Spoilers Rings of Power Season 2 Rating and Review and Discussion Thread: Spoilers inside.
- Thread starter fireproof78
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Episode 3:
I'm glad they jumped right into what Isildur is up to, I was afraid they were going to try to build some kind of mystery around whether or not he survived. And as an animal person, I liked how much of his story was based around his horse. I'm curious if the girl burning Adar's brand off her back was her covering up where her real loyalties lie, or her turning her back on Adar in favor of Isildur and the other people there.
I'm glad they're using Bronwyn's death as a such a big plot point, I was afraid since the actress left they'd just say she died and move on.
Definitely some scheming and developments with The Numenorians. I did not expect Miriel's coronation to play out that way. Does any of the background material from the books ever explain the significance of the eagles, and why they always seem to show up at just the perfect moment.
I'm assuming everything going on with Sauron, the Dwarves, and Celebrimbor was all Sauron manipulating everyone else? I admit, I'm not always good at picking up on that kind of thing.
I'm glad they jumped right into what Isildur is up to, I was afraid they were going to try to build some kind of mystery around whether or not he survived. And as an animal person, I liked how much of his story was based around his horse. I'm curious if the girl burning Adar's brand off her back was her covering up where her real loyalties lie, or her turning her back on Adar in favor of Isildur and the other people there.
I'm glad they're using Bronwyn's death as a such a big plot point, I was afraid since the actress left they'd just say she died and move on.
Definitely some scheming and developments with The Numenorians. I did not expect Miriel's coronation to play out that way. Does any of the background material from the books ever explain the significance of the eagles, and why they always seem to show up at just the perfect moment.
I'm assuming everything going on with Sauron, the Dwarves, and Celebrimbor was all Sauron manipulating everyone else? I admit, I'm not always good at picking up on that kind of thing.
The Eagles are servants of the King of the Valar, Manwe and dispatched on presumably his wishes to aid men/elves/dwarves in the battle against evil.
So an Eagle showing 'favor' or appearing to show favor could indicate (or be used by someone to say) that Manwe has blessed that person with an important role/distinction.
So the arriving at the 'right moment' is certainly plot point, but also explained because they're being influenced/dispatched by the most prominent immortal being in Valar.
So an Eagle showing 'favor' or appearing to show favor could indicate (or be used by someone to say) that Manwe has blessed that person with an important role/distinction.
So the arriving at the 'right moment' is certainly plot point, but also explained because they're being influenced/dispatched by the most prominent immortal being in Valar.
The way they're used in Tolkien's narrative works where they appear is definitely that.
It's hard to say in this show because there is a lot of 'creative license' to Rings of Power and the outlines of some of the history of the characters in it. I'm not sure that Pharazon is ever mentioned to have had an Eagle 'designate' him as anything. The way the character in the show was talking certainly seems like somehow they knew an Eagle would appear.
Perhaps exposing a Palantir in public was a way to cause one to show up? I dunno.
It looks like Pharazon spun it to his advantage, from what I saw over my wife's shoulder.
So 3 episodes in and I have to say that season 2 feels like an improvement. Things seem to be moving along with a little more urgency. There are still moments of characters walking around and not doing much but it's a lot less compared to season 1.
Pretty much. In the books they show up at just the moment when everything seems lost and the main characters blackout missing all the action and wake up to find out the Eagles saved the day.
I read the following quote in a comment on a YouTube review by @TheOneRingcom and I think it sums up my feelings about this series.
"Commodified fantasy takes no risks: it invents nothing, but imitates and trivializes. It proceeds by depriving the old stories of their intellectual and ethical complexity, turning their action to violence, their actors to dolls, and their truth-telling to sentimental platitude. Heroes brandish their swords, lasers, wands, as mechanically as combine harvesters, reaping profits. Profoundly disturbing moral choices are sanitized, made cute, made safe. The passionately conceived idea of the great storytellers are copied, stereotyped, reduced to toys, molded in bright-colored plastic, advertised, sold, broken, junked, replaceable, interchangeable." - Ursula K. LeGuin
biblioklept.org
It's obviously not for me. If people want to invest their time watching it, that's their choice. I have other fish to fry.
"Commodified fantasy takes no risks: it invents nothing, but imitates and trivializes. It proceeds by depriving the old stories of their intellectual and ethical complexity, turning their action to violence, their actors to dolls, and their truth-telling to sentimental platitude. Heroes brandish their swords, lasers, wands, as mechanically as combine harvesters, reaping profits. Profoundly disturbing moral choices are sanitized, made cute, made safe. The passionately conceived idea of the great storytellers are copied, stereotyped, reduced to toys, molded in bright-colored plastic, advertised, sold, broken, junked, replaceable, interchangeable." - Ursula K. LeGuin
Commodified fantasy takes no risks (Ursula K. LeGuin)
All times are changing times, but ours is one of massive, rapid moral and mental transformation. Archetypes turn into millstones, large simplicities get complicated, chaos becomes elegant, and what…
biblioklept.org
It's obviously not for me. If people want to invest their time watching it, that's their choice. I have other fish to fry.
