Rings of Power’s Tom Bombadil: Yet Another Faithless Bastardization

[@nerdcookiesrants]

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[@TheHeroRises]

My wife watched this episode, who is not a lore person, and was “who the freak is this guy now?!” Did they even say his name? How many unnamed characters are they putting in this show? Too confusing - she’s out. “Let’s just watch the Real Lord of the Rings.” Win!

[@archlittle6067]

Tom Bombadil is just another memberberry cameo. I expect the earthquake in Khazad-dûm was caused by the Balrog stirring. A young Smaug will no doubt show up. Not-Saruman will also fall in love with Galadriel and this desire will fuel his slide into evil. The Entwives will reject the domineering patriarchy of their spouses and create a lesbian socialist sisterhood. The remaining Southlanders will form a farming commune in Nurn and freely support poor, misunderstood Sauron. The Orcs will build Barad-dur as a workers' paradise. Nothing is beyond the showrunners.

[@michaelpipkin9942]

He looks like feminine Santa Claus before he went gray.

[@MasticinaAkicta]

Oh right THIS show exists... yeah Yeah no! Whatever the writers are doing, memberberries and all, it is not doing anything of use. It is dead. It never was a true Tolkien series.

[@RianD-xp3kk]

A lot of shows do this. They almost require you know about the lore of the show. Halo tv show, WoT show, SW, and this. They all seem to think the audience knows who is who and what is what. So a lot of people just have no idea what is happening. A friend of mine is watching RoP and he asked me who Tom was. Same with Plagueis in the Acolyte.

[@shanenolan5625]

Rory kinner , good actor , he was in danial Craig's bond movies ( except casino royale) he was wonderful in penny dreadful, as franenstiens monster,

[@MrOskiee]

The contrast between rop and fallout is actually insane.

[@PLMTL87]

Don’t forget the powerful scene where the (Not) Gandalf hear the Goat bleating .. and he spontanuously scream : « Nori?! » ….. this is a good and captivating writing style.

[@shanenolan5625]

Thanks Elaine

[@endorathewitchwriter1712]

I will do what I do every year around this time, rewatch all the Jackson Hobbit movies and Lord of the Rings back to back. Amazon can never take them away from me.😁

[@namou4777]

👍👍😇

[@goodputin4324]

What is impressive is the huge lack of knowledge the writers have about the characters. I would forgive it if they at least wrote them accordingly with Peter Jackson's trilogy (They were perfectly written for movies that had to tell such a huge story lore wise.) Yet they simply ruin important characters that have a huge legacy. Galadriel is one of the eldest Elves in the whole story, instead she is written like a 20 yo college girl. Elrond who is from a great line of Elves and is known for his wisdom is written as a sceptic antagonistic dude that shouldn't have a thing to say to Galadriel. Sauron an angelic being of great might is simply killed by an orc in the most simplistic and pathetic way. Isildur who is known as a great warrior is reduced to some child that knows nothing of the world. It is frustrating. Never would Galadriel rush recklessly into anything, never would she ignore Elrond's concerns. Never would prime Sauron get outsmarted by an orc, nor would he ever need to be crowned/accepted by orcs. His might alone would grant him such an influence over the mind of these lesser beings. The show is written by people who are trying to transpose todays society into a magnificent story. Galadriel is the 20 yo woman, that needs to free herself from the shackles of the patriarchy and experiment the world by her rules. Elrond is the lesser knowledgeable male, that has no say in what is right or wrong. Sauron is the dumb and evil being that needs a powerful woman at his side to achieve his goal. It needs to stop...

[@Jeremy-83]

They can't call them hobbits because they dont have the rights to. What Amazon bought was the appendices..

[@randomthings1293]

Robin Williams would have been a PERFECT Bombadil. RIP (I'm old, I know)

[@danshaffer5916]

I liked this depiction of Tom. Fan art makes him look like a goofball.

[@Roihclem871]

Tom is very obscure even if you read the books

[@chargingrhino5636]

With ROP struggling this badly on the downhill side of Season 2, I'll be astonished if it gets a 3rd season. Truly, who are they going to get to watch it? The hardcore Tolkien fans packed it in before the first season was done. There may be a small, vocal contingent of "situational" fans that will support this particular group of filmmakers no matter what they do, but how many of them are there? I suspect fewer than their noise level indicates. Maybe Amazon shuts it down, waits a couple of years and then tries again with a better concept, but I think this iteration of ROP is just about cooked.

[@jrconway3]

It depends. If they have a contract they might HAVE to finish out the series.

[@perceivedvelocity9914]

A couple of weeks ago I was talking with some family members who are in college and their friends. They are the target demographic for the show. I assumed that they would like Rings of Power. Haha. Amazon has failed completely. They all hated the Rings of Power and made fun of it.

[@brucewayne2558]

I said it once and ill say it again. If they just made an Elder Scrolls tv series instead, then people would have received this much better.

