Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Aecus Decimus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
A clear hyper-neoilliberal agenda they are focusing on.

Can we leave out the ridiculous hyperbole? At most what we are seeing here is a very moderate and centrist agenda driven by market research and concern for profits, there is nothing "hyper" about any of it. Whether or not you like the changes in question they are indisputably minor and incremental.

This is concerning because people who get fixated on those things tend to slather and defile everything they touch with this stuff.

And yet for all the complaints of the right-wing outrage machine over "wokeness" the primary things bringing down movies/shows/etc are the same old flaws that have existed for as long as we have had storytelling: poor pacing, shallow characters, emphasis on spectacle over story depth, etc. It wasn't a Star Wars character having a "feminist" hair color that killed TLJ, it was the complete inability to understand pacing and assemble a coherent story.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Gert wrote:
Adaptations of things have existed since forever. This isn't new. Heck, most new things are adaptations or reimaginings of other stories because art is influenced by other art. The showrunners were pretty explicit that while they believe their interpretation of Tolkien's works is pretty spot on, they also never claimed to be the only correct interpretation.

Exactly. If you want a LOTR story that does not deviate at all from the original text then go read Tolkien's books. They're all still there for you to read, nobody is taking them away. But when you have an adaptation it's inevitably going to have changes from the source material, and you may or may not like all of them. None of this is in any way new.

I don't see how you're disproving his point? The vast majority of movies or shows that push the message of "diversity" above all else have terrible character development, lackluster pacing and focus on spectacle precisely because they care less about having a coherent and interesting story than basically ticking the boxes of ensuring a specific narrative is showcased, regardless of whether or not its congruent to the existing franchise's lore or storyline. For Star Wars, Finn was completely wasted as a character (despite having a legitimately interesting story of being a child soldier trying to break mental conditioning) and ironically more or less used as the token black guy, hypocritically so since they removed him in their marketing for China. Rey, written in the same vein as many female leads nowadays, doesn't have to struggle to actually succeed her goals, she never loses once to anyone in the trilogy despite not having any formal training, and basically has no flaws besides being "insecure" about her origins, which has no tangible effects in terms of the plot or her development besides her learning to literally steal someone else's identity. When people raise these issues, what's the response? Oh, you hate Rey because she's a strong independent female. Oh, you hate Finn because he's black. They're already starting to say this for She-Hulk and it's mind numbing how many times they use this as a smokescreen to excuse themselves from having to put actual effort into writing characters that aren't one-dimensional.

Not to say this is exclusive to only entertainment with the need to push progressive ideology, but it's pretty clear from the last decade or so of franchise pillaging that things like Star Wars, Star Trek and He-Man have been hollowed out and used as skinsuits rather than continuing the legacy of their established history. Better Call Saul is a fanastic example of how you can do spin off works from an existing franchise where it builds upon the world that was established and is actually able to flesh out a side character in BB into a fully realized character with an amazing cast, where I would say Kim is the definitive example of how you write an strong female character that isn't just "better" than their male counterpart in everyway. There's also no hamfisted attempt to incorporate modern sensibilities, it just focuses on the dynamics and relationships of the cast and it really sets up perfectly into how BB starts that will make this show ageless for years to come.

Also, saying "Oh, you still have the old material, stop being a whiner and ignore the new stuff" is kind of hard to do when the new things often retroactively spit on the original lore and deconstruct or demonize past characters/heros. Look at what happened to Luke, Han and Leia in the sequel trilogy. Picard was rendered to a shallow shell of his formal self. He-Man in his most recent show from Kevin Smith was bait-and-switched and also thrown under the bus.

I'm pretty sure you'd vocalize your concern and distaste too if all of a sudden they started porting the equivalent of anti-vaxxers into Middle Earth during a plague or having a clearly Trump caricature in Numenor as one of the people working with Sauron before their fall into Black Numenoreans. Unless you want to put everything from the modern lens into our escapist franchises.

 Grimskul wrote:
The vast majority of movies or shows that push the message of "diversity" above all else have terrible character development, lackluster pacing and focus on spectacle precisely because they care less about having a coherent and interesting story than basically ticking the boxes of ensuring a specific narrative is showcased, regardless of whether or not its congruent to the existing franchise's lore or storyline.

The vast majority of movies or shows that push the message of "diversity" above all else have terrible character development, lackluster pacing and focus on spectacle precisely because they care less about having a coherent and interesting story than basically ticking the boxes of ensuring a specific narrative is showcased, regardless of whether or not its congruent to the existing franchise's lore or storyline.

