Current Events > Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Episodes 1 and 2 Topic *SPOILERS*

(+) Yeah! (+)

The first two episodes come out tonight at 9 PM EST/6 PM PST on Amazon Prime.

We've been hearing about this for years and it's finally here, so the hype level is crazy. I'm hearing some favorable opinions, so I hope it's good. The LOTR trilogy is my favorite set of movies ever.

Dammit, that's past my bedtime.

We will be watching, wife has been excited for this for a long time.

Zero interest. The Fellowship movies already exist, and the 1970's hobbit movie is around. Nothing will top those.

I'll wait till the season is done before deciding to watch it.

MabusIncarnate posted...

We will be watching, wife has been excited for this for a long time.

Lol, wish my GF was into it.

11110111011 posted...

Zero interest. The Fellowship movies already exist, and the 1970's hobbit movie is around. Nothing will top those.

Obviously nothing will top the trilogy, but like, does it necessarily have to top it? It's an extension of Tolkien's world.

Less than one hour left. I'm hyped.

How was it

Tag

I'll watch tomorrow probably. I didn't even know this was coming out but I just happened to watch all 3 Hobbit and LotR movies a couple weeks ago because they were free on amazon

No thanks. Already have The Hobbit Extended Edition Trilogy and The Lord of the Rings Extended Edition Trilogy on Blu Ray so that's enough for me.

So it's Gandalf right

DarthAragorn posted...

So it's Gandalf right

It's Gandalf or Saruman

Plot Twist: It's one of the blue guys

Also that kid is totally growing up to be one of the Nine isn't he

this was great

Definitely in after that 2nd episode

DarthAragorn posted...

So it's Gandalf right

Its actually Jesus >.>

Doom_Art posted...

Also that kid is totally growing up to be one of the Nine isn't he

I think so, seems pretty obvious unless they come with some sort of plot twist

Doom_Art posted...

Also that kid is totally growing up to be one of the Nine isn't he

Aren't the nine supposed be kings of men? Unless the kid grows up to be a king?

I didn't think orcs had been created this far back. And how far before the creation of the rings is this?

Also, I'm I supposed to know who that meteor dude was?

Finished episode 1, aint got time to watch the second tonight. Feel cheated because I feel like absolutely nothing happened and I shoulda just skipped to episode 2. >_>

This article gives some background info for the show for those interested. Answers some of the questions in this topic.

https://www.theringer.com/2022/8/30/23326657/lord-of-the-rings-of-power-amazon-prime-show-explainer

Kim_Seong-a posted...

I feel like absolutely nothing happened and I shoulda just skipped to episode 2. >_>

I guess thats why they released 2 the first week, the first one seemed pure story building and character intro which I dont mind but feels like nothing happened there. Episode 2 gets way better really fast

Enjoyed it so far. There's something a bit off with how Galadriel is portrayed. Like the other elves aren't really referring to her with the dignity she should have earned by this point. I mean she should be older than almost all of them and she's been in Middle-earth longer than any of them too. And of course her single-minded focus on hunting Sauron doesn't seem right for her as well, but at least I assume the show will deal with her growing out of that. It's nothing bad enough to heavily detract from the show, just not particularly what I'd expect either.

I'm not entirely fond of the Hobbits either for now. I think I'd have preferred if the show had done without them. But maybe their story will get more interesting.

indica posted...

I didn't think orcs had been created this far back.

IIRC Orcs were created by Morgoth in the First Age

indica posted...

And how far before the creation of the rings is this?

It's a while but will maybe happen over the course of the series. We already met the elf who gets tricked into making them later on.

indica posted...

I didn't think orcs had been created this far back. And how far before the creation of the rings is this?

Also, I'm I supposed to know who that meteor dude was?

This is pretty much a fan fiction. Most characters are new creations. The showrunners already said they are just throwing Tolkein's entire timeline out the window and are going to take the dozens of major events that happen over 3,400 years in the Secnond Age and cram them into the same time frame w/ their own original characters/stories mixed in.

To answer your questions, Orcs were around back then in the books. Who knows when the Rings will be made in the show, but they were supposed to be made 1600 years before the birth of Isildur, and he is already alive and grown in the show. No one ever emerged from a meteor in the books.

That wasn't all that bad tbh. I enjoyed both episodes.

I fucking loved it. I've seen it twice now.