[@Zachfive]

Tom is one of my least favorite things about the books, included in a show that I already gave up on.

[@RB-sz9gv]

The Rings of Power is 💩

[@VoicyZA]

What showrunners of Star Wars, The Witcher and Rings of Power all have in common is the lack of talent for proper storywriting combined with the budget to buy an existing IP - and thereby its fanbases. Effectively paying for viewership rather than creating something worthy of an audience. Their stories are creatively bankrupt, so they have to pay-to-win their way into settings where they know fans will watch no matter what they do to the legendariums and canon.

[@brimstonewinpete9306]

Yup complete utter dumpster fire

[@ALTRON3]

i had no idea who that guy was. "oh, some random dude" I don't keep up with the who's who of this show. I don't think the viewer should have to go and do the research into what's going on. This guy just seemed pretty meh

[@RB-sz9gv]

Love❤ you laughing at this GARBAGE

[@williamhab8646]

I am rather fond of Tolkien and understand how many viewers want the best version possible when adapting his novels to film. But I don't see this series as a complete disaster, far from it. The character of Tom Bombadil appears in this episode about 8 minutes in and the scene lasts about 2 minutes. Yes, his name wasn't given, but would you rather have him say, "Hi, Mr. Gandalf, I'm Tom Bombadil!" I think you would agree, that would be a mistake. Instead, if you have some patience, say 8 minutes, he appears again, and within 1 minute he states his name, "Tom... Tom Bombadil" rather clearly. And I'm sure most Tolkien fans were waiting and enjoying to finally see his presence in the cinematic universe.

[@RSanchez111]

They presume the audience because it's an obvious nostalgia cash grab

[@Peter2k84]

There is Rings of power news????? Jeeeeez Wouldn't it be easier to pay for chinese bots to watch this show.

[@anonymousposter3570]

ROFL...

[@andrewb.9815]

I just started watching Rings of Power last night, about to finish episode 3 and I think its fantastic. I don't understand where all the hate is coming from, I mean its set at the end of the Second Age, I am guessing the guy that fell out of the sky is Gandalf or one of the other Wizards, the show is freaking great so far. You have a young Isildur, Galadriel isn't the boss-bitch everyone made her out to be. The acting, script, set pieces, cinematography, special effects are all top tier. Now it might take a turn for the worse and go full blown "woke/DEI" and start throwing in all of these political messages which would be a shame because so far they are knocking it out of the park. I am just not seeing where all the hate is being directed at so far.

[@jrconway3]