That's my point that you're missing, these "extremist woke leftist hyper-neoiliberalist" movies and shows are failing for the same reason that countless other movies and shows fail. There are plenty of movies and shows with straight white male protagonists doing traditional hero things that fail because they're a CGI demo reel with painfully bad pacing, plot holes everywhere, and all the character depth of a puddle. But because their failures aren't ideologically useful nobody remembers Generic Summer Action Movie #37 once it leaves theaters and is replaced by Generic Summer Action Movie #38. Sturgeon's Law remains constant regardless of ideological content.

When people raise these issues, what's the response?

"You're right, that character really did have some problems."

I have almost never seen people responding to legitimate criticism of characters/stories/etc with "BUT UR RACIST". I'm sure it has happened because people say stupid stuff all the time, but most of the time when things like "you hate Finn because he's black" it's a response to people who very clearly are objecting to the character's race.

Also, saying "Oh, you still have the old material, stop being a whiner and ignore the new stuff" is kind of hard to do when the new things often retroactively spit on the original lore and deconstruct or demonize past characters/heros. Look at what happened to Luke, Han and Leia in the sequel trilogy. Picard was rendered to a shallow shell of his formal self. He-Man in his most recent show from Kevin Smith was bait-and-switched and also thrown under the bus.

Why is it hard to do? I think the Star Wars sequels suck and so I don't watch them. I saw them once and that was enough. Outside of watching clips of the hyperspace ramming scene (because, however stupid it is from a lore point of view it's a beautiful shot) I think the only time I've touched any of them was to capture screenshots for a meme. The Mandalorian was good, I'll probably watch it again. Boba Fett sucked, I probably won't ever bother with it again. The old EU is all non-canon anyway but the Rogue Squadron books are still a fun read. The fact that Disney did some stupid things with the OT characters means about as much to me as some random fanfiction author's Luke/Han/Yoda porn story. It exists, I'll give my (negative) opinion on it if the subject comes up, but the original works are still there to enjoy.

I'm pretty sure you'd vocalize your concern and distaste too if all of a sudden they started porting the equivalent of anti-vaxxers into Middle Earth during a plague or having a clearly Trump caricature in Numenor as one of the people working with Sauron before their fall into Black Numenoreans. Unless you want to put everything from the modern lens into our escapist franchises.

Sure. I would think that's stupid (and way beyond adding a couple of non-white characters) and have no interest in it. I'd probably watch gleefully as Bezos loses a bunch of money and is embarrassed by the failure, because that donkey-cave deserves it. But I'd dismiss it as well-funded fanfiction and go read the original books if I want a better LOTR story.

trexmeyer wrote:


If they really cared about the "woke agenda" they would be willing to sacrifice the bottom line to a greater degree and find women and minority writers to craft original stories and shows, but that wouldn't draw anywhere near the level attention as something with a built-in fanbase.

That's because they don't actually care about minority representation as anything other than a tool to claim western popular culture in the name of their ideology. It's them making claims on previous works in order to further that ideology.

Tolkien is an outlier, in that he is really the only person from so far back who still maintains such a massive presence in modern popular culture. Sure, people know his contemporaries like c.s.lewis, but they are minor league compared to Tolkien. And him being from a period where moral and cultural values differ vastly from the moral vacuousness that exists today, and add to that that Tolkien hearkens even further back to the medieval history of North western Europe and it's values in his work, make it too reactionary to stand unmolested.

He is their top prize, and he must be claimed, but they can't just outright denounce and reclaim it like they did with Lovecraft, who's views were extreme even for his time. More subtlety is required due to Tolkien's huge presence.

It's there down to the smallest levels. The 'representation' and race insertions are just the most obvious. Ask yourself why all the armour in the promos is gold scale type armour and not polished steel plate...

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
That's because they don't actually care about minority representation as anything other than a tool. The actual goal here is to claim popular culture in the name of their ideology. It's them making claims on previous works in order to further that ideology. Tolkien happens to be the top prize, due to the fact that he's really the only person from such a period, and with such reactionary material that still manages to be incredibly popular in the modern era. That can't be allowed to stand unmolested, and were witnessing that claiming first hand here.

Yes, the company owned by a conservative billionaire donkey-cave who would sacrifice his own firstborn son for 1% more shareholder value is clearly motivated by left-wing ideological concerns and the destruction of traditional culture. Seriously, do you bother thinking about what you're writing or do you just parrot right-wing talking points regardless of the subject?

