Lord of the Rings The Rings of Power

[Echoweaver]

Replacing all the race of men characters every season for (probably) the first four seasons would have been pretty awkward. In addition to losing cast continuity, it would have taxed the audience with several times more names.

They might have been able to pull it off by starting near the end (at a time when Elendil and sons are already alive) and flashing back to events before their time, but that would have created other complications.

That's an interesting idea that might have worked. It looks to me like they're modeling the story's timeline on the humans and then compressing the elvish timelines to human-length.

It would have been a challenge to keep the flashback approach from getting really confusing, and there are several plot threads that need to weave together. I'm guessing it would be deemed too risky.

On the third hand (I have a lot of hands), the timelines of elves and Men don't really need to come together much until Elendil and Isildur are already alive. Another approach might have been to just explicitly indicate that the threads are moving at different speeds in time. In my head, that's essentially how I'm viewing it. You might even be able to frame that approach as an extended flashback to go with your idea, with some elf who survives (Elrond?) sitting around by a hearth somewhere, explaining events leading up to the present.

The plot thread with Galadriel and our deposed Southlander king would be more difficult that way.

[TesalionLortus]

The big OH was when I realized that the, "Southlands" were in the location that would become Mordor and Gondor, and that the corrupt land and the orc invasion was the beginning of the construction of Mordor.

Then they knocked us over the head with that revelation when Galadriel made the connection between her sigil and the landscape. But it was still pretty cool.

Aha... well, no wonder I don't share that enthusiasm because what you said got nothing to do with canon. Southlands never existed, elves never occupied these lands, and these lands were never "contested lands" - or at least not much of a focus, not until Gondor was build. The actual Southern lands, like towards Harad, were what mattered more. They were like the levant and Asia Minor (or Egypt and African coast) of Tolkien's "medium to late antiquity" period in Middle-earth. Sort of. Whereas everything that was called "Southlands" in the show canonically was more like, say, Germania? Gallia? With lots of forests, before Numenoreans went truly wild on them. So the showrunners erasing Harad here to have their fake outlaw king Aragorn call back (in lands where in canon there were no great, distinguished kings, probably, at this time period - chieftains more like it) is already too much of a stretch, especially that they omit Harad and Umbar and ALL OF THAT, places actually being contested and where Ar-Pharazon humbled Sauron.

As for the construction of Mordor, there are too many things off. The plan to "build a kingdom" was strange (if so many people live there already and you don't have any established political influence/worshippers among men yet, better to build somewhere quiet and empty no?), also why would Morgoth give any thought towards his successor (a thought wouldn't cross his mind!) and the entire CIA premise is contrived to begin with, but scratch that, how come the elven wardens didn't see any super looong orc trenches being build in the distance? That's silly... Actually, orc resistance to sunlight aside, I really liked this kind of premise as portrayed in Shadow of Mordor game. It worked because it wasn't building from scratch, Sauron was directly involved with some of his powerful servants and necromancers (while recovering strength) and Gondorians guarding Mordor, well... the begining of the storyline is pretty straighforward it's already kind of decadence of Gondor, their watch over Mordor had diminished, they're shorter on men and apparently it's only outliers who are being send for duty at Black Gate and in Mordor (kind of like the Wall in GoT). The game not the best Tolkien adaptation but... at least such premise was nicely executed and worked pretty well.

Replacing all the race of men characters every season for (probably) the first four seasons would have been pretty awkward. In addition to losing cast continuity, it would have taxed the audience with several times more names.

They might have been able to pull it off by starting near the end (at a time when Elendil and sons are already alive) and flashing back to events before their time, but that would have created other complications.

I know some people complain about time compression but that's not really the biggest problem, the very concept of time-compression or changes to how some of the events unfolded (of some kind) is not bad, as far as tv format is concerned. It's execution (and greediness, and inability to write with common sense) that's a problem. They could have easily pulled it off by not having a hobbit focused storyline, by not having any dwarves in starting portions of it (and by NOT planning for the Balrog and the Fall...lol) and by introducing us to Numenorean complexities with Isildur and his son as our main characters (Numenor more or less the same timeframe as they have it in the show, but they have armies and colonies, Umbar can be a great storyline hub, except start with Miriel's father being a king - you can still have focus on Miriel in active roles, acting on behalf of her father - so when Ar-Pharazon takes over it's a direct result of a civil war that can be a major plot point in the course of the series). With the action centered around contested areas East, most of the time, with room for some fights shown, skirmishes, politics of men etc. Plus Lindon with everything regarding the Forging, which would be a slow build-up (which it is in the series that we got anyway)

[LagunaD2]

The Numenoreans (who were still on good terms with the Eldar) intervened to kick Sauron out of Eriador during the War of Elves and Sauron. That was around 1700 SA, in the immediate aftermath of the forging of the One and the hiding of the three.