Yeah no. Previous to the show it’s said the islands had moved away from the old ways. The when the king was getting coronated he was a follower of the old ways and wanting to bring the country back to those views.
That eagle was a sign of the Valar indicating that it was the right choice. That king is deposed and Muriel becomes regent but seems to embrace Pharazons view. When finally confronted by Galadriel she sends her away and we see the leaves fallen and sign that she is making a bad choice. She changes her mind and embraces her father’s view. Her choice of white references this.
This eagle is coming to show the people the rightness of returning to the old ways.
When the crowd turns against her the Eagle lands. And has the crowd chants Pharazon and he takes center stage. The eagle is screaming at them. It’s flies away it disgust at them taking another step closer to their doom.
The previous King and Muriel have seen where this leads. The utter destruction of Numenor.
And yet this show for all its faults actually shows more nuance than the material Tolkien presented for this period and condensed events. People may not like the characters presented but it without question is so far showing more depth then what we know of Galadriel, Sauron, Elrond, and Gil-Galad, ect.I read the following quote in a comment on a YouTube review by @TheOneRingcom and I think it sums up my feelings about this series.
"Commodified fantasy takes no risks: it invents nothing, but imitates and trivializes. It proceeds by depriving the old stories of their intellectual and ethical complexity, turning their action to violence, their actors to dolls, and their truth-telling to sentimental platitude. Heroes brandish their swords, lasers, wands, as mechanically as combine harvesters, reaping profits. Profoundly disturbing moral choices are sanitized, made cute, made safe. The passionately conceived idea of the great storytellers are copied, stereotyped, reduced to toys, molded in bright-colored plastic, advertised, sold, broken, junked, replaceable, interchangeable." - Ursula K. LeGuin
Commodified fantasy takes no risks (Ursula K. LeGuin)
All times are changing times, but ours is one of massive, rapid moral and mental transformation. Archetypes turn into millstones, large simplicities get complicated, chaos becomes elegant, and what…
It's obviously not for me. If people want to invest their time watching it, that's their choice. I have other fish to fry.
Now with the condensing of time the political and governmental side is very much weaker than the source material. But to date not character work.
Agreed, thus far. The characters offer a different take on the world, which I think is far less magical and heroic, far closer to a pragmatic view. Which probably doesn't alway set well because fans want that heroic aspect.
But, and to borrow from Gandalf in the Hobbit, it's the little things, the character moments, these people trying to make sense of the difficult truths they are being exposed to. They are not privied to what the audience is, nor do they always make the best decisions because of that lack of information.
I don't think this show does anything to take away from the original work.
IMO the show completely traduces the character of Galadriel. She's already thousands of years old in the Second Age, being born before the Sun and Moon were created, and having been instructed for much of the First Age by Melian the Maia. Now, if they'd given her role to her daughter Celebrian - future wife of Elrond and mother of Arwen - that might have made more sense.
I wanted to like the show and stuck with it throughout season one, becoming ever more disappointed as I did so. I'm not going to watch any more of what seems to me like very poorly written fan-fiction.
Well, that was a bad one for me.
No Sauron, no seduction/mind game shenanigans and far too much pseudo Frodo and Sam and CGI crap.
I like the concept of RoP, am okay with them adapting the storyline and condensing timelines and switching events around, you gotta do what you gotta do if you don't have the full rights which begs the question why do it at all if you can't be as close as possible, but that's a different discussion.
I did something else while "watching" the whole thing and i never felt i missed anything. Fortunately i stuck around when Tom Bombadil was introduced and he was instantly likeable both as the actor and the character. He was always the odd one out in the entire book, people wondering for decades who he is and why he is able to so effortlessly resist the ring when immortal elves and Istari fear they couldn't.
Other than that this episode felt like the worst of how Hollywood thinks Fantasy needs to be done - big CGI monsters that our heroes can fight or interact with with for mostly no reason at all other than to spend money and pat themselves on the back thinking that's what the audience wants. And now they throw in a romance with the new Elf character completely out of left field ( i guess they don't know what to do with him now that his initial storyline with Bronwyn is dead due to the actress pursuing real life activism in Iran).
And please don't get me started on the Ents - worst CGI design i have seen in ages! Who gave the thumbs up to give Ents, with supposedly rigid outer bark, mouths that bend and move like flesh and skin ( or in this case seemed like rubber)? Haven't seen a CGI fail this bad in quite a while ( Ant Man 3's Modok comes to mind).
