Alloyed

OK, it's been obvious from episode 1 that this show is at best average with its pretentious dialogue, hammy acting, an incredibly annoying lead character and very poor writing but now that the first season is over the question just has to be what was the point?

You would think that after the tedium of the previous 7 episodes that the pay off for having to suffer all that boredom would be an exciting conclusion with something important happening in grand fashion. It turns out not. It's just more boredom with more tedious dialogue and Galadriel has her jaws wired shut most of the time and shows less emotion than a boulder.

This show needs to improve drastically because if the first episode of season 2 opens with more of the same it's toast.

I didn't even realize until after It's finished this episode that this was the season finale. Because nothing felt really epic or having built up to a great moment. Not much action, no big battle or conflict. Lots more talking and characters staring concerned into the camera - Galadriel staring at Elrond and he staring back, Nori staring at her family, the Stranger staring at everyone, the camera lingering on the mithrial and forge; just too much with the long lingering shots. The only good part of the episode was with the Stranger, and that was ok at best.

The "big reveal" wasn't believable nor did it make a ton of sense. Too many lucky happenstances had to have happened to bring it about. The director probably thought the ending shots were epic but they were boring, predictable, and took too long.

And my whole family all laughed out loud at the song in the closing credits. Whatever stoic feeling there may have been was quickly dashed the moment that song started. Hopefully the writers and directors take note of what needs to be fixed and make Season 2 a whole lot better. As had been said before, I feel like all that happened this whole season could've been covered in a 4-minute prologue.

Finally, dialogs that doesnt seems to have been written by corporative robots. We started to care about some characters that needed much more screen time.

This last episode give me hope for the next seasons because this one was a snooze fest that care more about checking boxes than developing characters. Finally, we have some writing that actually mean something aside from pretty quotes and advance a global narrative.

I dont care much about the chronological adaption. Yes, they squeeze 2000 years (ish) into one generation. But i think, it was necessary. Either that or kill every mortal each episode with a 100 year time jump. It would have been a nightmare, story wise.

The last episode doesnt redeemed the season, wich, in my opinion, was very badly paced with a bad focus. Some scenes were cringe and badly acted and scripted. While the visuals are always extremly pleasing, I did not care about any character aside from Durin and hi wife.

In this last episode, they had no choice to go full throttle, overcompensating perhaps for lack of rythm of the season.

One scene still drag for way too long and again, focused on the wrong characters.

I am hopefull for season 2. But please, kick the corporate boomer out of the writting room.

This story likes to dance around things that might reveal who a character is and what their motivations are, but it stops short of revealing exactly who that character is.

For example: there were three strange looking women that appeared, they were very interested in the crater left by the Stranger, and the Stranger himself.

Ultimately, their goals and intentions were revealed, and were not good. But just like us, they were fooled. In this case they had fooled themselves, and they fell into their own trap. And in doing so they gave us a few more clues to the identity of the "Stranger". We now know that if the Stranger was not who they believed he was, then in fact he was somebody, something else. Somebody who we hope that he is.

That seems to be the theme here, not just the theme of the show but it's also embedded in Tolkein's books and stories and appendices. Misdirection.

We have to remember that Sauron fooled ELVES, as wise and intelligent as they are, they fell for it. But mainly Galadriel fell for it. And when she fell for it, so too, us.

She was basically fed what she wanted to hear and that caused her to set upon a course of action that will affect the very landscape of not just middle earth but Numenor and all other lands from the stories.

A lot of people, when talking about this show, are distraught because they feel that "Tolkien is being rewritten".

This is not so. This is exactly what he wanted, although it never happened in his own time, it is happening now. He wanted other people to expand upon what he had already written. So his works, starting with the Silmarillion, The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, Lord of the Rings appendices, and his several books of Lost Tales... They are a tapestry which gives us something to start with and to build upon.

As long as we don't stray too far from the themes and characters that have already been developed. And this show does a very good job of keeping to the stories that have already been written.

We forget that Tolkien wanted to write these stories because he felt that Britain had no mythology of its own. Thanks to Tolkien, now they do.

So the framework we are given here that started with The Hobbit and then Lord of the Rings, can be viewed as this new mythology.

Those of us who are familiar with the history of events from middle earth, can now see those events in much more detail. There were Catastrophes and Eucatastrophes all through the history of middle earth, bad things that happened and good things that happened.

And this season stops with one of the good things that happened, a eucatastrophe, even though it was surrounded by catastrophes.

In fact all through this episode some very horrible things have happened to most of the groups that are shown, but with each of those groups of people, the Elves in their city, The Harefoots as they travel with The Stranger, The Numinorians... something good develops from each of those catastrophes.

We are going to have to wait to check in with the fate of Durin's Folk and the Southrons.

What a disappointing ending to a series from which you had expected so much - but maybe it's exactly this expectation that makes the last episode in particular so incredibly boring, empty and sad. The dialogue is so unimaginative and uncreative that it makes you wonder what the writers and producers did with all the money they were given. One of the most expensive series of all time? You only notice that in pictures and music. The rest is actually a dramaturgical catastrophe. I'm a big Lord of the Rings fan, and I still find Tolkien's creativity simply stunning. Unfortunately, what was made of the fabric is not good. The chance was there.