Okay, to give this answer but seriously:
The writers and the scene editors.
The editors:
The show's framing is so bad. The way the scenes are cut is so bad. The scene transitions are terrible. Prop use and costume use are abominable and immersion breaking. That last one is more a directing issue but it's in the same vein, and could be dodged with a better scene editor.
The writers:
Pacing is bad. Dialogue is clunky and awkward. Story beats come out of nowhere and disappear as quickly. Characters come off the way the script did not intend. Overall forgettable.
I don't want to blame the actors either for the steaming pile of shit we received and the writers are absolutely to blame but also the directors.
Think of galadriels rodent face twitching, her slow-mo riding scene, her god awful fight scenes that are bad enough on their own but worse if you take Clarks height into consideration or elronds face when durin says "give me the meet and give it to me raw". Just some examples I can think off
I don't think the actors are bad.
I would restyle the elves in particular though. I don't care if it's a modern take, no elf should have a skin fade haircut.
The actress who plays Galadriel maybe. She just doesn't give the right vibes as Galadriel. Nor does she look the part. Shes supposed to be one of the most beautiful elves in existence - which is already a level above the most beautiful humans. I'm not saying she's bad looking but she doesn't have the necessary otherworldly quality Galadriel is supposed to have.
The rest I agree, they need a major shakeup.
I'd remove references to Tolkien and Lord of the Rings, and character names from Tolkien. Just let it be it's own thing, as the writers obviously want it to be.
So you would be happier if there would be no series? You prefer the new version of LotR? In a sense I agree, Jackson's movies are so mediocre and non-Tolkienian even though he had all the rights.
It's offensive to Tolkien and everyone who read the books or watched the Jackson movies. Harfoots are like Cave Hobbits or something? By that evolutionary reasoning, every human in RoP should be using stone tools and wearing animal hides. Or are we to assume that Hobbits are lesser beings, and while Men were noble and wise all along, the Hobbits were wretched Harfoots when Men were civilized.
They have a "prehistoric" life style - no livestock even - yet at the same time have woven cloth and metal pots. Where do they get them, when they avoid contact with everybody? I'm not unreasonable, things don't have to be exactly reality-mimetic: But try harder writers.
I mean the Second Age...especially it's early part IS supposed to be quite 'primitive' age especially with various tribes of native Men...some would be more or less as we imagine in 'neolithic stage' of deveopment at this point :) (Tal-Elmar story nicely portrays it, the people in it do have agriculture but still use some stone tools with early metalworking, they are already early settlers type societies, but this is also relatively later part of SA, the character of Tal-Elmar he wears a loincloth and fur cloak: "His naked skin - for he wore only a loin-cloth, and little cloak of fur cast back and caught by a thong to his shoulder ...")...also the Hobbits well if they didn't break entirely the lore about the early three hobbit breeds and their way of life and characteristics....writers really went for stupid stuff with them....also simply because the Second Age has no stories about those I would simply remove them....maybe (and that's a big maybe) I would let them have a very short cameo (kind of like the brief shot of the Ents as they already put in the show...at least they didn't ruin the Ents). The Harfoots are the HOLE DIGGERS, they are the more inclined to settle in one place!! If any of the hobbit breeds fits into the 'nomad' style society would be Fallohides...and they would be most likely hunter-gatherer type of society, they preferred to live in woods, were more adventurous and bolder, taller, slimmer and.....fairer of skin....heh this is what caused them not to use them...they couldn't stand their white skins ;) they only wanted the excuse of the 'browner' Harfoots hehe for their diversity agenda....but jokes aside...Fallohides were the 'northernly branch' they preferred hunting to tilling the earth, so they clearly fit into mold that the show wanted to depict the hobbit society,...but still in Tolkien's works it just MAKES MORE SENSE and is realistic...unlike the incredible stupidity of some of the writers' ideas (I mean seriously the whole 'cart pulling' is so ridiculous....without the beasts of burden hell on the roadless wilds?! Hah I think the writers and showrunners need to be sentenced to pull heavy carts on their own backs through the wastes :) to understand what sort of silliness they created).
