Philip Padalino

This pile is almost unwatchable. I had hopes that Amazon wasn’t going to “rewrite” one of the most famous pieces of literature in human history like they could do a better job than Tolkien but I was poorly mistaken. That was perhaps the greatest sin of all was the hubris of the writers. But I digress, pros and cons from a huge LOTR nerd of 25 years: Pros: - the visuals were amazing. It’s clear most of the time and effort was put into this. It’s basically the “look at the shiny object” after all things considered. But I did appreciate the level of detail in this aspect. - the actors were actually pretty good. I didn’t get the sense they were random people and I think some of them were LOTR fans so that’s good to know they chose people like that during casting. Cons (get ready…) - Galadriel was present in the Silmarillion, and did help her house during battles, however the level of importance this show played into her was profoundly unneeded. They gave her this “warrior princess” role and made characters like Gil Gilad look like bumbling idiots who had no purpose. - Harfoots…no idea what this had to do in the second age or in the forging of the rings of power. Cute connections to LOTR/Hobbit I guess but Jesus was this irrelevant. -ZERO…and I mean ZERO importance and explanation given to Numenor, Valinor, Trees of Valinor, Melkor, Celebrimbor and Faenor, the Silmarils, Ungoliant, Lindon, the Valar. Just too much ignored that could have explained the whole importance of the second age. - Sauron…completely ignored his physical body dying in Numenor and becoming his next form. Also…he was portrayed as this Chad human who told Celebrimbor how to make the rings. A human told the wisest elf crafter how to make the rings in a few weeks when it took several decades to make them. -I say this as respectfully as possible…but they really tried to make the men in this show look like bumbling idiots who needed women to take the reins and fix things. Got some woke attitudes during this show. - Gandalf arriving never happened in the second age, that occurred in the third age. Not sure what they are setting up here. - Lastly, and perhaps the most important thing they chose to never mention was the War of Wrath. This battle was the end of the first age and gave birth to the Second Age’s events. I hope the second season is better but I have little faith.

I doubt this steaming pile went through a diverse and dedicated focus group of MCU fans….