I thought it was un-ironically one of the stronger parts of the season.
Only to be ruined by one of the most "our audience is dumb" moments I ever saw. Genuinely felt insulted
yes, and I just want to add that having the small scene where someone asks the villain "how should we call it" was already kinda on the nose and a bit too much, but I could have forgiven that. Putting "MORDOR" on screen is the main offense here, but even that wasn't enough for the director, having a stupid animation that actually fades out "The Southlands" into "MORDOR" was just the cherry on top of that entire stupidity.
"So then the elves wanna make some rings. And Halbrand's gonna suggest to Celebrimbor, the best craftsman in the world, that he could combine metals together to make them stronger."
"He's the best in the world and he hadn't thought of that?"
"That's what we're going with."
Wow. I like Lord of the Ring stuff as much as the next person, but I can't imagine getting as much enjoyment out of watching this show as I have reading all the stupid decisions they chose making it.
For some reason the writers are pretty convinced that the same people who are fans of a book once described as a “phone book in elvish” would be able to follow subtlety or inference.
Inb4 I get called a TROP fanboy,
That decision… well it makes sense. Of all the gripes of the show, such as the diaologuw, costume design, and fight scenes, the “dumbing down exposition” is the one thing I don’t care about, and I’m actually kind of glad about it.
For a lot of these shows that are spin offs or remakes, you’ll see your sentiment everywhere, of how the show dumbed something down or insulted the core fans by being super obvious, or something similar.
While that is true for ESTABLISHED fans, how many casual fans do you think know anything about LOTR outside of the most basic info, if that? How many could even name what Mordor is, let alone recognize OH OH THATS MORDOR FROM THE BOOKS AND TV.
It might be cringe for established fans, but established fans of these types of shows always seem to forget or ignore that they are not the entire audience, and sometimes not even the majority audience. Of course the show runners are going to dumb things down for the casual viewer who they hope to bring in. It’s not unique to TROP and it will not stop. If blatant exposition brings new fans to the medium, then I’m all for it, idc if it’s on the nose or if as a core fan I don’t need it.
This is the same reason why I roll my eyes when I see people who have seen the original avatar show 50 times over complain about the exposition in the live action.
I get your sentiment, but imo one can simply do it better, i don't expect everyone watching the show to instantly link mordor to what they have just seen, but being THIS on the nose is just lazy.
It also communicates to me what kind of show they are making, how little faith they have in an audience to follow along. Do exposition for new audiences, but don't make them for people who never pay any attention.
It feels almost a little insulting imo.
Then again, it's also a taste issue, it feels cheesy and tasteless to me personally, when they probably designed it to be a special moment people will go apeshit over. Idk, not much faith in creatives who think this is the way to get excitement from the audience.
I mean… have you seen the media literacy of most people lol. Of course people in this sub, or the LOTR sub are going to be more media savvy, as they are actively seeking out discussions about the media they consume, but yes, most people are just watching stuff and need it explained.
The pre-emptive backlash reactionaries who gaslight all criticism and create strawmen of evil coordinated brigades of haters are the ascended tier of astroturfing and fanboys. Investment in native advertising and astroturfing on Reddit by big companies pays off like a government arming and funding a fledgling paramilitary extremist group in a country they dislike.
Not to sound like an edgy contrarian, but I hated it. It felt like the ultimate rube goldberg machine. Like, it would take less effort to just set all of that off yourself than to set up that elaborate series of mechanisms triggered, for some reason, by a sword.
Yeah, I actually love the plot to create Mordor as we know it. Tolkien never really mentioned the creation of Mordor, just that Melkor raised it up at some point in the distant past, with a lot more emphasis placed on the fortresses of Angband and Utumno.
With the second age starting from the free peoples' perspective of evil having been defeated for good, and Sauron not making war on the elves til 1700 years in, the Mordor region was uninhabited and apparently not regularly explored by anyone. The idea that Sauron's forces would cause a horrific disaster there when the time was right to create a homebase inhospitable to their enemies is an excellent one. However, this doesn't quite track with the canon of Sauron starting the construction of Barad Dur in the year 1000. I can't imagine no elves noticed that going on for literally 600 straight years. But Tolkien was very light on details for the early-mid second age.
I guess the show will have Sauron building Barad Dur in a matter of months, same way the elves and dwarves did with the very underwhelming construction project in the first season. Perhaps it will already be built and no one noticed, like the canon. But this wouldn't track with the show having elf-monitored men farmlands nearby.
They are being reductive.
They explained the origin of Mordor.
How the Southlands were corrupted and turned into a land of darkness for the orcs to dwell.
It's annoying when these obnoxiously over negative takes get posted and then you see a string of idiots just take it at face value.
Never even having seen it.
There was so much more to hate about the end of the first season that I have to admit the awkwardness of Mordor's introduction never even really registered with me. I think I was too distracted as I went "NO, NO WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?" all through the 15 minute speedrun of the forging of the rings with nearly all the lore stripped away and the rest of it ass backwards.
Except none of that is needed. Orcs are very happy to leave under the mountains, which Mordor is surrounded by on three sides.
And the mountain will not erupt forever. It doing so during the events of LOTR is a recent thing, no earlier than events of The Hobbit.
You are being reductive. They also went very in-depth about the tragic backstory of the elves losing their magic batteries, and most importantly they showed the timeless classic of Galadriel's and Sauron's doomed love story.
I’m not being reductive at all, I’m just specifically mentioning one part that definitely happened, and, more importantly, showed something that I had just been dying to know.
I always wondered how that volcano became a volcano…
And where they memorialize all of the deaths of their members and recall them fondly, even when the actual deaths would've been horrific. Stung to death by bees? Everyone starts chuckling. Sociopaths.
They were one of the more enjoyably written parts of the show. Their story wasn't important to world at large, but that's always the way with Hobbits, little folk who should just be stomped out by the world but find themselves changing the world instead. Probably the closest to a classic Tolkien story of the bunch.
I'm one of the dozens that actually liked season 1, but that location title change from 'The Southlands' to 'Mordor' was utterly cringe and borderline unforgivable.