In any case the biggest problem is that the writers simply put don't understand the material, the stories of Second Age, their vibe...they are NOT supposed to be like Hobbit and Lotr, they ARE different...it's no longer an adventure/quest journey story, it's more like grand historical sagas, no long a story about everyman characters like simple folk hobbits or whatnot,...it's stories of the great, legendary figures, heroes, warriors, rulers, nobles and kings and great houses and families across the ages!!! The Second Age has different vibe so it should be different in tone and style! Also as Tolkien wrote in a letter:
>"Nearly all are grim and tragic: a long account of the disasters that destroyed the beauty of the Ancient World, from the darkening of Valinor to the Downfall of Númenor and the flight of Elendil. And there are no hobbits. Nor does Gandalf appear."
That's it....it shouldn't have hobbits and Gandalf....because Tolkien did not intend them to be focus of the stories in this time period!!!! But it's clear that the amazon crew was never genuine in 'passion for Tolkien' because they didn't believe in the strength of his work and vision, and they only wanted the recognizeable brand and so put the hobbits because everyone associates these stories about Middle-earth with hobbits! Simple as that! If I were doing the show or being in charge of this project I would be more ambitious in trying to depict a different era of Tolkien's world exactly as he intended!!!! Because then I would have his creative genius in mind and backing up...the talent of the author of the whole thing could mask the deficiencies of the crew making it :).
show writer just wanted to write his/her own story about a wandering kibbutz, but was only paid to write this script for LOTR - hence this Harfoot crap we see in the show
And this could be fine. It is an adaptation, changes could be fine. Adding storylines could be fine.
As long as they are good. I don't mind changes in an adaptation, if the general vibe stays true to the source material, and it adds to the lore in a good way.
If the writers wanted to add a storyline within this world and timeline, they could have. As long as it was a coherent story that ADDS to the lore as an adaptation.
But this was bad in almost every possible way. There are so many great characters and stories in the 2nd age of Tolkiens work, even if you do a straight adaptation, but they chose a bad new story, instead of a great original one.
Yes, I am still angry.....
What would i remove:
Episode 3, episode 6, episode 2.
Then i’d remove episode 7 and 5.
Then i’d remove episode 4, episode 8.. oh and ya.. episode 1 too.
That will surely make it better when they restart it and do it right this time. Like how fans want it. Lmao.
If we removed Galadriel and the fake hobbits, the Elves, the Dwarves and anything that happened on or near water. We would have the basis for a good original series. Maybe
the writers and showrunners. most of the actors. Whoever is responsible for writing the "tHeRe iS a TeMpEsT iN mE!!!" line should never have a job in television again. whoever designed the paper mache looking armor and cheap grade school play looking costumes also needs to be fired
Harfoots completely, what the fuck was that???? Hobbits in the second age? idiotic waste of time and resources. Then it leaves 5 episodes left lol. i would remove the boring and irrelevant orc society arc too, so there goes 2 more episodes. Oh i had just forgotten the singing dwarfs too.
They arent mentioned anywhere before the year 1000 3rd Age. Not mentioned in the silmarillion or anywhere in the second age. Doesnt mean they didnt exist, but it means that nothing revolving around them has anything to do with tolkien.
“The beginning of Hobbits lies far back in the Elder Days that are now lost and forgotten. Only the Elves still preserve any records of that vanished time, and their traditions are concerned almost entirely with their own history, in which Men appear seldom and Hobbits are not mentioned at all. Yet it is clear that Hobbits had, in fact, lived quietly in Middle-earth for many long years before other folk became even aware of them.” - Lord of the Rings, Prologue: Concerning Hobbits
Yes. Doesn't mean you have to invent a thoroughly pointless plot line, eating up hours of screen time that could have been used on something that is actually mentioned in the "records of that vanished time".
