A better headline: TV series written by committee trying to make money feels like a TV series written by a committee.

It's a perfect example of how copyright is horribly broken. The people who own the copyright have no interest in preserving the source material and no relationship with the original author, but they must churn out crap now before the copyright expires at which point they have nothing.

So they decided to base the show's pacing on The Silmarillion it seems.

I feel a bit of pity for all of you who can't find it in yourselves to enjoy this show even a little bit. The visual quality is exquisite, the performances are marvelous, and the score is rousing and exciting. The dwarves are entertaining as hell, the harfoots and Totally-Not-Gandalf are charming, the orcs are suitably disgusting and terrifying even as this season attempts to make some of them just sympathetic enough to understand Adar's angle, and even the growing strife amongst the elves is dripping with pulpy drama worthy of any good tragedy.

It'll never be Tolkien, and I empathize with those who wanted nothing else from it but a straight-faced dramatization of the tale of years. But taken as a high fantasy with rich characters and lavish production values, I can't find much to complain about. But I'm a simple man.

Although she's mainly focusing on Picard, this person has the same complaint about what's going on in the Star Trek genre. It's really long, but it's essentially the same complaint - with which I sympathize.

Enshittification afflicts everything.

I've watched the first 3 episodes of season 2 with my wife, despite not liking season 1, but hey, it's a Tolkien show so I will watch it regardless.

Half the time we were on our phones, reading articles or playing some game, because this show is slow and the dialogue is pretty pointless half the time. There are no characters we are really invested in. I guess Durin the younger comes closest, but man, the character building sucks in this show.

I will still watch it, because I'm a Tolkien nerd and I will watch it if only to bash it. I just wish there were fewer reasons to do so.

I tried watching the first 10 minutes on my phone, it's all black, I can't see a thing. Presuming some fighting is happening from the squelching noises.