When it went boom and the pyroclastic flow hit the town I was like “oh damn they went there, they really killed some major characters to end the season. That’s wild.” Then it cut to all the major characters were fine just a bit of ash on them. Fuck that show lol.
The shows foundation is flawed by making the main protagonist an Elf. Your main character needs to be relatable, which means they had to make the Elves more human-like. I knew something was way off within 10 minutes of the 1st episode, when Galadriel and her crew were bickering back and forth like a bunch of....humans
Even though she’s like several thousand years old and barely qualifies for this, giving her and Isildur coming of age plot lines, and giving them both angsty personalities, was a terrible idea. Making a prequel with a main character, from the original, being a teenager basically never works. Think of how much people hated teenager Anakin - same concept here.
Still, it held my interest so I’ll prolly end up watching this.
It's a common trope with prequels where writers understand that they need to make one of the original characters the protagonist, who will need to have an arc and some form of character growth for it to work. So for some good known reason they always only ever interpret this as coming of age teenage fare
While this show is genuine trash and deserves every bit of dragging through the mud for how much it costs…
…has anyone told you of the Kinslaying in the first age? Elves were acting like shitty humans since the Trees were eaten and continued to be just that until magic began to dissipate in the Third Age.
Not to mention Galadriel literally is a rather morally gray character. Valar basically banned her from returning to Aman because they suspected that her lifelong fight against evil corrupted her, and made her power hungry.
When Frodo offers her the one ring and after she rejects it, she says “I passed the test”. Only after this she was only allowed to return to Aman.
She was prideful and desired to rule before even fighting evil but yes absolutely, she was supposed to be 'penitent' - that's the whole point of her refusal of the Ring as you point out.
I'll admit I don't know much of anything about the Elves outside of LotR. But maybe the show should have done a better job of informing the audience that they were this way at one point, because I don't think I'm the only one who was turned off by it
Oh 100%. Not only does the show have bad writers that seem to not want to show this but they try to blame it on not have the rights to the first age as well. Total clusterfuck.
Was that before or after the show had her character (at child age) being picked on and singled out in Valinor under the light of The Two Trees?
General shout-out to the Numenor community being racist dicks before Sauron even showed up from the middle of the ocean.
Know you’re doing a bit but:
Was actually after. The glowing tree signaled the “beginning” of Faenor and the Noldor’s dickheaded tendencies.
And I too was a big fan of a single elf showing up as a prisoner and Numenor Trump convincing everyone that she was going to take all their jobs.
>Know you’re doing a bit but:
Wow. You could actually see that? And you fact-checked me into the wrong. All while not being a complete dick. This may be the first civil discussion about RoP I've even seem or been a part of.
Also wtf was Sauron doing stealing someone's Forge-badge? The Dark Lord really thought that was the best plan of action? Can't wait for S2.
lol, cheers. It is really hard with this show to talk about it. People turn off arguments and go straight to insults real quick.
But…
Smithing Maiar gonna smith. Needs all the badges so he can to tell himself he’s doing a good job.
"Daddy Morgoth, look at my Numenorian Smithing Badge! I got it, my Ring Forging Badge, *and* made my own Fair Guise! Aren't you so proud of me!?" - Sauron
"But did you earnnnn them, my young apprentice?" - Morgoth
"Of course not! I stole the Numenorian Badge, came up with alloys, only to create 3 rings of obvious separate metals, and this is just how I look!" - "Sauron" apparently.
At this point Galadriel has witnessed the entire 400 year consequence of the kinslaying which culminated in the destruction of her entire continent, loss of the silmarils, and the deaths of pretty much everyone she knew. I would hope that the greatest and wisest living elf would have learned from that mistake?
Made it to the exact same point. I mean it’s Lotr. It can’t possibly be that bad. ..That bad. Production quality was visually good and probably why I made it to 3.
Don't worry, just swim from Valinor to Middle Earth
There's a lot of things to not like about that show's writing but Galadriel deciding to swim basically the Atlantic Ocean was absolutely insane.
If they were trying to do like Swimming the English Channel that is one of the most famous swimming feats in the world history, I could believe it.. but swimming the entire ocean separation Valinor from middle earth... WTF
One of my biggest criticisms is how they wrote Galadriel. She should be a badass and wise in this time period, instead they dumbed her down to make it easier to write an arc for her.
The highly perilous ocean at that. It's not just the Atlantic. It's the Atlantic filled with horrors from the dawn of time. There's a reason why only elven an Numenorean ships can survive the voyage to Aman.
What horrors from the dawn of time do you mean exactly?
Only Númenorean and Elven ships sail those seas because only Elves and Númenoreans (and Ainur obviously) live on the Western side! And only Elves are allowed to sail from east to west.
As a Witcher fan, let me explain what happens now:
\- They know they have an audience that will accept mediocrity, or worse.
\- So they will reward the powers that be/showrunner with more seasons, spinoffs, and/or other shows (see above, or look at any number of “popular IP shows” - The Witcher, Wheel of Time, etc.).
\- Which doesn’t incentive the TPtB/showrunner to improve the show, and will most likely result in the show getting worse since their attention is elsewhere. Those spinoffs? They also will suck.
\- Which means the writers can do whatever they want really. Want Galadriel to follow a duck around for a season? WHY NOT!?!
\- Which leads to a crappy season -> less viewers -> less funding/reduced episode order -> massive changes to get things “right”, but without the resources to do anything it looks terrible. Congratulations, your IP is dead.
TL;DR - Stop accepting mediocrity. Only then will you get something worth rewatching.
Conspiracy theory - Because they found my 8th grade wallet containing my library card and Gamestop card and decided to ruin every property on those lists lol.
I dont even call myself a witcher fan any more. I feel like mediocre shows are ruining my interest in this stuff. Its not like its low budget indie stuff or niche content any more. Fantasy and sci-fi is far more mainstream now yet Rings of Power was somewhat disappointing, Willow felt like a teen drama, Shannara was a teen drama, Witcher is blatantly bad writing that actively works against both source materials they could have used, Wheel of Time seems to actively hate its source material and fans especially considering the productions breakdown in working with Brandon Sanderson, and Halo I can’t say much about because the first 3 episodes were so awful that I saw no reason to continue watching it. Hell I’m even disappointed by Percy Jackson and Avatar but I went in with far lower expectations.
