Rings of Power: Three Threads for the Elven Lords (book spoilers)

[DMC]

6 minutes ago, Caligula_K3 said:

Ok, Galadriel's plan to swim across the ocean was pretty dumb, but other than that, what's been that stupid about it?

Yeah that's the only thing that deserves such hyperbolic derision thus far IMO.

[polishgenius]

7 hours ago, Werthead said:

Carpenter claims that Tolkien had little sense of his own mortality and would have not been thinking that far ahead, which I find highly dubious after a whole string of Tolkien's close friends and then his wife Edith all passed away within a short space of time.

Honestly, I find it highly dubious because I've read The Lord of the Rings. I mean I can't say for sure, I wasn't in his head, but that seems like the work of a man who knows that death comes, eventually, for us all.


 

 

5 hours ago, Caligula_K3 said:

In the books, it feels like a little bit of a cop-out that Faramir can just completely resist the lure of the ring. I like that Faramir in the movies can't resist at first, for all sorts of reasons, but then figures out why he needs to let Frodo and Sam go.

This is honestly just a pure ideological/worldview difference- for Tolkien, that simplicity of the reaction was the entire point. He had other things going on of course but Faramir's thematic cornerstone was that there do exist Men purely good enough to just be completely uninterested in the Ring's power. Feeling it's a cop-out just means you don't believe that's very likely.





 

[Iskaral Pust]

Agreed, the Galadriel swim was ridiculous, especially after showing on the map the vastness of the Sundering Sea.  But the series so far is pretty enjoyable.  BTW, I haven’t read the Sil or the BoLT, and it’s a long time since I last read the appendices, so I am just following the show as it unfolds without many anchor expectations.  Based on the rights they acquired, it’s understandable that they had to gloss over the first age. 

The visuals, acting and production quality are very good, and there is thankfully less portentous Elven dialogue than I feared.  As ever with Tolkien, the world building is ridiculously thin: who feeds these Dwarven underground cities and Elven  forest citadels?  Medieval agriculture requires space and lots of labor, and utopian hunting & gathering especially requires a huge, shifting area rather than a fixed population center.

One feature I dislike in the adaptation specifically is the assignment of accents to cultures: the twee, primitive Harfoots have Irish accents, the earthy, greedy, canny Dwarves have Scottish accents, the coarse, truculent Men have Northern English (Yorkshire?) accents, while the Elves speak in Received Pronunciation.  It betrays a regional bias straight out of Buckingham Palace. 

[SeanF]

5 hours ago, Ran said:

Tolkien made a very expensive home purchase and move to Bornemouth in 1969, and was also concerned with inheritance taxes, by all accounts. It seems likely that these two things were major aspects of his decision making. Le Monde interviewed CT in 2012, one of the only interviews he ever did (which is the source of the famous quote in which he stated that Jackson's films "eviscerated" his father's work), and raises the exact same account as to why he sold it as it discusses CT's feelings about it all. It seems to me if the account was wrong, CT would have corrected it then and there, or after publication.

Obviously, making sure his family had the wherewithal to pay the inheritance taxes that were coming would have the effect of helping to secure their future, so that's not untrue. But to my understanding, setting up the trust was for the future of his children and grandchildren. Selling the rights, OTOH, was for tax purposes and perhaps short term financial need reasons.

I think Roy Jenkins would have helped.  As an aesthete, and Chancellor, he altered the inheritance tax laws to exempt all sorts of cultural works.

[SeanF]

38 minutes ago, polishgenius said:

Honestly, I find it highly dubious because I've read The Lord of the Rings. I mean I can't say for sure, I wasn't in his head, but that seems like the work of a man who knows that death comes, eventually, for us all.


 

 

This is honestly just a pure ideological/worldview difference- for Tolkien, that simplicity of the reaction was the entire point. He had other things going on of course but Faramir's thematic cornerstone was that there do exist Men purely good enough to just be completely uninterested in the Ring's power. Feeling it's a cop-out just means you don't believe that's very likely.





 

Fair point.  I don’t actually think such people do exist, but that’s just me.

I’d have agreed with (book ) Denethor.  Sauron threatens to obliterate everyone and everything I love.  If I claim the Ring, there’s a big chance that hundreds of years down the line I’ll have become as rotten as Sauron, but at least I’ll have bought my people a long period of safety and freedom.

[IFR]

2 hours ago, Werthead said:

RoP has a myriad plethora of weaknesses but one of its widely-acknowledged strengths so far is that it's not as bad as the Hobbit trilogy (well, so far, admittedly it's early doors), where we really see the mind-boggling idiocy Jackson could conceive of. Although admittedly mainly due to the studio holding a gun to his (and New Zealand's) head.

