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Old 09-09-2022, 05:50 AM   #2
Thinlómien
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Join Date: Dec 2004
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Thinlómien is wading through the Dead Marshes.Thinlómien is wading through the Dead Marshes.Thinlómien is wading through the Dead Marshes.Thinlómien is wading through the Dead Marshes.Thinlómien is wading through the Dead Marshes.Thinlómien is wading through the Dead Marshes.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Formendacil View Post
  • Why by spring, Celebrimbor? You're an Elf--what's the time crunch for?
  • Why is "aged parent" an Elven metaphor? How would Celebrimbor OR Elrond know it?
I remember being irked by both these two things. They just smell of sloppy writing. Is it just me, or does it seem like that these days (and to be fair, maybe earlier too) the Achilles' heel of many big money movies/ tv shows is that the writing is the weakest link? And without that, nothing else works either. I feel like - apart from the concept/character/plot writing not being as good as it should be - they could have really benefited from someone thoughtfully reading the final draft of the script once more, preferably someone with a good grasp of the Tolkien canon (I mean, not even a hardcore Tolkien expert #1, but say someone the level of an average barrow-'downer would have caught a majority of these jarring little oddities).

Quote:
Originally Posted by Form
"Children" plural? I like the gap of understanding between Elves and Dwarves here, but 20 years is still not to a Dwarf what it is to a Man! It's like being missing 3-4 years.
I really liked the portrayal of Durin and Elrond's relationship and the talk that revealed their different concepts of time. But I agree it would have worked better with a human or a little longer time (30 or 50 years) - but perhaps that's the kind of pedantry we have discussed on the other thread. Perhaps Durin is just a little prone to drama, or it's just that Elrond managed to miss the 20 most eventful years of his life so far. I mean, with humans, one might feel like their close friend missed a big part of their life if they didn't see for five years but during those five years one got married and had two kids. Especially if they used to see much more often and then the other party just disappeared and wasn't there for those big moments.

Overall I think episode 2 was much better than episode 1, which I found genuinely boring (which is something I had not expected). It had better pacing; things finally got going in all the plots. Durin and Elrond's friendship - which we will hopefully learn more of, since it is an interesting addition that has no backstory yet - added a lot of depth to the story, and we finally got some interesting crumbs (the Númenórean ship, the "reverse Morgul blade", more of The Stranger) that might lead somewhere.

I'm still in no particular hurry to see episode three though - if for any reason, then just to be able to come to the 'Downs to dissect it at the same time with everyone else. But without the communal aspect The Rings of Power would be one of those shows where you see a couple of episodes and then you think you might watch more later and it's a bit of a coin toss whether you do and how soon. If you ask me, one obvious shortcoming of good TV writing that the show suffers from is that they're doing very poor job of keeping the audience intrigued enough to tune in for the next episode. (I know I'm not alone in this, I just talked to a friend yesterday who said she nearly didn't finish episode 1 because it was so boring and all over the place and she was wondering whether to give episode 2 a try or not.)
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