2024-09-07 17:42:32
There was a lot of buzz when Amazon Prime Video was preparing the first season of Rings of Power. The most expensive series of all time and a new grand narrative fantasy? At the same time, the creators acquired the rights only to “crumbs” from the mythology created by the writer JRR Tolkien.
However, the opening episodes last year introduced the world and characters that the viewer wanted to give a chance to. Problems came later. And they also persist in the current second series, which the platform has been broadcasting since last Friday.
As soon as the filmmakers started to move the pieces around the chessboard of the fictional continents of Middle-earth and Númenor, it was fully revealed that they did not know how to deal with the heroes. Less seasoned fans may have enjoyed seeing the Hobbits’ predecessors called the Hairynoses as the fabled Númenor spread out before them, inspired by the legends of Atlantis. There were also the ancients known as the Elven ruler Galadriel. And above all the dark lord Sauron, who – how else – tries to gain control over everyone.
The more demanding and meticulous connoisseurs of Tolkien’s world questioned the decision of the creators to change some essential elements, such as the reason for the longevity of the elves – it was especially irritating for the work of someone who built his intricate, detailed book universe, and after all, a pillar of the fantasy genre as such, with the care of an Oxford professor. But the series was hardly able to satisfy even an ordinary viewer who does not need to think about mythology.
The first episodes of the new series now continue in a similar vein. There are effective, memorable scenes, sometimes poetic, sometimes terrifying; they reveal a generous budget and a certain filmmaking skill. But, unfortunately, they tell about protagonists whose fates do not interest us at all.
Sauron moves around Middle-earth in human form and tries to manipulate the environment, the other heroes accuse each other of playing to his tune. And the series oscillates all the time between whether it wants to be the new Lord of the Rings, i.e. an epic fantasy, or rather a kind of chronicle just presenting this world.
The Rings of Power series feels like a calculus. The photo shows Ciarán Hinds as the Dark Wizard. | Photo: Amazon MGM Studios
At the same time, writing a chronicle is an absurd idea when Amazon does not have the rights to the entire Lord of the Rings, so it weaves together the past of Middle-earth and the surrounding lands in its own way. Of course, the majority viewer can wave their hand at that. What’s worse is that writers JD Payne and Patrick McKay don’t introduce characters whose fates we don’t care about. And most of the time they just mechanically switch between storylines.
When director Peter Jackson dynamically alternated story lines in his film trilogy The Lord of the Rings at the beginning of the millennium, he changed different types of moods and emotions, followed heroes we already know well and fear for them. At most, some viewers could complain that they were less amused by the “crying” line of Frodo alone on his pilgrimage to Mordor, and look forward to another one.
There is no threat of such things with the Rings of Power. Here you can’t connect to any of the characters and be interested in their fate more than the others. Everyone here has only some partial attributes – this elf gracefully shoots a bow, this dwarf and dwarf run a funny household almost like something from a sitcom.
The creators have already introduced a whole series of magical rings of power, so in the new series they can recite the famous poem that begins with the words: “Three rings for the king of the elves under the sky, seven for the lords of the dwarfs in the halls of stone…” As well as some visual quotations of scenes from the Lord of the Rings movies, but that’s just a helpless wink at the fans.
When Frodo used his ring in the original trilogy, or just touched it with his finger in his pocket, you could feel it right away. In the series, these relics roll down the stairs and change hands, but Amazon no longer conveys the urgency of what happens to them to the audience.
You can’t connect to any of the characters in the series Rings of Power. Pictured is Rory Kinnear as Tom Bombadil. | Photo: Amazon MGM Studios
In addition, the first three episodes of the new series only introduce characters that we know for the most part from the past, but we still need to be reminded of where they are right now. Unfortunately, it seems even more tiresome than last time.
Paradoxically, there is so much going on that there is no time for anything to actually happen, for the scenes to have any internal drama. The cute mysterious giant colobus still travels with hairy-legged halflings like at the beginning of the last series, the blacksmith Celebrimbor, the creator of the three elven rings, is still being manipulated – and the majority of the story lines sound similarly static or rigid.
The basic problem with the series is that it feels lifeless, like pure calculus. It’s as if the creators said to themselves: let’s quote a lot from well-known Tolkien works, but let’s also attract new fans. And let’s also try to impress those who are looking for a successor to Game of Thrones with scheming.
But, for example, the scheming for power in Númenor not only does not bring any emotions, there are no characters that would have a reason to be angry, or vice versa, let alone that the creators somehow change our view of them and allow them to develop. In addition, it is not even possible to properly understand what is at stake from the piecemeal scenes.
The rings of power thus become a fairy tale from which you can now and then extract an impressive scene: a poetic flight of butterflies, monstrous spiders, an archery shootout in the forest.
But what was a thrilling journey in both the book and film Lord of the Rings turns into a tiresome grind under the hands of JD Payne and Patrick McKay.
Serial
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power II
Creators: JD Payne and Patrick McKay
The series can be seen in the video library of Amazon Prime Video.