Supreme Watchmaker

As a lifelong Tolkien fan, this has truly been a disappointment. I tried to ignore the controversy around the show prior to its release and held out hopes that Amazon would make a faithful and engaging story, but so far they have failed on nearly every front. This is just a short summary of my impressions on the available episodes: The visuals, admittedly, have been quite solid, and I found a few scenes truly impressive. Unfortunately this is undercut by some bafflingly poor costuming and set pieces which repeatedly broke my immersion in the show. The armor and clothing just looks very fake for the most part, and some of the props look like they were 3D printed. There is one scene where some characters climb a "wooden" ladder in a watch tower that is very clearly just plastic. After the care that went into hand crafting/forging the armor and set pieces for the films, this is pretty sad to see, especially considering the monumental budget this series is working with. The plot so far has just not been terribly interesting, to the point that I found myself checking my phone multiple times during both episodes. The pacing is quite bad, with long stretches of nothing really happening followed by short bursts of action. It's obvious they are trying to build up the narrative towards something more significant, but at this rate there will be no one left watching by the time they get there. The characters and acting have been a disappointment as well. Galadriel has not been particularly likable as the main character, with her borderline fanatical devotion to her narratively dubious mission and her obvious disdain for anyone who dares question her on it. Furthermore, both her and the new elf character seem to have a very limited range of emotions in their acting. I think they are aiming for stoic and serious, but it just comes across as hollow and emotionless. The dialogue, which is shaky throughout, is especially bad for the Harfoots, whose lines made me physically cringe multiple times during the show. Elrond has been mediocre, not terrible but not particularly interesting either. The Dwarves are the only characters I've really found particularly likable. Although I understand this his highly subjective, I also found the musical score to be odd and disappointing. Certainly a big step down from the films. All of this is to say nothing of the many completely unnecessary deviations from Tolkien's lore, but that is a whole other can of worms that I won't get into here. Overall, I just find it sad that having been handed Tolkien's incredible worldbuilding and half a billion dollars to work with, this is all Amazon's showrunners could muster. Perhaps the show will improve dramatically over the coming episodes, and if so I will be glad to change this review, but I'm certainly not getting my hopes up at this point.