Not seen tge second season yet but enjoyed the first season. It's a good series. Don't listen to the nerds.
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Television The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power
- Thread starter DWelbz19
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Not seen tge second season yet but enjoyed the first season. It's a good series. Don't listen to the nerds.
Just watched ep4
End of episode ROP:
Galadriel spends 5 minutes killing a bunch of orcs with bow and arrow and a sword.
In the books:
If the series was accurate, that fight would have precisely lasted 1 second as Galadriel would flick her wrist and all the Orcs instantly die.
End of episode ROP:
Galadriel spends 5 minutes killing a bunch of orcs with bow and arrow and a sword.
In the books:
If the series was accurate, that fight would have precisely lasted 1 second as Galadriel would flick her wrist and all the Orcs instantly die.
Decent enough episode for what it is. They did alright with Tom.
Best episode of the season so far. Still early days, but Arondir could surpass Aragorn as the badass of the lotr universe.
In that they managed to make him ever so slightly less annoying than he is in the book?
Felt very much like a mid season 1 episode, lots of spinning the wheels of the main plots with a lot of set pieces to make it feel like stuff's happening. And cutting away to more hobbits.
This season is now longer than the Return of the King extended edition.
This season is now longer than the Return of the King extended edition.
Yeah but where is the bloody fun in that. We need some Keanu Reeves murder action. Hopefully Galadriel has a puppy too.
Damn. I really like Rory Kinnear but I was begging the gods from the moment he turned to the camera that he wasn’t Tom Bombadil… but it was futile.
Great actor but such a poor fit for the role. I kept seeing Churchill under that beard.
Great actor but such a poor fit for the role. I kept seeing Churchill under that beard.
I've recently discovered Elena Kukanova, a Russian artist who draws characters from the 1st/2nd age of Tolkien's works and they're absolutely incredible. You can guess who some of the characters are even without being told:
This fecking portrayal of Turin Turambar is honestly the best I've ever seen. And all her characters look the same in all the other drawings
This fecking portrayal of Turin Turambar is honestly the best I've ever seen. And all her characters look the same in all the other drawings
Turin looks a bit too elven to me.I've recently discovered Elena Kukanova, a Russian artist who draws characters from the 1st/2nd age of Tolkien's works and they're absolutely incredible. You can guess who some of the characters are even without being told:
This fecking portrayal of Turin Turambar is honestly the best I've ever seen. And all her characters look the same in all the other drawings
I've always pictured something like Mads Mikkelsen in King Arthur:
I feel like I'm in a minority of people who're enjoying the show. It has fantastic visuals. I haven't read the books(except Fellowship of the Ring), and I am not constantly comparing it to something else. On Reddit, I saw criticism today that said "why didn't the Elves go to Eregion on horses?". Who cares?
Judging the show by itself, I think the first season had some great episodes and it felt like they got the pace wrong the way they rushed the plot in the last 3. It's not a perfect show, but there are many parts of it which are very enjoyable.
But when I come online, it's just people going crazy with the nitpicking.
Judging the show by itself, I think the first season had some great episodes and it felt like they got the pace wrong the way they rushed the plot in the last 3. It's not a perfect show, but there are many parts of it which are very enjoyable.
But when I come online, it's just people going crazy with the nitpicking.
Agreed.
It's not perfect by any means, but some people should just stick to the books and avoid anything else.
There's nothing really for them to read, which makes the nitpicking even more absurd.
The parts of the silmarillion relevant to this series equates to about 50 pages, and is overall ~3,500 years of history; whilst the appendices in the Lord of the Rings is, well, an appendices... not exactly steeped in detail of each event.
I'm not sure how much of the other Tolkien work is used in this as I haven't read them all, but the writers haven't got a large amount to go off, especially in granular detail for particular events. Fortunately it's been a while since I read the Silmarillion so am enjoying the show for what it is, and S2 is already a big step up from S1.
I agree, I enjoy the show as well, it’s just a television show, nothing more, nothing less. But maybe I offend the die-hard LOTR community now.
History of Middle Earth
LACE
Fall of Numenor
Akallabeth
There are literally 500+ pages of source material on the characters here in the second age.
