The most expensive television show in history continues to be both tremendously and simultaneously visually-beautiful but dramatically underwhelming.
In the latest episode of Amazon's "The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power," elf woman Galadriel continues to be rude and unlikable but she is saved by her rugged, future love-interest Halbrand who may or may not be royalty of some kind. The black elf Arondir and his superiors come up with a poor plan of escape, resulting in the death of all the elves but Arondir. Hundreds or thousands of years old and yet Amazon's version of Tolkien elves may be the worst fighting elves in fiction yet. Elsewhere in the proto-shire with the proto-hobbits called Harfoots, the existence of the strange tall man from the sky is revealed to the rest of the group and he ends up being put to good use. This third episode was supposed to be special because it has some popular historical characters for the future clash with Sauron but Amazon chose incredibly dull actors or a script that no amount of talent could apparently redeem or save.
As a fan of Peter Jackson's two trilogies of "The Lord of the Rings" and "The Hobbit," it makes no sense to me whatsoever that they did not call Jackson to captain a spin-off of what is one of the most famous works of fantasy in recent history. Looking above at the make-up and costume design of the Orcs, anyone can see that this is a show manufactured by a big quality studio capable of technical grandeur ... and yet whoever they handed the show to has none of the dramatic chops witnessed in the previous Jackson movies. No character stands out, no moment has created any emotional staking. Things are just happening for no reason and we're supposed to call this progress. I really wanted to like the show but every second is extremely painful and makes me immediately look up clips of Peter Jackson's two trilogies. $1 billion dollars and one of the biggest companies in the world couldn't afford better actors and scriptwriters. I don't care for anyone on screen right now and I can't remember their names half the time because they make me feel nothing.
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I miss these guys -- and not just the guys, I miss the women as well. They were noble in appearance and behavior and their journeys were both nourishing and terrifying to the soul.
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I won't lie and say I immediately loved the Hobbit trilogy. There was an excess of CGI but the actors were still above-average and mostly decent. While not as riveting as the previous trilogy, this was still a beautiful world with beautiful people, and no one does dwarves or elves or hobbits or humans justice like Peter Jackson.
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So far the Rings of Power feels like really expensive bad community-theatre but since it's so popular I'll try to keep watching and praying ... praying for a miracle.
See you all on my next review.
