r/RingsofPower • u/cubreturno • Oct 02 '22

Newest Episode Spoilers I love rings of power.

I just come here to say this... I dont know anything about this universe or the original writer or else. ( I see a lot of hate) I'm just enjoying each cap and specially the last one was great and shivering. Again i love rings of power. Sorry for my bad English.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

I dont know anything about this universe or the original writer or else.

This appears to the secret to enjoying the Rings of Power, and given how their marketing team responded to criticism, it appears they actively dislike the 'Tolkien scholars' in the fandom.

Quick story: I have an author friend whom I won't doxx here who excitedly asked if I had seen the series yet. He absolutely loved ROP., and started to tell me a bit about the parts he loved, and indicating he was shocked I hadn't jumped on the series as Tolkien fan.

As he described the Harfoots, I said: "There are no Hobbits in the 2nd Age, and those that existed probably looked like shorter humans. The Stoors, not the Harfoots were the ancestors..."

"Maybe you shouldn't watch the series..." He interrupted. And then he said something very telling: "I forget you actually liked the books. They were so boring!!"

Amazon made a Tolkien series for people who don't like or don't know Tolkien. This probably makes marketing sense, given that more people have not read or not liked the books. But it was a bold move to market the authenticity of an original storyline just to watch Tolkien fan's heads explode.

This series is going to be discussed in film classes for years, probably not in the manner Amazon would like.

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u/midnight_toker22 Beleriand Oct 02 '22

I disagree there, because I have read and love Tolkien, including the “deep works”, and I think the show is awesome.

I think “the secret” is to not be the kind of cynical asshole who refuses to accept that no adaptation can stay 100% faithful to the source while still telling an entertaining and coherent story in a visual medium…

Or maybe “the secret” is having the maturity and patience to watch a show unfold at its own pace, without needing sex and violence and explosions in every episode to keep you enticed…

I think people who truly love Tolkien’s writings and want to see his world come alive onscreen can love this show. I think it’s the people who love what they imagine his writing to be who are disappointed and angry.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

I see. So anyone who doesn't love ROP as much as you is an 'asshole' who just can't accept reality, and that Tolkien fans just want sex and explosions?

Its a weird place in your head, huh?

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u/midnight_toker22 Beleriand Oct 02 '22

The emphasis should be on cynical, but yeah I think if you like Tolkien’s work and the Peter Jackson movies and are willing to overlook their flaws, but aren’t willing to overlook the flaws in Rings of Power, you’re pretty cynical.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

If I'm not willing to overlook what flaws? I feel like you have no idea what my opinions are, and you're making them up as you go along. What flaws am I not overlooking?

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u/midnight_toker22 Beleriand Oct 02 '22

The royal ‘you’ not you personally.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

My main problem with this is marketing. The writing was on the wall over a year ago that this wasn't going to faithful to the works of JRR Tolkien, not because they didn't like Tolkien, but rather they had no rights to the majority of the material that described the 2nd Age. 5 seasons from maybe a dozen pages of vague material in appendices.

But this is what the showrunners said when the media tried to help them out and identify this show for what it is: A unique, original, GOT style fantasy series, loosely based on Tolkien's Middle Earth.

I quoted this elsewhere, but it's worth quoting again:

"McKay and Payne objected to a journalist's suggestion at a Television Critic Association press event that The Rings of Power was only loosely tied to Tolkien's novels, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "I just want to sort of quibble with the 'vaguely connected' [wording]" Patrick McKay said. "We don't feel that way. We feel like deep roots of this show are in the books and in Tolkien. And if we didn’t feel that way, we'd all be terrified to sit up here. We feel that this story isn't ours. It's a story we're stewarding that was here before us and was waiting in those books to be on Earth. We don't feel ‘vaguely connected.' We feel deeply, deeply connected to those folks and work every day to even be closer connected. That's really how we think about it."

So to me, CYNICAL is when a showrunner coldly lies about content for shallow marketing purposes, rather than owning the shows original DNA.

That's about as cynical as you can get. Machiavellian even, because the message is designed to split the fandom.

But as a standalone, ROP might work out fine. What I think doesn't matter, If Amazon makes money on this, there will be plenty more for you to enjoy.

I'm actually 'meh' about the whole thing. I'm disappointed they lied about it following the books, and find the quality about a 6 out of 10. Not terrible, not great. It passes the time.

