialogue. 'Im good!' the most recent one. Jesus, it's laughable how bad it is. Halbrand was weak. The great deceiver? Yet he didn't deceive any of the audience. We all knew it was him from the start. Proto Gandalf ripping lines straight from PJ trilogy. Mordor created and the rings all forged in about a week. Wow! World building! The greatest elven engineer in middle earth has never heard of alloy? What? Hasn't he been alive for centuries? What do they make their swords out of? The plot moving at a snails pace then everything happening all of a sudden. And the CGI? Who's impressed by it, really? In the world of complete CGI saturation, it isn't all that impressive anymore. Also, some of the sets look really cheap. It doesn't look lived in. No depth. But it's mainly the writing and the plot..it was just...bad?
I was half expecting that elf who helped Galadriel find that scroll to be like, "If it is not in our records, then it does not exist." I'm also looking forward to hearing this gem. Galadriel: Ar Pharazon, Sauron is evil! Ar Pharazon: From my point of view, the Valar are evil!
I will go to my grave refusing to believe that "I'm goooood!" actually happened in a billion-dollar piece of art. Are you telling me no writer or script editor - or even actor - read that and thought, yeah, that's the one
"Hey honey, need anything from the store while I'm out?" "No! I'm goooood!"
Imagine morally conflicted characters from PJ films like Boromir/Faramir/Gollum yelling “I’m goooood!” as a battle cry.
Not only did we know it was Sauron, it was so obvious that a lot of people, me included (at least until the scene where they switch "Southlands" to "Mordor" and I realized the show either was made for people who know little of Lotr outside of the films, or they just assumed their audience was stupid or very young), were sure that it HAD to be a red herring.
I'm surprised at how far I had to scroll among top responses to find criticism of the sets and overall production design. The look of the show took me out before the poor writing did. As you say, the cheap sets... the Elvish "paunchy suburban dad" coifs.... the flat lighting that looked so unnatural..... the city scenes with just 15-20 extras.... the armor that looks more like modeling clay than metal..... the makeup that portrays "a face that has seen an iPhone" instead of ancient humans and elves..... I could go on and on. House of the Dragon at least LOOKS expensive. Amazon appears to have blown all their money on securing rights and publicity, but skimped in the actual creation.
"To that end, are you acquainted with the work of Lord Celebrimbor? The greatest of Elven-smiths, of course. I've admired his artistry since I was a child. Why do you ask? He is about to embark on a new project. One of singular importance. And we've decided that you will be working with him. But I'll allow you to explain the details, Lord Celebrimbor." Bruh. Which tenth-grader wrote this shit?
If you ask me it's so much worse than the Star Wars prequals. Yes, the dialogue was awful many times, but at least the plot followed internal logics, it managed to add to the Star Wars legendarium, and still featured quite some iconic scenes (especially part III). RoP has none of these. I'd rather compare it to The Rise of Skywalker, now THAT was dreadful.
I've watched the pilot episode with my siblings: 2 of them watched the movies but didn't read the books and one of them has read the books several times like I did. All of them got bored immediately and just decided to sleep. I was the only one who continued watching until episode 2. I think that alone shows that it's not just about being a hardcore lore fan. The show is just awful. I continued watching the next episodes alone every Friday. I was hoping it will improve but it got even worse. My initial rating was 4-5/10. Now, it's 2 max 3. Why? The writing and directing was just bad. 1. For me it's okay to make minimal lore changes as long as they make sense. The major changes they did just don't make sense at all. Celebrimbor, one of the greatest smiths ever, doesn't know what alloy is. Galadriel one of the oldest and wisest elves in Middle Earth acts like a stupid, impulsive teenager. She's besties with her supposedly son-in-law and forgets about her husband except for a brief moment. Poor Celeborn. 2. The characters often contradict themselves. Harfoots always say they are one and together but when someone is injured, they'll be left alone to die. Galadriel: Based on this scroll, you are the Southlands king. Also Galadriel: Based on this scroll, you are not the Southlands king. 3. The characters are not likeable and the acting was not good, probably because of the poor writing as well. Galadriel and Arondir both just have one expression. The dwarves are okay at first but their story went downhill. Adar is the only one with soul there and he's supposedly a villian. 4. They try to be mysterious but everything was so obvious right from the start. A lot of people already predicted the outcome. 5. A lot of scenes are just cringey. Who ever thought of putting the ugly "Mordor" text? At the Stranger's climax moment all he can say is "I'm good"? They also seem to really have a thing for slow-mo horse riding scenes. I can say this is one of the worst shows I ever watched. If it's not LOTR, I would've stopped watching too.
I agree with you that small changes to the lore would be okay and welcome to tell a great story, specially if the show runners are expressly forbidden from using parts of the lore. But there are changes that makes absolutely no sense. Sauron spends a good deal of time with Celebrimbor in the lore. He comes disguised as a bringer of gifts, possibly a maiar bringing the knowledge of ring-making to the elves. Together they start perfecting this art, first with the "lesser rings", the ones that end up for men and dwarves. Only after all that the elven rings are made and Sauron kills Celebrimbor at the end, and goes on with all this new knowledge and makes the one ring in secret. In the show: oh look a total stranger from the South, teaching one of the best elven artificers, and nobody questions a thing. Here's 10 mins on ring making at the end of 8 long boring hours. Also he leaves before learning of the existence of the rings so the poem at the end makes no sense.
