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Rings of Power: A New Thread to Rule them All


Ser Drewy

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3 hours ago, Darryk said:

 

The there's the fact that Gandalf discovers the Hobbits on his own during his wanderings and takes an interest in them because he sees something special about him. 

It was the longbottom leaf dawg

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Hollywood Reporter's first impressions which is not exactly delivering glowing praise:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-reviews/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-rings-of-power-amazon-prequel-1235208871/

To quote:

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It isn’t always clear what the propulsive plot carrying us from episode to episode is supposed to be, but you can tell it’s epic and if you can’t tell, just wait a few minutes and somebody will make a grand pronouncement about good and evil. So far, it’s all in the “broad strokes” stage and many of my favorite parts of these two episodes came when I thought things like, “This reminds me of Netflix’s Sweet Tooth!” and Amazon didn’t pay zillions for that comparison.

On a production level, it’s easy to get caught up in those broad strokes and it’s here that every critic may need to mention how they saw the first two episodes of The Rings of Power. Amazon screened episodes for some available reporters in theaters, and there’s no question that on a big screen, the immersive power of the series is great. [...] The music is grandiose and thrilling, and sells how big the show wants to be, no matter how big your screen might be.

Because rewatching the episodes on a smaller screen, my mind absolutely began wandering almost every time anybody conversed for more than a minute at a time. Although many aspects of the series’ effects work hold up regardless of the venue — the attack of a sea serpent in the second episode was a highlight for me — other pieces feel overlit and flat. In a few instances — the parting of glowing clouds at the climax of the pilot or a raft of survivors floating in what looks like a bathtub in the second — it’s borderline comical.

 

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Entertainment Weekly seems unimpressed by the pacing in the first two episodes, which seems to be an issue even in the positive reviews, but also notes there's a fair bit that's promising. Although, oddly, they seem to have given the actual review to a different person to the EW reporter who was much more effusive in her praise last week. Their final score was in the C-range, not brilliant, not utterly terrible either.

The only really negative review is from the Daily Mail, but them hating it of course dramatically increases the chances of it being good.

Den of Geek, IGN, The Guardian, SFX, Radio Times, Inverse, Entertainment Tonight, The Wrap,TV Guide, Collider, New York Post, IndieWire, Rolling Stone (Sepinwall) all have positive reviews but with caveats. The scores seem to be ranging in the 7-8/10 range (or "B" for those who swing that way). The general feeling from the critics is that it's solid to good. If anything, the reviews seem to be swinging slightly better than for HotD (which had several much more negative reviews), although I don't expect RoP to be on that level.

I did get an opportunity to attend the London premiere yesterday but they only confirmed it a short time before it was due to start and I didn't fancy the mad rush into London that would entail, so gave it a miss given it would have made barely 2 days difference.

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Washington Post wasn't particularly positive:

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Can you spend your way to the next “Game of Thrones?” Jeff Bezos — the world’s second-richest man and, incidentally, the owner of The Washington Post — certainly appears to have tried.

According to news reports, the Amazon founder and J.R.R. Tolkien fan had his company plunk down an estimated $250 million just for the rights to make a TV show based on “The Lord of the Rings.” The resulting series, debuting Thursday, will be the most expensive ever made.

But you already know what I do: If money were all it took to make the next fantasy monoculture phenomenon, it would’ve happened by now.

Amazon Prime Video’s “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” arrives 21 years after the first film in Peter Jackson’s theatrical trilogy — and less than two weeks after HBO’s own attempt to milk whatever goodwill “Game of Thrones” has left through its prequel series, “House of the Dragon.” Whereas the Westeros drama plays up its parent show’s penchant for shock, pulp and gore, the Middle-earth saga, in line with Jackson’s adaptations, is far more family-friendly. Though the eight-part debut season portends an imminent war between Elves and orcs — with Dwarves, humans and a precursor to the Hobbit race called the Harfoots in the mix — the copious and choppily edited action in the first two episodes (those screened for critics) is bloodless and computer-effects-driven. Its defining influence isn’t “Game of Thrones’s” epic scale but Marvel’s neuteredness. If the production design weren’t so spectacular (and the characters and settings bought up by Amazon), “The Rings of Power” wouldn’t be all that out of place on Disney Plus.

‘House of the Dragon’ is ‘Game of Thrones’ with more wigs, less grandeur

To be fair, the Lord of the Rings franchise was meant for all ages. But it’s not clear who “The Rings of Power” is for. Based largely on the appendixes — the appendixes! — to “The Lord of the Rings” novel, it takes place some 3,000 years before the events of that book. Already given the green light for five seasons (with a possible spinoff in the works), inexperienced showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay, who have only uncredited writing work on “Star Trek Beyond” to their name on IMDb, have said their goal is to make “a 50-hour show” from material covered in just a few minutes in Jackson’s movies. In total, the series’ budget is expected to top $1 billion. That should be fairly easy to surpass: The first season alone cost $465 million, according to the Hollywood Reporter, and that’s without factoring in the initial money to secure the IP.