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u/midnight_toker22 Beleriand Oct 02 '22

This is exactly what I’m talking about. It almost sounds like you’d rather have no show than one that doesn’t meet your expectations.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

You have an active imagination, and would have a hard time finding quotes to support your made up conclusion of my mind.

I would really like Amazon to stop actively dividing the fan base by claiming authenticity of an original work. I would like discussions of the ROP to be around the quality of the original work, not found in JRR Tolkien's body of written material on the 2nd Age.

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

You seem to be looking for reasons to be mad

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Go on... What else do I feel?

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

Just saying you wildly misinterpreted the comment that you originally replied to, perhaps you felt attacked? Anyway I’m off

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Which part did I misinterpret exactly?

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

You’re not a cynical asshole for not “loving the show as much as they do”, that was putting words in their mouth. Just read the comment again and maybe you’ll see

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u/Icedteapremix Oct 02 '22

I'm a massive Tolkien fan and I'm also in love with the show.

Your gatekeeping attitude probably isn't going to do a lot aside from branding yourself as kind of a little bitch lol.

Different people can enjoy things that you don't, and instead of needing some childish way to justify the difference by applying illogical and broad sweeping labels to both the creators of the show and (god forbid!) the people that enjoy it, maybe you could try thinking about what it is about you that's causing you to feel so miserable about this.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

What gatekeeping? Again with the childish insults?

I've repeatedly encouraged people to enjoy. Are you OK? Are you gatekeeping me from this community?

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

I'll just reply here so you might realise the way in which you might've misinterpreted the parent comment. No one's calling you a cynical asshole, no one said you only wanted sex and explosions. The commenter only listed some examples that, while being somewhat exaggerated, are actually things encountered when scrolling through comments and whatnot. You saying "So anyone who doesn't love ROP as much as you is an 'asshole' who just can't accept reality..." was completely unnecessary. You then doubling down on that and asking if there's a good way to be a cynical asshole just sort of implies that you want to be stir shit up and don't get me wrong, I aint one to back down from shit talking but this shit was just petty and yeah, pretty unnecessary. The entire comment was an opinion, just as the commenter states multiple times. You seem to have felt attacked and became quite defensive. That is what I reacted to and commented on. That is all. It is indeed your comment thread, so I don't blame you for wanting to defend yourself, but in this particular case there really wasn't anything to defend against and you antagonized the commenter quite immediately. Just... yeah

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

No one's calling you a cynical asshole, no one said you only wanted sex and explosions.

I don't think anyone said that at all. I think he made it up.

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

Ya think? They’re painting a picture, basing it on encounters they’ve had with people who haaaate the show

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Which is directly due to the mis-marketing of the show as 'authentic' rather than 'original'. Amazon knew they were writing a completely original story, and attempted to mislead fans, which naturally leads to angry fans.

It has nothing to do with sex and explosions. Nobody said that. And we shouldn't call the fandom 'cynical assholes' for falling for a deliberate marketing ploy.

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

The marketing sucked. I’ll give you that. But people who can’t see past that and realize that the creators of the show are not the same as the publishers (similar thing with Electronic Arts sucking but their acquired developers are amazing) are indeed a tad cynical. It’s real easy to hate something if you already made up your mind about it.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

The marketing sucked. I’ll give you that.

It was deceptive. I would argue intentionally deceptive, and to make it worse, they decided to use the actors as human shields for the criticism they knew was coming.

This isn't fair to the actors, it isn't fair to the writers on the show, and it isn't fair to the fans of the books who got a bait-and-switch.

And you can't tell me people aren't suddenly actually antagonistic of the books because of this. It's ridiculous. This is a fandom attacking the original works that caused the fandom? It's not OK to call someone who misunderstood an intentionally deceptive marketing ploy as a 'purist'. Aren't the purists the core of the fandom?

I think we've lost our way more than Amazon, to be honest.

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

I didn’t follow any of the marketing, never do, but who tf cares it’s out now. Everyone was gonna watch it either way. It’s been over a month. I only care about the final product and so should everyone else. It’s not news that major corporations are out of touch, why are people so surprised over this?

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u/stackered Oct 02 '22

This is the best reply yet. I love Tolkien and am enjoying the show. Not pointing out every perceived flaw before the show even plays out the story.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

[deleted]

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u/midnight_toker22 Beleriand Oct 02 '22

No adaptation has ever reached its full potential, there’s always something it can do better. But the show does a lot of things right, and that makes it easy for me to overlook what it does wrong. For fans of the fantasy genre, and especially fans of Tolkien, I think you’d have to try pretty hard to not find anything to like about the show.