It's true enough that The Hobbit adaptation was a bit of a scandal. I remember as a kid not being too wild about them, and I haven't watched them since. 

1 hour ago, Caligula_K3 said:

That doesn't mean the trilogy has no flaws and we can't discuss them.

I agree. I suppose I'm still at that stage where taking pot-shots at RoP provides some zesty excitement, and I take the opportunity where present.

There's plenty to criticize about the LotR trilogy, as much as I like it.

1 hour ago, Caligula_K3 said:

I won't say I love The Rings of Power so far, but I do like it, and I'm not sure I'd use "mind bogling idiocy" to describe it either

Oh, I would and do.

1 hour ago, Caligula_K3 said:

Ok, Galadriel's plan to swim across the ocean was pretty dumb, but other than that, what's been that stupid about it?

Sure, it is my pleasure to provide examples.

- Scaling the side of a frigid mountain in full metal armor.

-The troll fight.

-"Stones sink because they see only downward."

-"This place is so evil the torches give off no warmth." This lets Galadriel know where to go because, you know, the colder path is more evil.

-Galadriel punching through a thick sheet of ice.

-Why are the elves always speaking Common Speech?

-Galadriel is a 5000 year old impulsive teenager, I guess, which explains why other elves barely afford her any respect.

-Valinor being used by Gil-Galad as a political power move against Galadriel...and this somehow working for a while.

-The elf human love affair is consummately cringe-worthy. Allow me to sample some lines. 

"Say what you wish to say."

"I have said it already. A hundred times over in every way but words."

Passionately stare into each other's eyes.

- The elf proceeds to deliberately squirt diseased milk over his hands...and doesn't try to wipe if off later.

-The kid is obviously the son of the elf and has pointy ears which are covered by his hair. No one ever observes this? Did he have that hair cut from infancy?

-The elf, a seasoned warrior, is successfully bullied into taking a peasant and his lover into a place of obvious danger. For no reason, really. 

-They really sailed that ship all the way to Valinor? Was everyone just standing the whole time?

-And yes, to top it all, Galadriel swimming back to Middle-Earth.

This is just the first episode, but I think that's an adequate list, though one that could doubtlessly be added to.

I do want to say that I'm enjoying the series enough, otherwise I would simply stop watching it. But it's also entertaining to poke fun at it. Which is better than shows like Wheel of Time, The Witcher, The Foundation, etc., all of which I have no interest in continuing.

I am annoyed that Amazon couldn't be better than this. Sure, it's fun to watch Arnold Schwarzenegger mindlessly blow things up in True Lies, but I had hoped that Amazon would aim more for Goodfellas.

[Zorral]

I don't love much of anything any longer, not in These Times.  However everything good that happens in These Times feels epic, IS epic, because we don't know if it will ever be able to happen again. That feels quite Tolkienish to me.

For all we know there will be no more seasons of either ROP or HOT D, with Winter Coming, the cost of living, and particularly power -- even pubs unable to afford to stay open. People are already saying in Europe \both Netflix and amazon are shedding subscribers because they can't afford them -- or even internet subscriptions. Will the new Warlord series even get made -- it was supposed to start production this fall wasn't it?

So I'm even more grateful to have both of these series going on, along with the other productions I like. Appreciate while we have.

Somehow one doesn't think this discussion is going on in Ukraine.

Here endeth ye sermon; defenestrate me now, continue the gleeful enumeration of massive failures in these two brand new shows that surely none of us would commit if we were dealing with projects this immense with a rabidly self-identified fan base of the smartet people in the room.  

 

[DMC]

17 minutes ago, IFR said:

It's true enough that The Hobbit adaptation was a bit of a scandal. I remember as a kid not being too wild about them, and I haven't watched them since. 

Old Man Rule:  If you watched the Hobbit adaptations that came out 8-10 years ago "as a kid," you're still a kid.

[sifth]

I love how amazon is even advertising this show on its packages. I ordered something over the weekend and it came to me today in a Rings of Power box, lol

[DMC]

25 minutes ago, sifth said:

I love how amazon is even advertising this show on its packages. I ordered something over the weekend and it cam to me today in a Rings of Power box, lol

Capitalism baby!

[Zorral]

41 minutes ago, DMC said:

Capitalism baby!

Been seeing those packages starting this last weekend.  My first thought seeing a delivery guy with one of those boxes, was, "Are some Very Special Indeed Amazilla subscriber-customers getting dvd sets of HOTD?"  Then reality kicked in.  

