The Rings of Power – First Thoughts

At the time I am writing this, the first two episodes of The Rings of Power series have been released. This Amazon series is based in the world of Middle-earth, created by J.R.R. Tolkien.

First, I want to say that I am a huge Tolkien fan. I have read Lord of the Rings about a dozen times, the Hobbit about half that, and have read the Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, and much of the stuff Christopher Tolkien has released based on unfinished manuscripts.

None of that makes me a Tolkien scholar, but does indicate that I’m not just a casual fan who enjoyed the movies (not that there is anything wrong with that).

There are some mixed feeling from audiences about the series so far. While many people were excited to have anything Lord of the Rings-related on television, many have been disappointed. Audience reviews have tended to be worse than that of the critics, which is the opposite of what usually happens.

I suspect that part of this is because Tolkien fans tend to be extremely serious and even zealous about what Tolkien wrote. Many struggled with the minor revisions in the Lord of the Rings movies and the more extensive revisions in the Hobbit movies.

The Rings of Power take this to the next level because they are not really an adaptation of a story by Tolkien. Instead, it is a story set during a certain time in the history of Middle-earth as described especially in the appendices of Lord of the Rings.

This is going to be jarring for Tolkien fans because no matter how talented the writers of this series are, they are not J.R.R. Tolkien. Anything is going to be a disappointment when the bar is set that high.

I will put my cards the table. I actually liked the first two episodes of The Rings of Power and see much potential. It is not perfect and I can think of other recent series that I have enjoyed more but it is quite good.

I can enjoy this series because it is not Tolkien. It is a fantasy story set in the world of Middle-earth, with some of the characters created by Tolkien, but this is a new story and it includes new characters. That is fine. It can be fun to explore Tolkien’s world without it actually being Tolkien.

Apparently, some people are also upset about the diversity of the cast. There are elves, humans, dwarves, and hobbits, played by people of colour. Is that a problem?

On one hand, I can understand that it is a bit strange. There are reasons in the real world why certain groups of humans look a certain way. This is often related to location and climate, among other things.

There is no such explanation in this series. Presumably, different appearances just developed within each of the fictional races, despite the fact that they have all lived in the same general region of Middle-earth under the same conditions.

But having said that, I welcome the diversity. I think it is great that young people can watch this series and identify with characters who are like them. I am all for diversity and the more, the better.

And in terms of the logical explanation for the different appearances of race, remember, Tolkien’s world was conceived as being around before the sun and the moon and that it was originally lit up by two trees. Not everything has to make perfect sense.

This Tolkien fan will continue to give The Rings of Power a chance. In fact, it is rather freeing to be able to watch a fresh story without having to mentally compare it to how Tolkien would have told it.