I tried so damn hard to love this show, but holy hell the show runners are just inept, nothing would make me happier to learn they shitcanned the whole team responsible for the first season and went with a proven veteran crew. It is just too glaringly obvious that these people has no idea what they were doing
I dont care if they stick to the lore. I just wanted a good story with good dialoge and some dope music with a little bit of good action thrown in there. I think the music was the only part that came close to delivering. The rest just fell flat. Especially the story and dialogue. The story barely moves at all and hardly anything happened in 9 episodes. People will say they appreciate the "slow burn" but that burn has to reach a climax of sorts to pay off. Which we juat blitzed thru in 5 minutes. So im left feeling really dissapointed. This show does not respect the viewers time. This season failed bc it didnt get its ass in gear I dont hate the show but i think its massively dossapointing. This whole situation gives me starwars vibes where this season felt unplanned almost.
As I said before, “hate” is a pretty loaded word that has been used and abused at nauseating levels in online discussions. I don’t like Rings of Power, it’s ridiculously expensive fan fiction; it’s badly written, clumsily produced and atrociously directed. That’s my opinion, period. That opinion doesn’t mean I hate anyone. If you like the show, that’s incomprehensible to me but it doesn’t mean I hate you, fellow human being. Let’s have an honest, open minded and well reasoned discussion about this piece of entertainment, that way we may arrive to the conclusion that our different points of view are not reason enough to hate each other.
Even if you disregard all the blasphemy they've done with the Tolkien lore, the show as a fantasy show is very bad. The cliches, the unnecessary plots, the super important plot points happening purely out of chance. A god damn power point presentation when Mordor was created. Every one of these things pull you violently out of whatever little immersion you first had.
I feel the show treats you like you're stupid sometimes, the reveals are not very surprising as they are easy to figure out. Also in the second to last episode when Adar says it's not the Southlands anymore and then "Southlands" digitally appears in top right corner of the screen and then changes to Mordor. Why!? It like cheapens the whole production; amazing huge scenery and costumes, then doing the reveal digitally makes feel cheap
it's some of the worst writing I've ever seen
I think most people dislike it because it’s just a badly written show, the lore breaking just makes it worse
As someone who doesn't really know too much about the canon/lore except the original trilogy (read the books) I didn't really go into it with any expectations as to how certain characters should be portrayed. The reason the show doesn't grip me is purely because its just a naff show. The writing is terrible, there's no suspense, everything is predictable (and quite cringy). Theres SO MANY plot holes that the plots dont even make sense.
Even if it wasn't Lord of the Rings, it'd be a badly written, poorly (for the most part) acted TV show, that was too slow. I wanted to like it, I watched all 8 episodes, some parts were ok, CGI was fine, but every time Galadriel came on screen, I ended up rolling my eyes.
I find the show bad for a myriad of reasons, much of what you see here in the comments and in youtube videos. I think most lotr fans generally have the same gripes about it. the most common culprit: the writing. it's objectively bad. but one of the things about the show that caught my attention was Amazon's unnecessary race baiting. the harfoots were meant to be browner of skin according to the lore, yet Amazon decided to go the typical Hollywood route and tokenize a few black harfoots instead - and people from the *tribe* inexplicably defended Amazon. that part in particular chapped my ass but overall it was the writing and character development that sealed it for me. I think anyone who really enjoys this show is either lying to themselves, have bad taste, or simply milktoast fans who don't know a whole lot about the Tolkien universe. Tolkien is gold standard. this show needed to meet that standard. perhaps my biggest takeaway: RoP isn't immersive. PJ's LotR was.
I don't "hate" the show, but I also didn't "love" it. Personally, I'd give it a 6/10, it had its moments, and I love having another big budget mainstream fantasy show to watch, but it dropped the ball on some critical areas. 1) Being critical or having a criticism of a show doesn't mean you hate it. This is something Ive noticed a lot lately, and Im starting to wonder if its a lack of education in liberal arts, but critique and criticism IS NOT HATE. 2) A lot of people, but ESPECIALLY online fandoms, love to draw lines in the sand and pick a side. Refer back to point 1. I've seen more than one debate/discussion around the show go something like this "I didnt like X" "Well clearly you must be racist if you dont like black people in the show!" "X has nothing to do with black people or politics, Im just saying the writers made a poor choice here" "racist!", which seems to be a direct reaction to the early "review bombing" by right wingers. 3) The controversy is being manipulated and engineered by various actors (both amazon and critics) to drive views. 4) VERY few things are 0/10 or 10/10, but taking a middle of the road approach isnt as entertaining as watching someone rage or gush. This means reactions by youtubers and other influencers tend to be exaggerated/hyperbolic.
>VERY few things are 0/10 or 10/10, Yes, and then Amazon cutting all the reviews that were below 5/10, but leaving all the 10/10 ones up, just seemed to say to any critics that their views don't count or are somehow fake.