Flash forward to 3261 SA, when Ar-Pharazon (who we saw as "Chancellor" in Episode 3) landed in Umbar and received Sauron's surrender, beginning Numenor's final descent into depravity and destruction (which happened 58 years later in 3319 SA).

They pretty much have to merge those two wars more than 1500 years apart into a single one.

Sauron was finally overthrown about 120 years later, in 3441 SA.

[Radhruin_EU]

Replacing all the race of men characters every season for (probably) the first four seasons would have been pretty awkward. In addition to losing cast continuity, it would have taxed the audience with several times more names.

They might have been able to pull it off by starting near the end (at a time when Elendil and sons are already alive) and flashing back to events before their time, but that would have created other complications.

A lot of the early stuff would be about the Elves and they don't go away like that. It could have started around the year 1000 (when Sauron pops up again) and gone on from there in large chunks. Still compressed but much more mildly and with some time skips, doing one major bit with the Numenoreans as a self-contained series.

(1) 1000-1600, a (better) prologue to summarise the FA, and then start from the reappearance of Sauron and go up to the forging of the Three Rings. Cliff-hanger: Sauron forges the One Ring.
(2) 1600-2250, the War of the Elves and Sauron, his defeat by the Numenoreans and them going on to start colonising Middle-earth. Cliff-hanger: the appearance of the Nazgul.
(3) 2251-2386: the reign of Tar-Ancalimon, showing how and why the Numenoreans lose their faith and the rise of the King's Men. End with the Eagles symbolically flying away.
(4) 3255-3319: skip forward: show how Tar-Palantir had tried futilely to bring back the old ways, and his death. Pharazon usurping the throne. Sauron's capture and the corruption of Numenor. The Downfall. Cliff-hanger: the ships of the Faithful landing in Middle-earth.
(5) 3429-TA 2: Time skip forward a century to when Arnor and Gondor are flourishing. Sauron's assault on Gondor. The formation of the Last Alliance and the war. Ends with Isildur's death and the loss of the Ring into the Anduin. (After-credit scene: the Ring is found again).

So that'd be two seasons of mostly Elves and no problems with the casting, then a middle self-contained 'political' season in Numenor that could follow on from the second season, then a final two seasons which would take place within one Numenorean lifetime and again have no casting problems.

You shouldn't just take the show-runners' word for things - we know why they've done what they've done, because it's the easy way that allows for the most callbacks to LOTR.

[Echoweaver]

Aha... well, no wonder I don't share that enthusiasm because what you said got nothing to do with canon. Southlands never existed, elves never occupied these lands, and these lands were never "contested lands" - or at least not much of a focus, not until Gondor was build.

I think you're coming at this from the backward direction.

Sauron built his realm on a block of land. That land certainly had at least a few residents. The villages and villagers we've seen so far don't look important at all, but they're in an area Sauron is making important.

I'm not sure about the area being "contested lands." Was there someplace that indicated they were contested? By who? I might have missed it.

I got the impression that the elves had been patrolling around areas that had once pledged to Morgoth to look for signs of trouble. Meanwhile, the villagers had rolled through a bunch of generations, had no sense of connection to whatever their ancestors did, and resented that the elves treated them as suspicious.

Now, I'm not sure why it keeps being called the generic term "Southlands." Clearly the nation of Harad is included in the LotR license because LOTRO uses it. I would expect the lands that became Mordor belonged to someone, probably Harad. But I guess if Tolkien didn't say that, then the show is free to hypothesize some kind of political entity there.

But also keep in mind that if Tolkien is silent on a subject -- in the appendices of LotR, not anywhere, because that's the nature of the license -- the show is free to put something reasonable there. That's what expanding on Tolkien's appendices looks like. This isn't about acting out what bits we have from the appendices. It's about building a robust tale that weaves in the bits we have from the appendices. I'm sure we're going to find some stuff contradicted by some of Tolkien's extensive other writings because the show is literally not allowed to use that stuff.

The Numenoreans (who were still on good terms with the Eldar) intervened to kick Sauron out of Eriador during the War of Elves and Sauron. That was around 1700 SA, in the immediate aftermath of the forging of the One and the hiding of the three.

Flash forward to 3261 SA, when Ar-Pharazon (who we saw as "Chancellor" in Episode 3) landed in Umbar and received Sauron's surrender, beginning Numenor's final descent into depravity and destruction (which happened 58 years later in 3319 SA).

They pretty much have to merge those two wars more than 1500 years apart into a single one.

Sauron was finally overthrown about 120 years later, in 3441 SA.