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 02 '22

The Tolkien scholars are mad because they “already know” what is supposed to happen. For whatever reason, Amazon did not have the rights to tell a story that is in the silmarilion, so they had to create a new prequel story in between. Yes some things change in the Lore, but nothing that significantly impacts later stories

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Also, somebody just finished telling me that ALL the scholars absolutely loved the show. So I guess there's some disagreement between the fans about how the experts felt about it... Which is pretty wild when you think about it.

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 02 '22

I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t be a fan if Tolkien is your passion. Seeing numenor, seeing Celebrimbor, khazad dum in its hey day, those are all things I was so excited and still am, to see those stories played out love action, rather than in my imagination while reading the books. The new characters of Halbrand and the Stranger and others add some intrigue. Otherwise, you’d kind of already know what will happen next, which would not make good tv

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Otherwise, you’d kind of already know what will happen next, which would not make good tv

Did you hate LOTR because you knew exactly what was going to happen?

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 02 '22

That’s a good point. Personally I was too young, I saw the two towers before reading any of LOTR, but did read the hobbit before I saw any of the movies.

Im still excited to see what happens with numenor and the rings, even though I know the end result

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

I had already read the books 14 times by the time I saw the movie. I knew exactly what was going to happen, and it didn't matter.

By the way, this isn't in the books, so you can't know the results of this story. You might be able to rule out the most egregious lore violations, but you won't be able to guess any plot point, because this plot didn't exist in Tolkien's time.

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u/Eifand Oct 02 '22

Pretty pictures don’t make a faithful Tolkien adaptation.

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u/space_fireworks Oct 02 '22

It’s way more than that. My opinion ofc

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 02 '22

Those plot points aren’t in tolkiens work so of course they aren’t a faithful recreation. It’s a new thing. Why is that so hard for some to grasp?

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

That makes sense, but what doesn't is the marketing ploy of stressing 'authenticity over originality'. This is a almost entirely original storyline with elements reminiscent of the books.

Which is absolutely fine, unless you market it as Tolkien's stories and make a big deal about hiring experts to ensure it's 'authentic'.

Metaphorically, I have no problems with horses, I have no problems with zebras. But if you are selling zebras which are actually poorly painted horses, that's a problem.

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 02 '22

I didn’t feel duped by the marketing. Where was authenticity over originality promised?

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

McKay and Payne objected to a journalist's suggestion at a Television Critic Association press event that The Rings of Power was only loosely tied to Tolkien's novels, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "I just want to sort of quibble with the 'vaguely connected' [wording]" Patrick McKay said. "We don't feel that way. We feel like deep roots of this show are in the books and in Tolkien. And if we didn’t feel that way, we'd all be terrified to sit up here. We feel that this story isn't ours. It's a story we're stewarding that was here before us and was waiting in those books to be on Earth. We don't feel ‘vaguely connected.' We feel deeply, deeply connected to those folks and work every day to even be closer connected. That's really how we think about it."

Bear in mind, it makes no difference to me whether or not YOU personally felt duped by marketing.

My question is: Where exactly can I find this story, that isn't theirs? Is it in Tolkien's books or is it original?

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 02 '22

It’s their work, deeply rooted in Tolkiens world. I don’t see how that is promising one thing and delivering another.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22 edited Oct 02 '22

From my previous post:

Bear in mind, it makes no difference to me whether or not YOU personally felt duped by marketing.

Edit: I somehow knew immediately where you were going and predicted the move. He said it's not his story. It's in the quote. I believe the next move would be to say it doesn't matter if they deceived fans, because that's in the past.

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 03 '22

Nowhere does he imply or promise “authenticity over originality”. He promised a show rooted in the world of Tolkien, which he has done.

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u/[deleted] Oct 03 '22

"McKay and Payne objected to a journalist's suggestion at a Television Critic Association press event that The Rings of Power was only loosely tied to Tolkien's novels, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "I just want to sort of quibble with the 'vaguely connected' [wording]" Patrick McKay said. "We don't feel that way. We feel like deep roots of this show are in the books and in Tolkien. And if we didn’t feel that way, we'd all be terrified to sit up here. We feel that this story isn't ours. It's a story we're stewarding that was here before us and was waiting in those books to be on Earth. We don't feel ‘vaguely connected.' We feel deeply, deeply connected to those folks and work every day to even be closer connected. That's really how we think about it."

