So Rings of Power season two is coming out, and the flame-wars flared up again on social media. So let's take a look at why people hated the show. Although hate is a strong word. Disliked is more like it. I am quite apathetic, myself, despite being a 'Tolkien fan'. (I've read all books, even the Silmarillion, AND I have read LoTR once every year for more than a decade. I think I know the source material somewhat.)
1. The show has nothing to do with Tolkien's world (yes, yes, they only bought 150 lines, so they could not use more, I know the drill)
2. The whole set, everything looked incredibly cheap and artificial despite the budget. Just look at the set, the clothing, the armor, weapons, and compare it, not to the LoTR movies, but to GoT. The difference is jarring. Rubber armor vs actual metal armor. Actual design differences based on region. The sets look like lived in, actual environments, not like a green screen. Game of Thrones had a much lower budget, and somehow did better in this regard. Heck the movies had lower budgets than this shit.
3. Characters were off; and seriously off. Galandriel, Elrond and the rest had no connection whatsoever to their actual selves described in Tolkien's works. They were different characters altogether, not to mention their decisions, their interactions were forced. It all served to move the story forward, so they made choices that were required for that to happen, and not what they would have made had they been actual characters.
4. The story was absolute and utter shit - it was worse than an average fan fiction, to be honest. Was more like a Warhammer 40K book by Guy Haley -bolter porn, in other words. It made no sense. Let me repeat. The story makes absolutely no sense. None. I have no idea how people cannot see how ridiculously idiotic the story is. I guess people do not use their brains, just let the show wash over them without thinking, mesmerized by the shiny stuff and action. But let me stress it: at this point in the story, Galandriel is solely responsible for the return of Sauron. And she never told anyone that the great evil lord is back; somehow it never occurred to her. And this is only one of the idiotic things. Let's not mention not-Gandalf, the sociopathic and evil not-Hobbits, who, despite being an isolated, small community, manage to be more diverse than a Starbucks in Beverly Hills. The weird vulcano-trigger thingy, and why it was created, and why it was activated. Forget about the greatest smiths of all time not knowing how to make alloys, the incredibly stupid and hamfisted THEY ARE TAKING YOUR JOBS, MAKE NUMENOR GREAT AGAIN nod to current day politics and the rest. I would love to see people defend the various story lines and "character development", but so far I could see no actual argument justifying the jumps in logic and the lack of good writing apart from "duH, yOU DoN'T LikE It, dOn'T wAtCh It. HAter".
5. The performative diversity was jarring, especially that this was the main point of the marketing campaign, instead of how they wanted to bring Tolkien into the screen. They showed a very diverse cast of 'Tolkien Experts' who apparently had no idea about what Tolkien wrote apart from what made it into the movies, because they had no issues with the lore-breaking stuff they were allowed to see before the show was aired for the rest of us, peasants. (Again: Game of Thrones did diversity as well- but it made sense there. You do not see Asian or black people among the First Men or Wildlings over the wall sprinkled in the cast. It makes sense geographically and ethnicly. Because what da ya know. You can have dragons AND diversity that makes sense. Who knew?) But diversity was the message they were going with, this is what they marketed with, and then used it as a tool to shoot down any and all criticism. You don't like the show? YOU HORRIBLE RACIST AND SEXIST MONSTER. This tactic was utilized with every shit show from Ghostbusters 2016 onwards, but here's an idea: how about not making a shit product, and then you would not need to fall back to this defense? Not to mention it does not work. It does not actually guilt trip people into loving the show. It only serves as a way for the showrunners to suck their own dicks (metaphorically, since many of these people are women) how it is not their fault their creation failed.
6. The showrunners said they deliberately changed the story, so it would surprise people who do know the history of Middle Earth. What the actual fuck. I mean... how? How do you come up with an idiotic take like this? Well, surprise us they did.
And if you do not believe me, go back in time, read the raving reviews in the Guardian, etc when it came out, calling anyone, who does not like it, a MAGA loving, evil fascist, sexist, racist, culture-war waging incel asshole, essentially saying that if you are a good person you just LOVE the show, but god forbid if you do not. Then jump ahead in time and read the reviews from the very same people saying that the show was not very good. If you think there was no concerted effort to sell this piece of shit to the public when it comes out (the known issues with access media), you are quite naive. Taken all this, especially the attacks on the fans, makes people a tad... upset. Wexed, even. Or even galled, exasperated, or I would hazard, irked. I may go as far as riled, really. So yeah. Bring on season 2.