[Clueless Northman]

2 hours ago, SeanF said:

I’d have agreed with (book ) Denethor.  Sauron threatens to obliterate everyone and everything I love.  If I claim the Ring, there’s a big chance that hundreds of years down the line I’ll have become as rotten as Sauron, but at least I’ll have bought my people a long period of safety and freedom.

Sadly, no human with the Ring can genuinely beat a ringless Sauron. Though Denethor probably doesn't realize it and the Ring would convince him he can easily destroy Sauron.

[Slurktan]

4 hours ago, Iskaral Pust said:

The visuals, acting and production quality are very good, and there is thankfully less portentous Elven dialogue than I feared.  As ever with Tolkien, the world building is ridiculously thin: who feeds these Dwarven underground cities and Elven  forest citadels?  Medieval agriculture requires space and lots of labor, and utopian hunting & gathering especially requires a huge, shifting area rather than a fixed population center.

Feeding the dwarves actually is answered in the HoME.  They trade for their food.  Its why their cities are always next to places they can get food from.  For the show they actually showed terrace farms in Khazad Dum, so that. Also do elves eat anything other than Lembas? 

[Slurktan]

Duplicate

[Iskaral Pust]

4 hours ago, Slurktan said:

Feeding the dwarves actually is answered in the HoME.  They trade for their food.  Its why their cities are always next to places they can get food from.  For the show they actually showed terrace farms in Khazad Dum, so that. Also do elves eat anything other than Lembas? 

The scale doesn’t work.  Not even close.  Medieval agricultural food surplus wasn’t that large, so huge populations of serf farmers would be required to support Dwarf cities.  And road-based trade would have been very slow and hugely inefficient— just look at how hard it was to transport food supplies for armies; just feeding the draught animals used a large fraction of the food mass.  Laketown was the closest to a plausible food supply system, but still not that close for the population size indicated.

[Zorral]

It was a time of magic!  Magic all over the place(s!) None of this I thought about a second -- even as a farmer kid -- while the hundred times of reading LOtR before I grew up into history.  That was the joy of LOtR back then.  But then, I grew up pretty quickly into history and other facts of life.   Magic, magic, magic, the solution to everything -- except when it wasn't thus the evil of the Ring.  One had to think about that at some point if one is growing up.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

4 hours ago, sifth said:

I love how amazon is even advertising this show on its packages. I ordered something over the weekend and it came to me today in a Rings of Power box, lol

That's actually incredibly clever. If I spent the kind of moneys they supposedly did to make this show, I'd be looking for "opportunities" like that as well.

It's also kind of depressing. Get ready for random marketing wank to be inserted into your shipped packages. You'll order something from amazon and along with your item as some packing material, paper flyers and coupons determined by some algorithm based on your region, recent purchases and browser history (of course they know your browser history). 

Of course they might be doing this already. I haven't purchased from Amazon in years. 

[The Anti-Targ]

11 hours ago, Werthead said:

RoP has a myriad plethora of weaknesses but one of its widely-acknowledged strengths so far is that it's not as bad as the Hobbit trilogy (well, so far, admittedly it's early doors), where we really see the mind-boggling idiocy Jackson could conceive of. Although admittedly mainly due to the studio holding a gun to his (and New Zealand's) head.

Mordin Solas said it best, "Had to be me, someone else might have got it wrong." Only in Jackson's case, with the Hobbit, he got it wrong anyway. Will the question ever be answered that anyone else would do a worse job? I guess we have The Hobbit, the animated movie to compare.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

Oh, super good! This fucking human decided to weigh in.

 

[Heartofice]

24 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Mordin Solas said it best, "Had to be me, someone else might have got it wrong." Only in Jackson's case, with the Hobbit, he got it wrong anyway. Will the question ever be answered that anyone else would do a worse job? I guess we have The Hobbit, the animated movie to compare.

Jackson was trying to make the best of a bad lot though to be fair to him, a job he only took very reluctantly and with a number of issues to deal with. I'm sure there is a lot to criticise about many of the decisions he made, why he wanted to add in so much back story to tiny story we might never understand, other than there were 3 movies and he wanted to put something in them. I'm not sure I'd ever want there to be another version of this tale though, just leave it alone. 

 

 

21 minutes ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Oh, super good! This fucking human decided to weigh in.

He's not even right, there is like.. one male character who isn't a jerk, and I'm sure Galadriel isn't a total jerk. I mean this isn't the She-Hulk show, it's not that bad.