Amazon’s LOTR Rings of Power

[Packerraymond]

Sad that this is getting review bombed because that's the cool thing to these days. I quite enjoyed the first episode.

[MacReady]

1 hour ago, Xenos said:

Is this good? All the streaming metrics are different for each platform.

 

It's their biggest opening for sure, but it doesn't say anything as far as whether or not it's a success. Amazon doesn't care if 25 million or 25 billion people watch it. They care by how many new accounts it creates, and that's where they track success.

If it's a success, they will be sharing how many new subscribers started for it.

If it's a failure, they will be saying how many people are streaming it.

That's not the whole story, but that's where the money is. The money doesn't come from ads on streaming services, but new subscribers.

https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-rings-of-power-prime-subscriptions-2022-8

So its break even point is 5.1 million new subscribers.

 

Edited September 4, 2022 by Outpost31

[MacReady]

1 hour ago, Xenos said:

That’s fine. You don’t need to watch it if it scars you that badly. 

That's not even what I'm getting at. It's BS that they're doing this. It looks like crap. Dragonheart looks better than this and it was made 30 years ago. That's only slight hyperbole, too.

I could accept the bad set design, the bad lighting, the laughable costumes if they blew the budget on the CGI, but FOTR troll looks more photorealistic than this one does... Twenty years later, same budget.

It's criminal what they're doing.

Edited September 4, 2022 by Outpost31

[Xenos]

6 minutes ago, Outpost31 said:

That's not even what I'm getting at. It's BS that they're doing this. It looks like crap. Dragonheart looks better than this and it was made 30 years ago. That's only slight hyperbole, too.

I could accept the bad set design, the bad lighting, the laughable costumes if they blew the budget on the CGI, but FOTR troll looks more photorealistic than this one does... Twenty years later, same budget.

It's criminal what they're doing.

That’s just a bad screenshot. The snow troll looks much better than the cave troll in the show. 

[Packerraymond]

14 minutes ago, Outpost31 said:

That's not even what I'm getting at. It's BS that they're doing this. It looks like crap. Dragonheart looks better than this and it was made 30 years ago. That's only slight hyperbole, too.

I could accept the bad set design, the bad lighting, the laughable costumes if they blew the budget on the CGI, but FOTR troll looks more photorealistic than this one does... Twenty years later, same budget.

It's criminal what they're doing.

Personally I thought the first episode was beautiful, but that makes sense if you're on the opposing side. 😂

It's one of those shows that you pat yourself on the back for spending more money for that bigger HDR TV that your wife nagged and said you didn't need.

[MacReady]

5 minutes ago, Xenos said:

That’s just a bad screenshot. The snow troll looks much better than the cave troll in the show. 

That's the point though. You could probably take a bad screen shot from the trilogy, but the question is how many frames in a 460+ million dollar production look bad in light of 20 years in advances in CGI?

And I can forgive bad CGI since most CGI is rarely photorealistic. Especially if you're nitpicking down to certain frames. But when the costumes are bad, when the lighting is bad, when the set design is suspect, and when you have no big actors you're paying...

Where TF did that money go?

Where's the strength? Don't say story because it's an adaptation. The story was already there, so if they are banking all of this on suckering in LOTR fans, y'all got screwed.

There are serious issues with this and I'm supposed to ignore that?

Hold them accountable for this **** or we're never going to get great shows and movies.

If people keep throwing money at these streaming giants just for WHAT content and HOW MUCH content, we are never going to get excellent filmmaking and film-like television.

 

[MacReady]

3 minutes ago, Packerraymond said:

Personally I thought the first episode was beautiful, but that makes sense if you're on the opposing side. 😂

It's one of those shows that you pat yourself on the back for spending more money for that bigger HDR TV that your wife nagged and said you didn't need.

How though? Like I'm not trying to be a **** here, but how can you watch that and not see how bad it looks? It is NOT cinematic at all. Stranger Things feels more cinematic than this, and that's just ****.

You watch House of the Dragon and you feel like you're in a theater. You watch Rings of Power and you feel like you're in a video game cut scene.

Scroll through a few threads on places. Reddit, Google articles, whichever.

You'll see dozens of people commenting on how they can't put their finger on it.

 

What they can't put their finger on is the lighting, set design and costumes. It's literally those three issues (and to a lesser extent framing, makeup and a lot of nuances in cinematography).

You want to know the difference you can put on Game of Thrones. Look at the lighting. By lighting I don't just mean how bright things are. Game of Thrones is very dark in its lighting, which makes all the sets more believable. You can see this problem in Witcher, too. I don't care how good or terrible a costume is, if you've got bad lighting it is going to amplify any problems you have with costumes or minimize bad costumes if done well.

This is the fantasy genre. It's tough. Really tough. But it's not an excuse because HBO did it in its first try, and they did it beautifully.

Why? Because HBO has been doing this for decades. They set the bar, but the fact of the matter is that THEY SET IT. They set the bar, they've been making Home Box Office quality television for... (googling) since 1972. They wanted to make cinema quality television... For home. And they did it. This is why anything HBO makes will have that cinematic quality to it. You watch it on that big screen TV of yours and you will feel like it's a movie.

So when I see people saying they can't put their finger on it, this is exactly what it is, and there's no excuse for this.

They spent close to a billion dollars and they can't even make all that money look cinematic. So yes, I am upset about that fact.

 

[Xenos]

5 hours ago, biggio7 said:

He looks Neil Patrick Harris and I can't stop seeing it.

Damn, now I can’t stop seeing it either 😆

[Deadpulse]

Im 100% with @Outpost31. This is an Amazon issue, especially with their high fantasy fair. Everything is over saturated with the wrong lighting. WoT was worse, but the issue persists. 

[Deadpulse]

For those who don't get it. Imagine if The Batman was lit and looked like this. It would be awful. Cinematography and lighting MATTER. 

[biggio7]

I guess watching on a laptop, I don't have that issue with the lighting and what not. One thing I really couldn't get into so far is the Elf (no shot I can spell his name correctly) trying to be like Greyworm. The delivery, the movements, it's all just Greyworm.

[Xenos]

3 hours ago, biggio7 said:

I guess watching on a laptop, I don't have that issue with the lighting and what not. One thing I really couldn't get into so far is the Elf (no shot I can spell his name correctly) trying to be like Greyworm. The delivery, the movements, it's all just Greyworm.

Elrond, Arondir, Celebrimbor, or Gil-galad? 

[adamq]

Oh, you think the cinematography sucks. I disagree, but going on an anger filled rant about it seems like a crazy thing to do.

Edited September 4, 2022 by adamq

[Deadpulse]

54 minutes ago, adamq said:

Oh, you think the cinematography sucks. I disagree, but going on an anger filled rant about it seems like a crazy thing to do.

It can be good in a vacuum but not in this context. 

[kingseanjohn]

I’m about halfway through the second episode. I really don’t like the hobbits in this. I feel like Nori is just a lucky, plot armored Pippin. 

Galadriel jumping off the boat in the middle of the sea was a bit ridiculous at the end of episode one. Then the raft/monster encounter was pretty weak  

The dwarf rock breaking thing was dumb.

Those are my only complaints so far.