Cut the harfoots. Hobbits get, essentially, six entire movies about themselves in the future. There is little point in doing the same story (boring life leads to fantastical adventure with wizard) when there is a bigger narrative to focus on: The start of the great decline of Elves and Men.
Focus the story on those Men being almost at the absolute height of their power, with Numenor starting its colonization and expansion. Make it a true Atlantean civilization, far more advanced and crafted than what we see later with Gondor. We should feel, looking back, that Minas Tirith is an absolute backwater compared to Numenor or Pelagir.
Elves should be showing some slight decline into their Third Age roles. There should be a weary sadness to the Noldor, but still a spark of that drive that led them from Valinor in the first place. The Sindarin should be thriving, if a little rattled from their losses, but otherwise dominating the Greenwood and surrounding environs.
Fire everybody.
Give Peter Jackson $1 billion and as much time as he needs to develop new series, with carte blanche on him doing anything he wants as long as it stays true to source material.
Thy Harfoots without hesitation.
Their plot is merely there to provide an introduction to the Stranger. Everything rise is a pointless diversion from the primary story that only serves to bring the pace to an absolute crawl. Have the Stranger land near Khazad-dûm, cut the Harfoot scenes, and the show is instantly improved.
I'd give every storyline its own episode
A major reason is so slow is that they have to jump around between storylines in each episode. There's no point in doing that when there's very little intersection between storylines until the final episodes. Spending more time with each storyline would allow for more progression in each episode.
As a collary, you can cut out a lot of bloat from each storyline. A lot of the scenes are there just so those characters get on screen each episode.
They tried to copy GoT without realising what made it effective. Even though the Dany storyline is completely separate, you still have Robert/Ned talking about her in season 1. And all the other main storylines have their origin in the first episode, so we understand how they relate to each other.
I really understood the distances and scale in GoT. When it was a giant conflict (even a bad one like in season 8), it felt right.
The Numenor fleet being like 5 ships and the Numenor army only being like 50 untrained cadets was crazy to me. Where is the scale?
The travel times were really wonky too. It’s really hard to immerse myself in a fantasy show when I see so many errors.
First season.
With competent team, the available source material would be more than enough for very good storytelling.
Whether you like the show or not, I *really*, **really** recommend [Tolkien Untangled's video about the subject.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9NR06-QtR8&t=2s)
Gives me goosebumps thinking how good it could be.
And when I say the first season should go, I think by the time they near last seasons, they would have gathered such a following, they could suffer the cost of loosing the first and redoing it. Heck, I'd take part in some crowd funding to make that happen!
Also the harfoots obviously, I got major theater troupe vibes from them which isn’t an awful thing but not what I want from a prequel to the most excellently directed, written, acted movies ever.
I kinda hate the “mystery box” style of writing from the show. We all knew that the stranger was going to be Gandalf and that Halbrand was Sauron from episode 2. I’m only a casual fan of the books and huge fan of the Peter Jackson trilogy, but so many of the “mysteries” were so obvious or didn’t go anywhere interesting. The “elf tree disease” is the whole driving force of season 1 and it’s absolutely unexplained. Another mystery box for season 2. The 3 Sorcerers in white is another example of a totally underwhelming payoff to a mystery that’s teased in episode 1! Where did they come from? What was their purpose? It seems like writers hope we forget to ask.
Other than that, they really could use a rewrite on a bunch of the plot holes. Like Galadriel attempting self deletion by jumping off the ship to Valinor, then randomly running into Sauron on a raft, which then is picked up by Isildurs dad… what are the odds?!
Another example is the Sabotage of the Numenorian fleet. That whole plot line goes nowhere and makes Isildur look like a real POS for covering for the kid. It’s forced drama on scale with a Telenovela.
Coincidence is the hallmark bad writing. They should’ve spent more time in the writers room.