My hypothesis is that we'll see both conflicts, but the first one will be compressed. It might well begin AND end in this season. The important part is that the forces of Elves and Men will be victorious, and Al-Pharazon will triumphantly return to Numenor with Sauron as a prisoner. At that point, the Men of Numemor had already begun to resent the restrictions the Valar put on them and covet the elves' agelessness. Sauron will grab those threads and use them to corrupt Numenor.

The rings haven't been forged, however. IIRC (not looking at the source material this moment), Sauron presents himself to the elves as another elf Annatar and works with Celebrimbor in the forging of the rings. We're running the storylines in parallel, but I'm not sure how Sauron can be Annatar with the elves while simultaneously being in prison in Numenor. We'll just have to see what they have in mind when we get there.

[TesalionLortus]

Sauron built his realm on a block of land. That land certainly had at least a few residents. The villages and villagers we've seen so far don't look important at all, but they're in an area Sauron is making important.

I'm not sure about the area being "contested lands." Was there someplace that indicated they were contested? By who? I might have missed it.

The political and economic wealth seemed to reside in the South and that's what was contested, between Sauron and Numenoreans. Not "Southlands South" from Amazon's but Harad South and even further, like Far Harad and perhaps even further. This entire coastline is where Numenoreans had their outposts

In Anafalas and the rest of future Gondor there were very forested areas, populated, yes, as described in Tal-Elmar and other places, but not really a great "prize" yet. Probably wasn't colonized before Ar-Pharazon's time. As for Mordor/Nurn - it's a leftover after what happened to Sea of Helcar. Probably somehow volcanic. Sure, some people around the Sea of Nurnen, in time, but nothing worth of note in a show that's supposed to portray Numenor, probably no one cared to possess this land. So yes, what they're doing with these "Southlands" (and the significance they give them, with pointless racial dramas) is super boring version of things and deviation from canon. Rumors about the orcs emerging and a character from the South investigating near Nurn only to find enslaved people would have been enough (maybe Barad-dur construction already underway) and then back to good stuff South. We should be seeing Umbar and different peoples of Harad/Far Harad, their relations with Numenoreans and how it all leads to Ar-Pharazon vs Sauron and the humbling of Sauron. But in the show they're essentially erasing Harad and colonial aspect of Numenor, all in favor of tropes and boring, rehashed writing - the finale of S1 will be essentially the Siege of Mini Village Helm's Deep. Or something like that, but it's Galadriel leading the charge instead of Gandalf and Miriel plays Eomer here. I can already see the cringe rehashed scenes from PJ.

[Echoweaver]

In Anafalas and the rest of future Gondor there were very forested areas, populated, yes, as described in Tal-Elmar and other places, but not really a great "prize" yet.

Again, this doesn't have anything to do with economic wealth. The people there are poor. They just happen to be there.

Probably wasn't colonized before Ar-Pharazon's time. As for Mordor/Nurn - it's a leftover after what happened to Sea of Helcar. Probably somehow volcanic. Sure, some people around the Sea of Nurnen, in time, but nothing worth of note in a show that's supposed to portray Numenor, probably no one cared to possess this land. So yes, what they're doing with these "Southlands" (and the significance they give them, with pointless racial dramas) is super boring version of things and deviation from canon. We should be seeing Umbar and different peoples of Harad/Far Harad, their relations with Numenoreans and how it all leads to Ar-Pharazon vs Sauron and the humbling of Sauron.

Is all this in the appendices of LotR?

Also, note that anything you prefaced with "probably" is open to a different interpretation.

[TesalionLortus]

Again, this doesn't have anything to do with economic wealth. The people there are poor. They just happen to be there.

You're missing the point and act as if what I was just talking about was exactly the same as what they have in the show, but no. Southlands is an utterly fake fallacy Amazon came up with, not "a different interpretation." As for the people that just happen to be there, sure, and I mentioned the potential people around Nurn (which would have been more likely than immediate proximity to Mount Doom where Tirharad and watchtower are) but I also mentioned they can be dealt with off-screen because there is no sane reason to make it a main theater of events with all sorts of characters including elves and Numenoreans (look how far it is from the coastline to Mordor... I guess there is nothing in-between? just cool plains? no harder terrain? and Galadriel and Miriel will just take a casual stroll with cavalry to Tirharad, sure... it's utterly dumb and contrived)

Is all this in the appendices of LotR?

Also, note that anything you prefaced with "probably" is open to a different interpretation.

The key events? For certain. Some of the context? Maybe not. But it's pretty clear what Numenor was supposed to be in canon and where the center of attention was (Harad and actual South), it doesn't take a genius to figure that out and if common sense and all logic speak against it... no, not "open to different interpretation and fair game" but just bad, lazy writing, centered around bizarre shallow ideas rather than real storytelling and adaptation (like this entire "oh, wow, this mark is a map and I've just only figured that out!" nonsense)

[Radhruin_EU]

Sauron built his realm on a block of land. That land certainly had at least a few residents. The villages and villagers we've seen so far don't look important at all, but they're in an area Sauron is making important.

