Wait, there was a Shank 2? How did I not know this.

Alright, be honest. Who’s expectations were all that high for this thing?

You’re projecting that there is a threat of this fantasy while all available evidence (and common sense) suggest otherwise. Even the worst conceivable adaptation of Tolkien couldn’t not focus on those themes.

Why are you assuming that Amazon isn’t going to touch on the super obvious, unavoidable themes of this world? The trailer alone shows pretty much every thing you mentioned.

I was afraid no one was going to say something completely stupid.

Yeah no way anyone is talking about a $1 billion LoTR show that’s debuting without getting paid.

Big Tolkien nerd here, but I’m not really looking for any absolute fidelity to the text for this show... mainly because the “text” the show is based on mostly exists as a series of footnotes and half-developed outlines that neither JRR or Christopher Tolkien ever really fleshed out. Other than certain broad story arcs,…

In the spaces where people who would care about a show like this coming out, the reaction has been exactly as described in this article.

I honestly would love to know where you’ve been reading about this show that hasn’t been infected by toxic, racist, sexist trolls who are openly rooting for it to fail, because I find them inescapable.

Despite the best efforts of...[checks notes]...Twitter randos and YouTube comments sections, the billion-dollar franchise will most likely succeed.

Toxic fans are people who like, try to review bomb stuff for starring a Black actor and claim it’s for other reasons etc.

Pretty sure nerd shit has been doing “first look at” promo photos on Vanity Fair for like, decades. Hell, I remember Phantom Menace doing it waaay back in the day.

Note: I really just posted the above to piss off the sweaty hordes of angry neckbeards in the greys who saw this article pop up in the sidebar of whatever article - “Top Five Hentai Games That Only Require One Hand To Play” or whatever - on Kotaku they were looking at the screenshots of, saw the link to this article,…

Not what was written at all.

There is enough raw material in various Tolkien writings that the right creative minds could conceivably flesh out into interesting narratives. Whether or not this team managed to do so has yet to be seen.

I had no idea AT ALL that that guy was supposed to be Elrond

Sophia Nomvete is the the first to play an actual female dwarf character rather than a silent background extra for a few seconds of screentime.

There’s plenty of story to tell. Two big ones, in fact: the dissatisfaction among the elves about their impending decline that allows for Sauron to seduce them into learning from him and creating the Rings of Power with his aid. And the dissatisfaction of the Men of Númenor of their elevated position among mortals…

lol. Triggered?

Really excited for the “Liked”, “Laughed at”, “Loved” and “Emphasized” messages to stop coming through.