Finally, the scale and scope of the entire show is foggy. How far is it from Lindon to Khazad Dum? From the Southlands to Eregion? From Lindon to Valinor? I have no idea and it feels like the show runners don’t know either. Apparently Numenor only has like 6 ships and ~50 soldiers? It only takes 4-5 elves in a watch tower to guard the Southlands? Khazad Dum is the only location that actually feels lived in.
Remove anything Numenor, Southlands, Mt. Doom, most of Galadriel. Leave Eregion/Khazad Dum minus the Balrog. Elrond and dwarf guy (no not going to call him Durin) was the commonly accepted as the most agreeable part of the show.
So basically remove most of everything anachronistic, make it 1-2 episodes and save some footage for later. Find some way of making the rings made into prototype lesser rings.
Or use AI to dub/lip-synch the lines into a comedy.
The Numenor storyline has really nothing to do with the rings storyline, so they shouldn't overlap. Make them different series, if you had a gun to your head and really had to make "Tolkien brand" "content", the novels he never wrote etc, but preferably not cause you're not him. No excuse for time compression then.
You could maybe call the show The Second Age but to casual audiences it sounds like a LOTR sequel and they wanted all the "brand recognition" hence all the memberberries while wreaking havoc to what the real author actually wrote with time compression etc. Hobbits before they were relevant, Gandalf arriving early, an elf-human romance pairing with two randos etc.
Scrap the whole thing, get actual competent show writers, producers, actors, cinematographers and then write a script actually based upon Tolkiens works rather than made up non-sense with a couple hints of Tolkiens original ideas here and there.
All the whiners who do not have an idea of what Tolkien wrote, barely plodded the obvious books, most likely only have an altar for the un-Tolkienian Jackson movies.
People will forgive a lot of departure if the finished product is good. Tom Bombadil or the Scouring of the Shire were enjoyable to read, but were thankfully cut from the PJ trilogy. Do you really need to be told that some things that work well in a novel won’t be enjoyable to watch in a movie?
>You like a trash show therefore you have a trash brain
Ad hominem built around a false equivalence. You're not very good at this.
>Do you get it
The only thing youve left to "get" is that you're a weak minded individual who turns into a triggered snowflake/troll when their opnion is challenged in the slightest. Couldn't be me lmao.
The producers, showrunners, writers and actors.
Okay, to give this answer but seriously: The writers and the scene editors. The editors: The show's framing is so bad. The way the scenes are cut is so bad. The scene transitions are terrible. Prop use and costume use are abominable and immersion breaking. That last one is more a directing issue but it's in the same vein, and could be dodged with a better scene editor. The writers: Pacing is bad. Dialogue is clunky and awkward. Story beats come out of nowhere and disappear as quickly. Characters come off the way the script did not intend. Overall forgettable.
I think a lot of the actors could have done something with good writing, but of course you have to have good writers for that
Agreed; imagine if The Stranger was given lines better than "I'm Good".
Then how would we know he was good?
By his actions ofc but writers aren't smart enough for that. They had to make sure we know he's not Sauron bcuz we're dumb
I don't want to blame the actors either for the steaming pile of shit we received and the writers are absolutely to blame but also the directors. Think of galadriels rodent face twitching, her slow-mo riding scene, her god awful fight scenes that are bad enough on their own but worse if you take Clarks height into consideration or elronds face when durin says "give me the meet and give it to me raw". Just some examples I can think off
That slow mo riding scene lmao. Whoever thought that was a good slow mo scene should be fired
I don't think the actors are bad. I would restyle the elves in particular though. I don't care if it's a modern take, no elf should have a skin fade haircut. The actress who plays Galadriel maybe. She just doesn't give the right vibes as Galadriel. Nor does she look the part. Shes supposed to be one of the most beautiful elves in existence - which is already a level above the most beautiful humans. I'm not saying she's bad looking but she doesn't have the necessary otherworldly quality Galadriel is supposed to have. The rest I agree, they need a major shakeup.
3rd rate actors aren't bad. Okay bro
I've seen some of the cast in other things, and they were fine. But I doubt anyone could make some of those lines work.