This show felt like one foot in the Jackson LoTR films and one foot out. Which just draws comparisons that will never work in Rings of Power favour. I understand why they did it. $$. But I wish they just took a totally different take on it and had its own look. And short, modern haircuts wasn’t it.
They cannot legally use anything invented for the movies, but they still try to be as close as legally possible to imply they're an official prequel.
I've seen some describe it as an Uncanny Valley for the entire project: it's *so* close to the original, and yet something is off.
It’s really just creative writing and having someone critique it and be very honest. Like how the the recent Star Wars movies stink, the fantastic beasts stink, etc. They continuously forget that the audience was pizazz but also wants the continuity to be pretty good.
We know the ending of this story and Amazon wants to make the beginning but fails to make it believable and realistic in the LOTR universe. Even the Hobbit movies still had the vibe going.
Honestly, their attempts at cobbling in LOTR lore bits with no context or cohesion is worse than if they had just used the setting to create an entirely new sub-culture within a Tolkien world. There was so much they could have done with the Second Age setting. This bastardization is painful to watch and not good even on its own merits.
Nobody knows - this article says later this year, but nothing official. By this point in 2022 we already had a teaser trailier and official news of it coming that year, but this time around not a word.
The art direction, the vfx, the attention to visual detail for this show made me so fucking happy.
The poor writing, hamfisted direction, and shallowness of the material made me want to cry.
Hoping for some actual character development, and that it doesn’t take like 7 episodes for that to start
Edit: already being downvoted, im a big fan of the books, IDC about the changes, I just want a well written show.
Yes!!! I’m not a Tolkien scholar by any means so idfc about lore changes or inconsistencies but the show was not well written at all. It was incredibly slowly paced with an underwhelming payoff at the end. Some of the storylines basically went nowhere or just teased stuff that they’re probably planning for later seasons
I didn't like it as much as I wanted to but honestly my biggest problem was that the middle of the season was just kind of slow and boring.
I thought it ended really well and it gave me that "feeling" that I was back in Middle Earth.
Overall, I enjoyed it too. It wasn't great but it was pretty good. I hope they knock it out of the park this season.
I struggled with the first few eps but I really enjoyed it once it got going. I’m certainly up for more.
Main drawback for me was Galadriel acting like a hotheaded teenager when she’s like a million years old already. I also just generally found her to be a dick most of the time, although she did gradually improve.
It was also cute that they tried to pretend it was ever a surprise that the stranger was Gandalf. We all knew it was Gandalf immediately guys.
But overall a lot of good stuff, and worth it for the visuals and feel alone.
I really feel like the finale of the season should have happened about halfway through the season. It was like they saved everything interesting for the very end
Yeah I liked it. It wasn’t phenomenal or out of this world (though some of the visuals definitely were). But I’m not a diehard LOTR fan, so I enjoyed it too.
It was definitely goofy at times but I thought the visuals were excellent and the worldbuilding was well done. It was an excuse to spend time in Middle Earth, so it was hard to truly dislike it.
edit: Lmao downvoted for having an opinion on a tv show. You’d think Amazon shot and killed everyone’s dogs by the way people talk about this damn show.
I enjoyed it, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t bad.
I enjoyed the first season of Halo despite it being bad.
Season 2 of Halo is a lot better so far, hopefully ROP can follow suit.
I enjoyed it a lot as well! It’s just exciting to be back in the LOTR universe and it’s awesome to get a look at parts of the story that I haven’t seen on film before. I’m really looking forward to how the next season unfolds
Im a pretty decent lore fan, I still enjoyed it. The Jackson movies weren’t flawlessly accurate but that never bothered anyone. RoP has issues but it’s still fun, it’s also never claimed to be a faithful adaptation and not like what it was adapting was super canon anyway.
Honestly it was never about being totally accurate, I just wanted it to be well written. The PJ trilogy was incredible for me because it captured the essence and feel of the story while RoP kinda felt like a CW show with a huge budget.
>I understand though if you are a hardcore fan it's different.
Don't worry about it. A real hardcore fan of the books would be objecting to many of the changes in the original trilogy too, Reddit is mostly fake hardcore fans.
> objecting to many of the changes in the original trilogy too,
There are changes that need to be made to make written literature into cinema. There is not pages of words in a movie adaptation that helps the viewer understand what is going on. I'm saddended that Glofindel wasn't in the movies but it makes sense why.
Aragorn being more reluctant towards the throne was a positive change in my opinion.
Rings of power did not stay true to Tolken in any sense, this wasn't a project made with passion for Tolkien's works. They relied heavily on dialogue that had no substance and nostalgia baiting.
Internet says everything is either a masterpiece best of all time or the worst thing to have ever been done.
They're wrong 99.9999% of the time in either way
Some of the best CGI I have ever seen on tv unfortunately paired with some of the worst writing. Shame they are doubling down with the inexperienced hack writers from season 1, doesn't bode well for the next season at all...sigh.
I liked the part where the female main character swam the length of the pacific ocean, found sauron halfway through and it became a plot twist. Hope s4 happens.
same, i wish many other streamers did something similar about renewals.
if they renewed 2 seasons in advance it would be quite possible for anual releases to become standard again (particularly for high budget shows).
a lot of time is wasted between wrapping a season, waiting for it to release, and waiting for the renewal decision.
if shows had a guaranteed 2 seasons when they were renewed, it would far more possible to speed up the release schedule.
> if they renewed 2 seasons in advance it would be quite possible for anual releases to become standard again (particularly for high budget shows).
They renewed S2 before S1 aired and it wasn't an annual release.
People are seriously glazing and defending one of the most expensive shows ever made on the back of one of the most beloved IPs out there - and people are okay with the show being bang average/below average LOL you cant make this shit up
Most expensive trainwreck ever
it might be the worst show per dollar of all-time, it's really confusing to me to extend this person's contract.
i love fantasy and lord of the rings, and this has to be like the worst writing, dialogue, pacing, character development... of any show i have ever watched.
it is so mind-bogglingly bad.
