Part 3

The speaker discusses their thoughts on the first season of a show called "The Rings of Power." They mention that the season relied too heavily on mysteries and surprises, which made it feel lazy. They also criticize the inclusion of certain characters and the lack of development in certain storylines. They highlight the lack of realism in the portrayal of Middle-earth and express confusion about some changes made to the lore and canon of Tolkien's works. Despite these criticisms, they acknowledge the show's technical achievements and visually stunning scenes. What I saw as a failure for the first season was having to play the guessing game as to who is Sauron, but less so that specifically, but more the mystery box nature of the first season. The narrative and plot of the Rings of Power is governed by surprises and mysteries to the nth degree. Who is Sauron? Who is the Stranger? Who are these white robed characters? Who is Thea's father? Who is Adar Trulli? Where is Aenarion? Where is Celeborn? What is this mystery sigil? Who is the King of the Southlands? What will happen with the Balrog? Season 1 almost seemed dependent on these mysteries, with personally the Halbrand Galadriel and Stranger Nori being the two main plot points of season 1. Even though the payoff for the Halbrand Galadriel reveal wasn't even that bad, the concept and idea of the overall plot being based on guessing who is who and where this person is from etc is a bit overkill and somewhat lazy. A perfect mashup of the previous two failure points are the mystics. No explanation as to who they are, which race, why they are after the stranger. They just come out of nowhere in episode 5 and then we see them next to none of them. A perfect mashup of the previous two failure points are the mystics. No explanation as to who they are, which race, why they are after the stranger. They just come out of nowhere in episode 5 and then we see them next to none of them. They are mainly there to serve again the who is Sauron plot in making us think it's the stranger and this just results in an overly reliant mystery narrative. I am going to do a bit of a strength and weakness mix together in one point as it is quite conflicting and it's around the Halfords. Through them we got a sense of the wide scale of Middle-earth and this really helped with the world building, but looking back in the end were they really a necessary addition for the plot? First off I think Marcella Cavanagh as Noddy was brilliant and in a way these Halfords felt the most like Middle-earth to me in this show, but that is because Hobbits is what we have mainly seen in Middle-earth adaptations. Looking back, could you make this season or even this show without the Halfords? Yes. Firstly they took up the second most screen time after Galadriel and Halbrand and mainly served the plot to in fact serve the stranger and his identity and the reason they got so much screen time is the reason why it wasn't actually that bad because we got to see so much of them. Nevertheless, my favourite moments of this first season were the 20 minutes of footage and time we spent in Eregion with Celebrimbor and Elrond roaming around the Eregion gardens and fields and they felt most like the second age to me. What this show maybe should have been focusing on is spending time within Eregion and maybe we could have spent as much time here instead of with the Halfords or in other places. However, the purpose of the Halfords did serve is that they made the world feel big, such as being scared of whatever these characters were, but they also made the world feel like it was a lot bigger than it actually was. This made Middle Earth feel big. I mention this because it links with my other failure that when you have a franchise like Lord of the Rings which in films and books embellishes journeys, quests through different lands and places, characters trekking and going from one forest to the next or one kingdom to the next, this is what makes a world feel real to an audience and lived in. Galadriel and Helbrand riding a horse from near Orodruin to Eregion in a few seconds and then Elrond and Celebrimbor in one scene making it from Lindon to Eregion and then from Eregion to Khazad-dûm just hampers the world building essence of what makes Middle Earth so splendid and which the fans have been accustomed to. Again, this point can be linked to the limited screen time for an 8 episode jam packed season. Though let's not forget, this show is beautiful and despite the prologue being heavily simplified, the Tyrion shots were mesmerising and Eregion was an amazing elven city, clearly signifying elvendom at its peak, Lindon as well, but to a bit of a lesser degree, and we have already talked about Khazad-dûm, but the real benefactor here is New York. The opening montage in episode 3 is where this billion dollar budget has gone to and even the capital New Nordian city and all the statues clearly signifying this is the height of men. I am sure the Rings of Power will win a lot of these technical awards for this, and this goes for the music and school by Bear McCreary as well. But a lot of these cities don't look like they are lived in, or have people living in them which is quite strange. Let's take Lindon for example, you would think only Gil-Galad and his clothed elven maids lived there, and although we did see some extras and different locations inside Lindon in episode 1, it was pretty limited after to mainly this tree set. Then we have the Southlands, where when you become the king of it, you seem to be the ruler of 7 huts and about 50 people, or fathers on speeches in front of 30 people, or the Numenoids having about 5 ships available in their fleet. I know Covid may have been an issue, but I don't get why they couldn't have digitally added people up the scale a bit. Also, around the Southlands, I don't get how Brandt, who suddenly becomes the king of the Southlands, and the Southlands people just take him in. That's a really strange plot point and writing issue I see there personally. We haven't really touched upon Numenor until this last section, and that is similar to the first season as well. I believe Numenor felt a bit overlooked or pushed to the side. We barely get the meat off the bone in regards to Fadazon, who should be a key player in this show, and though we see some scheming with his son Kimen about exploits in Middle-earth, it is still not developed enough. The strength of