In a way we, the audience have only ourselves to blame. We're all so obsessed with existing properties/franchises that we're reluctant to give new IPs a chance. There's a reason the big studios/networks pump out generic 'insert Marvel, DC, Star Wars, Harry Potter' movies. It's because they're guaranteed to capture eyeballs while new stuff is a risk. Add in the fact that production costs have ballooned and I can see why the money men are so risk adversed.
Anyway...yeah the story telling is weak. Still....we're two episodes in and there's six more to go. I hope they pick things up a bit.
And that's the point, the creation of what's supposed to be "art" is controlled by money men and thus it has turned into a production line for investors, taking a safe bet instead of taking the risk. The whole scene gets even more complex with a large part of the potential customers moving away from the traditional methods of of consuming (going to the cinema, watching cable TV). In short, streaming has muddied the waters a lot. And on top of all of this the trend of hiring ppl based on traits that have nothing to do with their job, which makes even supposedly safe bets underperform in the end.
So we the viewers end up with a LotR show that had great potential with great visuals and effects and maybe even good actors if they were given the right lines and direction, but it's just not on a level that it should be. Which is even more weird considering the first ep was written by the same person that wrote some great episodes for some of the best TV shows like the X-files , TNG, Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul!
It's kinda baffling but I think the reason is that there is no cohesive vision behind this from the creators. They have a rough outline of what they want to happen, the money men have given them a list of what must be in it to pull at our strings (nostalgia for the movies, name drops from lore, familiar objects...), they have the ideologues to please with hiring ppl based on characteristics that have nothing to do with the job they should perform, and they have a legal department combing every single sentence so it doesn't contain anything they don't own (which is like 90% of the world and lore).
Ofc it's not easy to please everyone, but that's the job they willingly chose. If they had a strong vision of what needs to be on screen, we wouldn't have ended up with something so mediocre.
This is gonna sound extremely nitpicky and silly, but hear me out. How do you know that not enough care and attention went into this show? It was obvious from a 3 second shot at the beginning of ep 1.
There was the scene, some flashback scene, where the elves stand in a semi circle and raise their swords pointing to the center. Half of em couldn't hold em up high enough and held their swords with bent elbows... It didn't come off as a heroes united moment, it looked ridiculous!
It's a very simple shot that has no bearing on the show, but if you care about your movie, you will damn well shout at the extras until they can hold those swords up straight, and take your time to get it right, even if it takes 10 minutes more then it should have! (with a well trained crew you should be able to do like 4-5 takes in those 10 minutes cos there's nothing to reset)
I've been to plenty of movie/show/advert shoots, you could always tell if the director cared or not. The ones with vision usually ended up shooting 2-3 hours longer per day at least, with the hacks we sometimes wrapped sooner than planned. I didn't mind going home at 7pm instead of 2 AM, but those extra hours were clearly visible in the end result.
@Bambooza It's funny you should mention the nostalgia bait. On the one hand it's there in some of the visuals (the elven cities, objects like that broach or pin or whatever it's called and so on), yet somehow apart from the dwarves, everyone else feels out of place. The elves have sporty dude-bro footballer hair instead of the long locks and speak like they are in a Starbucks with the occasional "look at me I'm sophisticated and smart" words dropped in, the legally-not-hobbits wear flip flops and have regular sized legs and are very unfun and come off as miserable which is the opposite of what they are based on (and overall look like they were styled after the homeless ppl outside the studio gates) and so on...
So many opportunities to make them feel more nostalgic, and correct to what we expect to see, wasted cos of... no reason I can tell really. Long haired elves are surely not copyrighted lol And they also have a close-enough-to-sue copy of Aragorn in the boat guy, so I really don't get it why they didn't into it more, it actually could've helped the overall feel of the world and characters.
