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Author Topic: The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (Prime Video)  (Read 15991 times)
NowhereMan
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Reply #140 on: October 26, 2022, 04:15:00 AM

I'd watched up to episode 7 and saw that 8 was actually the final one so decided to watch it in a fit of nothing better to do. I'm not going to bother with spoilers for all but one thing because it doesn't sound like anyone particularly cares about this -


Also super weird that the first 5 episodes seemed to go so slowly and then the last 3 feel so massively rushed. The pacing has just been dire, they really would have been better trying to cover introducing Numenor in a single episode and getting to the Southlands ASAP. This really felt like a waste of IP.

"Look at my car. Do you think that was bought with the earnest love of geeks?" - HaemishM
Khaldun
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Reply #141 on: October 26, 2022, 08:09:14 AM

Yeah, it doesn't really work for me, though I think there are versions that could have? After all, elves kind of know all the elves that are running around elving-it-up, that happened after centuries and millennia. But they don't pay that much attention to specific men, and in human societies, there are plenty of people who sort of seem to come out of nowhere, even in Numenor. So I suppose when you stop to think about it the idea of a stranger elf that no other elf knows or can remember meeting seems pretty impossible.
HaemishM
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Reply #142 on: October 26, 2022, 07:33:10 PM

Not going to spoiler anything because if you haven't watched it by now, just don't.

My biggest disappointment after the creation of Mount Doom was the attempted fakeout of Sauron being the Stranger, who it somehow turns out is just Gandalf in an adventure that was sort of hinted at in some of the books but never explained. I think it was literally one line about how he had an adventure in the West that no one speaks about or something. The actor was fine, but really disappointed they felt the need to go to that character rather than Radagast or another wizard for what likely will have no effect on the ring story at all.

Phildo
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Reply #143 on: October 26, 2022, 07:48:22 PM

Nah, you need Gandalf, Sarumon, and Radagast at some point.  The two Blue wizards can show up for a minute before fucking off to the East, too.  Now those two you could do something interesting about if you were a decent writer.  But the council of wizards formed to fight Sauron, so it makes sense for them to show up at some point in the show.
MediumHigh
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Reply #144 on: October 26, 2022, 08:13:54 PM

I actually liked the last half of this show more than house of dragons last 2 episodes. So it did something right. I feel like the only real complaint about the show is that its slow. Like painfully slow. And there's like 3 main plots when I feel like I'd rather follow one. Especially the pre-hobbit plot that felt unnecessary. It feels like a really long road trip to Miami. I don't like sitting in the car for 8 hours, but the party when you actually get there is pretty good. Also I'm tired of people complaining about Galadriel. There is like several hundred years between her and the character you end up meeting in LOTRs.
Khaldun
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Reply #145 on: October 27, 2022, 06:31:01 AM

I can't think of a line about Gandalf having an adventure in the West that no one speaks about in any of the published books (not counting all the letters and drafts published by Christopher Tolkien).

More importantly, I *can* think of a line, quite a few lines, that say definitively that the Istari don't show up until the Third Age, period. Heck, if they were gonna do something off-mythos here, why not send a Valar incognito, maybe that's where they get the idea later on of sending their favorite servants to help out. Send Yavanna and have her escort the hobbits to the Shire, since that is actually something that Tolkien brackets as somewhat mysterious (how the ancestors of hobbits got to the Shire and how the Shire somehow didn't get caught up in all the trauma of the Second Age or the rise of Angmar in the Third Age).
Phildo
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Reply #146 on: October 27, 2022, 08:00:26 AM

Was that it?  The Istari came after Sauron's defeat to make sure he never came back?
Khaldun
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Reply #147 on: October 27, 2022, 09:19:30 AM

I think the Valar were aware that Sauron would eventually regain his power, and that was the long-term mission for the wizards, but the first job may have been helping to counter the Witch-King of Angmar, perhaps, given the time frame.