The show still shows off its gorgeous environments, something that always amazes me and you can see they have a sizeable budget to shoot on location and it's a big part on selling this world but when they drop the ball that hard storywise in an episode it's hard to let it pass.
The show better pick up fast from this one and return to its interesting core or they might not make it through all the 5 planned seasons if this is the level they produce.
No Sauron, no seduction/mind game shenanigans and far too much pseudo Frodo and Sam and CGI crap.
I like the concept of RoP, am okay with them adapting the storyline and condensing timelines and switching events around, you gotta do what you gotta do if you don't have the full rights which begs the question why do it at all if you can't be as close as possible, but that's a different discussion.
I did something else while "watching" the whole thing and i never felt i missed anything. Fortunately i stuck around when Tom Bombadil was introduced and he was instantly likeable both as the actor and the character. He was always the odd one out in the entire book, people wondering for decades who he is and why he is able to so effortlessly resist the ring when immortal elves and Istari fear they couldn't.
Other than that this episode felt like the worst of how Hollywood thinks Fantasy needs to be done - big CGI monsters that our heroes can fight or interact with with for mostly no reason at all other than to spend money and pat themselves on the back thinking that's what the audience wants. And now they throw in a romance with the new Elf character completely out of left field ( i guess they don't know what to do with him now that his initial storyline with Bronwyn is dead due to the actress pursuing real life activism in Iran).
And please don't get me started on the Ents - worst CGI design i have seen in ages! Who gave the thumbs up to give Ents, with supposedly rigid outer bark, mouths that bend and move like flesh and skin ( or in this case seemed like rubber)? Haven't seen a CGI fail this bad in quite a while ( Ant Man 3's Modok comes to mind).
The show still shows off its gorgeous environments, something that always amazes me and you can see they have a sizeable budget to shoot on location and it's a big part on selling this world but when they drop the ball that hard storywise in an episode it's hard to let it pass.
The show better pick up fast from this one and return to its interesting core or they might not make it through all the 5 planned seasons if this is the level they produce.
Having seen the clip in question, I don't think that was an Ent - more likely a tree spirit akin to Old Man Willow from LotR. I guess it's a memberberry for those of us who have read the book in an attempt to sweeten us up.
Do those of us who have read the books need sweetening up? Are we old and bitter?
I have a question. Having watched episode 4. Anytime someone encounters a dark place with evil it's blamed on Sauron. But the guy is off making rings and seems to be not yet in his most powerful state. If he was a glowing eye in a tower I could believe he has some evil influence over the lands he watches. But now? Is he really responsible for all evil creatures?
I'm the quintessential grumpy old fart.Do those of us who have read the books need sweetening up? Are we old and bitter?
I'm grumpy about almost everything, repeatedly called "old" by various people despite being 40, and often described as a "wet blanket" by my kids, and generally feel grumpy.
Rings of Power is one thing that I feel doesn't need to sweeten me up. I enjoy it all across the board as a separate thing from a book that I consider one of the greatest ever written.
Episode 4 was ok, but Elrond is being such a shitty little asshole. "She did it to save the ring". Really? If she just wanted to save the fucking ring she'd have fled with the ring, she certainly could have outrun the other elves if she put her mind to it and didn't care about their safety. Elrond is going way too far with his ring based temper tantrum, if they keep this up he could become an irredeemable asshole. The fact that he's going to wear one of the Elvish rings for over 3000 years makes this even stupider.
Tom Bombadil was ok, but its totally broken his lore in a way that just feels ridiculous. He shouldn't be in Rhun, he shouldn't be so serious and he shouldn't be without Goldberry. Still, at least the stuff with The Stranger was interesting, The Hobbit storyline is just garbage, total filler. I have no idea why they felt like the show needed hobbits, but they were wrong. Also, the stoors never lived in rhun, they lived near a river close to the east side of the Misty mountains. Also Smeagol was a stoor, which is pretty funny based on what RoP has done with the stoors (hard to find the one ring in a river when the stoors no longer live within hundreds of miles of that river, according to RoP)
This is definitely a rough episode, but minus the hobbit stuff it was ok if a bit frustrating.
Tom Bombadil was ok, but its totally broken his lore in a way that just feels ridiculous. He shouldn't be in Rhun, he shouldn't be so serious and he shouldn't be without Goldberry. Still, at least the stuff with The Stranger was interesting, The Hobbit storyline is just garbage, total filler. I have no idea why they felt like the show needed hobbits, but they were wrong. Also, the stoors never lived in rhun, they lived near a river close to the east side of the Misty mountains. Also Smeagol was a stoor, which is pretty funny based on what RoP has done with the stoors (hard to find the one ring in a river when the stoors no longer live within hundreds of miles of that river, according to RoP)
This is definitely a rough episode, but minus the hobbit stuff it was ok if a bit frustrating.
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