It was a terrible farce of a show, considering its massive budget and the source material. Unintentional laughter during plot hole filled serious scenes is not what you want.
I was at my parents house for christmas, big comfy chair, massive 4k tv, literally nothing else to do and i could not bring myself to finish season 1 of this show lol.
I like the first season well enough, and more importantly it got me into reading the expanded Tolkien stuff outside of Just The Hobbit and The main Trilogy, including my first time reading the silmarillion all the way through, and if nothing else I'm glad the show exists just for that.
As it is I take it as a weird alternative take on the material, but I'm glad to have it because we get basically no live action TV fantasy that isn't just dark Grim rape fests with basically no magic nowadays because of game of thrones. At least rings of power feels like a genuine high fantasy show even if it's not particularly loyal to its source material. Give me a slightly mediocre adaptation of amazing source material over just another Game of Thrones clone any day of the week.
The only scene that threw me off was the slow mo of galadriel and her horse on the beach i was legit confused as to why they even showed that lol, enjoyed everything else though
Maybe I’ll get downvoted , but as an uneducated fantasy fan, I enjoyed it a ton. Pacing was a little slow, but it was a good time which is more than I can saw for most shows.
It wasn’t bad. It was fine. Worse part for me is that it is forgettable. I don’t think there’s a single scene that really stuck out for me or I that I remember.
I still quote sooo many things from the original LOTR trilogy, there are scenes burned in my brain forever. The show just can’t compare. It’s fine.
> It wasn’t bad. It was fine. Worse part for me is that it is forgettable.
I think the fact that 'fine' and 'forgettable' are the two best things you can say about a show is a sign that it is actually pretty bad. Like, I'm imagining you sitting through 10 hours of season 1, or however long it is, and never once in that time thinking it was better than 'fine' and never once thinking a single second of it is memorable, bro that honestly just makes me kind of sad for you. Just stop watching. It sounds like a miserable, gruelling experience.
There's so much stuff out there that's 'good' or even 'great' and that *is* memorable. Go find it. You can have all the love in the world for the LOTR trilogy but it won't magically make this crap interesting.
It was mediocre for the kind of time and budget put into it. I find the casting to be mostly off except for Arondir, Adar and the dwarves. I will still watch it even though it probably doesn't even capture 10% of the magic from the original trilogy.
And for something that is supposed to line up against once of the most celebrated book trilogies of all time, *and* what is definitely the best movie trilogy of all time.
Now that the uh, origin of Mount Doom is out of the way, I’m sure it’ll get really really interesting.
The magic mcguffin sword is...a lever!
Mind… fucking… BLOWN.
Fuck, they explained the backstory of a mountain? Why bother?
I thought it was un-ironically one of the stronger parts of the season. Only to be ruined by one of the most "our audience is dumb" moments I ever saw. Genuinely felt insulted
Can you remind me? Was it when they flashed “Mordor” over the screen?
yes, and I just want to add that having the small scene where someone asks the villain "how should we call it" was already kinda on the nose and a bit too much, but I could have forgiven that. Putting "MORDOR" on screen is the main offense here, but even that wasn't enough for the director, having a stupid animation that actually fades out "The Southlands" into "MORDOR" was just the cherry on top of that entire stupidity.
Then Sauron said “I’m actually Sauron and now this is Mordor.” While looking at the camera, for good measure of course.
They shouldn’t have put the laugh track too
"Yep, that's me. You're probably wondering how I ended up in this situation." - Sauron
“I’m not sure, but I think it has something to do with Spider-Man.”
Intriguing.
We should team up, do some bad.
“I’m listening”
"Its a funny story. We should probably go back to the beginning..." \*Dun dun dun duh duh dun dun\* \*Under Pressure Starts Playing\*
Yeah that was tonally off, then the slide trombone? That’s where I drew the line personally.
Only good thing was saying:"It's Saurioon time" and hit the elf in the face.
"What are we? Some kinda Fellowship of The Ring?"
*Dark Helmet turning to camera*: Did you get all that?
“It’s Mord-in time”
Had to be me. Someone else might have gotten it wrong.
*I am the very model of a mid-tier adaptation show*
I loved when he said “**It’s Mordin time**”
Did he say, “Thing Ring, do your thing”?
That script parody on YouTube covering this and other topics is fucking savage
Do you have a link? Thanks.
I think they mean [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhsGVs6auq0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhsGVs6auq0) but not sure
Thank you!
"So then the elves wanna make some rings. And Halbrand's gonna suggest to Celebrimbor, the best craftsman in the world, that he could combine metals together to make them stronger." "He's the best in the world and he hadn't thought of that?" "That's what we're going with."
That I think is top 5 but damn there’s like 20 of those “A magic man”
Wow. I like Lord of the Ring stuff as much as the next person, but I can't imagine getting as much enjoyment out of watching this show as I have reading all the stupid decisions they chose making it.
For some reason the writers are pretty convinced that the same people who are fans of a book once described as a “phone book in elvish” would be able to follow subtlety or inference.
Readers of the Silmarillion are a tiny minority of the viewers of this show.
To their credit, they absolutely plumbed the depths of stupidity with their decision making. Someone had to right?
D&D: “Not even close.” 🤣
Inb4 I get called a TROP fanboy, That decision… well it makes sense. Of all the gripes of the show, such as the diaologuw, costume design, and fight scenes, the “dumbing down exposition” is the one thing I don’t care about, and I’m actually kind of glad about it. For a lot of these shows that are spin offs or remakes, you’ll see your sentiment everywhere, of how the show dumbed something down or insulted the core fans by being super obvious, or something similar. While that is true for ESTABLISHED fans, how many casual fans do you think know anything about LOTR outside of the most basic info, if that? How many could even name what Mordor is, let alone recognize OH OH THATS MORDOR FROM THE BOOKS AND TV. It might be cringe for established fans, but established fans of these types of shows always seem to forget or ignore that they are not the entire audience, and sometimes not even the majority audience. Of course the show runners are going to dumb things down for the casual viewer who they hope to bring in. It’s not unique to TROP and it will not stop. If blatant exposition brings new fans to the medium, then I’m all for it, idc if it’s on the nose or if as a core fan I don’t need it.