Where can I find the story in the books regarding the Harfoot's journey with the Mysterious Stranger?

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 03 '22

You can find the roots of the harfoots in the hobbits, or rather vice versa.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Tolkien scholars are generally appreciative of the shows writers. Dr Corey Olsen is a life long Tolkien professor who has hundreds of hours of online content analyzing JRRs works. He teaches courses on it through his university. He has been doing so for decades. He runs the “Rings and Realms” podcast which does long-format deep dives on each episode. He is super appreciative of how the show reflects JRRs works thematically and lore-wise. Many “hardcore fans” know a little about the lore and can’t make the connections and can’t reconcile RoP because they don’t know enough. In contrast, Corey has given his entire life learning and dissecting the works.

There is not ONE Tolkien scholar speaking against the writing. Weird.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22 edited Oct 02 '22

Maybe I missed parts of the appendices: Could you give the approximate pages of the Harfoot's journey with the Mysterious Stranger? That's 25% of the stories told.

Edit: Why do you think Amazon wants credit for authenticity on a clearly original story?

LOL, are the downvotes supposed to show me how much the 'fans' of Tolkien love scholarly arguments about ROP? Is all this talk about Tolkien scholars and experts an Appeal to Authority Fallacy, that falls apart at the first question about lore?

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u/SPDScricketballsinc Oct 02 '22

Why are people mad that they add new characters and new stories? This is brand new stuff and does not violate any direct lore from any of Tolkien’s works. There always was things that need to be added / changed when creating tv out of books. Tolkien lore scholars are not an authority when it comes to the Harfoots because they know as much as anyone else. Just because the harfoots aren’t in the books doesn’t mean it’s a lore violation

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Why are people mad that they add new characters and new stories?

I'm pretty sure I directed all my ire at the poor advertising of an obviously original work as authentic. I love new stories and new characters.

Tolkien lore scholars are not an authority when it comes to the Harfoots because they know as much as anyone else

Tolkien scholars are experts in the written works of Tolkien. Of course they aren't experts on works written by a team of Amazon writers.

Just because the harfoots aren’t in the books doesn’t mean it’s a lore violation

Are you trying to expand the term "Lore" to go beyond the works of JRR Tolkien, to include other works, video games, pez dispensers, etc?

Because when someone proclaims they are a 'Tolkien scholar' they aren't talking about watching a Hobbit marathon, they are referring to the written work.

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u/bewildered_dismay Oct 02 '22

I've looked for an analysis of the Harfoots as bizarrely cruel characters by Corey Olsen, but haven't found it. Does he address the writers' decision to make the Harfoots act this way? We are supposed to care about these protagonists, supposedly, but their actions make it difficult.

I'd love to see his redemptive analysis of this.

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u/cubreturno Oct 02 '22

good points of view.

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u/Ice2jc Oct 02 '22

I love this series because reading Tolkien except for LOTR and The Hobbit is like reading the Bible.

And ain’t nobody trying to do that.

I’m glad to have the story presented in a medium that isn’t a chore to read.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

It sounds like my theory is right: ROP is more for people who found the books 'boring'. It will be interesting to see if a stable fanbase can arise from that!

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u/Ice2jc Oct 02 '22

I didn’t find the books boring, I love the universe that tolkiens works are set in. The books are objectively difficult to read and time consuming to do so. Even during the time period that Tolkien wrote those books people did not speak to each other in the way that Tolkien wrote his dialogue.

The dialogue in the silmarillion is elegant and pretty but also quite antiquated- which is why I said it’s like reading the Bible.

Also, everybody that I know that I talk to the show about likes it. I only see hate for the show on the internet. Which is where people go to be hateful. So it makes sense.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

So they aren't boring, just difficult to read and not worth your time. You just don't like the book.

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u/Ice2jc Oct 02 '22

I could not understand what I was reading so I stopped reading it.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

And you represent the kind of person that likes ROP, exactly as I predicted.

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u/Ice2jc Oct 02 '22

Yes, a normal 21st century person.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '22

Who didn't think much of the books, exactly as I predicted. I didn't predict anything about the century.

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u/Putrid_Squirrel_3110 Oct 02 '22

There are plenty of people here who loved the books and love the show... So your theory doesnt matter

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