Here's what's in the LOTR Appendices about them:

Quote
When maybe a thousand years had passed [in the Third Age], and the first shadow had fallen on Greenwood the Great, the Istari or Wizards appeared in Middle-earth. It was afterwards said that they came out of the far West and were messengers sent to contest the power of Sauron, and to unite all those who had the will to resist him; but they were forbidden to match his power with power, or to seek to dominate Elves or Men by force and fear.

They came therefore in the shape of Men, though they were never young and aged only slowly, and they had many powers of mind and hand. They revealed their true names to few,' but used such names as were given to them. The two highest of this order (of whom it is said there were five) were called by the Eldar Curunír, 'the Man of Skill', and Mithrandir, 'the Grey Pilgrim', but by Men in the North Saruman and Gandalf. Curunír journeyed often into the East, but dwelt at last in Isengard. Mithrandir was closest in friendship with the Eldar, and wandered mostly in the West and never made for himself any lasting abode.

But it's really definitively Third Age, not before. I suppose one could just say "well actually they were sent there in the Second Age too only they didn't interact with any of the big guns among the Elves and Men so nobody important knew about them" and well, ok, I guess. In the wider legendarium, Tolkien did write that Gandalf's Maiar spirit was afraid to go to Middle-Earth and try to match Sauron and had to be pretty well ordered to do it by Manwe, so maybe this is the backstory to that--that Gandalf was vaguely remembering being sent there in the Second Age and getting his ass handed to him by Sauron, or something along those lines.

The only hint we have in the published texts that there are more than the the three named wizards who show up in LOTR is that Saruman refers to the "rods of the Five Wizards". In one of the earlier publications of Tolkien's notes he does talk about "the Blue Wizards" who seem to have had an idea that there was something in the East of Middle-Earth that they needed to go do. None of his notes really talk about that, so they either did what they were trying to do and that was that or they failed at and that was that, since they never came back.

Apparently in the most recent publication of Tolkien's notes, scribblings, and grocery lists, there's one document where Tolkien thought about the idea of a group of Maiar with similar instructions to the Wizards being sent to help watch over the elves prior to their full awakening.

Ashamanchill
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Reply #148 on: October 29, 2022, 04:47:24 PM

**Pushes glasses so far up his nose they merge with his brain.**

Sauron only ever appears to the elves as a Maia. From  Unfinished Tales: 'In Eregion Sauron posed as an emissary of the Valar, sent by them to Middle-earth' Also, when you read his dialogue to the elves in The Silmarillion's Of Rings of Power and the Third Age, he cites Valinor and what it looks like, and speaks to them as a first among equals at absolute worst. Besides, Celebrimbor, a grandson of Feanor who was born in Valinor while it still had the Two Trees, was going to be shown all sorts of shit in the lore of Aule that he didn't know by some random human. That makes no sense. Sauron never hides what he is, only who he is.

The important thing is that this billion dollar fan fiction piece of shit misses isn't that Sauron tricked the Noldor. He's a shapeshifter. Of course he can. He could have appeared as a non-scowly Galadriel of he wanted to. That's dog bites man level of interesting. What makes it man bites dog worthy is how he deceives them. He tells them what they want to hear. That they can have a realm as beautiful as Aman while fully keeping their pride and not having to face the Valar. That they could have their cake and it too, as Tolkien himself said. Or, more pertinent to today; that they could retain the prestige and lifestyle they once had, if only they will listen to this suave liar.

I know Tolkien stated he didn't like overt allegory, but its hard to not see that the same one pops up again with the Numenorians. "Hey, you can be a young dynamic race aaannnd be immortal, just listen to me. Hey, there's lifeguards around here, right?"