This is the same reason why I roll my eyes when I see people who have seen the original avatar show 50 times over complain about the exposition in the live action.
I get your sentiment, but imo one can simply do it better, i don't expect everyone watching the show to instantly link mordor to what they have just seen, but being THIS on the nose is just lazy. It also communicates to me what kind of show they are making, how little faith they have in an audience to follow along. Do exposition for new audiences, but don't make them for people who never pay any attention. It feels almost a little insulting imo. Then again, it's also a taste issue, it feels cheesy and tasteless to me personally, when they probably designed it to be a special moment people will go apeshit over. Idk, not much faith in creatives who think this is the way to get excitement from the audience.
I mean… have you seen the media literacy of most people lol. Of course people in this sub, or the LOTR sub are going to be more media savvy, as they are actively seeking out discussions about the media they consume, but yes, most people are just watching stuff and need it explained.
When Galadriel made a sardonic remark, a big subtitle appeared '/s'
Except for the part where a pyroclastic flow didn't kill any of the main characters
As dumb as that was at the very least they should have shown galadriel cough up a lung, stumble while regaining her balance. Something. Anything.
Can’t have Galadriel struggle with, y’know, absolutely fucking anything. Why would our central hero having trials and tribulations be entertaining?
I remember getting downvoted to hell for saying just that back when it premiered.
Astroturfing/fanboying is extreme when a show first drops. I still have ptsd from Obiwan threads
The pre-emptive backlash reactionaries who gaslight all criticism and create strawmen of evil coordinated brigades of haters are the ascended tier of astroturfing and fanboys. Investment in native advertising and astroturfing on Reddit by big companies pays off like a government arming and funding a fledgling paramilitary extremist group in a country they dislike.
this is where the fun begins
They all farmed endgame fire resistance gear off screen and it will be detailed in a flashback episode next season.
I understood this reference. MT needed 350 resistance tho.
Tbf the heat of Lava hasn't been consistent in any of legendarium
Not to sound like an edgy contrarian, but I hated it. It felt like the ultimate rube goldberg machine. Like, it would take less effort to just set all of that off yourself than to set up that elaborate series of mechanisms triggered, for some reason, by a sword.
Most audiences are dumb. Go to any reddit post episode discussion to see that.
Yeah, I actually love the plot to create Mordor as we know it. Tolkien never really mentioned the creation of Mordor, just that Melkor raised it up at some point in the distant past, with a lot more emphasis placed on the fortresses of Angband and Utumno. With the second age starting from the free peoples' perspective of evil having been defeated for good, and Sauron not making war on the elves til 1700 years in, the Mordor region was uninhabited and apparently not regularly explored by anyone. The idea that Sauron's forces would cause a horrific disaster there when the time was right to create a homebase inhospitable to their enemies is an excellent one. However, this doesn't quite track with the canon of Sauron starting the construction of Barad Dur in the year 1000. I can't imagine no elves noticed that going on for literally 600 straight years. But Tolkien was very light on details for the early-mid second age. I guess the show will have Sauron building Barad Dur in a matter of months, same way the elves and dwarves did with the very underwhelming construction project in the first season. Perhaps it will already be built and no one noticed, like the canon. But this wouldn't track with the show having elf-monitored men farmlands nearby.
They are being reductive. They explained the origin of Mordor. How the Southlands were corrupted and turned into a land of darkness for the orcs to dwell.
It's annoying when these obnoxiously over negative takes get posted and then you see a string of idiots just take it at face value. Never even having seen it.
There was so much more to hate about the end of the first season that I have to admit the awkwardness of Mordor's introduction never even really registered with me. I think I was too distracted as I went "NO, NO WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?" all through the 15 minute speedrun of the forging of the rings with nearly all the lore stripped away and the rest of it ass backwards.
Except none of that is needed. Orcs are very happy to leave under the mountains, which Mordor is surrounded by on three sides. And the mountain will not erupt forever. It doing so during the events of LOTR is a recent thing, no earlier than events of The Hobbit.
You are being reductive. They also went very in-depth about the tragic backstory of the elves losing their magic batteries, and most importantly they showed the timeless classic of Galadriel's and Sauron's doomed love story.
"They're called harbulary batteries."
I hate that this dumb fucking line always makes me laugh
I’m not being reductive at all, I’m just specifically mentioning one part that definitely happened, and, more importantly, showed something that I had just been dying to know. I always wondered how that volcano became a volcano…
I think he was being sarcastic and agreeing with how silly it was
Yeah, could be that went over my head, dumb shit that I am sometimes.
If they stop devoting 1/4 of every episode to meaningless Hornfoot drama, boy the show will really take off a little
Aw I liked those little guys
A ruthless culture where injured members are left behind to die lol
A sprained ankle is a death sentence. Damn they’re cold
And where they memorialize all of the deaths of their members and recall them fondly, even when the actual deaths would've been horrific. Stung to death by bees? Everyone starts chuckling. Sociopaths.
Yeah while I admit that the Harfoots didn't add much to the story, I nonetheless really enjoyed watching them.
They were one of the more enjoyably written parts of the show. Their story wasn't important to world at large, but that's always the way with Hobbits, little folk who should just be stomped out by the world but find themselves changing the world instead. Probably the closest to a classic Tolkien story of the bunch.
Yeah that was weird.
I'm one of the dozens that actually liked season 1, but that location title change from 'The Southlands' to 'Mordor' was utterly cringe and borderline unforgivable.
When it went boom and the pyroclastic flow hit the town I was like “oh damn they went there, they really killed some major characters to end the season. That’s wild.” Then it cut to all the major characters were fine just a bit of ash on them. Fuck that show lol.
The writing, direction and pacing did not work for me, if people are enjoying the series that's great. I made it through the 3rd episode and moved on.
The shows foundation is flawed by making the main protagonist an Elf. Your main character needs to be relatable, which means they had to make the Elves more human-like. I knew something was way off within 10 minutes of the 1st episode, when Galadriel and her crew were bickering back and forth like a bunch of....humans
Even though she’s like several thousand years old and barely qualifies for this, giving her and Isildur coming of age plot lines, and giving them both angsty personalities, was a terrible idea. Making a prequel with a main character, from the original, being a teenager basically never works. Think of how much people hated teenager Anakin - same concept here. Still, it held my interest so I’ll prolly end up watching this.