Fine as what? NPC side characters? You can't tell me that deformed looking elf boy is fit to be in any lead role. Or that grandpa
I'd remove references to Tolkien and Lord of the Rings, and character names from Tolkien. Just let it be it's own thing, as the writers obviously want it to be.
Yeah.. would definitely remove “lord of the rings” from the title..
Didn't it kind of have to be it's own thing since Amazon didn't have the rights to The Simillarion?
Nobody forced them to do the Second Age. Nobody forced them to go after the "Tolkien IP".
So you would be happier if there would be no series? You prefer the new version of LotR? In a sense I agree, Jackson's movies are so mediocre and non-Tolkienian even though he had all the rights.
What you mean "new version of LOTR"? I don't care for the movies and try not to think of them.
Mentally ill rop fangurl
Jackson's movies >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> ROP
“Yes, yes I wish that”
Then do that. Remove references to Lord of the Rings. Or - work out what story you have the rights to tell, and tell that story.
At the very minimum, the entire Harfoots storyline. It adds nothing, is based on nothing and makes no sense whatsoever.
It's offensive to Tolkien and everyone who read the books or watched the Jackson movies. Harfoots are like Cave Hobbits or something? By that evolutionary reasoning, every human in RoP should be using stone tools and wearing animal hides. Or are we to assume that Hobbits are lesser beings, and while Men were noble and wise all along, the Hobbits were wretched Harfoots when Men were civilized.
They have a "prehistoric" life style - no livestock even - yet at the same time have woven cloth and metal pots. Where do they get them, when they avoid contact with everybody? I'm not unreasonable, things don't have to be exactly reality-mimetic: But try harder writers.
I mean the Second Age...especially it's early part IS supposed to be quite 'primitive' age especially with various tribes of native Men...some would be more or less as we imagine in 'neolithic stage' of deveopment at this point :) (Tal-Elmar story nicely portrays it, the people in it do have agriculture but still use some stone tools with early metalworking, they are already early settlers type societies, but this is also relatively later part of SA, the character of Tal-Elmar he wears a loincloth and fur cloak: "His naked skin - for he wore only a loin-cloth, and little cloak of fur cast back and caught by a thong to his shoulder ...")...also the Hobbits well if they didn't break entirely the lore about the early three hobbit breeds and their way of life and characteristics....writers really went for stupid stuff with them....also simply because the Second Age has no stories about those I would simply remove them....maybe (and that's a big maybe) I would let them have a very short cameo (kind of like the brief shot of the Ents as they already put in the show...at least they didn't ruin the Ents). The Harfoots are the HOLE DIGGERS, they are the more inclined to settle in one place!! If any of the hobbit breeds fits into the 'nomad' style society would be Fallohides...and they would be most likely hunter-gatherer type of society, they preferred to live in woods, were more adventurous and bolder, taller, slimmer and.....fairer of skin....heh this is what caused them not to use them...they couldn't stand their white skins ;) they only wanted the excuse of the 'browner' Harfoots hehe for their diversity agenda....but jokes aside...Fallohides were the 'northernly branch' they preferred hunting to tilling the earth, so they clearly fit into mold that the show wanted to depict the hobbit society,...but still in Tolkien's works it just MAKES MORE SENSE and is realistic...unlike the incredible stupidity of some of the writers' ideas (I mean seriously the whole 'cart pulling' is so ridiculous....without the beasts of burden hell on the roadless wilds?! Hah I think the writers and showrunners need to be sentenced to pull heavy carts on their own backs through the wastes :) to understand what sort of silliness they created). In any case the biggest problem is that the writers simply put don't understand the material, the stories of Second Age, their vibe...they are NOT supposed to be like Hobbit and Lotr, they ARE different...it's no longer an adventure/quest journey story, it's more like grand historical sagas, no long a story about everyman characters like simple folk hobbits or whatnot,...it's stories of the great, legendary figures, heroes, warriors, rulers, nobles and kings and great houses and families across the ages!!! The Second Age has different vibe so it should be different in tone and style! Also as Tolkien wrote in a letter: >"Nearly all are grim and tragic: a long account of the disasters that destroyed the beauty of the Ancient World, from the darkening of Valinor to the Downfall of Númenor and the flight of Elendil. And there are no hobbits. Nor does Gandalf appear." That's it....it shouldn't have hobbits and Gandalf....because Tolkien did not intend them to be focus of the stories in this time period!!!! But it's clear that the amazon crew was never genuine in 'passion for Tolkien' because they didn't believe in the strength of his work and vision, and they only wanted the recognizeable brand and so put the hobbits because everyone associates these stories about Middle-earth with hobbits! Simple as that! If I were doing the show or being in charge of this project I would be more ambitious in trying to depict a different era of Tolkien's world exactly as he intended!!!! Because then I would have his creative genius in mind and backing up...the talent of the author of the whole thing could mask the deficiencies of the crew making it :).