Lore-wise it was already somewhat Mordor-ish: the mountains were already there and so were the volcano and the plateau it sat on. Also, Shelob was already living in the Ephel Duath. Yes, the place didn't become Mordor until Sauron set up shop there but it already showed Morgoth's handiwork and there were parts of it you wouldn't want to hang around in.

Also, back then most of the familiar parts of Middle-earth were heavily forested - it was the Numenoreans who clear-felled most of that original forest for lumber. And a village of Easterlings should look a lot more basic than that (more 'Dark Ages' looking) whereas what we see in RoP has a typical fantasy pseudo-Renaissance look.

The real problem with the show's scenario is showing Gil-galad's writ running that far, as if the High Elves have an empire, and the idea of the Elves as an occupying force who are keeping Men down even that far east. As far as Tolkien was concerned the High Elves only really seemed to be bothered about their own patches in Lindon and Eregion on the western side of the Misty Mountains and everywhere else (including most of Eriador, never mind Rhovanion) they seemingly left Men to their own devices on a "if you don't bother us, we won't bother you" basis.

I got the impression that the elves had been patrolling around areas that had once pledged to Morgoth to look for signs of trouble. Meanwhile, the villagers had rolled through a bunch of generations, had no sense of connection to whatever their ancestors did, and resented that the elves treated them as suspicious.

It had been a thousand years or so (so about forty generations of Men!). That'd be a long time even to Elves. I can maybe imagine them maybe taking a look at those Men every now and again for a century or two after Morgoth's downfall, but after that it'd be "meh, they're just getting on with their lives, leave them to it".

Now, I'm not sure why it keeps being called the generic term "Southlands."

As distinct from the Northlands, because people know what Northmen should look like. LOTR mentions the south and Southerners in Eriador as essentially meaning people of broadly more southern European appearance (shorter and a bit darker when compared to Northmen), who we see variously as the former Men of the White Mountains, the Dunlendings, the Bree-folk and the locals in Gondor who were vassals of the Dunedain. (And also probably the locals in Cardolan, before plague and war did for the place). That's distinct from Harad where you get the dark-skinned Haradrim.

Clearly the nation of Harad is included in the LotR license because LOTRO uses it. I would expect the lands that became Mordor belonged to someone, probably Harad. But I guess if Tolkien didn't say that, then the show is free to hypothesize some kind of political entity there.

Back then Harad would likely be just a whole bunch of different tribes. And if anything, the soon-to-be Mordor was 'east' more than 'south' so sparsely settled by more (southerly) Easterlings rather than Haradrim. The real South started hundreds of miles away. And then when Sauron turned up, those Easterlings would be easy pickings for his brand of persuasion and would fall in line. The Haradrim back then hadn't really had anything to do with Morgoth (his realm had been in the far north and so a long, long way away) and weren't so bad until Sauron got his hooks into them, after he'd set himself up in Mordor. The show had the opportunity to have fully genuine sympathetic dark-skinned (think North African, primarily) characters as Haradrim who could have been being oppressed by Numenorean colonialism or all the nastiness associated with Sauron starting to exert a hold over them. Or both.

But also keep in mind that if Tolkien is silent on a subject -- in the appendices of LotR, not anywhere, because that's the nature of the license -- the show is free to put something reasonable there.

The key word there is 'reasonable'. The one thing they've not done, because they've largely ignored the Appendices as well.

My hypothesis is that we'll see both conflicts, but the first one will be compressed. It might well begin AND end in this season. The important part is that the forces of Elves and Men will be victorious, and Al-Pharazon will triumphantly return to Numenor with Sauron as a prisoner. At that point, the Men of Numemor had already begun to resent the restrictions the Valar put on them and covet the elves' agelessness. Sauron will grab those threads and use them to corrupt Numenor.

The forging of the Rings has to come first. I imagine the War of the Elves and Sauron will end up being just the destruction of Eregion (I just want to see the Orcs using Celebrimbor's corpse as a banner, lol) and they'll somehow combine the Numenorean intervention then with the much later one where Ar-Pharazon turns up and takes Sauron captive. That'd be in a later season: Pharazon also has to take power first, and he can use Miriel siding with the Elves as the perfect excuse. His reason for helping fight Sauron would be self-serving (it'd look good politically to have the Elves desperately needing Numenorean help, and thus appearing inferior) and he might have been led to believe that Sauron could give a very different perspective on the Valar and thus let him find out what's 'really' going on (conspiracy theory style). Of course that'll turn out to be a Really Bad Idea.