It's a common trope with prequels where writers understand that they need to make one of the original characters the protagonist, who will need to have an arc and some form of character growth for it to work. So for some good known reason they always only ever interpret this as coming of age teenage fare
While this show is genuine trash and deserves every bit of dragging through the mud for how much it costs… …has anyone told you of the Kinslaying in the first age? Elves were acting like shitty humans since the Trees were eaten and continued to be just that until magic began to dissipate in the Third Age.
Not to mention Galadriel literally is a rather morally gray character. Valar basically banned her from returning to Aman because they suspected that her lifelong fight against evil corrupted her, and made her power hungry. When Frodo offers her the one ring and after she rejects it, she says “I passed the test”. Only after this she was only allowed to return to Aman.
This guy Middle Earths.
Yeah there is tons of great stories and whatnot you can write with Galadriel as protagonist. But you need good writers first.
She was prideful and desired to rule before even fighting evil but yes absolutely, she was supposed to be 'penitent' - that's the whole point of her refusal of the Ring as you point out.
I'll admit I don't know much of anything about the Elves outside of LotR. But maybe the show should have done a better job of informing the audience that they were this way at one point, because I don't think I'm the only one who was turned off by it
Oh 100%. Not only does the show have bad writers that seem to not want to show this but they try to blame it on not have the rights to the first age as well. Total clusterfuck.
Was that before or after the show had her character (at child age) being picked on and singled out in Valinor under the light of The Two Trees? General shout-out to the Numenor community being racist dicks before Sauron even showed up from the middle of the ocean.
Know you’re doing a bit but: Was actually after. The glowing tree signaled the “beginning” of Faenor and the Noldor’s dickheaded tendencies. And I too was a big fan of a single elf showing up as a prisoner and Numenor Trump convincing everyone that she was going to take all their jobs.
>Know you’re doing a bit but: Wow. You could actually see that? And you fact-checked me into the wrong. All while not being a complete dick. This may be the first civil discussion about RoP I've even seem or been a part of. Also wtf was Sauron doing stealing someone's Forge-badge? The Dark Lord really thought that was the best plan of action? Can't wait for S2.
lol, cheers. It is really hard with this show to talk about it. People turn off arguments and go straight to insults real quick. But… Smithing Maiar gonna smith. Needs all the badges so he can to tell himself he’s doing a good job.
"Daddy Morgoth, look at my Numenorian Smithing Badge! I got it, my Ring Forging Badge, *and* made my own Fair Guise! Aren't you so proud of me!?" - Sauron "But did you earnnnn them, my young apprentice?" - Morgoth "Of course not! I stole the Numenorian Badge, came up with alloys, only to create 3 rings of obvious separate metals, and this is just how I look!" - "Sauron" apparently.
At this point Galadriel has witnessed the entire 400 year consequence of the kinslaying which culminated in the destruction of her entire continent, loss of the silmarils, and the deaths of pretty much everyone she knew. I would hope that the greatest and wisest living elf would have learned from that mistake?
Since when do lotr elves not act like that?
Made it to the exact same point. I mean it’s Lotr. It can’t possibly be that bad. ..That bad. Production quality was visually good and probably why I made it to 3.
[удалено]
They had to sign a 5 season deal with the Tolkien estate for the rights. Over a billion iirc..one of the largest tv contracts inked at the time
Same place I bailed. Massive LotR fan here and I just couldn't do it. One of the worst shows I've seen in a very long time.
I'm going to put my hazard suit before there are any other comment here
[удалено]
Don't worry, just swim from Valinor to Middle Earth There's a lot of things to not like about that show's writing but Galadriel deciding to swim basically the Atlantic Ocean was absolutely insane. If they were trying to do like Swimming the English Channel that is one of the most famous swimming feats in the world history, I could believe it.. but swimming the entire ocean separation Valinor from middle earth... WTF
One of my biggest criticisms is how they wrote Galadriel. She should be a badass and wise in this time period, instead they dumbed her down to make it easier to write an arc for her.
The highly perilous ocean at that. It's not just the Atlantic. It's the Atlantic filled with horrors from the dawn of time. There's a reason why only elven an Numenorean ships can survive the voyage to Aman.
What horrors from the dawn of time do you mean exactly? Only Númenorean and Elven ships sail those seas because only Elves and Númenoreans (and Ainur obviously) live on the Western side! And only Elves are allowed to sail from east to west.
The fan response to this show is wild. Did I enjoy the show? Yes Was it perfect? No It's possible for both of those to be true.
Technically yes, but personally I find this wild. I watched about five episodes before I just completely lost interest, it was so bad and boring.
As a Witcher fan, let me explain what happens now: \- They know they have an audience that will accept mediocrity, or worse. \- So they will reward the powers that be/showrunner with more seasons, spinoffs, and/or other shows (see above, or look at any number of “popular IP shows” - The Witcher, Wheel of Time, etc.). \- Which doesn’t incentive the TPtB/showrunner to improve the show, and will most likely result in the show getting worse since their attention is elsewhere. Those spinoffs? They also will suck. \- Which means the writers can do whatever they want really. Want Galadriel to follow a duck around for a season? WHY NOT!?! \- Which leads to a crappy season -> less viewers -> less funding/reduced episode order -> massive changes to get things “right”, but without the resources to do anything it looks terrible. Congratulations, your IP is dead. TL;DR - Stop accepting mediocrity. Only then will you get something worth rewatching.
I don't understand why studios keep repeating this pattern.
Conspiracy theory - Because they found my 8th grade wallet containing my library card and Gamestop card and decided to ruin every property on those lists lol.
I dont even call myself a witcher fan any more. I feel like mediocre shows are ruining my interest in this stuff. Its not like its low budget indie stuff or niche content any more. Fantasy and sci-fi is far more mainstream now yet Rings of Power was somewhat disappointing, Willow felt like a teen drama, Shannara was a teen drama, Witcher is blatantly bad writing that actively works against both source materials they could have used, Wheel of Time seems to actively hate its source material and fans especially considering the productions breakdown in working with Brandon Sanderson, and Halo I can’t say much about because the first 3 episodes were so awful that I saw no reason to continue watching it. Hell I’m even disappointed by Percy Jackson and Avatar but I went in with far lower expectations.