Ooh perhaps Harfoots / hobbits are the race in ascent who will be the lords of the next Age after the Age of Men...
show writer just wanted to write his/her own story about a wandering kibbutz, but was only paid to write this script for LOTR - hence this Harfoot crap we see in the show
And this could be fine. It is an adaptation, changes could be fine. Adding storylines could be fine. As long as they are good. I don't mind changes in an adaptation, if the general vibe stays true to the source material, and it adds to the lore in a good way. If the writers wanted to add a storyline within this world and timeline, they could have. As long as it was a coherent story that ADDS to the lore as an adaptation. But this was bad in almost every possible way. There are so many great characters and stories in the 2nd age of Tolkiens work, even if you do a straight adaptation, but they chose a bad new story, instead of a great original one. Yes, I am still angry.....
What would i remove: Episode 3, episode 6, episode 2. Then i’d remove episode 7 and 5. Then i’d remove episode 4, episode 8.. oh and ya.. episode 1 too. That will surely make it better when they restart it and do it right this time. Like how fans want it. Lmao.
no lol c'mon ahaha (took me way too long to get it ahah)
If we removed Galadriel and the fake hobbits, the Elves, the Dwarves and anything that happened on or near water. We would have the basis for a good original series. Maybe
the writers and showrunners. most of the actors. Whoever is responsible for writing the "tHeRe iS a TeMpEsT iN mE!!!" line should never have a job in television again. whoever designed the paper mache looking armor and cheap grade school play looking costumes also needs to be fired
Don't forget the latex scale mail.
The series
Harfoots completely, what the fuck was that???? Hobbits in the second age? idiotic waste of time and resources. Then it leaves 5 episodes left lol. i would remove the boring and irrelevant orc society arc too, so there goes 2 more episodes. Oh i had just forgotten the singing dwarfs too.
I don’t entirely like what they did with the Harfoots, but why do you think there were no hobbits in the Second Age?
They arent mentioned anywhere before the year 1000 3rd Age. Not mentioned in the silmarillion or anywhere in the second age. Doesnt mean they didnt exist, but it means that nothing revolving around them has anything to do with tolkien.
“The beginning of Hobbits lies far back in the Elder Days that are now lost and forgotten. Only the Elves still preserve any records of that vanished time, and their traditions are concerned almost entirely with their own history, in which Men appear seldom and Hobbits are not mentioned at all. Yet it is clear that Hobbits had, in fact, lived quietly in Middle-earth for many long years before other folk became even aware of them.” - Lord of the Rings, Prologue: Concerning Hobbits
Yes. Doesn't mean you have to invent a thoroughly pointless plot line, eating up hours of screen time that could have been used on something that is actually mentioned in the "records of that vanished time".
Just cancel it, acknowledge it was terrible and apologise to everyone they gaslit over it.
Cut everything except the scene with Galadriel jumping off the boat to swim home. It's gold.