They've already made a mess of Numenor because the whole reason for their loss of faith was death and the wish for deathlessness (and the feeling that the Valar and the Elves had been lying to them all along), not being grumpy about "dang Elves takin' ahr jerbs". And they haven't even mentioned Eru (he's referred to as 'the One' in the Appendices so they could absolutely call him that, at least) despite how the Numenoreans worshipped the guy, and they keep referring to the Valar as 'gods' despite how only ordinary Men in Middle-earth did that and both the Elves and the Numenoreans knew better.

The rings haven't been forged, however. IIRC (not looking at the source material this moment), Sauron presents himself to the elves as another elf Annatar and works with Celebrimbor in the forging of the rings. We're running the storylines in parallel, but I'm not sure how Sauron can be Annatar with the elves while simultaneously being in prison in Numenor. We'll just have to see what they have in mind when we get there.

I don't think they'll do the Annatar thing directly. It seems likely that Sauron is already in play in disguise (they're not being terribly subtle about it) and that'll play into that in a somewhat similar way (putting the idea in Celebrimbor's head is all they need, the rest can play out much the same once they get that far).

[TesalionLortus]

Back then Harad would likely be just a whole bunch of different tribes.

Depends on how "back then." If we were a bit more established in the story, it's easy to say there were already some kings (so possibly some better developed kingdoms) based simply on Sauron's titles and how he called himself "the king of kings" to mess with Ar-Pharazon (kinda evokes ancient Persia, no?). And some of the leaders of such political entities would inevitably end up with rings.

The show had the opportunity to have fully genuine sympathetic dark-skinned (think North African, primarily) characters as Haradrim who could have been being oppressed by Numenorean colonialism or all the nastiness associated with Sauron starting to exert a hold over them. Or both.

Exactly. Such a wasted potential... and I wouldn't even mind if they broke the lore a bit (or came up with a different interpretation, as in: different clans of dwarves were a bit scattered too, just like Longbeards, so not unlikely some dwarves ended up South) and had a black (or Arab?) dwarven kingdom in the Sothern theatre of the story. Why not! Imagine THAT! (But hey, people will call me racist because I'm not particularly keen on the idea of a single black dwarf female who happens to be princess in almost exclusively all-white Kahazad-dum... )


Btw, even the Theo character could have worked under such circumstances and perhaps slightly more believable too. Perhaps he would get mixed up with a bunch of cultists who are just beginning to spread Sauron's cult in the South, maybe a little bit of necromancy stuff to make things cinematic. Like, show us how a seemingly normal person can get involved with the cult and become Sauron's follower, what would be the reasons and the appeal that Sauron offers. Instead we have... a Soulcalibur hilt and an ugly old gezeer fanboying over Sauron... who maybe used to live in his barn as mortal or something... Uh oh. Awkward. Theo will just decide to be evil because he hates elves, the racist boy, plus the Soul Edge made him do it.

[LagunaD2]

My hearing isn't the best, and it happened quickly, but I thought Miriel referred to "the One's bounty" or something to that effect during the baby-christening dream sequence.

It appears that in the show, at least for the moment, the Numenoreans' beef is only with the Elves, and they still respect the Valar.

Surprised that you find the southland towns "Renaissance"-like. They look pretty Dark Ages and squalid to me. They also have no leadership, organization or infrastructure beyond the village level, which makes them quite primitive.

[Echoweaver]

My hearing isn't the best, and it happened quickly, but I thought Miriel referred to "the One's bounty" or something to that effect during the baby-christening dream sequence.

I read a review that said the women with babies in that vision appeared to be elves. I honestly didn't notice, and it didn't occur to me that they weren't Numenorean. I'm curious as to what the connection the mothers and babies would have to the sinking of Numenor.

I need to rewatch that scene.

[Radhruin_EU]

Depends on how "back then." If we were a bit more established in the story, it's easy to say there were already some kings (so possibly some better developed kingdoms) based simply on Sauron's titles and how he called himself "the king of kings" to mess with Ar-Pharazon (kinda evokes ancient Persia, no?). And some of the leaders of such political entities would inevitably end up with rings.

I'm thinking more of petty kingdoms in general (north as well as south and east) given that Numenor essentially equates to Atlantis and that was a mythical foundational source of high civilisation, at least in the west, and in Tolkien's version civilisation is something the Numenoreans brought with them when they started their initially friendly travels in Middle-earth (it was all about teaching and helping people, to start with). So to start with the Northmen for example would be a really rough and ready bunch with Iron Age style tribal kingdoms, and still be pre-literate (just like the real thing, way back when) with the nearby Easterlings being much the same. Living in wooden long-houses and huts and the like, with broch-like strongholds or hill-forts for defence. (Bree had probably started out as a hill-fort in the dim and distant past, before the Dunedain came and founded Arnor - so the Bree-folk became civilised, while way off down the road in Dunland their Dunlending cousins were still as rough as ever). RoP had a chance to do something different from your typical fantasy but they missed it - they got the idea of making Numenor look ancient but it doesn't seem to have occurred to them that the same logic should apply in the Southlands, too.