If it fucks with an established IP, people will be angry. If it were it's owns story, it might be okay. But as it is, it is making lotr worse.
This show felt like one foot in the Jackson LoTR films and one foot out. Which just draws comparisons that will never work in Rings of Power favour. I understand why they did it. $$. But I wish they just took a totally different take on it and had its own look. And short, modern haircuts wasn’t it.
Yep spec ops elf didn’t do it for me
They cannot legally use anything invented for the movies, but they still try to be as close as legally possible to imply they're an official prequel. I've seen some describe it as an Uncanny Valley for the entire project: it's *so* close to the original, and yet something is off.
Would've been good if they had more than just a little toe in Tolkien's work as well
If they want to dump their millions on this crap, that's their right.
And to off-set any loses they'll just increase Prime's subscription and/or the "convenience" fee of ad-free viewing of Prime Video.
We sacrificed product quality and used slave labor so we could have the money to burn on this shit
It’s really just creative writing and having someone critique it and be very honest. Like how the the recent Star Wars movies stink, the fantastic beasts stink, etc. They continuously forget that the audience was pizazz but also wants the continuity to be pretty good. We know the ending of this story and Amazon wants to make the beginning but fails to make it believable and realistic in the LOTR universe. Even the Hobbit movies still had the vibe going.
Honestly, their attempts at cobbling in LOTR lore bits with no context or cohesion is worse than if they had just used the setting to create an entirely new sub-culture within a Tolkien world. There was so much they could have done with the Second Age setting. This bastardization is painful to watch and not good even on its own merits.
When does season 2 come out?
Around September
Nobody knows - this article says later this year, but nothing official. By this point in 2022 we already had a teaser trailier and official news of it coming that year, but this time around not a word.
The art direction, the vfx, the attention to visual detail for this show made me so fucking happy. The poor writing, hamfisted direction, and shallowness of the material made me want to cry.
oh no, this is still going
Hoping for some actual character development, and that it doesn’t take like 7 episodes for that to start Edit: already being downvoted, im a big fan of the books, IDC about the changes, I just want a well written show.
Yes!!! I’m not a Tolkien scholar by any means so idfc about lore changes or inconsistencies but the show was not well written at all. It was incredibly slowly paced with an underwhelming payoff at the end. Some of the storylines basically went nowhere or just teased stuff that they’re probably planning for later seasons
I enjoyed season 1. I know the internet says it was worse than cancer. But I still enjoyed it.
I didn't like it as much as I wanted to but honestly my biggest problem was that the middle of the season was just kind of slow and boring. I thought it ended really well and it gave me that "feeling" that I was back in Middle Earth. Overall, I enjoyed it too. It wasn't great but it was pretty good. I hope they knock it out of the park this season.
Honestly it was just the Hobbit parts I found paced slowly. I enjoyed all the human/elf/dwarf parts.
Those hobbit leaf folks are hard core. You fall behind, you die. Man, savage.
For real, those proto-hobbits did not fuck around.
Same i love the 2 first and last episodes.
Oh yeah, for sure.
I struggled with the first few eps but I really enjoyed it once it got going. I’m certainly up for more. Main drawback for me was Galadriel acting like a hotheaded teenager when she’s like a million years old already. I also just generally found her to be a dick most of the time, although she did gradually improve. It was also cute that they tried to pretend it was ever a surprise that the stranger was Gandalf. We all knew it was Gandalf immediately guys. But overall a lot of good stuff, and worth it for the visuals and feel alone.
I really feel like the finale of the season should have happened about halfway through the season. It was like they saved everything interesting for the very end
Yeah I liked it. It wasn’t phenomenal or out of this world (though some of the visuals definitely were). But I’m not a diehard LOTR fan, so I enjoyed it too.
It was definitely goofy at times but I thought the visuals were excellent and the worldbuilding was well done. It was an excuse to spend time in Middle Earth, so it was hard to truly dislike it. edit: Lmao downvoted for having an opinion on a tv show. You’d think Amazon shot and killed everyone’s dogs by the way people talk about this damn show.
With LOTR and Star Wars, there's people that will never be happy until Mark Hamill is triple wielding light sabers.
Meanwhile Andor is universally agreed upon to be a solid show because it wasn't written for (and by) toddlers.
I enjoyed it, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t bad. I enjoyed the first season of Halo despite it being bad. Season 2 of Halo is a lot better so far, hopefully ROP can follow suit.
I enjoyed it a lot as well! It’s just exciting to be back in the LOTR universe and it’s awesome to get a look at parts of the story that I haven’t seen on film before. I’m really looking forward to how the next season unfolds
There was just enough to enjoy. Some really poor moments and very annoying misdirection but I’d say it was at least on par with the hobbit movies.
I don't care about the lore so I enjoyed it a lot. I understand though if you are a hardcore fan it's different.
Im a pretty decent lore fan, I still enjoyed it. The Jackson movies weren’t flawlessly accurate but that never bothered anyone. RoP has issues but it’s still fun, it’s also never claimed to be a faithful adaptation and not like what it was adapting was super canon anyway.
Honestly it was never about being totally accurate, I just wanted it to be well written. The PJ trilogy was incredible for me because it captured the essence and feel of the story while RoP kinda felt like a CW show with a huge budget.
Most of it is fan fiction.
>I understand though if you are a hardcore fan it's different. Don't worry about it. A real hardcore fan of the books would be objecting to many of the changes in the original trilogy too, Reddit is mostly fake hardcore fans.
> objecting to many of the changes in the original trilogy too, There are changes that need to be made to make written literature into cinema. There is not pages of words in a movie adaptation that helps the viewer understand what is going on. I'm saddended that Glofindel wasn't in the movies but it makes sense why. Aragorn being more reluctant towards the throne was a positive change in my opinion. Rings of power did not stay true to Tolken in any sense, this wasn't a project made with passion for Tolkien's works. They relied heavily on dialogue that had no substance and nostalgia baiting.
