Why 'The Rings Of Power' Was A Flop
Barely over a third of viewers stuck with Amazon's Tolkien fan-fic until the end.
Amazon’s Lord Of The Rings drama, The Rings Of Power, was a flop.
Not only was it snubbed during awards season, it turns out that a mere 37% of people who started the show actually ended up finishing it.
The majority of Rings Of Power viewers quit watching the show before the finale, missing out on some truly ghastly television in the process. Some attrition is to be expected, of course. Casual viewers who may not be that interested in fantasy or Tolkien might be drawn in for an episode or two. But a good show—even a fantasy—will see increasing viewership over time. More people tuned in for the Game Of Thrones Season 1 finale than for its premiere. That’s what success looks like.
The big question I have is out of all the viewers who stuck around for all eight episodes of Season 1, how many were hate-watching? I finished the show because I was reviewing it, and because I have a macabre curiosity normally reserved for rubbernecking car wrecks on the side of the freeway.
There’s something about watching these shiny things crash and burn. You just can’t look away.
The other big question we must ask ourselves in the aftermath of this travesty is simply: Why was The Rings Of Power so unbelievably bad?
One theory I’ve read is that The Rings Of Power was actually written by AI, which would explain why the story was so bizarre and the writing and dialogue seemed so . . . fake.
Is that the right word for it?
A 37% completion rate is incredibly bad and a terrible bit of news for Amazon and its shareholders. It’s a stunning rebuke of everything Amazon Studios and the showrunners have done so far, and should result in a major shakeup across the board. If I were Jeff Bezos, I’d be livid. Heads would roll.
Amazon Studios chief Jennifer Salke has done her level best to spin this news.
“This desire to paint the show as anything less than a success — it’s not reflective of any conversation I’m having internally,” Salke says, adding “That’s a huge opportunity for us. The first season required a lot of setting up.”
Too much setup was the least of the show’s problems. So what went wrong? Let’s dive right in.
The Many Problems Of The Rings Of Power
So much of the dialogue felt like something a machine would write; not quite how actual people talk. The bit about why stones sink and ships don’t is one of those ‘fake wise’ bits that I can imagine an AI writing. Same with Bronwyn’s speech about fighting the orcs, or the thing she used to say to her son before bed: "In the end, this shadow is but a small and passing thing. There is light and high beauty forever beyond its reach. Find the light and the shadow will not find you."
Whether or not this is AI, it’s the kind of writing that mimics Tolkien but is transparently not something he would write. It is not what a character in Middle-earth would say to their small child, in any case, and certainly not some peasant woman in the middle of nowhere.
Unlikable Characters
When it came to the show’s sprawling list of characters, most were unlikable and almost all were involved in some sort of manufactured conflict with one another. Whereas The Lord Of The Rings focused on friendship and camaraderie, Rings Of Power set up ridiculous, endless squabbling between most of its key characters. Galadriel was always in some kind of tussle with everybody she encountered, but so were just about all the characters. Isildur and Elendil spent most of their time arguing. Same with Durin Jr. and Durin Sr. None of these conflicts made much sense. Why was Isildur such a disappointment to his father? Because he didn’t believe that “the sea is always right”? Why did Durin the Elder fear mining for mithril, even if it meant the end of elvenkind? It’s never explained! The story needed conflict and so everyone was given someone to argue and bicker with.
Wild Coincidences
The Rings Of Power also relied heavily on wild coincidences to drive the story forward. Plot devices, like Galadriel jumping into the middle of the ocean and then just happening to come across a raft with Halbrand (aka Sauron) on it is such a wildly stupid plot device it beggars belief. But this is the kind of stuff that propelled the narrative in The Rings Of Power. Not providence, either, or the invisible hand Eru Ilúvatar shaping fate, but just pure coincidence. The fact that the Numenorean army would be able to travel several thousand miles over sea and land and find the exact location of Bronwyn’s village at the exact time that Adar’s army attacked is like something plucked from the worst seasons of Game Of Thrones. Utterly implausible when held to any scrutiny whatsoever.
