The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (Prime)

Vern1961 said:
Oh i knew quite nicely who Gandalf was, thank you. And I agree it was a pointless plot element to think they could keep the audience guessing.

My point was more the retconning of Saruman who, in canon, up to the point where Gandalf visited him and was captured prior to the hobbits setting off on their journey in FOTR, was regarded as the Istari "team leader" and a much respected wisdom.
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You said

"Oh and at least we finally got to find out Gandalf is Gandalf, or Grand Elf as the Harfoot's initially called him" - That sounds a hell of a lot like it came as surprise to you...or at least it conveys the idea that you thought this "reveal" was some sort of a positive fopr the show.

It's not Tolkien, never was and never will be. I don't critique this is show as a Tolkien show, I've done that to death and so has everyone else, I'm criticising it as a show of its own and it is hilariously terrible - and how it still utterly fails to tell an engaging story, even if it is not an adaptation of JRRT in any meangful way.
 
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However they approached or whatever material they might have had access to would not have made a difference, the creatives behind this show do not possess the reuqired skill and talent to handle an IP of this magnitude. And that is proven by how absolutely dire the thing that they actually made with unlimited resources is.

The whole "time compression" issue is a bit of a red herring really, yeah they way they approached was completely wrong, but it makes no difference when they cannot tell a story anyway, even with much wider access to source material (which thankfully they did not have) they still would have f'd that up too.

They're simply useless creatives, and what were they banging on about from day 1? - DEI and "correcting" Tolkien etc - but that was all gone over 2 seasons ago, so I'm not opening that can of worms again - but it's been borne out as a detriment and more than that as a very early indicator that they did not know what they were doing, and that the show was going to be bad.

Tom Shippey leaving the project, the Oxford shills tour, the hysterically bad "social media influencers" show (I'll fix him!") LMAO, their own promotional material and PR, and the awfully mediocre cast - all pointed directly towards this show being absolute dog-water, and that's exactly what it is.

I and many others could smell the stink of absolute failure a mile off, and we were told to shut up and just watch the show, we didn't know anything etc because we hadn't seen it yet - so be quiet etc


And yet here we are...

;)
 
Really missing any sense of adventure, watching Gandalf wandering around reminded me of siri wandering the desert in the witcher series

In The Witcher series, Ciri's desert journey is a character-building experience where she discovers herself and her powers:


  • Fear
    Ciri enters the desert as a young girl who is afraid of herself and her powers.


  • Reconnection
    Ciri has visions, hears voices, and talks with her ancestors, reconnecting with her past.


  • Survival
    Ciri barely survives in the desert with the help of a unicorn.


  • Healing
    When the unicorn is wounded, Ciri uses her latent magical powers to heal it.
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Watching an old man wander around an allotment is probably more entertaining.

I'm guessing the worlds tiny as well, about the size of the Scotland
 
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Flawed at a conceptual level IMO.

They are trying to condense the entire story of the Second Age into a 5 season show with a consistent cast. But the Second Age spans something like 3,500 years.

The Rings of Power should have been three separate TV shows. The Rings of Power, focussing on the forging of the rings, the sacking of Eregion & the War of Elves & Sauron. The Fall of Numenor, which takes place ~1,500 years later and concerns the downfall of Numenor. And The Last Alliance, which unites characters from both shows & depicts the events leading up to the Siege of Barad Dur.

The other major issue is that the Elves in ROP aren't Elves. They're pointy eared humans. Their demeanor is entirely wrong for Elves. No amount of changes could fix this show without dealing with that issue.
 
McPhee said:
They are trying to condense the entire story of the Second Age into a 5 season show with a consistent cast. But the Second Age spans something like 3,500 years.

The Rings of Power should have been three separate TV shows. The Rings of Power, focussing on the forging of the rings, the sacking of Eregion & the War of Elves & Sauron. The Fall of Numenor, which takes place ~1,500 years later and concerns the downfall of Numenor. And The Last Alliance, which unites characters from both shows & depicts the events leading up to the Siege of Barad Dur.
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That sounds like a much better way of doing it.
 
Its a shame Corro or Eastenders cant take 18+ month breaks between series. I feel the 18 months gap is just about enough to get over the the woeful mess this is. Ill then be excited for it, watch about 15 mninutes of the first episode and be reminded of why I needed those 18 months.

Nothing else on TV so may as well keep watching it.
 
Andrew Moore said:
Its a shame Corro or Eastenders cant take 18+ month breaks between series. I feel the 18 months gap is just about enough to get over the the woeful mess this is. Ill then be excited for it, watch about 15 mninutes of the first episode and be reminded of why I needed those 18 months.

Nothing else on TV so may as well keep watching it.
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Absolutely this
 
They simply don’t care for the source material or the man’s lifetime’s work.

They were only interested in the pull of the LOTR name.

The show is an abomination and you can’t hide it now when it’s defenders are starting to run for the hills
 
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‘Tuning in’ for the first ep… dis gunna be gud… I hope :p

I remember the middle of the first season being pretty poor but thought it recovered, who knows what I’m in for now :D
 
Nitefly said:
‘Tuning in’ for the first ep… dis gunna be gud… I hope :p

I remember the middle of the first season being pretty poor but thought it recovered, who knows what I’m in for now :D
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It's better than the first season.

To be fair to ROP, it's not the worst thing on TV. It's not even the worst fantasy series of recent years (The Shannara Chronicles & Willow were worse, and I'd wager there's worse Netflix Originals fantasy stuff that I haven't watched). But it is easily the biggest disappointment. This is the most expensive TV show ever made, and it's based on a literary work which gave us the best fantasy movies ever made. It should have been amazing.
 
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arknor said:
just watch the deep fake reactions on youtube
more fun than the series
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Watching that channel and a couple of other channels which analyse the show you'll end up feeling even more stupid that you didn't notice just how dumb some of the show, well pretty much all of it, really is. Nothing survives a close inspection.
 
Latest samba numbers show it’s about to drop out of the top 10!!

Sooo how many more season of the 5 are they going to do? We ain’t reaching 5 and that’s for sure.

They won’t admit failure. Quite the opposite expect glowing reports while they give you hand picked numbers expecting that most won’t look under the hood. When they could quite easily give detailed figures.

I’m still sticking by 1 more season broke in two to finish it off.
 
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Bigpig said:
Latest samba numbers show it’s about to drop out of the top 10!!

Sooo how many more season of the 5 are they going to do? We ain’t reaching 5 and that’s for sure.

They won’t admit failure. Quite the opposite expect glowing reports while they give you hand picked numbers expecting that most won’t look under the hood. When they could quite easily give detailed figures.

I’m still sticking by 1 more season broke in two to finish it off.
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From what I've read the next season is already pretty much set in stone and 5 seasons total pretty much committed - probably why they've brought in ads, etc. to try and desperately recoup hah.

For all its faults I don't see much which couldn't be rectified with better writing and whatever else is on top of that director/producer wise - some exceptions aside most of the actors are decent enough and others would probably be more than passable with better script and direction. If a bit clean they've captured the visual style and if the rest was better I could ignore the failings there. I'm uncertain on the portrayal and actor for Gandalf - maybe with something better to work with it would be improved but it feels very flat and like someone trying to invoke the character of Gandalf based on someone else's description rather than seeing the real thing. Galadriel feels miscast but again I think with better material to work with and better direction it would work well enough.

It does need someone to be brave though and shake things up - I'd be surprised if there weren't respected writers and producers, etc. who'd jump at the chance of saving season 3.
 
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