I watched it

No, not Biden’s speech

but the first 2 episodes of Amazon’s Rings of Power (ROP).

It wasn’t, for me at any rate, anywhere near as bad as I had feared, or as bad as some reviewers had been making out. It wasn’t great either.

One of my worries had been the deliberate insertion of ‘diversity’ into Tolkien’s world. Diverse casting, when appropriate, is great. But just as you wouldn’t make a series about the US slave trade by casting some of the slaves as being white or Asian, I wondered whether the diversity would prove to be more of a distraction that ‘took you out’ of the story.

I was pleasantly surprised on that score. It worked, it felt ‘natural’, and I didn’t feel like it intruded on the story at all. My favourite character, so far, is the black elf

and I think he, and his story, is going to be one of the better things in this show.

This guy notwithstanding, the most disappointing things in this show are the elves. Elrond is portrayed as some kind of wimpy philosopher-diplomat and nothing like the vigorous and hard-as-nails character we saw in Jackson’s Hobbit and LOTR movies.

Perhaps Elrond had gone through puberty by the time of the 3rd Age.

Instead of the Galadriel we saw in the Hobbit and LOTR, perhaps the most powerful magic user in Middle Earth with the exception of Sauron, we were treated to Battlestar Galadriel. Galadriel’s power in the movies is based on protection and wisdom and insight - although she can use it aggressively when necessary. In ROP she is portrayed, so far, as being a kind of female version of Boromir and little else. Good at fighting, but a bit dim.

Dim, you say? Well, anyone who thinks it might be a good idea to jump off a ship and swim hundreds of miles back home could reasonably be classed as not being all that bright. Not to mention that she’s been hunting for Sauron with her merry band of elvish warriors, all ten or so of them, for centuries. At one point her “army” is pretty much getting their asses kicked by some kind of troll until she steps in to save the day with some Middle Earth Mulan moves that, frankly, look ridiculous. I think they were aiming for the style and panache of Legolas and Tauriel from Jackson’s movies, but they fell far short of the mark. And, we are to believe, this shower of useless shites is going to take down Sauron if they find him? Yeah, right.

So far, it’s OK. Some bits I’ve really enjoyed, other bits I haven’t, and I’d give it about a 5 out of 10 overall. I’m quite looking forward to seeing how it develops.

I don’t want to do an in-depth review, partly because my reason for watching these kinds of shows is to indulge in a couple of hours of pure escapism where I’m not too bothered about absolutely everything making sense or being wholly in line with any ‘source’ material.

What is fascinating, however, has been the reaction to the criticism of the show. Amazon has suspended customer reviews in order to prevent ‘trolling’. It seems that not even girlboss Galadriel can deal with these sorts of trolls. The bad reviews, it is supposed, are purely because of bad-faith people sticking the knife in for ideological reasons. One twitter user drew a very interesting parallel

It’s similar to the rejection of the reviews for She-Hulk, which is an absolutely excruciatingly bad show so far. It’s jaw-droppingly awful. Reviewers of this show are, once again, merely expressing bad-faith opinions about a sublime creation of majestic brilliance, the magnificence of which has never before seen on our screens. Yada, yada, yada.

It seems we are fast moving into a world where opinions that disagree with the ‘official’ position are classed as extreme and illegitimate. We’ve seen it with covid, we’re seeing it with movie reviews, and we’ve just seen Biden basically write off a significant fraction of the US population as ‘semi-fascists’ who are trying to undermine the US constitution.

I’m perhaps not best qualified to comment on US politics. For one thing I’m from the UK and for another, it’s not something I have studied to any depth. But it seems to me that, constitutionally speaking, the biggest threats at the moment are coming from folk who want to constrict people’s ability to have an alternative opinion and have entered into alliances with Big Tech to achieve that. And perhaps also we may ask about those who would wish to restrict the constitutional right of the populace to properly defend themselves against a tyrannical government.

It seems to me that the 2nd Amendment isn’t about the right to have guns per se, it’s about the right to be able to overthrow a tyrannical government, if necessary. And let’s face it, wasn’t the overthrow of a tyrannical government kind of what started it all in the first place?

Trump was, and still is, described as a “fascist”, a “dictator”, and a “threat to democracy”. I have yet to see any cogent argument as to why these appellations are appropriate. I don’t see how he was, or is, any of these things. That doesn’t mean he’s St Trumpet of Assisi, of course.

What’s more disturbing is that these trumped-up labels are being applied to Trump’s supporters by no less than the President himself. How much longer before they’re classed, officially, as domestic terrorists I wonder?

---