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

Still watching here - I was forming the view that it was just a little dull / unexciting, but I thought it picked up a lot in episodes 5 & 6, quite enjoyed them.

All the ‘long game’ stuff of what happens is just totally boring though because we know what happens… prequels are cursed by this.
 
Never thought I'd say this but...

I skip all the little foot, hoobbitssssss things and Gandalf rubbish and I'm really enjoying The Lord of the Rings TV :cry:
 
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Just watched it over four nights. Preferred season one but still found two enjoyable and getting better as it moved towards the end. I now have an excuse to watch all six films again! Oh, and season three will be called the "Sauron Show".
 
Caught up and got S2 finished last night, it was ok, highlight for me was seeing the trees with modern CGI compared to the original films. Pacing felt padded out similar to HOTD to hit the 8 episode target.
 
I sort of still like this,but I think one of the weakest parts of it is the casting. The show has too many weak actors/bad performances.

I don't think it's just the writing and direction either (though it may play a part). I just think some of the actors chosen are just really phoning it in.

Galadrial is bad
Elf King is bad
Sauron is..mediocre. I think they could have got someone better here considering how important a role it is.
Many of the smaller parts are also acted poorly.

Some are good. Highlights are Elrond, Durin, Diss (in fact the dwarves in general) and a few more.

Honestly, I think pulling off this style of fantasy stuff without making it sound silly/hammy is one of the hardest acting tasks to pull off. A lot of the cast fail miserably.

It's a shame,because the CGI and visuals are fantastic, and I don't think the story is too bad.


Probably should have put more budget into some more well known/better performers though. It's all too "Hammy" sometimes.
 
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I said after the first cast reveals that this show would be a utter travesty, (next clue firing Tom Shippey) and here we are. You cannot expect C list actors and nobodies to carry a 1BN Tolkien adaptation, look at the cast for S1 GOT, a much smaller IP particularly at the time, much smaller budget etc etc and it is absolutely stellar.

So what did this early casting tell us about ROP? - It told us that the produces and showrunners hadn't got the first idea what they were doing, they did not care one iota about making a quality faithful Tolkien adaptation, and they did not care about casting either, other than how much they could virtue signal about its "diversity" - oh and boy oh boy did they bang on and on about that...how could anyone who worked in TV and had read or watched LOTR could possibly think Morfyyd Clark was Galadriel? :cry:

They were going to make their own show, a nonsensical, non-canon, bastardisation and "correction" of JRRT, and just hoped with enough money thrown at it, some laughably bad "mystery boxes" and plenty of "shipping" would carry them through. I think once they realised they had no story, they decided to make a Wish.com Peter Jackson trilogy - it's just scene after scene after scene ripped off PJ, 'memberberry after 'memberberry.

I give them no credit either for spending 1BN and then managing to have some good CGI.


There are no saving graces for this show, it is at every single level absolute dog****.
 
I ended up giving this a rewatch and I definitely found it more interesting after seeing it from the beginning again.

The conclusion I've come to is it's too light on content. It jumps about a lot and is driving a lot of stories forward. I think we'd all love to see hours more with the elves, dwarves etc even if it's unrelated to the plot. They spent so much money on production, they should've stretched it out to another 10 hours of exploring middle earth
 
p1RATE said:
I ended up giving this a rewatch and I definitely found it more interesting after seeing it from the beginning again.

The conclusion I've come to is it's too light on content. It jumps about a lot and is driving a lot of stories forward. I think we'd all love to see hours more with the elves, dwarves etc even if it's unrelated to the plot. They spent so much money on production, they should've stretched it out to another 10 hours of exploring middle earth
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They can't fill the time they have now, what the hell would they do with another 10 hours?

They're also NOT INTERESTED in Tolkien's legendarium at all, they have made that clear, even if they had access to material with which to delve deeper into the Lore, that would not interest them.
 
I finally managed to finish season 2, the only positive is that I won't have to watch season 3 because they've deviated so far from the actual lore I love, I don't need to endure watching it because I simply no longer care about it, it's a different story now and a worse story, especially the Numenor arc, the characters are so bland, certainly not what you'd expect Aragorns ancestors to be like
 
I finished this last night - much like Season 1, it sagged in the early middle and then got better towards the end, IMO. Overall I enjoyed it, deffo flawed though.

Things I liked:
- It looked really good: sets, costumes, make-up and CGI.
- Dynamic and scenes between Calabrimbor (sp?) and his ‘guest’.
- The awkwardness of whether the rings should be used or not.
- Dwarf scenes.
- Elrond.
- Ents (despite how fleeting they were).
- Impressive scale battle sequences towards the end.

Things I didn’t really like:
- Prequelitus: it’s boring when the plot focuses on ‘long game’ things that we already know the resolution to.
- Many dull characters: elf archer with the breastplate, blind queen, son of woman that died… I don’t have any care for these.
- ‘Mysterious wizards’ and hobbit scenes: needed more oomph… just not exciting.
- King elf just rubs me the wrong way… just doesn’t ‘command’ a king like presence.
- The way that Galadrial is just written to be slightly unlikable… this sort of ‘low rumbling arrogance’. I get that she’s a flawed hero but unfortunately I never find myself rooting for her. I don’t really see this as being the fault of the actress.

Interesting comments above re: it padding it out. I agree. It either needs to be shorter and ditch the scenes with these secondary characters, or it needs to be longer then invest time in them properly to make us care. The ‘middle-ground’ we get doesn’t strike the right balance. I know this is suppose to be ‘middle-earth’ but tHiS iS rIdIcUlOuS! :p :o
 
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Minusorange said:
I finally managed to finish season 2, the only positive is that I won't have to watch season 3 because they've deviated so far from the actual lore I love, I don't need to endure watching it because I simply no longer care about it, it's a different story now and a worse story, especially the Numenor arc, the characters are so bland, certainly not what you'd expect Aragorns ancestors to be like
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They did everything they possibly could to ignore Tolkien's work, so they could write their own guff instead, because they thought they could write a better story than JRRT.


:cry:
 
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Nitefly said:
- The way that Galadrial is just written to be slightly unlikable… this sort of ‘low rumbling arrogance’. I get that she’s a flawed hero but unfortunately I never find myself rooting for her. I don’t really see this as being the fault of the actress.
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I'm amazed she is apparently 35, I thought she looked like an almost 50 year old woman in this :S
 
- The way that Galadrial is just written to be slightly unlikable… this sort of ‘low rumbling arrogance’. I get that she’s a flawed hero but unfortunately I never find myself rooting for her. I don’t really see this as being the fault of the actress.


Slightly unlikeable? - You have a talent for understatement Sir. I will grant you that.

I think the casting of Morfydd Clarke (5 foot 3 in heels) as Galadriel, and how the decided to protray Galadriel on screen tells yoiu all you need to know about this show. She isn't elven in any way whatsoever, and far too short, entirely different to Kate Blanchett who has that ethereal energy, Clarke comes off like a primary school teacher whose having a bad day every day. Then to make her an insufferable girl boss, and also as thick as a whale omlette is enough to sink the show on its own, but luckily for Clarke, the show has also failed in every other regard.

MC was completely and utterly miscast, and Amazon's portrayal of Galadriel was even worse - but because of reasons, the show had to be centred around a "strong female character" who was also a girl boss, trouble is she looks absolutey ridiculous in combat, again not MC's fault either.

I think Amazon's "Galadriel" completely encapsulates the total incompetence of the people running and writing for this show.
 
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