It felt very much LotR and Middle-Earth to me. I'd say it's closer in feel to The Hobbit than the LotR trilogy, but that's not a bad thing since I'm talking about aesthetics and atmosphere. It's definitely darker than The Hobbit.

Biggest disappointment to me is that Howard Shore only did the main opening theme, and not the whole OST. But I still gotta give Bear McCreary (Battlestar Galactica OST) credit for making a very compelling OST. My favorite so far is the Valinor theme.

I feel like between the usual hate and the Tolkien purists, this show is gonna unfairly get a bad reputation. I really liked it so far, even though it's not perfect and does have issues.

I thought it was just okay. It felt a bit too predictable which at times turns scenes into a slog.

I liked Galadriel a lot to start with but less as it went on but found the opposite with Elrond who I'm now quite endeared to with all the excellent Durin stuff.

Arondir is by far the only elf that really personifies one, except for the short hair (which almost all but like one of the males seem to have???), he carries the same presence as the Elves from the movies.

Like I said though, it feels pretty typical and middling so far. Hopefully it picks up but House of the Dragon is the far more captivating show, to compare it with another brand new fantasy series.

My husband and I enjoyed it. Trolls need to move on. I didnt realize LoTR fanbase is as toxic as SW.

Some of the writing was a bit cheesy to me and I hate the Harfoots, but other than that Im excited for the rest. I loved the dwarves. I didnt think I would like Elrond based on the trailers but hes growing on me.

I liked the Harfoots, they feel real and I like the little cart caravan set, I think it all looks great and even though it seems like the writers were just looking for any excuse to through Hobbits back into the story to appeal to fans, they are done well enough that I dont really mind.

The Elves, on the other hand something is very off about them, to me. Not digging the short-haired look for Elrond, at all. I get that part of the sort of ethereal, otherworldly aesthetic that Elves have in Lord of The Rings comes from the fact that our perspective mostly comes from the Hobbit characters who are amazed by them, but they dont feel very Elvish to me, if that makes sense. With the sole exception of Arondir, who, as someone else noted, perfectly carries that presence that you could feel from Elves in the movies, every other Elvish character just sort of feels like a regular person.

Overall Im enjoying the show a good bit, and Im interested in seeing where they go with the different plot lines we are following currently.

With the way they wrote Galadriel in episode 1, I legit thought they were going to have her swim all the way back to town in episode 2 without any trouble. I actually like the hobbit sub plot, and curious if this is how Gandalf gets to be on such good terms with them.

A lot of the elf stuff is quite contrived, like that shit about how hunting the evil will make it spread? No, that's not how it works. Come up with less ham-fisted way to have Galadriel "save the day without support from the guys". We know she's badass; don't make the men complete fucking morons and incompetent - a running theme in these Amazon shows. Liking Elrond's character in ep. 2 though.

Liking the whole human subplot as well. Interested to see how the dumbass kid and his evil sword develops. His mom's hot too - the elf guy's got good taste.

LeCh0nk posted...

Aren't the nine supposed be kings of men? Unless the kid grows up to be a king?

I'm pretty sure that the first part is the case, so I don't know where they're going here.

Yeah the hobbits don't ever really do much until Bilbo then it's really only him and the 4 from LotR, otherwise they really just keep to themselves. It's like they added the whole wizard coming into a meteor from heaven thing into because you gotta have Gandalf for fanservice even though the wizards weren't sent by Eru until the 3rd age then chose to add the hobbits to join that made up plot point for more recognition

Doom_Art posted...

Plot Twist: It's one of the blue guys

Haha we finally get to see what happens to them

AngelsNAirwav3s posted...

This is pretty much a fan fiction. Most characters are new creations. The showrunners already said they are just throwing Tolkein's entire timeline out the window and are going to take the dozens of major events that happen over 3,400 years in the Secnond Age and cram them into the same time frame w/ their own original characters/stories mixed in.

To answer your questions, Orcs were around back then in the books. Who knows when the Rings will be made in the show, but they were supposed to be made 1600 years before the birth of Isildur, and he is already alive and grown in the show. No one ever emerged from a meteor in the books.

Also this

Yeah, the meteor man is definitely either Gandalf or a previously unseen character. Sauron and Saruman don't seem to fit.

DarthAragorn posted...

Yeah, the meteor man is definitely either Gandalf or a previously unseen character. Sauron and Saruman don't seem to fit.