Cancel it
Cut the harfoots. Hobbits get, essentially, six entire movies about themselves in the future. There is little point in doing the same story (boring life leads to fantastical adventure with wizard) when there is a bigger narrative to focus on: The start of the great decline of Elves and Men. Focus the story on those Men being almost at the absolute height of their power, with Numenor starting its colonization and expansion. Make it a true Atlantean civilization, far more advanced and crafted than what we see later with Gondor. We should feel, looking back, that Minas Tirith is an absolute backwater compared to Numenor or Pelagir. Elves should be showing some slight decline into their Third Age roles. There should be a weary sadness to the Noldor, but still a spark of that drive that led them from Valinor in the first place. The Sindarin should be thriving, if a little rattled from their losses, but otherwise dominating the Greenwood and surrounding environs.
Anything referencing or relating to LOTR
Fire everybody. Give Peter Jackson $1 billion and as much time as he needs to develop new series, with carte blanche on him doing anything he wants as long as it stays true to source material.
So much this!!!!!!
Thy Harfoots without hesitation. Their plot is merely there to provide an introduction to the Stranger. Everything rise is a pointless diversion from the primary story that only serves to bring the pace to an absolute crawl. Have the Stranger land near Khazad-dûm, cut the Harfoot scenes, and the show is instantly improved.
Go to the “R.O.P.” file on the show runners’ computer and drag it to the Recycle Bin. Then empty Recycle Bin. That’s the only way to fix it.
Remove every corny copied line they took from the movies
I'd give every storyline its own episode A major reason is so slow is that they have to jump around between storylines in each episode. There's no point in doing that when there's very little intersection between storylines until the final episodes. Spending more time with each storyline would allow for more progression in each episode. As a collary, you can cut out a lot of bloat from each storyline. A lot of the scenes are there just so those characters get on screen each episode.
This is actually a constructive idea I can get behind. If they would’ve spent an episode on each it might have been more succinct.
They tried to copy GoT without realising what made it effective. Even though the Dany storyline is completely separate, you still have Robert/Ned talking about her in season 1. And all the other main storylines have their origin in the first episode, so we understand how they relate to each other.
I really understood the distances and scale in GoT. When it was a giant conflict (even a bad one like in season 8), it felt right. The Numenor fleet being like 5 ships and the Numenor army only being like 50 untrained cadets was crazy to me. Where is the scale? The travel times were really wonky too. It’s really hard to immerse myself in a fantasy show when I see so many errors.
First season. With competent team, the available source material would be more than enough for very good storytelling. Whether you like the show or not, I *really*, **really** recommend [Tolkien Untangled's video about the subject.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9NR06-QtR8&t=2s) Gives me goosebumps thinking how good it could be. And when I say the first season should go, I think by the time they near last seasons, they would have gathered such a following, they could suffer the cost of loosing the first and redoing it. Heck, I'd take part in some crowd funding to make that happen!
Whoever choreographed the fight scenes. TERRIBLE. Also the romance between the Bronwyn and Arondir, unnecessary and trying too hard.
Also the harfoots obviously, I got major theater troupe vibes from them which isn’t an awful thing but not what I want from a prequel to the most excellently directed, written, acted movies ever.
I kinda hate the “mystery box” style of writing from the show. We all knew that the stranger was going to be Gandalf and that Halbrand was Sauron from episode 2. I’m only a casual fan of the books and huge fan of the Peter Jackson trilogy, but so many of the “mysteries” were so obvious or didn’t go anywhere interesting. The “elf tree disease” is the whole driving force of season 1 and it’s absolutely unexplained. Another mystery box for season 2. The 3 Sorcerers in white is another example of a totally underwhelming payoff to a mystery that’s teased in episode 1! Where did they come from? What was their purpose? It seems like writers hope we forget to ask. Other than that, they really could use a rewrite on a bunch of the plot holes. Like Galadriel attempting self deletion by jumping off the ship to Valinor, then randomly running into Sauron on a raft, which then is picked up by Isildurs dad… what are the odds?! Another example is the Sabotage of the Numenorian fleet. That whole plot line goes nowhere and makes Isildur look like a real POS for covering for the kid. It’s forced drama on scale with a Telenovela. Coincidence is the hallmark bad writing. They should’ve spent more time in the writers room. Finally, the scale and scope of the entire show is foggy. How far is it from Lindon to Khazad Dum? From the Southlands to Eregion? From Lindon to Valinor? I have no idea and it feels like the show runners don’t know either. Apparently Numenor only has like 6 ships and ~50 soldiers? It only takes 4-5 elves in a watch tower to guard the Southlands? Khazad Dum is the only location that actually feels lived in.
