I immediately figured it was mithril. Galadriel's ring is made of mithril and even though I don't know if Tolkien explicitly said any others were, it would make sense for them to be, and I'm guessing the shows's going to make this some sort of point of contention between Celebrimbor and the Dwarves because after all they have to blow this bit of miniscule source material into hours upon hours of plot and DRAMA!
The Lord of the Rings
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amigo
Lord Nagafen Raider
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Sarcasm is fine.... No, it's not the sole reason, it's part of the problem (and for some a big one ). Tolkien didn't need mystery boxes to keep you reading, he wrote an interesting and captivating story. These hacks do. What's in the box, who's the meteor man, I'll even call non-Galadriel's swiming adventure at the end of EP1 a mystery box, making it a double mystery box finisher to "make sure" you tune in for EP2.
If you see every women in that light: 1.my condolences, 2. did it occur to you that maybe *you* are the problem?
Seriously, I don't mind criticism and different opinions, but please make it believable.
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The marketing was fucking horrible.
Whatever anyone's claims are to pattern recognition skillz, cast / crew interviews are almost always vapid trash directed by marketing to stir up whatever interest or controversy is going to gather up the most eyeballs. It seems that they particularly turbo charged all of that for this show. I really don't understand how people willingly toss their free time into the ether by diving into that stuff for more than a couple of minutes, even if it's just for the purpose of hate watching. It's awful.
So far, there have been no race or gender swaps in this. Yes, I'm aware that Tar-Miriel shows up brown in a future episode, but she doesn't even rate as a minor character in the books. She's virtually non-existent. Yes, she's married to a key Numenorean king but does absolutely nothing other than die in the books. It's an unnecessary change and smacks of yay diversity! but it's not some huge deal. And if this show is supposed to be catering to minorities, it's off to a rollicking start, as the first black person we meet is literally half a retard.
If this is indeed taking "a giant shit on the canon", it's not really any worse than the revered Jackson films were, so far (for the record, I love them despite their faults). Aragorn was given a completely invented arc in the movies, that of the reluctant king who has to grow and be prodded into accepting his fate. In the books he's laser focused on taking his rightful place on the throne of Gondor from the get-go. There's no hesitation or claims to being some humble, unworthy ranger in the books. He also never survived cliff diving a hundred feet into a river. Tolkien's Frodo would never send Sam "home". Faramir was completely fucking butchered in the movies (although this was slightly improved in the extended editions). Elves never showed up to fight at Helm's Deep. Denethor never turned into a stupid flaming fireball that somehow lived long enough to run half a mile for the sole purpose of creating a nifty cinematic moment. There are many, many more examples of adaptorial decisions that ran counter to Tolkien in those films.
But here, Galadriel is given a sword and suddenly these writers have exhumed Tolkien's corpse and gang banged it into dust. I don't like the change either, but maybe try to have a little perspective. Either you can concede to the fact that they are turning less than 10 pages of dry, expository source material found in an appendix into a multiple-narrative and character-heavy five season show - and by extension will need to change and invent an absolute mountain of shit - or you can't. If you can't, it's quite easy to not watch it.
Simmer down sir, it was a joke.
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Kirun
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spronk
FPS noob
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every friday at midnight EST, or thursday 9pm PDT, for the next 6 weeks (8 episodes total).
Here's a question I have. So Galadriel has spent centuries hunting orcs and Sauron to ensure evil is gone. She gets to the Frozen Throne or whatever and her company decides thats enough, its obvious there is no one left and its time to stop.
Then a few weeks later it turns out there are thousands (?) of orcs digging tunnels underneath ??human land??, another band of orcs wiped out ??wherever the ship people came from??, and there are probably more.
Is Galadriel just REALLY bad at her job? Like I can accept missing the Sword of Morgoth or whatever, maybe its not evil or powerful enough to sense, cool. But if your entire job is wiping out orcs... how the fuck are you missing out on so many while hunting them in the tundra?
anyways she is still hot so thats ok
that dude on the right is totally Sauron though, and he and Galadriel are totally gonna bang
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Goatface
Avatar of War Slayer
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think it said she was currently in command of the north and the tunnel orcs are in the SE(?)
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Presumably she was seeking for Sauron in places where Morgoth and his minions would have already been seen or where there were rumors of them. We have no idea yet if she had already explored thousands of miles southeast (where the men's villages are) and declared an all-clear.
I think Morgoth "created" Mordor years earlier but abandoned it. Who knows if the Elves are supposed to have had any idea.
Presumably the frozen fortress in the beginning was the ruins of Utumno, Morgoth's original stronghold that he abandoned before building Angband, which became his main hangout. Angband was drowned after the War of the Wrath (along with a massive chunk of Middle Earth - you see super brief glimpses of this in the prologue).