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Khaldun
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Reply #149 on: October 29, 2022, 05:08:40 PM

If we're going to the wider legendarium, the thing that Celebrimbor is after is not "the prestige and lifestyle they once had", it's "preserving the greatness of the elves in Middle-Earth for all time" and "making beauty beyond what Middle-Earth was meant for"--which explains Sauron's seductiveness, because it's a repetition of Melkor's original sin--wanting to make something beyond the original Music, wanting to make Middle-Earth something more than what it was meant to be. But of course, since Tolkien was Catholic, his Creator gets away with some capricious inconsistency--say, on the creation of the Dwarves. (Another reason I think making the Stranger an incognito Valar fits better--Aule got away with it, so...)
Ashamanchill
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Reply #150 on: October 29, 2022, 07:18:42 PM

These two themes are not mutually exclusive at all. In fact, the Elves were trying to 'make beauty beyond what Middle-earth was meant for' because they wanted the riches (not in wealth, but in arts, lore, etc) they had in Valinor, but in Middle Earth. I'm willing to concede that maybe I didn't chose the best word with 'prestige', but I think lifestyle is essentially correct, and I think the spirit of sentence was as well.

From the Silmarillion:

Sauron says to the Noldor in Eregion

Quote
"...But wherefore should Middle-earth remain ever desolate and dark, whereas the Elves could make it as fair as Eressea, nay even as Valinor? And since you have not returned thither, as you might, I perceive that you love this Middle-earth, as do I. Is it not then our task to labour together for it's enrichment, and for the raising of all the Elven that wander here untaught to the height of that power and knowledge which those have who are beyond the sea?"
     It was in Eregion that the counsels of Sauron were most gladly received, for in that land the Noldor desired ever to increase the skill and subtlety of their works. Moreover they were not at peace in their hearts, since they had refused to return to the West, and they desired both to stay in Middle-earth, which indeed they loved, and yet to enjoy the bliss of those who had departed.

Sauron is straight selling them 'Member Berries here. Considering that when the Noldor returned from exile they were not permitted to go back to Valinor, but had to stay in Tol Eressea, Sauron is selling the Noldor on their life from when they straight up lived in Valinor and were 'above' the Teleri.

From The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, pages 150-152. It's a long fuckin letter where Tolkien is explaining the whole Silmarillion, Akkalbeth, and Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age to a correspondent. We'll pick up in his description of the Noldor in the Second Age:
Quote
We learn that the Exiled Elves were, if not commanded, at least sternly counselled to return to the West, and there be at peace. They were not to dwell permanently in Valinor again, but in the Lonely Isle of Eressea, within sight of the Blessed realm . . .   But they wanted to have their cake without eating it. They wanted the peace and bliss and perfect memory of 'The West', and yet to remain on the ordinary earth where their prestige as the highest people, above wild Elves, dwarves, and Men, was greater than at the bottom of the hierarchy of Valinor. . . . Sauron found their weak point in suggesting that, helping one another, they could make Western Middle-earth as beautiful as Valinor. It was really a veiled attack on the gods, an incitement to try and make a separate independent paradise.

The point being, Sauron is selling them the past, even if it is not viable in their current environment, and they are receptive to it. He may as well as been selling a return to a post WWII American way of life, while he is partially sharing technology capable of, or at least appearing to be capable, of achieving it.

A poster signed by Richard Garriot, Brad McQuaid, Marc Jacobs and SmerricK Dart.  Of course it would arrive a couple years late, missing letters and a picture but it would be epic none the less. -Tmon
Threash
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Reply #151 on: November 22, 2022, 02:21:15 PM

Just got done binging this over the last week or so, I liked it quite a bit. It's not amazing but it's not anywhere as bad as some people make it out to be. It's no LOTR movie quality but far beyond Hobbit movie quality. Not watching it at the same time as house of the dragon probably helped.

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Khaldun
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Reply #152 on: November 22, 2022, 08:05:53 PM

Considering how bad the Hobbit films were, that's a low bar to clear.

But yeah, it's not terrible at all. It's fine? It's even good? It's just, I dunno, less than it could be. It feels flabby in terms of directing and staging a lot of the time. Conceptually fine, technically kind of meh.
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Reply #153 on: November 22, 2022, 08:11:18 PM

MahrinSkel
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Reply #154 on: November 22, 2022, 10:21:30 PM

Considering how bad the Hobbit films were, that's a low bar to clear.