I enjoy the LOTR films but I'm not a die hard. I think the show is a bit of a mess personally. Wanted to like it but it's not just the top tier nerds who have issues with it.
Watched the first 3 episodes of S2 and I like it overall, slightly better than Season 1. I'm slightly in the middle when it comes to Lore, I've read all the books and some major changes do bother me but I also can't give a shite about which Elves relationsship is incorrectly depicted.
Negatives:
- Like plenty have said already, the Sauron "Origin storyline" as in getting stabbed by Adar and Orcs is truly truly terrible. The part afterwards was also trash CGI where they clearly had Venom in mind but overall this whole sequence was a disaster and didn't make much sense.
- Not a big fan of the Sauron/Annatar actor, he was okay as Halbrand but now he just comes across as bland.
Positives:
- Everything in the East has fantastic potential and looks cool. Also helps that we don't have nerds chipping in all the time because there is so little known about it anyway.
- I overall like the different dynamics of Elrond, Cirdan, Gil-Galad, Galadriel and Celebrimbor.
- The dwarfs continue to be the better part of the show.
- Everything around Adar is great.
- Pharazon looks very promising.
Mixed/indifferent:
- Does anyone else feel that everything is so "small"? Like we know middle earth is massive with The Fellowship and everyone travelling for months. Yet here we have in one corner Adar chilling with about 100 orcs, then we have Eregion with what looks like 50 Elves and same with Lindor. Numenor despite having massive buildings also has this community vibes of a couple of hundred people (also given that they send an army of about 50 people last season).
Negatives:
- Like plenty have said already, the Sauron "Origin storyline" as in getting stabbed by Adar and Orcs is truly truly terrible. The part afterwards was also trash CGI where they clearly had Venom in mind but overall this whole sequence was a disaster and didn't make much sense.
- Not a big fan of the Sauron/Annatar actor, he was okay as Halbrand but now he just comes across as bland.
Positives:
- Everything in the East has fantastic potential and looks cool. Also helps that we don't have nerds chipping in all the time because there is so little known about it anyway.
- I overall like the different dynamics of Elrond, Cirdan, Gil-Galad, Galadriel and Celebrimbor.
- The dwarfs continue to be the better part of the show.
- Everything around Adar is great.
- Pharazon looks very promising.
Mixed/indifferent:
- Does anyone else feel that everything is so "small"? Like we know middle earth is massive with The Fellowship and everyone travelling for months. Yet here we have in one corner Adar chilling with about 100 orcs, then we have Eregion with what looks like 50 Elves and same with Lindor. Numenor despite having massive buildings also has this community vibes of a couple of hundred people (also given that they send an army of about 50 people last season).
Turin looks a bit too elven to me.
I've always pictured something like Mads Mikkelsen in King Arthur:
Hmm,I see him looking quite elfy in terms of style;
He was basically raised by Elu Thingol and spent more time amongst the Elves than men.
A lot of characters, to be fair. But I'm enjoying S2. It's good TV, I guess book fans/nerds are always going to be disappointed but for the rest...those things don't matter. Some can't believe the Elves' ears aren't as pointy as they're in books.... Anyway I'm waiting for Foundation S3 - by far the best thing on telly. But this will more than do for the time being.
I'm not a book nerd and no that stuff doesn't matter to me. It was more the surface level beauty/lacking any groundedness, poor storytelling, shite scenes, bad actors, etc...
Yeah I agree. Mentioned it about the coronation in Numenor, felt tiny.
In the end I think it looks like what it is, which is an expensive TV show. It doesn't feel made for a big screen.
I was referring to his looks rather than his attire.
I mean sure, in the grand scheme of things this isn't a big deal, but - they are supposed to be in a rush to check their ring guy isn't being gaslit by personification of evil guy. This is even made a point of when they decide they can't go north because it'll take too long, so they have to go where the writer happens to want them to go.
So yeah, not a reason to break sweat or anything, but just kind of symptomatic of how things get plotted in this.
