Tolkien fans are underwhelmed by Amazon’s The Lord of the Rings: The rings of power trailer
The trailer for Rings of Power dropped at the Super Bowl, and Amazon doesn’t seem to have gotten much bang for its buck, with many fans expressing disappointment at Middle-Earth’s sterile new aesthetic.
There’s a certain look shared by many modern fantasy television shows; a glossy, textureless sheen that makes picturesque landscapes look like computer screensavers, and knights in armor look like high-effort cosplay.
Viewers, perhaps, have been spoiled by the perfectly realized worlds of Game of Thrones and Lord of the Rings, which look as though they’ve been inhabited for millennia; weather-worn, overgrown, spattered in dirt, dust and blood from long-forgotten wars. There’s a certain weight, an atmosphere in these works that imitators can rarely replicate.
The Rings of Power trailer, however, echoes the CGI-heavy, oversaturated world of The Hobbit trilogy, which many fans viewed as a significant downgrade from the carefully crafted sets and costumes from the original films.…
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