But yeah, it's not terrible at all. It's fine? It's even good? It's just, I dunno, less than it could be. It feels flabby in terms of directing and staging a lot of the time. Conceptually fine, technically kind of meh.

It had genuinely great moments...and a lot of plodding to get to them. So, perfectly on brand for JRR Tolkien.

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Threash
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Reply #155 on: November 23, 2022, 07:28:20 AM



Bit of a low point, but can't hold it against her. Some people just look weird when they smile. She does have a very cute mean mug though.

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HaemishM
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Reply #156 on: November 23, 2022, 09:08:11 AM

I don't know, I thought it was fine right up until the volcano, and then it just fell completely off a cliff. It was still watchable, but goddamn did that moment just ruin it for me.

Khaldun
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Reply #157 on: January 07, 2023, 06:03:57 AM

I finally got around to the last two and I ended up deciding that it really sucked, that it was in fact not merely fine. We've already talked about a lot of the reasons why.

The pacing is terrible. If you're going to spend time establishing the status quo, do it in three episodes at most and don't dick around with dumb melodrama, just establish that on Numenor, in Eregion, everywhere we turn, life is good. Show us what's about to be cast into chaos and suffering in all its splendor and complacency. Don't spend five episodes frittering things away on boring stories and underbaked characters.

Second, a show is bad when I can practically sit in the writers' room myself and listen to the conversation between the writers and showrunners. I can tell exactly what they decided to do here: 1) create problems for which the Rings will seem like solutions in order to explain why Men, Dwarves and Elves are keen to learn ringcraft rather than it just being "oh look a ring, can I have it?"; 2) Play "Hide the Sauron" to try and get people to invest in finding out who it turns out to be, which requires spending enough time with the three major possibilities to make each of them credible; 3) play around with newly fashionable 'there are no evil races' ambiguity to create a bit of tension about what is 'good' and 'evil' here. It's just all very transparent and unengaging in the end--the inexperience of the showrunners rises like a miasma around every episode.

Third, in lore terms it's just fucking dumb in several respects. There's no group of Men who served Morgoth in ancient times who have been hanging out in what will become Mordor. Morgoth didn't need a bunch of low Men the way Sauron will--he had fucking dragons, balrogs, mega-orcs, trolls, etc. by the metric ass-ton. I mean, sure, there were probably a few here and there who signed on with the probable winners, but they don't matter narratively and it's inconceivable that the Elves would station a bunch of observers to look over them. And just in what would be Mordor? Really? "The Southlands" is a big territory. If they were really going to have done something along these lines, put us in a town in the northeast of Umbar, southwest of what would become Mordor--the people who are going to be Gondor's enemies. Don't put them under Elvish supervision--maybe have an Elf who is stationed thereabouts as a spy. Have a group from the Havens of Umbar who've been sent northeast with mysterious orders--they're the guys who are going to trigger off the volcano. Have the Elf and maybe a few sympathetic humans (Bronwyn etc) trail them to see what's going on. I dunno--the whole village plot just seemed dumb as well as lore-violating. (It's also dumb in terms of the Numenoreans landing and going straight there--it's a long way from where they would have landed to where Orodruin blows up even with Halbrand leading them straight there.) 

If you're going to do some world-building in the "Southlands", do some goddamn world-building! Tell us about all those spaces on the maps where we know there might even be "evil Numenoreans", don't take us to the quintessential village of average-joe farmers.

And yeah, it doesn't really make sense for Sauron to be a human; the whole plot with the Stranger doesn't make sense. The idea that the Elves need mithril to survive is dumb. It's just dumb all around.
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Reply #158 on: January 07, 2023, 09:10:02 PM

The village plot was the weakest part of it by far. It felt way too small scale to matter (maybe because there were like 50 people there total and you could tell it was that small), and there was absolutely no setup in that village for a "king of the southlands." Bronwyn and the elf's romance, what with the kid who is so obviously the elf's kid hanging around, was just really boring and bad. When the best part of the story is the fucking Dwarf's wife, you know there are problems.

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