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Yeah the issue is, is that it has the same sparseness vibe of LOTR trilogy which is problematic:
The end of the 3rd age was essentially after a millenia of dark age: Plagues, war, destruction have depopulated practically all of the North/Western regions, Arnor is destroyed and there's barely any settlements, and even most of the big Gondorian cities have been depopulated (Osigiliath, Minas Ithil, etc)
Numenor had a population of 10-15 million at the time of the Akallabeth.
Same with Lindon, in the War of the Last alliance, Lindon was able to field armies close to 100,000 soldiers. The scale here doesn't really make sense.
I understand people having issues with it, but so is everyone about everything. I liked the LOTR films the best and liked the Hobbit films much less. I think I enjoy the rings of power a bit more than the Hobbit films. To each it’s own.
You don’t need to be a Tolkien nerd to consider this a disappointment, same as you don’t need to be hardcore into Star Wars to consider recent SW stuff not named Andor or The Mandalorian a disappointment. I think many were hoping for this to succeed with a Wheel of Time S1-2 level jump in quality and I’m not seeing that so far.
If you like it, then that’s good…but don’t blame everything on the nerds.
If you like it, then that’s good…but don’t blame everything on the nerds.
Gotta say that was my first thought but then I quickly remembered they have things like that in just about every TV show. Especially in fantasy. The amount of walking in GoT is insane, in the LotR- to the non book readers why didn't the giant birds just drop the ring or Frodo in Mordor? Etc etc. In this case the poor horses wouldnt have stood a chance in the Barrow Downs so one could argue they did animal protection activists a solid.
C'mon now. I think Wheel of Time is a decent way to pass the time but it doesn't hold a candle to this. Not in the least bit because the story is even more convoluted and the acting is significantly worse as well. It feels like something akin to the old Legend of the Seeker type of TV quality. Fun enough but very forgettable as well. I also can't stand how much the author of it ripped straight from Tolkien in the early parts in particular.
In this context I was referencing the improvement in quality between S1-S2 respectively, not the relative quality between the shows.
That said, WoT S2 is on par with what RoP has put to screen so far.
All Gandalf needs now is fill a pipe and smoke it.
You can enjoy the show for what is and still critize it for what is it is. The looming danger of Sauron got turned on its head when a few orcs managed deceive him and kill him. His omnious presence in the movies made you feel how everything was against the odds despite him now being shown in a material form.
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It's so dark in half the scenes I can't tell what's going on, I can't remember what half the characters are supposed to be doing anyway , Galadriel is a shit actress and there's a fair few other slightly wooden ones too. It should be a lot more enjoyable than it is frankly.
Makes me wonder about season 3. It'll definitely happen (and 4 + 5) but you wonder if Amazon, having spent $500m on the rights and then that again on production so far, begin to think a creative shakeup might be needed. The reaction can be generously said to be lukewarm thus far. We'll have to see how the second half of the season goes I guess, should be pretty action heavy.
Fair enough the improvement. You're right that S2 of WoT was better than the first. Best thing about that show IMHO is the cinematography, which is often stunning.
It's 2024 brother man. Why don't you have an OLED yet?
Fair enough the improvement. You're right that S2 of WoT was better than the first. Best thing about that show IMHO is the cinematography, which is often stunning.
It's 2024 brother man. Why don't you have an OLED yet?
You'd think if they've spent $200m on it then perhaps I wouldn't have to spend the same on my TV!
Haha i actually got one after the last season of GoT bc I couldn't see shit during some of the battle at Winterfell. At least prices have come down quite a bit. Nothing as cheap as the lower end LCDs of course but they are basically half of what they were only a year or 3 ago.
I'm quite enjoying it so far. The last episode was the silliest, but it has been much better than the first season. However, if The Stranger turns out to be Gandalf, I'm out.
Im still thinking Saruman and im sticking by it (it probably is Gandalf). Reason im thinking Gandalf is bc 1. Im thinking they re trying to throw us off with a variety of known resemblances and 2. He shows a knack for darker magic and especially controlling the elements. He even tells Tom he notices he controls them and wants to learn how to do it too. Isn't that more in line with what Saruman s power was?
He used the same line(last one in s1) as Gandalf does in the fellowship of the ring - book and movie. It’s definitely him.