P&CE Discussion of Tolkien, LOTR, Silmarillion, and Amazon’s Expensive Commercial Attempt at Fanfic

Yep. It's much easier to write a show with the one-eyed men as kings than it is to write realistically intelligent characters, and then other characters who are so truly gifted that they can stay ahead of the pack.

 

On the subject of GoT, I do agree that it did some of its characters dirty in favor of plot. Like Littlefinger or Stannis and the "resolution" of both of their story lines.
Neither of which made sense in terms of what we knew about them.

It's also a bit besides the point, if we are talking how GoT contrasts to Rings of Power. GoT mostly allowed fully realized internal lives for most of their characters. With clear motivations that were consistent within said character's circumstances.
Even if those lives were utterly ********ed up like Jaime's.

To return to Rings (and thus get a bit more on topic), my main take-away after episode six is mostly confusion at how rushed it felt. After hitting pause for three episodes on Numenor, they now arrive not only in the Southlands but in the one village that is on the very cutting edge of the action within thirty minutes of screentime...
The pacing of this thing is thus a bit erratic. Reminding me a bit of Rome season two in that regard, but the Rome showrunners had the excuse that they only knew very late in the game that season two would be their last, so they had to rush through a lot of plot to fit it all within the remaining episodes. Rings of Power does not have that excuse.

 

Yes in the sense that neither has yet met their end. It’s unknown whether or not their ends in the series were based on something Martin told the showrunners, or was their own invention. He apparently outlined a lot of his plans to them, but he’s also notorious for changing things as he goes.

 

I would be very much surprised if Martin (supposing he ever finishes the series) would give both of those characters a similar end.

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Already the pre-published Theon chapter from Winds of Winter, that heavily features Stannis, suggests that he is taking the character in a very different direction.

 

As the plot had to eventually coalesce into a more integrated climax, it meant they had to end some characters' story lines. And in doing so, they weren't always respectful of those characters' pasts, or indeed their established skill sets/intelligence.

I think GoTs messy ending and GRRM's inability to finish the book series are two sides of the same coin.

 

It's better than House of the Dragon. But mostly because the House showrunners seem intent to make the most joyless and humorless version of GoT possible.

The experience of watching Rings is still weird to me. A gorgeously shot show with admirably seamless CGI (for the most part), a good cast who are mostly doing a decent job, beautiful sets (even for locations that are only used in one or a few scenes), enough money to do proper justice to the big set pieces, ... and then writing that is about at the level of a mid-tier CW show.

It's like Pimp My Tolkien, if you throw enough money at it and have enough flashy stuff, people might not notice that there isn't much under the hood.
Oops!

 

House is far more skillfully executed and original than ROP, which is pure formula. (Even Episode 6 of ROP, which is better than its predecessors, is nothing but melodramatic tropes, down to the cavalry arriving one minute before the good guys were to be slaughtered.) I mean, there's nothing remotely in ROP to match the slow-burning pain of the opening funeral scene of Episode 7 of House, as the camera moves from character to character, touching on each of their different griefs.

But I do hear you, House is a tough slog. Rather like watching Team USA fight to a 1-1 draw against a vastly superior opponent, thanks to a corner kick goal and the U.S. keeper standing on his head. One appreciates the achievement more than enjoys the spectacle.

 

The episode looked great. But the writers ... it's hard to believe they are professionals. To cite one example -

Trapped goodies surrender to baddies
The baddies want their treasure
The baddies kill a red shirt to get the goodies to surrender the treasure
The baddies kill another red shirt
The baddies kill another red shirt
The baddies turn to a named character, who of course can't be killed
After letting the red shirts die, the goodies instantly confess, so that the named character stays in the show
The baddies find the treasure
The baddies then set to kill everybody in the room, now that they have the treasure
The cavalry that was sent days ago, without even the specific task of finding *them*, bursts upon the scene
Everybody rescued
The named character lives
All the baddies die

You would think that if anybody turned in a script like that, the response would be "We can't play that shit straight. If we are to film that, it must be tongue in cheek, as Stars Wars did 45 years ago."

But nope. Totally straight.

Not picking on this show. Most high-budget shows are nothing but nonstop brain-dead tropes, acted well enough and flimed attractively. Their writers are seemingly without talent.

 

Bronwyn, yes. That is her name. I'm pretty sure she was also in Independence Day.

 

It's all subjective but to me it has two big issues:

- The total lack of humour and levity. They found plenty of opportunities to include both in GoT.

- The choice (inspired by GRRMs source material) to have a Westeros show without any truly likable characters. Whilst GoT arguably also had a cast of morally dubious characters, you also had several that were pretty close to the old hero archetypes. Jon, Daenerys prior to her heel turn, Brienne, Arya, Tyrion, ... there are more.

The first thing is 100% a mistake (and not one inspired by GRRM whose books do have more than a bit of humor and levity).

The second choice is one that can actually produce an interesting show. But if you are going to write "Succession in Westeros", the writing has to be a lot better and smarter than it has so far been.
I should also mention that my tolerance for this is probably lower than most people's.
I gave up on "You're the Worst" prior to the final season too because the quality of the writing took a noticeable dip and at that point it wasn't worth it to devote any more of my time to watching a bunch of terrible people being horrid to each other.

 

Absolutely true. I would not argue that House is a show for everybody. I am not even sure that it is is a show for me. It is increasingly like a Bergman film. Talky, gray, misty, moody. The characters range from morally damaged -- one of the heroes, by this show's standards, bashed in his previous wife's head, simply because he did not like being in an arranged marriage -- to detestable. There is hardly any sex on the show, and even the violence has been cut way back. (One physical fight this past week, and that was among children.) The overt excitement level is pretty damn low.

I admire the skill of execution but the choice of story is peculiar.

 

The problem with House is that the source material is written in such broad strokes that you only get a minimal grasp on who these characters are, and obviously the writers of the show weren’t able to turn those basically historical figures into compelling characters (I still haven’t watched anything beyond recaps, and don’t know if I want to). GRRM writes some brilliant and hilarious dialogue, a lot of which made its way directly into GOT, but there wasn’t anything of the sort to include in this show, so I’m not surprised it suffers in comparison.