]Exactly. Such a wasted potential... and I wouldn't even mind if they broke the lore a bit (or came up with a different interpretation, as in: different clans of dwarves were a bit scattered too, just like Longbeards, so not unlikely some dwarves ended up South) and had a black (or Arab?) dwarven kingdom in the Sothern theatre of the story. Why not! Imagine THAT! (But hey, people will call me racist because I'm not particularly keen on the idea of a single black dwarf female who happens to be princess in almost exclusively all-white Kahazad-dum... )

Yeah, it's telling that they'd sooner have fake or token diversity than the sort of world-building that'd allow for the real thing.

[Radhruin_EU]

Surprised that you find the southland towns "Renaissance"-like. They look pretty Dark Ages and squalid to me. They also have no leadership, organization or infrastructure beyond the village level, which makes them quite primitive.

The Renaissance had plenty of peasants and squalor, you know. Look at the architecture, particularly the presence of built-in fireplaces and chimneys in ordinary people's houses. Then go look up what houses in the Dark Ages looked like.

[Radhruin_EU]

I'm curious as to what the connection the mothers and babies would have to the sinking of Numenor.

Babies symbolise the future. That's why she's holding a child, the message is "the future of your people is in your hands". You kind of expect prophetic visions to be symbolic

[TesalionLortus]

I'm thinking more of petty kingdoms in general (north as well as south and east) given that Numenor essentially equates to Atlantis and that was a mythical foundational source of high civilisation, at least in the west, and in Tolkien's version civilisation is something the Numenoreans brought with them when they started their initially friendly travels in Middle-earth (it was all about teaching and helping people, to start with).

Yeah, though this should have been more like a backstory, I guess, considering the timeframe of the show. So if you take that prologue from RoP and make it more Numenorean focused so it already gives a viewer some idea about where Numenoreans came from and what they were as a civilization, with a tale of how they helped people of Middle-earth right there in the prologue, so there is already a "hook" in a viewer's mind that makes it more plausible when the entire superiority, racism and colonialism get explored later in the story. Also, helps to sell this "nothing is evil at the beginning" premise.

As for the South and Harad, it doesn't even matter if there were some greater oriental-styled kings portrayed, why not. But the most important thing to show: their kingdom isn't as impressive as Numenorean and their ships can't sail that far off the coast. Numenoreans were supposed to be great sailors (also out of need) so they were able to traverse all this way from the Island and sea travel isn't as one-dimensional, deep open sea is harder without technological advancements and experience. But then of course we wouldn't be able to have even a fake semblance of logic for diverse Island of Numenor with Asian traders, oriental captain from the Caribbean screaming nonsense such as "the sea is always right" and what not :P

[Echoweaver]

The Renaissance had plenty of peasants and squalor, you know. Look at the architecture, particularly the presence of built-in fireplaces and chimneys in ordinary people's houses. Then go look up what houses in the Dark Ages looked like.

Yeah, the tech level, including the village is definitely "High Fantasy," which is sort of like medieval except where it's too weird or inconvenient.

Most markers the layman has for the Renaissance are in affluent society. Built-in fireplaces were a Renaissance advancement?

Babies symbolise the future. That's why she's holding a child, the message is "the future of your people is in your hands". You kind of expect prophetic visions to be symbolic

Dur, yeah, when you put it that way, it seems obvious.

RoP had a chance to do something different from your typical fantasy but they missed it - they got the idea of making Numenor look ancient but it doesn't seem to have occurred to them that the same logic should apply in the Southlands, too.

I don't necessarily disagree, but to play devil's advocate, they seem to want their perspective characters in the Southlands to be comfortable nobodies that a modern western audience can relate to. The easy connection is making their culture look familiar.

The "Southlands" don't appear to equate to Harad, though, so maybe they'll go further south at some point. Or maybe they won't. Your general point stands.

[Radhruin_EU]

Yeah, the tech level, including the village is definitely "High Fantasy," which is sort of like medieval except where it's too weird or inconvenient.

Most markers the layman has for the Renaissance are in affluent society. Built-in fireplaces were a Renaissance advancement?

You'd find built-in fireplaces in large stone buildings (with a flue in the thickness of the wall) from quite early on but not in peasant houses. They'd still have the archetypal fire-pit in the floor, and the smoke going out through the roof (either out through the thatch or through louvres). Chimneys became all the rage for well-to-do people in Tudor times as they were new and fancy but if you were to go back a bit further and visit even a quite swish medieval hall house (the sort a merchant would have), you'd still find the hearth in the middle of the floor in the hall.