Opinion: Our new fantasy show is definitely a prequel to something you love

I’ve spent this review thus far focusing more on “The Rings of Power’s” development than its contents because there’s so little of note in the actual show. The characters — including Elves Galadriel and Elrond, played by Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving in the films — are phyllo-dough thin, and the plots not much more substantial. Exiled from her childhood home of Valinor by a centuries-long war that claimed her older brother, this younger Galadriel (Morfydd Clark) won’t give up the fight despite the lack of orc sightings in years. (Outside of combat, Elves tend to live forever.)

There’s also a boisterous young Harfoot seeking adventure named Nori (Markella Kavenagh) — an anomaly among her insular, nomadic community — so archetypal her refrain might as well be “I want to be where the people are, there must be more than this provincial life!” She soon gets her wish when an ailing stranger (Daniel Weyman) — tall and angular of face — is found nearby spent, amnesiac and strongly implied to be the story’s antagonist.

Many miles away, a human healer, Bronwyn (Nazanin Boniadi), and an Elven sentry, Arondir (Ismael Cruz Córdova), entertain a probably doomed cross-species flirtation. Elrond (Robert Aramayo), a member of the Elf king’s court, has his own challenges maintaining a friendship with the Dwarven Prince Durin (Owain Arthur), who could prove a crucial ally in the battle against the orcs. Despite Jackson’s claim that the “Rings of Power” creative team ghosted him, they borrow from and build on the character designs, fairyland aesthetics and musical landscape he created for the films. (Expect singing — a lot of it.)

“The Rings of Power” seems to be banking on dazzling Tolkien fans with soaring sights of exotic lands they may not have seen before: Middle-earth, of course, but also Valinor, a holy land where the immortals reside, and the island kingdom of Númenor, whose fall is written in the books. (Like Jackson’s films, the series was shot in New Zealand.) But for audiences not already invested in the comings and goings of the pointy-eared folk, the series doesn’t provide much reason to care.

The performances are serviceable but unremarkable, while the dialogue is particularly corny and inartful, with too many intoned monologues about the search for “the light” or the ever-vague nature of evil. The fate of many worlds hangs in the balance, but the uninspired opulence on screen spark in the imagination only visions of bills going up in smoke. Rarely has danger felt so dull.

 

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Variety's is surprisingly positive. I know the author was one of a whole bunch of Hollywood reporters who were "WTF?" about the initial news and the development process. And Sepinwall has been vocal that he thought the whole thing was a total clusterfuck in the making and has been pleasantly surprised by the final product.

No review from Mo Ryan yet, who's my usually-reliable barometer for how a show is doing.

Interestingly, Bezos has said he gave the showrunners notes which they sometimes completely ignored, and he seems happy now they did so.

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Several years (and several hundreds of millions of dollars) after Amazon bought the TV rights to “The Lord of the Rings” from the J.R.R. Tolkien estate, the mammoth effort to boost Prime Video’s profile with the same kind of phenomenon HBO found in “Game of Thrones” is upon us — and it’s just as grand, if not as downright surreal, as the occasion calls for. Sure, “Game of Thrones” might have solidified a television format for fantasy epics. But George R.R. Martin’s novels simply wouldn’t exist without Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings,” and bringing these stories to episodic life requires not just all the considerable money Amazon can provide, but a certain amount of guts from the TV writers taking it on now, some 85 years after “The Hobbit” changed the game. 

From first-time showrunners Patrick McKay and John D. Payne, “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” — premiering Sept. 2 with two episodes — slots as neatly into Peter Jackson’s preexisting cinematic universe of “LOTR” and “Hobbit” films as a series could feasibly manage, while also expanding on the lore fans have parsed for decades. The first episode even mirrors the opening scene of “The Fellowship of the Ring,” in which Cate Blanchett’s ethereal elf Galadriel intones a brief history of why the Ring is so important. The series, however, brings us back to the beginning of time, as Galadriel, now a younger and fierier version played by Morfydd Clark (“Saint Maud”), details the origin of all things.  

From this prelude onward, “The Rings of Power” narrative adopts a solemn and awestruck approach that feels in line with Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Jackson’s scripts, even if the direction — by J.A. Bayona and Wayne Che Yip in initial episodes, with Charlotte Brändström to follow in ones to come — is more serviceably sweeping than specific. As for production value, it’s not exactly surprising that the physical world-building and glittering, armored costumes rate so high given the show’s astronomical price tag, but it’s still refreshing to escape into an alternate world that feels more tangibly real than it does CGI creation. When the action does require a visual effect — for, say, an enormous, undulating sea monster creeping underneath a splintering raft — clearly no expense was spared in making it ring true and palpably ominous. (Though if you’re wondering whether “The Rings of Power” might be a friendlier option to watch with your kids than the unabashedly violent “House of the Dragon,” the answer is “Yes, as long as they can handle war and/or the occasional orc jump scare.”) 

After the opening outlines centuries of Galadriel’s life and the catastrophic First Age war, the story arrives at a single crucial moment where several plotlines and characters across races can collide. Die-hard Tolkienists may bristle at the idea of the show condensing so much history, but layering the action this way is undeniably effective when building a television show. And frankly, given how many characters and how much Tolkienian material “The Rings of Power” has to get through, the season’s eight-hour run time (the equivalent of two Jackson extended editions) feels practically Spartan. 