Some people have lower standards than others and are perfectly fine with mediocre slop if it can satiate their need to consume content. One of the big reasons for the hate is the complete bastardization of the lore. "Its set at the end of the Second Age, I am guessing the guy who fell out of the sky is Gandalf" Exactly right. It is Gandalf (its pretty obvious based on everything they're saying), and this is set at the end of the Second Age. (Sort of.) The Istari never arrived until Middle-Earth until the Third Age (somewhere around TA 1000), except MAYBE the blue wizards, who were never really all that important anyway and were only briefly alluded to by Tolkein. And Gandalf specifically was one of the last ones to arrive. He arrived at the Grey Haven and was immediately given the Ring of Fire by Cirdan (who already had worn the ring for thousands of years by this point.) Speaking of the Rings, they were forged around 1500 of the Second Age, not at the end of the Second Age (Ar Pharazon becomes king of Numenor in 3255, almost 2000 years after the rings were forged). Annatar helped forge all the initial rings, which were designed SPECIFICALLY for the elves only, they were not designed for anyone else. Once the elves realized they were deceived, they abandoned using the rings and Annatar/Sauron gave the rings to Men and Dwarves. Celebrimbor then forged three more rings for the elves WITHOUT Sauron's help to help combat the other rings. Due to the fact that they were forged in the same method, once the One Ring was forged it had subtle influence over them, but not nearly as much as the other rings did. They then took off the rings until Sauron was defeated. Oh, and the rings were forged early-to-middle of the Second Age, not towards the end. If Miriel and Pharazon exist at this point, then the rings should have been forged Now, while the lore is all completely screwed up, the series isn't good even IGNORING the lore. What EXACTLY is so good about Gandalf falling out of the sky and not even knowing how to act like a person or use any of his powers? Like, please, answer me this. Can you explain why this makes ANY sense at all? Gandalf was sent as an emissary to help the people of Middle-Earth fight Sauron. The idea that he'd be sent to Middle-Earth in such a ludicrous way doesn't make any sense, and the only reason they kept up the "mystery" all season long was so they could have their ridiculous plot twist with "Halbrand is actually Sauron lol!" Speaking of Sauron, he's a terribly portrayed character. Sauron is an incredibly powerful being who strikes fear into the hearts of the people of Middle-Earth. Here he is weak, unconfident, and easily gets murdered by a small band of orcs. The entire thing with him pretending to be the lost King of the Southlands is a MASSIVE contrivance, as is the idea that Galadriel nearly goes to Valinor, only to jump in the water and somehow think she's going to survive, and then somehow conveniently not only find a boat that shouldn't be out there at all (where were they even going?!) but not only that, just conveniently happened to have Sauron on board. The way Mount Doom was set up is ludicrous. Even ignoring the fact that Mordor always existed, the "rube goldberg device" used to form Mount Doom in this series is utterly stupid and makes no sense. Somehow the trenches that the orcs dug are required to lead the water into Mount Doom. But there's also a key (which is actually a sword) that is designed to slot into a wall marking that will release a damn and send the water... down into the trenches that the orcs dug? So whoever made the device to send the water into "Mount Doom" and had a complicated lock also knew in advance that the orcs would dig some tunnel system, or at the very least pre-planned that? And if the only thing this "sword key" did was release water from a damn, just blow up the damn. There's no reason for such a complicated mechanic. And no, that's not how volcanos blow up either. There's too much room in that wide open space to blow up the volcano, and even then, regardless of whether the volcano should blow up or not, that's a pyroclastic cloud. Anyone caught in that pyroclastic cloud is DEAD, period, end of story. With the lore, the series just drops a lot of little nuggets that are nods to either the prior films or nods to the books while completely contradicting most of the lore. So its utterly horrendous by lore standards. But its also INCREDIBLY BAD by writing standards alone, even ignoring the lore. No, "turn your brain off, it'll be fine" is NOT an answer to bad writing. The details I have laid out here are only a small piece of the puzzle as well. The Proto hobbits are not only pointless in the grand scheme of these, they're also utterly horrible people. There is literally no reason for them to be here. The "Gandalf" character, assuming it is Gandalf, would have just shown up at the Gray Havens and meet directly with the elves. The "Hobbits" are only here because "Its LOTR, it has to have hobbits!" They keep acting like characters who should be alive can somehow die, even though we know they can't die. Characters like Isildur and Celeborn. Galadriel's daughter Celebrian, Elrond's future wife and the mother of ARWEN isn't even mentioned (she was born early in the Second Age, so it Celeborn in this series allegedly "died" during the War with Morgoth, Celebrian could not have been born yet; my guess is they'll introduce her and say she was born before Celeborn went missing, and just wasn't mentioned until this point, but its still ludicrous to think Galadriel has been running around for thousands of years to hunt down Sauron when she has a living daughter, nor does she seem to care as much about her husband being supposedly dead). Even if you pretend that it just needs to line up with the LOTR films (which this series is not actually related to, but it tries to pretend it is), then we at least need Celeborn to be alive, which means they took him out of the story for no reason other than to allow Galadriel to be some sort of war elf which she never was, and to set up some ridiculous romance story with Sauron of all characters. She was fine in her original role; being a great queen of the elves who guided others, which she also did during the Second Age.

[@andrewb.9815]

@@jrconway3 See I haven't got that far into it, thanks for the spoilers. I am about to finish episode 3 and the production value, script and acting are all fantastic so far. If Halbrand is actually going to turn out to be Sauron.......well that is the stupidest fucking twist imaginable. I thought the way Gandalf arrived was imaginative, maybe the process of the Maiar returning to middle-earth is rough and it takes time to get their bearings. If it is as bad as you say, I'll keep watching and see.

[@Jeremy-83]

Making a bad entertainment product is more profitable than making something good. Billions in ad revenue is flowing through youtube, and the more people get on here and make videos about how bad something is, the more revenue is created. It literally doesn't matter anymore if something is good or bad, but if it's gonna be bad regardless, then you lean as far into the cringe as you can. This is also the business model of apps like tik tok. The cringier the better..

[@Feanor1988bis]

This might very well be the worst episode between the two seasons right now.

[@brandonbeliveau-vanover152]

You’re very pessimistic. How is this not storytelling? How else would other characters be introduced if not, you know, referencing them? And also have you never heard of set up? Maybe, just maybe, some things are left unexplained on purpose, maybe for like drama or idk suspense. Just don’t watch it, you don’t have to. Imagine consuming media for no other reason than to show the world how much you hate it and how cool and witty you can shit on it.

[@Knee-JerkReactor]

Finally we got to see merry old Tom Bombadillo! I know he deserves better than this, but at least they finally found time for him.

[@angela_merkeI]

Skipping a meal is better than having shit for breakfast, y'know? And if you wanted to see Tom Bombadil you could've just re-read his passages or play BfME.

[@Knee-JerkReactor]

@@angela_merkeI האם אתה מנסה ליצור קשר עם שגרירות ישראל בהמבורג, אדוני?

[@angela_merkeI]

@@Knee-JerkReactor Thank God I cannot read this rotten tongue and YT is benign enough to not offer the translation feature for fake languages.🙏🏼