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Daidraco
Golden Baronet of the Realm
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The show tries to make its audience view the show through the eyes of Elves and does a poor job conveying that. They go so far as to make that the whole subject of discourse between Durin and Elrond in order to push their audience into realizing that. Which is all well and fine, but how the fuck is the audience supposed to know when something took days, weeks, months, years, to do? As others have said, it's very shitty story telling where time and distance are only relevant when important to the story.
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Zindan
Ahn'Qiraj Raider
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Wasn't the Tar-Miriel thing explained to you previously? You say it isn't a "huge deal" and that she is a virtually non-existent character in the book, yet she does exist and she was described. She is also the direct descendent of Elros + Elwing. Yet she is black.... of course that is a huge deal and it was done just to fuck with the fanbase, zero excuse for having her be black.
Only the Dwarves have any sort of reasoning with them having black skinned people, they were made of the Earth by Aule (if I recall), so sure there could be blacks among them. No problem.
Black elves? Yea, no. The only black / dark skinned people were all east / south of Mordor, aside from those the Numenoreans brought back to Numenor. It is just stupid to have them, and only shows it was done to fuck with the fanbase (again) and to make the showrunners / actors feel morally superior. Its dumb.
You always point to how little there was written by Tolkien in regards to the Second Age and Numenor, yet, he did write about them both. What he wrote set the groundwork perfectly well, and given good writers and directors without an agenda, it could have been realized far better, I'm sure you'd agree with that. Having so little to directly copy doesn't forgive them for the shit decisions they've made. At all.
As for Galadriel being a mary sue. I'd disagree that she -made- into a mary sue, as she is on naturally given her lineage. Tolkien was very subtle in the use / presentation of "magic" vs. melee prowess. It was probably easier for the writers to present Galadriel as more than capable of melee combat vs. being a sorceress shooting fireballs and lightning bolts. I've not watched these shows, and probably never will, so I haven't see the actress act as Galadriel, but I doubt it can be worse than how she was shown in LotR.
I don't need the Tar-Miriel thing explained to me. I've read the LoTR and the appendices multiple times. I've read the Silmarillion multiple times. I've read The Unfinished Tales and some of my Histories of Middle Earth hardback collection (no, I haven't read all 5000+ pages of that).
Obviously it's a race swap (and, more relevant to my point, the only one so far). I've already stated that it's unnecessary, likely a diversity hire, and I'm not fond of it (though I certainly don't think it was done as a "fuck you" to the fan base given all of the fan-specific nods in the show so far). I also largely don't care because it's just not that critical to the story, and many more important adaptorial issues are that are actually worth debating. Yes, she's a descendent of Elros and Elwing, but like 25 generations removed. Evidently some dark meat slipped in there along the way, oh well. Even if they had cast someone "fairer than silver or ivory or pearls," she's clearly been given a colossally larger role in this than she had in the books. I'm far more concerned that they'll botch that up than I am about her skin color. If somehow they manage not to, I can look past the race swapping rubbish even if it's still mildly irksome.
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ShakyJake
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You think so? For whatever reason, I find her totally unattractive. She's not ugly of course, but just something about her looks annoys me.
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Gavinmad
Mr. Poopybutthole
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This weak-willed bullshit is why our culture and heritage is constantly being eroded with garbage like Rings of Power. Blackwashing Tar-Miriel, someone Tolkien gave an unambiguous physical description of, and then making her a major character is a really big deal but sure lets just handwave it away with 'some dark meat slipped in there along the way, oh well'. What a fucking joke.
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It's not handwaving, it's a response to a specific comment that practically precluded the possibility of her racial makeup being alterable because of who her ancestors were...thousands of years ago.
And yes, I'm sure that blackwashing a character who three people outside of hardcore Tolkien nerditry even remember existed will rapidly accelerate the collapse of our heritage. It's stupid and needless casting to be sure, but let's not pretend that this flawed show won't drive thousands of people to read Tolkien's work and extend his legacy. It's at least "good" enough to accomplish that, so far.
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Cybsled
Avatar of War Slayer
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Wow, The Quartering hates it??? OMG, I am shocked. Shocked I tell you.
Not clicking that link because that POS doesn't deserve any Youtube algorithm assistance.
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Chukzombi
Millie's Staff Member
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the marketing is still horrible.
A Racist Backlash to ‘Rings of Power’ Puts Tolkien’s Legacy Into Focus
The ‘Lord of the Rings’ series’ inclusive casting has sparked social media vitriol from those who insist J.R.R. Tolkien intended Middle-earth to be populated by white characters only, yet this belief is not only faulty, it misses the spirit of the author entirely, writes The Hollywood Reporter...
www.hollywoodreporter.com