It occurs to me that a non-spoilery review of the first episode (only one I've had time for) would probably be handy for people who are considering whether to watch the series. Adapting this from my spoiler version:
Episode one ("A Shadow of the Past") is not as faithful as I'd hoped, but nowhere near as bad as people anticipated. There's been a lot of impressions based on the trailers, and even in this episode it's clear that the trailers don't show everything.
One thing it is is
very pretty. Valinor looks like Valinor. The swan-ship looks like a swan-ship. Lindon is like Movie!Rivendell writ large. There's an "old farm" in the Harfoot sections which is exactly the kind of place you'd like to stumble on exploring a wilderness. Even the small things have had a lot of thought put into them - I flagged an elvish ladder which the propmakers clearly designed as if it had been grown as a single tree, shaped over a decade or more. It does owe a lot, visually, to the Jackson movies (LotR, not Hobbit), so if you didn't like the style there you probably won't here either; but for me, it feels like being in Middle-earth of the Second Age.
That feeling doesn't always extend to the characters. The absolute stand-out stars here are the Harfeet, who are utterly believable proto-Hobbits (and adorable besides). But while Galadriel is a believable Galadriel (if you can accept that the woman who fought fiercely at Alqualonde might possibly pick up a sword once in a while), most of the features male elves have a weirdly craggy look to their faces, though their costumes are usually pretty good. The mortal village swings a little too far into "medieval people wore mud and rags" at times; but based on the trailers, I have high hopes for the Numenorean costume design.
A fair few people have been talking about "inserting ideopolitical messaging" and the like, but honestly, Episode One has none of this. The only argument I can see being made is that the existence of non-white people, or of Galadriel acting like some sort of "man-maiden" or something (
), is an ideological statement in and of itself, but I don't put much truck in that claim. I think people are projecting external statements by the actors and creators onto the show, and seeing things that - again, in Episode One specifically - aren't actually there.
The storyline has some canonicity issues. A lot of them stem from what
Bęthberry has quoted
in another thread - the legal requirement for the writers to not only not use the Silmarillion, but to actively work to make their story
not look/be inspired by it. In places, they achieve this by being deliberately vague, but there are places where their storyline and interpretations fly in the face of, if not the text, at least the most likely intent of Tolkien's work. That's probably a good thing for their ability to actually tell a story - to take an extreme example, a Fall of Numenor which tried to vague its way around anything in Akallabeth would have to be completely plotless - but it does mean the Tolkien content is reduced. "The book Tolkien never wrote" is not an accurate description of this show.
Viewed apart from Tolkien (which is hard to do in places), the story is... fine. It falls firmly into the "first episode setup" genre, establishing characters and settings rather than giving us anything to chew on. The characters mostly follow their character as established in the show - I only counted two particularly irrational acts, one of which was highlighted as politics, the other an act of desperation. The elves have the air of smug superiority which you'd expect from the Noldor at their second peak, and there's one moment where Gil-Galad's response to Galadriel is very definitely "I'm the High King, but you are my terrifying aunt and I really hope you don't make an issue of it".
I'm not great at judging dialogue or acting, but I had no problem with it. There are some beautifully delivered lines in this episode, several of which showed up in the trailer. It's clear that Galadriel is the main character, and I think Morfydd Clark can carry that role. There's enough characters who
aren't stuck in the Tortured & Harrowed mindset that the ones who are don't drag it all down. And the Harfeet are a positive delight.
Overall, my expectations have lowered slightly, but I enjoyed it, and will still watch the second episode when I get the chance. It works. It's
fine - and I hope, when the plot gets its feet under it, it can graduate to "good".
hS