Bezos is part of the elite. There is nothing right wing about him, or the shareholder capital you use as evidence for it, for some odd reason... And no, If you read my edit, you'll see I actually think deeply about everything, unlike your reply, which is literally a cut and paste response that can be seen below virtually every non progressive comment on the internet.

That's enough now thank you, keep the political commentary for sites that welcome it.

Edit: fine, I'll leave it at what I said previously. Amazon and Bezos want money, nothing more. They are making a LOTR series for the sole reason that the LOTR trilogy made almost $3 billion in profit without even counting merchandise sales, and even the mediocre Hobbit movies made another $3 billion.

FFS, that new Game of Thrones series was somehow greenlit, produced, and premiers tomorrow despite GRRM never finishing ASOIAF and the last 2-3 seasons of GoT sucking something fierce. The final season of GoT was so bad that it killed off the fandom to an unparalled degree. Yet, despite this, House of the Dragon is rolling out.

Why? There is zero risk with franchises once you get them off the ground. You have to be consistently unbelievably awful to truly kill one off. There hasn't been a good Terminator movie since T2 and the last several have all drawn in some semblance of audience despite becoming progressively worse.

The new Star Trek films were mediocre to bad, but they made money and generated enough interest for Discovery, Picard, and Lower Decks to be made.

Somehow The Fast and the Furious series has continued going and spawned at least one spinoff.

All franchises ultimately turn into cash grabs and they are dominating the market. The last original piece of media I can think of that was actually good would be something like Coco or True Detective. I'm not sure if Disney really counts because they almost always draw an audience. I can't imagine something like Babylon 5 or The X-Files actually being greenlit, produced and surviving more than 1-2 seasons today.

Film franchises carry on if they make money and if they don't make money - they don't. The movie / TV buisness is a business....

Some people may not like long running series like Fast and Furious, Resident Evil, Underworld etc - but they made a ton of money - because people enjoy/enjoyed them.

Lord of the Rings films made huge amounts of money so a TV show or new film was likely - Game of Thrones was nearly destroyed by the final series but still achieved vast viewing figures - and they likely think the potential audiance is still there - I will be watching to see how it goes based on the trailer even though I would have prefered to see the initial invasion and conquest.

The growing amount of streaming services mean that there is a need for a equally large number AND variety of shows to fill their schedules and hence we have a vast array of different shows being produced - its a golden age.

Mrs. GG and I watched the first two episodes this morning. I think I liked them more than she did but we both very much enjoyed them and were left wanting more.

Were they perfect? No. But considerably better than I was expecting. Far better than the trailers led me to believe it would be.

The writing was tight. The casting better than I expected. It is more subtle in its political tones than Game of Thrones but it has hints of a sharper edge of politics than Jackson's LOTR. Ambition, arrogance and bigotry look to be core plot points but not quite as exaggerated as in GoT.

I am finding myself liking most of the characters more than I expected. There were a couple of plot points that I found annoying and the decision to compress so much history into such a short time is frustrating but they are doing a much better job of making “cliff notes” or “short hand” of Tolkien Middle Earth history than I expected.

More of my first impressions, spoiler free, on my blog…

https://thegrumpygnome.home.blog/2022/09/02/the-grumpy-gnomes-first-impressions-of-amazons-rings-of-power-spoiler-free/

Aecus Decimus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
This is concerning because people who get fixated on those things tend to slather and defile everything they touch with this stuff.

And yet for all the complaints of the right-wing outrage machine over "wokeness" the primary things bringing down movies/shows/etc are the same old flaws that have existed for as long as we have had storytelling: poor pacing, shallow characters, emphasis on spectacle over story depth, etc. It wasn't a Star Wars character having a "feminist" hair color that killed TLJ, it was the complete inability to understand pacing and assemble a coherent story.

While this is true, the new part is that when you POINT OUT those same old flaws such as poor pacing, shallow characters, etc. in the new material, you get called racist, sexist, etc. etc. etc. for not liking their 'new and unique in the history of all mankind story featuring a strong female/minority/LGBT character'.

As if characters like Ellen Ripley, Axel Foley, and Victor/Victoria Grant didn't predate their badly written fanfic by DECADES....





Automatically Appended Next Post:

Aecus Decimus wrote:

 Grimskul wrote:

When people raise these issues, what's the response?

"You're right, that character really did have some problems."