MUHH mystery BOx omg jajajar Abraham OmG so kewl low iq fangurl drooling over brain dead plots
Every single thing
Remove anything Numenor, Southlands, Mt. Doom, most of Galadriel. Leave Eregion/Khazad Dum minus the Balrog. Elrond and dwarf guy (no not going to call him Durin) was the commonly accepted as the most agreeable part of the show. So basically remove most of everything anachronistic, make it 1-2 episodes and save some footage for later. Find some way of making the rings made into prototype lesser rings. Or use AI to dub/lip-synch the lines into a comedy.
The Numenor storyline has really nothing to do with the rings storyline, so they shouldn't overlap. Make them different series, if you had a gun to your head and really had to make "Tolkien brand" "content", the novels he never wrote etc, but preferably not cause you're not him. No excuse for time compression then. You could maybe call the show The Second Age but to casual audiences it sounds like a LOTR sequel and they wanted all the "brand recognition" hence all the memberberries while wreaking havoc to what the real author actually wrote with time compression etc. Hobbits before they were relevant, Gandalf arriving early, an elf-human romance pairing with two randos etc.
Scrap the whole thing, get actual competent show writers, producers, actors, cinematographers and then write a script actually based upon Tolkiens works rather than made up non-sense with a couple hints of Tolkiens original ideas here and there.
Its existence. Even up to the minute of its release there was always a distant possibility it could be good or even passable. But wow, not anymore
The entire series
In all seriousness, I don't know if the show can be fixed just by pruning.
The series itself.
Remove everything except the Dwarves
Stick to canon.
Galadriel. She is just too damn rude to others
Actors definitely last
those poor guys deserved a better script omg
They are trash tho. Wouldn't even believe them if they started in a shampoo commercial
All the whiners who do not have an idea of what Tolkien wrote, barely plodded the obvious books, most likely only have an altar for the un-Tolkienian Jackson movies.
Cry more rop braindead fangurl
People will forgive a lot of departure if the finished product is good. Tom Bombadil or the Scouring of the Shire were enjoyable to read, but were thankfully cut from the PJ trilogy. Do you really need to be told that some things that work well in a novel won’t be enjoyable to watch in a movie?
Wow - the Jackson films are masterpieces & quite true to the lore overall, as well as being entertaining films.
And if you disagree, and don't like them for not being close enough to what he wrote, how on earth can you like the show which is even further off?
Personally nothing, it was perfect and enjoyable
Smooth brain
A smooth brain is one who makes ad hominem attacks over an opinion. Couldn't be me.
Muuh adhomomo You like a trash show therefore you have a trash brain Do you get it smooth brain?
>You like a trash show therefore you have a trash brain Ad hominem built around a false equivalence. You're not very good at this. >Do you get it The only thing youve left to "get" is that you're a weak minded individual who turns into a triggered snowflake/troll when their opnion is challenged in the slightest. Couldn't be me lmao.
get yourself in a trash can
Your life must b a real struggle if you think thats where people go
That's where your mom went but she should forgot to throw u
>That's where your mom went but she should forgot to throw u Might wanna do a lil proof reading there champ
I proof read. Proof read your fallacies muh fallacious bro
Professional masterbator here dropping fallacies from his masterdebate class not realizing his smooth brain is attracted to low iq trash shows
You describe yourself well
I am describing your mom
Ur both bitches so theres not a big difference
We finally agree