I originally thought it was going to be one of the Istari, but after thinking about it, the fact that he came down in fire (that didnt give off any heat) that the fireflies all died around him, and that the leaf that fell off the tree in Lindon turned black and gross on the bottom after he flew past, suggests to me that hes got to be some sort of incarnation of Sauron, or one of his servants.

from what i've seen around the internet the tolkien estate is being very stingy with amazon has the rights too so they're really having to write around what little was mentioned about the first and second age that was mentioned between the hobbit movies and the LotR trilogy.

DarthDemented posted...

from what i've seen around the internet the tolkien estate is being very stingy with amazon has the rights too so they're really having to write around what little was mentioned about the first and second age that was mentioned between the hobbit movies and the LotR trilogy.

There's definitely some Silmarillion in there...oh wait:

"And the answer surprised many fans who thought the show would be focused on the events in The Silmarillion. Amazon doesn't actually have the rights to The Silmarillion. This means the series will be based on The Appendices at the end of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King."

This does not bode well for the series...

Just watched both episodes. This is freaking great.

indica posted...

I didn't think orcs had been created this far back. And how far before the creation of the rings is this?

Also, I'm I supposed to know who that meteor dude was?

Pretty sure Orcs were originally created by Morgoth who started causing trouble well before Sauron made the rings.

Im talking centuries or millennia.

DarthAragorn posted...

Yeah, the meteor man is definitely either Gandalf or a previously unseen character. Sauron and Saruman don't seem to fit.

I think it's gonna be some OC. The people behind the show said they specifically made it feel like it could be both Gandalf and Sauron.

So I think they're purposely just fucking with us.

My money is on meteor man being one of the Blue Wizards, Tolkien said in one of his writings that the Blue Wizards did show up before the others, so maybe you could bring one in here and not break the lore too bad.

So far though it seems to me Amazon just wasted a ton of money buying the LOTR name and then they slapped it on a generic fantasy show. I see 0 reason why they couldnt have just made this same show in an original universe, there is no Tolkien in here. If anything they just swatted the hornets nest of LOTR fans that actually know the lore and brought a ton of negative attention to the show. No one is excited for a corporate studio fan fiction

I thought the first two eps were good but Im not a huge LotR nerd and dont know any of the pre-Hobbit lore. I had to google Morgoth cause I heard the name before but couldnt remember if it was from Skyrim or some shit >_>

AngelsNAirwav3s posted...

My money is on meteor man being one of the Blue Wizards, Tolkien said in one of his writings that the Blue Wizards did show up before the others, so maybe you could bring one in here and not break the lore too bad.

I was reading a reddit post that explained that even Gandalf wouldn't break it too much. The poster said that Gandalf came to ME in the Third Age, but Orolin could have also been around ME in the Second Age as it was written somewhere that he chilled amongst the elves "unseen" during the Second Age and gave them visions and shit to help them.

I don't know how accurate all of that is.

indica posted...

There's definitely some Silmarillion in there...oh wait:

"And the answer surprised many fans who thought the show would be focused on the events in The Silmarillion. Amazon doesn't actually have the rights to The Silmarillion. This means the series will be based on The Appendices at the end of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King."

This does not bode well for the series...

Well we can only hope if the series proves successful they'll be able to get more and more

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

This crossed my mind and I wouldnt even be mad tbh

Lot of memorable quotes in this series so far like:

thats the problem.. see wheels sposed to be round -hobbit guy

Also Robert Aramayo as Elrond is giving off strong Neil Patrick Harris vibes.

HornyLevel posted...

I was reading a reddit post that explained that even Gandalf wouldn't break it too much. The poster said that Gandalf came to ME in the Third Age, but Orolin could have also been around ME in the Second Age as it was written somewhere that he chilled amongst the elves "unseen" during the Second Age and gave them visions and shit to help them.

I don't know how accurate all of that is.

Yeah I think I'd prefer if it is one of the Blue Wizards. They have a lot of room to work with regarding those two since we know hardly anything about them. Gandalf has had more than enough screentime across the various pieces of LOTR media.

I also very briefly thought it might be Radagast with the way he was communing with the fireflies. But then they all died, so I'm thinking probably not.

I doubt it's any of the Wizards. It's probably Sauron.

I don't think the fireflies would have died if it was anything good. Plus, it seems like the leaves going black in Lindon were related to him. He was also scribbling some really weird shit.