the Numenorean storyline comes from Elendil and Miriel, as well who I personally see as a mix with Telperien. Firstly, the performance of Lloyd Owen is superb, and the basic values and traits of one of the faithful is clearly shown through him. The use of the White Tree of Nimloth was also quite intriguing and symbolic in many ways, such as Miriel's decision to change her mind. But again, very limited in what the storyline can produce overall if we see so little of it. Like, Aeadian was a part of this as well, but I almost only remember the dinner scene and the painting scene 5 episodes later. Isildur is a tricky one too. The idea of a character arc and transition from a young boy into a man is clear and could work, but I think they are playing a bit too hard with the wimp and struggling aspect. Nearly there, we have the lore or canon in Season 1 of the Rings of Power. These two terms in regards to Tolkien are always loose with the idea of what the lore is often conflicted due to the various aspects of Tolkien. But canon being the most established and distinctive aspects of the works, for example Rivendell being the kingdom of Elrond. So technically, giving the benefit of the doubt to Mick Payne, as with all adaptations just like Peter Jackson's, as mentioned earlier, they have to sometimes change or alter or tweak something to help support a different medium. But there are canon characters and after watching the season, I still don't see the reason why so much was invented including the characters when you have Círdan, Celeborn, Narvi, Oropher, Amdur, Thranduil, Anarleon, even Glorfindel all there written by Tolkien and these are canon characters but instead we get so much else. By not putting in these characters and instead having so many wholly new ones, I don't get what difference it makes having these characters in the show instead of so many new Halfords, new humans and so forth. Another thing I understand and came to terms with is that stuff and events in the season will be original and made up as Mick Payne have limited rights in the appendices to work with so I don't hold this against them too harshly. But what I don't get is changing the existing or canon events when these things are so limited already, it's like it's almost not helping them in a way with their reactions from Tolkien fans. For example, the whole approach to Annatar who funnily enough they do indeed have the rights to, they have Halbrand instead and having the three elven rings forged first and the whole process of Annatar seducing Celebrimbor happen so quickly or even the concept of Anastadi coming in a meteor format. But this I think after the actual execution of the stranger wasn't wholly bad and quite enjoyable at times and isn't as a major grievance as the Halbrand Annatar thing. But the biggest example of this is the Mithril Silmaril connection alongside the rapid fading of the elves. I don't want to sound too harsh here but I don't get how you get given the appendices, read it all, the Lord of the Rings, even the Silmarillion for that matter and then make up Silmarils. And then after reading all these books come to the conclusion of Silmarils are in fact connected to Mithril which in fact the Silmarils are a critical aspect of Tolkien's entire legendarium. So you're already walking on a tightrope here. And then those being linked to the roots of Ithalgir, couldn't there have been a more tangible and at least slightly more canon empathising way of causing the drama and the need for Mithril and cause tension as away from the lore and canon aspect the random turn midway through the season of elves dying was quite strange and I just thought this could have been built up in a way that there is still that tension or we see the roots and beginnings of this problem grow from earlier on. Not just randomly midway through. Okay I'm going to repeat that whole section. I don't want to sound too harsh but I don't get how you get given the appendices, read it all, then maybe read the Lord of the Rings and then the Silmarillion and then after reading all that work and making the show on the Second Age come to the conclusion that Silmarils are going to be connected to Mithril which in fact the Silmarils are a critical aspect of Tolkien's entire legendarium. So already firstly you are walking on a tightrope and those being linked to an event called the Roots of Ithalgir, couldn't there have been a more tangible and at least slightly more canon empathising way of causing the drama. I understand the stuff has to be made up but having it create something so left field from all what's available is quite strange and maybe having a way of causing tension away from just having midway through the season the elves are fading which is another strange thing because it seems like we just come to episode 5 and then the elves are just fading out of nowhere. I feel like there is a way to build this tension up and I can see that tension needs to be built in the season because another criticism of the show is that it was quite slow so I can see the need to build it up but it's just quite strange that they have gone through this route. Maybe there could have been a more canon empathising way of creating this tension but it will be quite interesting to see everybody else's thoughts on this. And instead of this happening left field. So overall I think there could have just been an easy way to build up that tension and see the roots and beginnings of this problem grow from early on not mostly randomly throughout the midpoint of the season. The subject of the lead protagonist Galadriel is a topic that I will have to leave for another video entirely as I think there is so much to unpack there. So that is my overall evaluation of season 1 of the Rings of Power discussing the successes and failures. This is my honest and explicit thoughts and reviews without any bias in mind or trying to pretend everything is great to make certain viewers or fans or notable members in the community happy and pleased or to try and get views and panic to crapping entirely on the show to look cool and pretend to be a quote true talking fan honestly just playing the algorithm. Not going to be doing either one of those. I'm sure there will be hate comments saying how did you even get one success for the show or people thinking why am I giving so many failures. Well thanks for the view. Make sure to like and subscribe but until the next video my friends goodbye.