I have almost never seen people responding to legitimate criticism of characters/stories/etc with "BUT UR RACIST". I'm sure it has happened because people say stupid stuff all the time, but most of the time when things like "you hate Finn because he's black" it's a response to people who very clearly are objecting to the character's race.

Did you seriously manage to miss the entire backlash against The Last Jedi... and then KK and RJ lashing out at 'toxic' fans being 'racist' and 'misogynist'? Not just the ones who genuinely WERE toxic, misogynist, and racist, ALL the fans who criticized the movie for ANY reason. For a good year if you were a Star Wars fan you couldn't get away from it.

If you did manage to miss it, more power to you. You're probably better off for not caring about Star Wars, Star Trek, MCU, or any other franchise at this point. I know I am.

 Vulcan wrote:
As if characters like Ellen Ripley, Axel Foley, and Victor/Victoria Grant didn't predate their badly written fanfic by DECADES....

Alien & Beverley Hills Cop for the first two - but where is the third character from?

Movie of the same name starring Julie Andrews.

M.

I can't wait until we get more Barrel fighting! And I want Legolas to magically appear as well. Then we should have a hot young dwarf/illuvatar sex scene. Finally we need to see a dragon get killed when Legolas does a back flip off the tower of Angmar and beheads it with a dagger.

You may be asking now, beheads the tower or the dragon? My answer: YES.

Just look at this wardrobe effort...
This looks like pure fan fic generic fantasy made by a comicon cosplayer..

Apparently this is some character who is not even part of the lore..

I'm so glad I cancelled my amazon. The more screen shot etc. that come through my feeds the more im content with my choice to never watch his pile of gunk or give the company producing it any more money.

While there are some cosplayers who could produce gear like that, you're looking at probably to the top 5% or so of them - it is definitely well above the average cosplayer you might see at a Comic Con or similar event.

You do seem to have quite a hate boner going on for something you're not even giving a sliver of a chance to.

I have to admit the first two episodes were better than expected. I'm not keen at all on the portrayal of Galadriel, but on the other hand I really enjoyed Elrond a lot more that I had thought, which kind of made up for it.

Once I had made peace with the fact that it's less of an adaptation and more of a fanfic, it was really fun to watch and I'm looking forward to ep. 3.

 Dysartes wrote:
While there are some cosplayers who could produce gear like that, you're looking at probably to the top 5% or so of them - it is definitely well above the average cosplayer you might see at a Comic Con or similar event.

You do seem to have quite a hate boner going on for something you're not even giving a sliver of a chance to.

I agree with you Dysartes. The armor in that photo looks on par with the Weta Workshop pieces from the Jackson LOTR. I dislike the ceremonial plate armor Galadriel and her company wears in the second episode. I was not keen on their maille in episode 1 but the full plate in episode 2 looked poorly made in comparison to the maille in episode 1 and the scale in the above mentioned photo.

So... yeah.

Wow.

Watched it last night, it was really good, they've really put their best foot foreward.

Dripping with money, of course; money everywhere, but every cent is being put to work here with great production value in every shot.

More importantly, the direction behind it is ambitious, cinematography, acting, the music, all of this is movie tier, and barring some major misstep by either party this thing is going to go toe-to-toe with House of the Dragon the way LotR and Harry Potter did in the aughts. Star Wars is going to have to step up their TV game, for sure.

I especially appreciated the dialogue: Tolkien would write his characters speaking in a very structured way, and the show maintains that in the words while still having the characters speak with energy as if they were real people in the space and it works very well. It's especially noticeable with the dwarves and hobbits who manage to be quippy or boisterous without needing to fall into anachronistic modern dialogue like the Jackson films would.

Content wise:

*spoilers I guess*

Well, they weren't as bad as I was expecting. However, they have butchered some major background lore already (Finrods death, how going to Valinor works). And not even for any plot gains, they just changed some stuff for no real reason.



One technical complaint: Sometimes characters will talk EXTREMELY quietly. Even with sound turned all the way up I had to put on subtitles to tell what was said sometimes. The voice audio was too quiet.

Khazad-dûm. That is all.

Nothing about this show looks cheap.

Also nothing about this show is really all that interesting.

Sure is slow though. Really slow. Drearily slow.

Galadriel's story line takes her as far away from Middle Earth as one can literally travel and then makes her swim back. Her entire story is basically is going to be one side-quest after another to keep her away from the main story. Makes me wonder why they bothered putting her in other than marketing her as a strong-independent-woman-who-don't-need-no-man (or Elf, in this case).

