the ringzzzz ... oh, sorry, I fell asleep
Sep. 1st, 2022 09:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
calimacI watched the first episode and a bit of the second of The Rings of Power, giving up about ten minutes into the second when the two hobbits (yes they are, they're hobbits) have the same conversation for about the fifth time in those ten minutes about whether they should help the stranger from the meteor. Any curiosity about who the stranger is is not worth wading through more of this to satisfy. Besides, I can find out more efficiently when the spoiler plot summaries get written.
But first, let me give this show compliments where due:
1) The scenery is awfully pretty.
1a) Furthermore, it's bright and sunny when it's supposed to be bright and sunny. Peter Jackson made everything with elves in it dark and gloomy.
2) They know how to pronounce "Sauron" correctly.
This show is fan fiction: fan fiction with a large budget. It quickly departs from the known facts within Tolkien's sub-creation sufficiently far, and unnecessarily so, that I can't really feel it has anything to do with Tolkien. Which won't prevent many people from mixing up its characters and plot with Tolkien's characters and plot.
Furthermore, it's dull and mundane. Everybody in it, at least the elves, is either a righteous monomaniac or else a conniving skeever. There's no morals, only the cheap imitation politics of bad fiction. It doesn't feel at all Tolkienian. I kept feeling the breath of Le Guin's "From Elfland to Poughkeepsie" down my neck.
I guess I get something different out of Tolkien's works than some other people. I don't care for this invented world because of the characters, or the setting, or the plot. That's nice but it's not what I'm there for. What makes Tolkien's stories worthwhile is the skill and quality with which he wrote them. And if you want to know more about that, check out the critical works of Verlyn Flieger, who's done more than anyone else to illuminate that skill and those qualities.
What I want is Tolkien's writing, not some cheap imitation that can't do what he does. It doesn't satisfy me, it's not what I want.
But first, let me give this show compliments where due:
1) The scenery is awfully pretty.
1a) Furthermore, it's bright and sunny when it's supposed to be bright and sunny. Peter Jackson made everything with elves in it dark and gloomy.
2) They know how to pronounce "Sauron" correctly.
This show is fan fiction: fan fiction with a large budget. It quickly departs from the known facts within Tolkien's sub-creation sufficiently far, and unnecessarily so, that I can't really feel it has anything to do with Tolkien. Which won't prevent many people from mixing up its characters and plot with Tolkien's characters and plot.
Furthermore, it's dull and mundane. Everybody in it, at least the elves, is either a righteous monomaniac or else a conniving skeever. There's no morals, only the cheap imitation politics of bad fiction. It doesn't feel at all Tolkienian. I kept feeling the breath of Le Guin's "From Elfland to Poughkeepsie" down my neck.
I guess I get something different out of Tolkien's works than some other people. I don't care for this invented world because of the characters, or the setting, or the plot. That's nice but it's not what I'm there for. What makes Tolkien's stories worthwhile is the skill and quality with which he wrote them. And if you want to know more about that, check out the critical works of Verlyn Flieger, who's done more than anyone else to illuminate that skill and those qualities.
What I want is Tolkien's writing, not some cheap imitation that can't do what he does. It doesn't satisfy me, it's not what I want.
no subject
Date: 2022-09-02 10:12 am (UTC)I'm going to try it myself this afternoon. I hope I enjoy it more.
(I'm also currently reading The Hobbit to Sophia in the evenings, a couple of pages each evening, and although I'm simplifying the language for her, I'm thoroughly enjoying it for myself.)