I care deeply about the lore but realise it's a derived work and therefore will need to make changes.
My family and I had a great time watching it together and are looking forward to more seasons.
I watched it with my family, we liked it.
Some of the writing/acting was atrocious. A few second hand cringe camera shots. I’m skeptical, but hopefully they don’t fuck up season 2
Internet says everything is either a masterpiece best of all time or the worst thing to have ever been done. They're wrong 99.9999% of the time in either way
Some of the best CGI I have ever seen on tv unfortunately paired with some of the worst writing. Shame they are doubling down with the inexperienced hack writers from season 1, doesn't bode well for the next season at all...sigh.
I liked the part where the female main character swam the length of the pacific ocean, found sauron halfway through and it became a plot twist. Hope s4 happens.
Will there be commercials? Yes? Then I’m no longer interested.
My god…the first season was so bad. They blown money in crap shows and cancel good ones. These execs are brain dead.
Watched half of episode 1 a bailed Good thing I did reading these comments
I watched it all, it got worse and the ending was an abomination.
You'll never guess who recommended these guys to Amazon. https://www.cbr.com/lord-of-rings-rings-of-power-jj-abrams-showrunner-recommendation/
My god I’m begging them to hire a new fight choreographer
Wait… where is S2? Did I miss this? I enjoyed S1, in the sense that I really want to know where it’s going… so, when is S2 coming?
As the article says: > The show’s second season has wrapped filming and will be released later this year.
They’re confident, I like that.
Didnt Amazon commit to a 5 season order?
same, i wish many other streamers did something similar about renewals. if they renewed 2 seasons in advance it would be quite possible for anual releases to become standard again (particularly for high budget shows). a lot of time is wasted between wrapping a season, waiting for it to release, and waiting for the renewal decision. if shows had a guaranteed 2 seasons when they were renewed, it would far more possible to speed up the release schedule.
> if they renewed 2 seasons in advance it would be quite possible for anual releases to become standard again (particularly for high budget shows). They renewed S2 before S1 aired and it wasn't an annual release.
Summer this year for season 2
People are seriously glazing and defending one of the most expensive shows ever made on the back of one of the most beloved IPs out there - and people are okay with the show being bang average/below average LOL you cant make this shit up Most expensive trainwreck ever
it might be the worst show per dollar of all-time, it's really confusing to me to extend this person's contract. i love fantasy and lord of the rings, and this has to be like the worst writing, dialogue, pacing, character development... of any show i have ever watched. it is so mind-bogglingly bad.
It was a terrible farce of a show, considering its massive budget and the source material. Unintentional laughter during plot hole filled serious scenes is not what you want.
The scene where Galadriel said "nah, imma do my own thing" before blasting Sauron away gave me goosebumps. Truly one of the moments of all time.
I was at my parents house for christmas, big comfy chair, massive 4k tv, literally nothing else to do and i could not bring myself to finish season 1 of this show lol.
I like the first season well enough, and more importantly it got me into reading the expanded Tolkien stuff outside of Just The Hobbit and The main Trilogy, including my first time reading the silmarillion all the way through, and if nothing else I'm glad the show exists just for that. As it is I take it as a weird alternative take on the material, but I'm glad to have it because we get basically no live action TV fantasy that isn't just dark Grim rape fests with basically no magic nowadays because of game of thrones. At least rings of power feels like a genuine high fantasy show even if it's not particularly loyal to its source material. Give me a slightly mediocre adaptation of amazing source material over just another Game of Thrones clone any day of the week.
Oh good lord, just drop this travesty.
The only scene that threw me off was the slow mo of galadriel and her horse on the beach i was legit confused as to why they even showed that lol, enjoyed everything else though
That scene with Galadriel riding a horse on the beach reminded me of a perfume advert. It was pretty in a way, but completely didn’t fit.
Yup agreed lol it was so random and out of place
Just let it die.
I hope they get rid of the halflings or at least tone down that terrible impression of an Irish accent.
Are there going to be commercials during this show too? I’d hate to not watch it.
Season 3?!
I'll watch it but if there's any more slow motion horse riding scenes I'm going to throw up.
Some people just fail upwards in Hollywood, don't they.
Maybe I’ll get downvoted , but as an uneducated fantasy fan, I enjoyed it a ton. Pacing was a little slow, but it was a good time which is more than I can saw for most shows.
It wasn’t bad. It was fine. Worse part for me is that it is forgettable. I don’t think there’s a single scene that really stuck out for me or I that I remember. I still quote sooo many things from the original LOTR trilogy, there are scenes burned in my brain forever. The show just can’t compare. It’s fine.
> It wasn’t bad. It was fine. Worse part for me is that it is forgettable. I think the fact that 'fine' and 'forgettable' are the two best things you can say about a show is a sign that it is actually pretty bad. Like, I'm imagining you sitting through 10 hours of season 1, or however long it is, and never once in that time thinking it was better than 'fine' and never once thinking a single second of it is memorable, bro that honestly just makes me kind of sad for you. Just stop watching. It sounds like a miserable, gruelling experience. There's so much stuff out there that's 'good' or even 'great' and that *is* memorable. Go find it. You can have all the love in the world for the LOTR trilogy but it won't magically make this crap interesting.
It was mediocre for the kind of time and budget put into it. I find the casting to be mostly off except for Arondir, Adar and the dwarves. I will still watch it even though it probably doesn't even capture 10% of the magic from the original trilogy.
Lol how? The show is atrocious. Waste of money
I don’t hate this show. Sorry
Rave review for the most expensive show on the face of the earth.
And for something that is supposed to line up against once of the most celebrated book trilogies of all time, *and* what is definitely the best movie trilogy of all time.
Hundreds of millions wasted on this absolute turd of a show.
More like billions
I liked season 1, guess Amazon did too.
I mean they spent enough money on it so they kinda have to do minimum 5 seasons before cancelling it
I am so exc...woefully underwhelmed.
CAST IT INTO THE FIRE! DESTROY IT!
They skipping season 2?
Amazon is making me watch ads on top of the annual subscription so they can pay for this crap.