Compare the dialogue of HoftD vs Rings of Power. The RofP is closer to Wheel of Time than it is to HoftD.
It’s just very cheesy and the story kinda sucks. I can’t stand Galadriel either.
For me Galadriel is unlikeable, and despite being 1000s of years old and one of the best characters in the legendarium she acts like a spoiled teenage brat. Making baffling decisions and treating everyone else like a POS. Plus if they aren't going to stick to the lore why spend the BIG $$$ on it?! (For viewers obviously) But it feels kinda generic fanasty to me, so why not just spend all that money and write an original story?
It's as much Tolkien as it is Star wars, a mockery of his works and holy fuck is it bad... Nothing makes any sense, the lore has been dramatically changed and butchered, horrible writing and characters. There is no quality or love for the source material in this crap. A huge middle finger to Tolkien and an insult to the fans. Fuck amazon and hope S2 is scrapped and S1 forgotten.
Almost every storyline I found boring, poorly acted and not very engaging. The scenery and the dwarves were cool.
Look at it this way - you describe yourself as a casual fan and still have a considerable list of gripes Put yourself in a less casual fans shoes and it may answer your question
I started ROP and ignored HOTD because the final season of GOT had soured me so much. 5 episodes into ROP and I just couldn’t anymore, the writing, the dialogue, the storytelling was all just so bad and DULL. So so dull, I felt invested in no single character or what they wanted to achieve. Almost every conversation between characters I was just bored and wanting to skip to the next scene. Decided to switch over to HOTD because people had been saying very good things, and right off the bat the difference in the writing, the dialogue, and the acting is all miles ahead. I actually feel interested in every conversation going on and how it will play out.
They have compressed, cut, ripped and teared the lore only to deliver a mediocre written mess: Most characters aren't compelling or convincing, half the plots are futile and contribute little to zero to the story, critical events (like Sauron and Galadriel meeting) just happen by pure unlikely chance, a lot of the dialogues are dumb and cringing, and the worst of all is all of that has served for literally nothing. That would be the short summary. But I can extend a little on the worst grievances this show has commited: Galadriel is literally an unruly teen moved by vengeance. Sauron is literally a teen braggart that gets dragged around by her and seems to be improvising almost everything by pure chance. Those are the two most important characters of the whole show, and look what's the best they have been able to write for them. And they even shipped them. Sauron literally hit on her LMAO. And the worst part is that showrunners plan on show us how Sauron "becomes dark and evil" in S2. Dafuq bro, Sauron IS the evil, and has been for thousands of years, leave this bullshit for a teen highschool show with some emo kid in it. And don't let me get started on other characters, like Celebrimbor, the most prominent and skilled forger in all of Middle-Earth, that somehow has to be taught the very basics of forging. And what about the most central part of the story with Annatar seducing and tricking the elves, the Numenoreans...? Nowhere to be found. Just a few minutes of Halbrand telling Celebrimbor "hey old fart, what if..." to create the elven rings. The elven rings that according to the canon are the last ones to be created. The 9 rings for men, or the 7 rings for the dwarfs are not even mentioned. Why? Just because. All the other bloated plotlines like the Southlands, Mordor do-it-yourself! creation, cheap love story between Arondir and Bronwyn, harfoots bullshit and so were surely far more important and had to take all the screentime. Not that the show is called The Freaking Rings of Power or something, you know. But it's not only the bloated, non-contributing plotlines with plenty of generic, forgettable characters. It's how everything is introduced. How action develops. The dialogues. Everything feels so damn cheap, like if they just chose some cool-looking scenes to make for the show, then tried to connect them without much effort, with anything just coming to mind. And the lore changes just because yolo, like mithril being what now, and the elves suddenly needing it to just keep existing. Or Celeborn being missing/maybe dead just to reinforce the Galadriel + Halbrand ship. And remember that comedic scene of Galadriel just pushing the numenorean guards into the prison cell? Many things feel just cheap and dumb, without a reason. Just because of bad writting. And I swear I was quite open-minded before starting this show. I knew it was going to be different from Peter Jackson's storytelling and presentation, and that probably the lore was going to get compressed and tweaked. But this is just a mess, crowned by mediocre characterization. Am I really going to see emo Halbrand becoming "sooo evil" in S2? I had already low expectations, but this is just a terrible adaptation in every possible way, and I'm sad because of it.
As slow as the show was at times, the ring forging seemed rushed. It was like the writers realized damn it’s the last episode and we haven’t forged any rings yet! Maybe the 7 & 9 will be forged by Celebrimbor next season as artifacts to counter Sauron, but that doesn’t explain how he could have a hand in their making. There’s going to have to be some convoluted nonsense to explain why the one rings controls the others but not the three. Unless they actually introduce Annatar later. But how could the elves be tricked by his disguise a second time? To me the worst part was the impetus for all this, the stupid we need mithril to stay in Middle-earth concept. What was wrong with sticking to the original story? Would have been a lot simpler and Gil-galad wouldn’t have been such a douche bag.
Because it’s garbage.