Goofy Plot Devices
On top of the heaping mound of wild coincidences we must pile vast absurdities. Take, for instance, the volcano going off to form Mordor. This should have been a really cool moment, but it relied on a stupid Rube Goldberg machine to work. A magic key emptied a dam miles away which then flooded a bunch of recently dug trenches and tunnels which funneled the water into the belly of the mountain to set off the eruption. Recall: This is a fantasy where a magic key could simply set off the volcano with magic but instead we’re supposed to believe that some ancient, hidden key just turns on a machine that breaks a dam that could have broken at any time over the last few centuries and the whole thing relies on trenches being dug to even work in the first place? WHAT IS GOING ON!?
The slightest bit of critical analysis (or common sense) reveals that each and every storyline, from the mangled mithril conflict between the elves and dwarves to the entire “King of the Southlands” charade, is completely nonsensical and riddled with plot holes. $450 million and not a shred of quality control on the script.
Lack Of Fidelity To The Source Material
I’ve written a great deal already and still haven’t mentioned fidelity to the source material. Perhaps because the show had none. There wasn’t even a hint of Tolkien in this mess, neither in spirit or in a basic adherence to the details of Tolkien’s writing and established lore. The Rings Of Power’s showrunners decided that they knew better than Tolkien when it came to the Second Age’s timeline, and so they condensed thousands of years into a few months. Perhaps with better writing elsewhere this could have been overlooked, but instead we were left with a rushed story that felt too slow all at the same time, replete with egregious fast-travel and the glossing-over of important events.
What makes this sting most is the promises made by the showrunners themselves in the lead-up to Season 1. They reassured Tolkien fans over and over that they were huge Tolkien nerds devoted to treating his stories with respect and reverence. It simply wasn’t true.
The Halfwits
At last we must put in a footnote about the Harfoots and their amnesiac wizard. This subplot contributed effectively nothing more than an elaborate head-fake to the story and some galling fan-service to keep audiences guessing: “Is he Gandalf or is he Sauron?”
“I’m good!” he proclaims in his moment of triumph.
Brilliant stuff.
But It’s Just Fantasy!
Detractors of my criticism generally have two (lousy) arguments as retorts:
The first: “If you don’t like it, don’t watch it.” I guess most people took this advice. Unfortunately for those of you who did like the show, this advice is also the surest way to get your show cancelled. I suggest you stop saying this, lest you get what you wish for.
The second: “It’s just fantasy, so what if XY and Z happened?” This is a terrible argument. Even in a fantasy filled with dragons and Hobbits the basic rules of plausibility apply. Fantasy has rules and boundaries or else why not just have all the characters become powerful sorcerers who can shoot fireballs out of their eyes? Why have any struggle or conflict at all if “it’s just fantasy”?
Good fantasy is like any other fiction. A quality fantasy story is almost always part of some kind of plausible-but-fantastical world. It has relatable characters who make hard choices. Whatever fantastical elements we enjoy, from orcs to magic swords, must still exist in a world that feels plausible and real.
The Rings Of Power failed on all fronts, and the majority of viewers appear to feel the same way. I have little faith that Season 2 will be anything but more of the same. Amazon should cut its losses and start over with a new project helmed by people who know not only how to make a decent TV show, but how to respect Tolkien’s lore while doing it. Fantasy requires a bit more magic than the current team is capable of conjuring.
Check out my video on this topic below:
A version of this post first appeared on my blog at Forbes.
I watched the first episode, but I don't remember if I finished it. So I can't comment on most of the substance of your review. But I'm willing to agree with it.
It's kind of sad, really. It would be really nice to see a well-done dramatization of the era of the forging of the Ring of Power. I'm not super fluent in the Tolkienverse (e.g., I've read Hobbit and LOTR, but not the Silmarillion), but I'm more than just a casual fan. I like the idea of exploring how Sauron started out good and then became bad and deceived the elves, who didn't catch on until it was almost too late. But instead, what we got (from what I saw of the first episode), was the warrior Galadriel (whose role in LOTR didn't seem to me to be primarily that of a "warrior" per se) chasing after Sauron. Oh, we also got a cutesy look at a pre-hobbit society.