Which just makes me wonder: Where the feth is Celeborn? His and Galadriel's daughter marries Elrond, yet the dude's no where to be seen. Is this a rights thing? Do they literally not have the rights to Galadriel's other half?

Anyway, some of the plotlines have promise. Let's hope they get a move on...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:


Which just makes me wonder: Where the feth is Celeborn? His and Galadriel's daughter marries Elrond, yet the dude's no where to be seen. Is this a rights thing? Do they literally not have the rights to Galadriel's other half?

This worries me greatly. They're almost trying to setup Elrond and Galadrial for each other. But at this stage in the lore Elrond should have already married her daughter.

They can't possibly not have the rights, we know they have the LotR and the appendices in the RotK. That is all they have. This is pretty much the only place Celeborn exists, he barely exists in the Silmarillion other than "he's Galadrial's husband".

It's possible they could introduce them later, maybe have Elrond meet Celebrian at a later date and they get married over the course of this show. Though having 2 episodes without showing Galadrial's family would be odd. They could at least have had some of Galadrial's motivation be protecting her family.

First episode is being digested. Now, for clarity, I’ve never read any Lord of The Rings.

No. Put your pitchfork down for now.

I confirm that, as it means I’m a fairly Average Pleb coming to it. Pretty much all I know of LOTR is from the films, the Hobbit films, and the GW games (hence I’m pretty sure Gil Galad is notably hard, including besting a Balrog single handed). But that’s it.

Got to admit, I found some of the casting jarring, but only because in my head Galdriel is Cate Blanchett etc.

I’m enjoying it. Production values are frankly incredible. Harfoots are interesting, and the elf-centric POV makes sense to me, given their long lives.

Initial battle scene was….well I dunno. It felt a bit anaemic (second time this week I’ve used that word), with lots of jostling but not much hacks/slashy. Whilst not terribly cinematic, I do wonder if it’s perhaps more realistic than everybody was Kung Fu fighting.

Taking a break before E2, to enjoy the new Beavis & Butthead, on account it’s been a long week of being smart and stuff, so my brain deserves a proper flush.

I watched the first episode this morning, off and on because my dog was being a mess. Will have to give it a proper focused watch after work.

I feel like the Cave Troll fight in Fellowship was a solid 5 minutes, while this Ice Troll fight was an at most 30 second "I out leveled this boss 15 levels ago" RPG fight. It also seemed like none of the NPC elves bit the bullet despite getting trounced by the troll?

The Harfoots are just corny and I don't think I'll enjoy their presence unless that wolf shows up with friends.

Elven kids being mean to each other was weird.

Some great visuals in this show for sure. They deserve praise for that, imo.

Got to the part where Galadriel was given a reward for finding nothing and marched off to work!

I didn't particularly hate what I watched, to be honest.

 Captain Joystick wrote:

-The dwarves were especially great, seeing Moria as a proper thriving Dwarf Fortress (complete with waterfalls to improve dwarven moods and tank your FPS) made me smile.

I bow in respect.

M.

Edit: Galadriel Gold medal in open sea swimming in Middle Earth Second Age Olympics.

Watched first episode - it was ok - quite watchable

pros
It looks good
Its Galadriel

I did not hate the harfoots as much I thought I would but I would rather they were not in at all.
The unpleasant Elf Children bit was wierd as was the forshadowing of her brothers death by him - who she then says have never known death.....
The Ice Troll fight was not bad but not great - bit too much Galadriel is the only one who can fight considering they are all veterans AND Elves - needed more minons for them to kill stylishly
Also IIRC the Elves lost very badly until the gods came down and sorted out Morgorth as one of their own - would have been nice to see Shelob's mum with the trees as well
Also I thought Elves were not bothered by the cold?
I think Elrond marries Galadriels daughter or granddaughter so friendship is interesting

I would bet the change in lore and lack of Celeborn is due to a rights issue. The show has the rights to the LOTR appendices, but NOT to the Silmarillion. Everything in the show has to be based on extrapolations from the appendices, and likely has to be changed not to include material strictly mentioned in the Silmarillion.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I would bet the change in lore and lack of Celeborn is due to a rights issue. The show has the rights to the LOTR appendices, but NOT to the Silmarillion. Everything in the show has to be based on extrapolations from the appendices, and likely has to be changed not to include material strictly mentioned in the Silmarillion.

I haven't read the appendices, but I definitely have read the Silmarillion.

I don’t remember.

I’m just trying to give the show runners the benefit of the doubt.