Title: Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings is Utterly Awful
Article: Look at me. Look at me. Hey, Internet, over here. I said something controversial. Pay attention to me.
this post was submitted on 01 Dec 2023
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If the article starts with "seriously", you know to not take it seriously.
Seriously, that is great advice.
Seriously
That guy sounds just like my dad.
While I’m all for criticism where it’s due, harping about something for decades doesn’t make you any more fun to listen to.
Almost every teenage goes through a phase where they think that criticizing things makes you sound smart. I did it. I have a teenager going through it right now.
Some people never grow out of it.
There is a certain age where it just feels right. I wish I knew the cure, but maybe it's just something people have to go through.
Maybe finding something to be happy about.
The first trilogy is great.
The second trilogy ran about 5 hours too long.
I saw a pretty good three hour cut of all three Hobbit movies. I don't remember what it was called, but I think they only used like 20 min of the last movie.
I'm guessing not much of Fast and Furious: Minecart Racing made it into that cut.
Maple Films' edit is pretty good. Chops out the majority of the dwarf backstory, all of the wizard side quests, and significantly cuts down the superfluous action sequences, resulting in a strong narrative which follows Bilbo's story exclusively, as it should.
The animated Hobbit movie from the 70's is still better than the Peter Jackson trilogy just on the music alone.
But his LOTR trilogy is better than the animated LOTR one. I mean... It at least finished the story.
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don't get me started about that cringey romance arc too...
Yeahhhh that really wasn’t necessary at all.
But in all seriousness, while I do think the films are alright, they are nothing compared to the books. People should definitely read them before watching the adaptation, it really is an experience.
I think the movies are the best adaptation we could have gotten. The books a hard read and most of it wouldn't translate well to film. All the songs, the long winded dialogs, descriptive parts, the ending, etc. I can understand Christopher Tolkien though, especially since he grew up and old with these stories, and probably nothing would ever do it justice compared to what he imagined his whole life.
Having read the books long ago, and recently listened to them narrated by Andy serkis, holy shit the books do NOT translate into movie form.
Maybe a miniseries like Battlestar Galactica, but the budget for it would have to be insane.
People don't seem to understand that nobody is going to fimund their dream movie adaptation, because their dream movie adaptation has a larger budget than most countries' GDP.
I would LOVE to have seen Tom Bombadil and the barrow wights. I'd love to have gotten to see everything in the book, but let's be realistic here.
Go back in time with a few metric tons of gold, fund it however you see fit. I think if given proper funding, and more strict guidelines to keep the funding, he'd make as perfect an adaptation live-action could get in a miniseries. Make it like 90-100 minutes per "episode" and stretch it out however long it takes.
Do people not realize he was told initially it would have to be shown in ONE movie? And he fought to have at LEAST two, and that the studio we finally got insisted on 3 because this story is too long and complex (and lucrative) to be only two movies?
It could have been much, much worse. But hot damn do I wish it were better, even recognizing how good it was.
I read the books as a child and young adult multiple times before the films came out. The films are fantastic and a solid adaptation for a different medium, they got the feeling down even if some parts were left out as part of the change to the other medium.
The Hobbit movies are hot garbage though, and I blame studio meddling for those.
On the Hobbit movies, I don't even think studio meddling was the biggest issue.
Peter Jackson had so much time to prepare for the original trilogy, where as he took over the Hobbit movies quite soon before they were scheduled to shoot and he couldn't use the preparation the previous director had done.
So he had no time to prepare and basically had to wing it with 3 movies and little to no prep.
I liked the hobbit movies, but I'm not going to argue that they were good. I even reread the book in preparation. The movie hit all of the points I was curious to see illustrated visually. I thought the new characters ramped up the tension nicely, and the barrel scene was genuinely joyous. I was also glad the singing was such a big part of the theming, including the wonderful opening, where Bilbo is beset by the Dwarfs and has to host them against his will.
Anyway, I'm not saying I'm right, or that my view is objective, but I enjoyed all of Peter Jackson's Tolkien movies more than I thought I ever would. Clear evidence that we don't live in the darkest timeline, at least.
Interestingly, the added characters and the barrel scene are exactly (some of) the reasons why I don't like the movies and IMO symptoms for why they're bad.
Unnecessary and don't fit well into the story, they feel tacked on and seem to be there mostly to make the movies more appealing to an action audience.
I've never met anyone IRL or even online who shared my opinion, so I'd say you're very much in the majority with that opinion.
I would say my only gripe with the barrel scene is that CGI characters don't age well and the animation seems weird these days but even the LOTR trilogy has many scenes that look bad to my eyes (lighting is weird, characters look too "clean"...)
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That lack of time is a direct result of studio meddling. The studios pushed Guillermo del Toro out, threatened Peter Jackson with removing the production from New Zealand to force him into coming on as director, and tried to force him to keep to a similar timetable as the GDT production.
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I'll always miss the scouring of The Shire. I know the movie didn't need more endings, but it is a big part of Frodo's end and it's the big payoff for Merry and Pippin
I always rate my movies by volume of Tom Bombadil.
Peter Jackson asked him if he wanted to be in the movies, but he just trotted along saying "Goldberry is waiting"
So I don't blame him. I wouldn't keep her waiting either.
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Hey dol! merry dol! ring a dong dillo!
Ring a dong! hop along! fal lal the willow!
Tom Bom, jolly Tom, Tom Bombadillo!
Here's the article, btw.
not gonna lie, the author does make a few interesting points
Gimli is a vehicle for cheap gags
This is a fair point in particular.
Yeah I think the story benefits from some humorous beats, but maybe not like that, in retrospect.
Yeah, in retrospect, the movies kinda did Gimli dirty.
What I’m driving at is that by making everyone flat, no one can grow. When Boromir falls for the Ring, everyone in the audience saw it coming from a mile away. When Denethor goes suicidal, there’s no surprise because he’s a raving madman from the moment we meet him.
Damn
But if it were like he's suggesting, people would complain that those characters final(ish) actions were out of character and it would make no sense for them to do those things. Just because you can see something coming doesn't mean it isn't enjoyable to watch. If you saw two trains heading towards each other on one track you wouldn't look away simply because the you see the outcome coming. There's a difference between foreshadowing and being predictable and imo it's not good criticism.
Right, and I think Denathor is a good example. Spends his screen time being an asshat. Very satisfying when he gets what's coming.
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Jfc the ads on that page are obnoxious
Guess my ad-blockers are doing a great job. I was completely unaware.
Unfortunately I was browsing away from my pihole at the time
Whoever wrote that article is a servant of Sauron.
Imagine being this vocally stupid
I've done it before. But I had the good grace to apologise.
I mean ... the warg fight in the second film is pretty bad. Even Mr. Jackson copped to that part being ... under produced.
Witless worm detected.
Must be a book reader
As a book reader, I still don't get it. The LOTR movies are probably the best book adaptations of all time. I can't think of very much they could have done better. The extended editions really make the trilogy sing. Would a book reader want this to have been MORE than 13 hours? That's ridiculous.
The best adaptation is Forrest Gump because they got rid of all the over-the-top bullshit in the novel and turned it into a great story
Three simple words: Droning minor chords
You get maybe, in a 2 hour movie . . . 20 minutes maximum. Not 100 minutes.
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