To be fair, in RoP they tried to make the windows plausible as they'd obviously realised glazing them would be too much, so it's meant to look like horn instead (people used to use small panels of horn which had been soaked and flattened, which were at least translucent) but more likely the windows should have been entirely open except for mullions, relying on wooden shutters to close them. (I love period details, they're my jam). The bay window in Bronwyn's house is too fancy, regardless. And they have other typical pop culture tropes like people burning candles all the time (those were expensive!).

Wind things back to the even more basic look things should have (what we know Tolkien had in the back of his mind) though - think Dark Ages - and you could all but forget windows, too.

I don't necessarily disagree, but to play devil's advocate, they seem to want their perspective characters in the Southlands to be comfortable nobodies that a modern western audience can relate to. The easy connection is making their culture look familiar.

People are actually used to seeing Dark Ages stuff, since many things with Vikings in have the sort of period feel that goes with that (some more than others, obviously). And it's not as if they never get to see realistic portrayals of medieval life, either. But somehow when it's fantasy a generic look tends to creep in.

[LagunaD2]

Real-world anthropology isn't necessarily a reliable guide.

Men only first appeared in middle-earth about 2000 years before RoP starts, but they were in contact with a far more ancient and developed culture as well as divine/demonic beings during that time.

[Devolved]

It was more insufferable than it was funny, to be honest .....

VL;RIA -- Very Long ; Read It All.

...
You should see all the notes I made on just the first episode... I was going to do an "Everything Wrong With..." but it ended up way too big to post here

Too much to post here, and too much wrong in ways that shall not be mentioned.

--------------

When I used to debate the quality (or lack of) with WoW among my friends and co-workers, I was constantly asked "Well, have you even tried it?" Eventually I did have to try it, and found it was pretty much as I'd expected.

Same here. Seeing the reviews and opinions before in the early days I knew I was in for some gut-wrenching disappointment, and downright disgust, at how the lore was being twisted all out of whack to smooch up on the New World Order crowd. I'm not as deeply lore-locked as some folks, but when you get slapped by a dark elf (We call those Drow where I come from) and dark dwarves? (Duergar) Let alone where's that dwarfette's beard??

All the "Gurl Powah!" of every race surrounded by bumbling male navel-pickers is as subtle as a sledgehammer to the temple.

Theo reminds me of Will in Stranger Things, tho with a slightly better hair cut. Each as inept and stupid as the other. Maybe we're destined to see a Theo/female Half-Orc session as the origin story for half-orcs.

If they had taken that budget and just made a world and lore of their own, this might have been a much better watch. I could enjoy the Harry Potter stuff with the family cuz I never read the books and didn't see all the canon errors in the movies. Lol. But OH they did, and I heard about it constantly. It's just becoming the thing to do - take something already done and twist it all out of whack (Remember when MTV was actually a station for good music instead of the abomination it turned in to a few years later, cuz of... reasons?) But then, I don't think the real reason they made RoP was for the LOTR fans, anyway. An original work wouldn't have had the same "faceslap" effect.

Anyhows - back to the Craft Hall with me. o/

[TesalionLortus]

I could enjoy the Harry Potter stuff with the family cuz I never read the books and didn't see all the canon errors in the movies. Lol. But OH they did, and I heard about it constantly.

I'm not exactly sure about later books but I did read them before movies and remember at least movies 1-4 didn't bother me as much. I guess we were in a bit different and a bit better era then... when it was still substance over just tropes and agenda.

[Radhruin_EU]

Real-world anthropology isn't necessarily a reliable guide.

Men only first appeared in middle-earth about 2000 years before RoP starts, but they were in contact with a far more ancient and developed culture as well as divine/demonic beings during that time.

Guess Tolkien didn't get your memo again, because the Rohirrim were living a 'Dark Ages' lifestyle (mildly jazzed up to look 'heroic') even after they'd had the benefit of lengthy cultural contact with Gondor (goodness only knows what they were like before) and that, of course, is something like five and a bit thousand years after the approximate time RoP is set. Meduseld is your classic 'epic' mead-hall, much like Heorot in Beowulf, period details and all (and as described by Tolkien it's markedly more basic than the movie version). And the people in Tirharad are just some random bunch of peasants who the Elves are supposedly keeping a beady eye on so they don't cause any trouble - it was the Numenoreans who actually got taught stuff by the Elves, like the Edain before them, because they were trusted - meanwhile everybody else didn't have the benefit of contact with any 'more ancient and developed culture' in any friendly way.

Essentially what I'm saying is that if you wanted a familiar point of reference for what a place like Tirharad should look like it'd be the Dunlendings, whose material culture was decidedly poorer than the Rohirrim. Their distant ancestors, the Men of the White Mountains, had been contemporary with the Gwaith-i-Mirdain and that sure didn't rub off on them.

