this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2024
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Tolkien, Lord of the Rings (LotR), etc.
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I think the biggest crime of the show is choosing to use established characters like Galadrial, Elrond, etc. We know these characters and know how they turn out - stakes are very low for the viewer. The plots literally don't matter. I got bored and we stopped watching about halfway through. We didn't hate it, we just stopped caring.
The one plot that has all original characters was my favorite, but
::: Spoiler It ends up being about one of the established characters in the end too. :::
It is just more of Hollywood being cowards and not having the guts to write stories of their own. Tolkien built such a vast world with well-defined lore and rules and they choose to do almost nothing with that. They choose to play the safe route and use marketable names.
This is the current crime of most every show these days. I feel as if it was normalized with the Star Wars prequels, and even a bit in the original trilogy, where an entire universe of people is crammed into an incestuous clique of the same dozen characters. Bad enough that Lucas didn't have the balls or imagination to introduce new characters that didn't orbit the same old group, but in the prequels it was especially bad. I almost vomitted when it turns out baby Annakin built C3PO.
The Hobbit was nauseating, where they were compelled to retcon in characters and arcs that simply didn't exist in the novels; it went well beyond artistic licence into blatant crass pimping, because they had these big name actors lined up and had to use them.
Another example is Strange New Worlds. I like the show; I really do. Sure, it's got a lot of flaws, but they're doing ok. What bugw me the most is - again - the (again) incestuous need to cram every character from TOS in as fast as they can, as if they're somehow going to appeal to the fan base by dragging in beloved characters. Especially since they're only those characters in name only, with no resemblance to the personalities or abilities of the originals.
It's a particular crime in the industry of pimping characters, and I hate it, and by extenion, the people perpetrating it.
While I agree with you, you have to keep in mind that they were legally bound to use only stuff mentioned in the LotR books. So the alternative was to use existing characters or don't use any at all. I think it would have been awkward as well if there was hardly any connection to the books.
Courage doesn't play into it. It's a business, and people don't watch original material without a miracle of good timing and circumstances. An established property is always a safer bet, and thus generally a better investment.
With a prequel like this, I find it helpful to think of it as historical fiction, set within a fictional universe. I can enjoy a story about Robert Oppenheimer even though I know he succeeds in making the bomb, or find Apollo 13 riveting even though I know they all made it back. Tension over whether a character dies or not isn't and shouldn't be the only factor in whether a story is entertaining.