Nandarolondë

 Yesterday Amazon released the long awaited 'Rings of Power' series. It is set in the Second Age of Middle Earth. I watched both starting episodes and I will watch them again to look for things I may have missed, as I always do with films.

First off, in my own opinion, it is not really a Tolkien story. To my mind they took Tolkien's Silmarillion and used it to inspire their work to one degree or another, alongside the Appendices of the LotR trilogy.. It does play fast and loose with the Lore, completely replacing known story lore with their own ideas. To my mind it is more reminiscent of the old D&D movies kind of mixed with Willow. It is most emphatically not Tolkien. I got no feeling of returning to Middle Earth from it at all. 

This does not mean it is bad watching. As a fantasy series it holds much promise. It has its own very interesting parts in it that moved me nicely. I will continue to watch the series.

I do not give a damn about the racial casting in the film. I know what the lore says, the Silmarillion is my favorite of all the Master's works and I have read the Appendices more times than I can count. I know Hobbits aren't mentioned at all in it, although they are in the Appendices. In the first case Tolkien never really specifies whether all are the same color race or not. Mostly when he uses 'dark' it has to do with evil or unenlightened. Eol comes to mind, and the Elves who never went to Aman are of the latter type. Bear in mind that the realm ruled by Thingol and Melian brought forth the fairest flowering of Elven peoples ever seen in Beleriand. Thingol was a 'Dark Elf' and Melian a Maia. No Noldorin were part of that flowering, and indeed, they rather led to its downfall in some ways.

Dwarf women. Very cool. Beardless. Very cool. I wasn't nearly so impressed with Durin IV. Love the 'Aulë's Beard' oath.

The show does play very loose with the timeline in the Lore. They also imply Morgoth 'fell', as if in battle. That's not what happened and it most certainly wasn't the Elves that accomplished it. The Elves were incapable of truly defeating Morgoth, it was Tulkas who wrestled with him at the end. They depict the Elves as being on the hunt for Sauron. Not really the way things happened. They went to war on Morgoth for his theft of the Silmarils. Sauron was a Lieutenant, a Maia of fire who had been corrupted by Morgoth. Sauron managed to fool them with his 'fair likeness' more than once. He didn't lose the ability to do this until the fall of Numenor. Which he accomplished using the weaknesses of men.

I did like the depiction of Eregion, and of the Dwarrodelf. Well done, I though. I'm rather glad they steered clear, so far, of trying to depict Valinor. I'm curious of their depiction of Numenor...we have only the trailers so far.

Most of my negative reactions, or at least, unenthusiastic reactions did have to do with casting...mainly because their casting of Elvish folk did not seem on target. In the LotR trilogy and even in The Hobbit trilogy, the Elves looked pretty convincing to the type described by Tolkien. They gave me the feeling of being tall (Elves were taller and stronger than Men), elegant, and beautiful. Nothing at all like the Elves in this series, who came across as shorter (Galadriel is shorter than a Man), their faces are not longer, rather shorter and kind of pinched. I'm not someone who casts people for parts. All I can say is that those playing the parts, save for Gilgalad, do not awaken in me identification as Elves. 

In short, I find it a good fantasy series with the potential to be great. It is not Tolkien, to my mind. Does that matter? Only to me. 

Eledhwen i Minhiriath