 

The first two episodes are admirably concise and compelling in their introductions. As written by McKay, Payne and Gennifer Hutchison (“Better Call Saul”), these initial chapters strike a sturdy balance among the warring, politics and everyday life defining the chosen era as they establish protagonists from every corner of Middle Earth and beyond. There are elves: Galadriel, High King Gil-galad (Benjamin Walker) and Elrond (Robert Aramayo, playing a much more affable version of the character than Hugo Weaving’s mature, or at least crankier, iteration in the films). There’s Nori (Markella Kavenagh), a restless Harfoot (i.e., a breed of Hobbit) who dreams of intrigue beyond her campground. There’s dwarf prince Durin IV (Owain Arthur) and wife Disa (Sophia Nomvete), as well as star-crossed would-be lovers Bronwyn (a stalwart human played by Nazanin Boniadi) and Arondir (a loyal elf played by Ismael Cruz Córdova). Eventually, even mythic “Lord of the Rings” figures Elendil (Lloyd Owens) and Isildur — the father and son whose demises lead to The One Ring’s survival — will join the party from the city of Númenor, whose grandeur is long gone by the time “The Hobbit” takes place.

In the first couple episodes, the elves’ arcs are by far the quickest to click into gear as the other characters end up in more supporting roles. Still, the beauty of spinning so many plates is that when one threatens to come crashing down, the show can simply move on to the next until it’s ready to pick up where it left off. 

If there’s one story plate that stays remarkably steady, though, it’s Galadriel’s. From her weighty narration to her flinty determination to find Sauron and avenge her brother’s death, Clark’s take on one of the books’ most iconic figures has an arresting gravitas. Particularly in Galadriel’s testier moments — as when her friend Elrond suggests she’s chasing Sauron’s ghost rather than a real menace — Clark’s controlled face nonetheless betrays flashes of the roiling, righteous rage that will, thousands of years later, overflow in Frodo’s direction. When she’s paired with cocky outcast Halbrand (Charlie Vickers), her frustration cracks just enough to tease something resembling affection, or at least atypical amusement. Tasked with making Galadriel equal parts voice of reason and battling hero, Clark proves the series’ most reliable constant.  

With a whopping 50 episodes reportedly planned, it’s hard at this point to say how successful “The Rings of Power” will ultimately be as a whole. There’s plenty of time for some plots to overstay their welcome as their paths intersect with more intriguing ones, or for the series’ overall narrative to get tangled in the weeds of Tolkien’s dense “Lord of the Rings” appendixes. For now, however, it’s safe to say that Amazon throwing the weight of its coffers at this property has resulted in a perfectly winning adaptation that unfolds swashbuckling adventures with clear reverence and affection for the considerable mythos behind it. As the series forges ahead, combining storylines and leaving literal translation from page to screen behind, it will be telling to see just how ably “The Rings of Power” can stay rooted in its venerable source material while, inevitably, bending it into something new. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Oddly, video game website Polygon has the most measured review, noting its visual impressiveness and its successfully capturing of something of Tolkien's ideas and atmosphere, but also noting that it has maybe tried too hard to be safe and stuck to Jackson's playbook (even where it's inappropriate to the Second Age). They also found the dialogue to be inconsistent, which seems to be a legitimate fear from the trailers.

Other trends from the reviews I've seen

  • Morfydd Clarke is the MVP on the cast and does a great job with the role she is given.
  • The elf/dwarf/harfoot storylines are all pretty solid.
  • The "Southlands" story and elf/human romance is the most tedious storyline so far.
  • The show has some "mystery box" elements which are sounding serious alarm bells for some of the reviewers (probably burned by JJ Abrams one time too many).

Also an important point: it sounds like they don't get to Numenor until Episode 3, which is where the biggest test of the show (how it incorporates two wildly disparate time periods into one narrative) is to come.

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1 hour ago, Takiedevushkikakzvezdy said:

FWIW, it is at 100% on Rotten Tomatoes right now.

I'm not sure it's worth much. She-Hulk has a 94% on Rotten Tomatoes, and Obi-Wan Kenobi has 80%. Considering that those two shows are so awful I think they may constitute as actual Hollywood war crimes, critics collectively are hardly to be trusted when it comes to putting a numerical value to their opinion.

What is said in these reviews is worth considering though.

The Guardian review for instance seems infatuated by the budget and the idea of heroic warrior Galadriel. Most positive reviews also fixate on the budget.

Those for whom flashy CG is the main draw may take this as a positive sign.

What I'm personally getting from these reviews is that it may take a little more than two episodes to get a sense of how to feel about this show. It seems like a really mixed bag if a huge budget isn't a major selling point. But it may tilt positive overall.

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1 hour ago, Werthead said:

No review from Mo Ryan yet, who's my usually-reliable barometer for how a show is doing.

Interesting.  Honestly not sure I've read anything from her in a few years but she was always one of my favorites.  Are you sure she is gonna review it?  If so I'll be on the lookout.

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