[DavidmeetHal]

If they had taken that budget and just made a world and lore of their own, this might have been a much better watch.

Definitely, if it would have been an original work, it would have been enjoyable. All I have seen so far is "Lord of the Rings was racist, let's fix it!". It's just too much.

[LagunaD2]

Guess Tolkien didn't get your memo again, because the Rohirrim were living a 'Dark Ages' lifestyle (mildly jazzed up to look 'heroic') even after they'd had the benefit of lengthy cultural contact with Gondor (goodness only knows what they were like before) and that, of course, is something like five and a bit thousand years after the approximate time RoP is set. Meduseld is your classic 'epic' mead-hall, much like Heorot in Beowulf, period details and all (and as described by Tolkien it's markedly more basic than the movie version). And the people in Tirharad are just some random bunch of peasants who the Elves are supposedly keeping a beady eye on so they don't cause any trouble - it was the Numenoreans who actually got taught stuff by the Elves, like the Edain before them, because they were trusted - meanwhile everybody else didn't have the benefit of contact with any 'more ancient and developed culture' in any friendly way.

My point was not, as you insist, that there is only one way things could be, but many.

And I think you have cause and effect reversed. The Edain were trusted because they met, and were aided by, the first-born, before they encountered the emissaries of Morgoth.

Yet it is told that ere long they met Dark Elves in many locations, and were befriended by them; and Men became the disciples and companions in their childhood of these ancient folk [...].

- The Silmarillion, "Of Men"

And if you read the later chapter, "Of the Coming of Men into the West", you'll see that Finrod's embrace and tutelage of the people of Beor, a race he had never encountered before, was not based on trust (for he had no basis on which to trust complete strangers), but because "love stirred in his heart" for this "strange people", and they in turn, perceiving his love and wisdom, "took him for their lord".

Those who served Morgoth could have still been exposed to elements of elf-influenced culture, by sacking or dwelling in areas with it, as happened for instance to Turin's home.

Essentially what I'm saying is that if you wanted a familiar point of reference for what a place like Tirharad should look like it'd be the Dunlendings, whose material culture was decidedly poorer than the Rohirrim. Their distant ancestors, the Men of the White Mountains, had been contemporary with the Gwaith-i-Mirdain and that sure didn't rub off on them.

I don't disagree, but that doesn't mean their towns lacked fireplaces or chimneys...

[Radhruin_EU]

My point was not, as you insist, that there is only one way things could be, but many.

Not anything that'd include RoP's version, but then they aren't really trying to be Tolkienesque except with the occasional Easter egg when it suits them. Tolkien plainly had some idea in his head of what the basic culture of Men in that part of the world looked like and by implication it's (broadly speaking) some sort of ancient Iron Age style culture where they have the typical cultural artefacts associated with old tales. Being written as constructed myths these exist in the same sort of imaginative space that the genuine Nordic, Celtic and Finnish ones do, some ancient heroic age. One not furnished with Renaissance-era creature comforts

And I think you have cause and effect reversed. The Edain were trusted because they met, and were aided by, the first-born, before they encountered the emissaries of Morgoth.

As per 'Of the Coming of Men into the West' Morgoth had already managed to place a darkness in the hearts of Men, all Men, after they awoke but he hadn't been able to turn all Men against the Eldar. Tolkien describes this as the Fall of Man, a counterpart to the original sin of the Noldor. And that was visible to the Elves, but in the case of the Edain their hearts were no more darkened than those of the Noldor themselves (post the Kin-slaying) and so they could still be kindred spirits. Other Men, not so much and of course RoP's Southlanders fall into the category of Men known to have actively served Morgoth (i.e. in the First Age they'd have been among the Easterlings) so the High Elves are holding them at arm's length and don't trust them. From LOTR we know that even in the late Third Age there could still be Men who were still a rough crowd, the Dunlendings for example, and your would-be explanation doesn't allow for them to exist.

And if you read the later chapter, "Of the Coming of Men into the West", you'll see that Finrod's embrace and tutelage of the people of Beor, a race he had never encountered before, was not based on trust (for he had no basis on which to trust complete strangers), but because "love stirred in his heart" for this "strange people", and they in turn, perceiving his love and wisdom, "took him for their lord".

He watched them secretly for a long time to suss out what they were like, first. His heart told him they were trustworthy, sure, because they were (and as a High Elf it's hardly surprising that he'd be able to sense that they were okay).

Those who served Morgoth could have still been exposed to elements of elf-influenced culture, by sacking or dwelling in areas with it, as happened for instance to Turin's home.

And there you're making assumptions about what that would mean in practical terms.

I don't disagree, but that doesn't mean their towns lacked fireplaces or chimneys...

There were loads of people who lacked things like that even at the end of the Third Age. See RoP for what it is, generic fantasy.