And Even More About Amazon's Questionable Foray Into Middle-earth! (Updated)

 A few days ago, posters showing the Numenoreans from Rings of Power was released, and someone released an article talking about the storyline and the actors. At least it's not Vanity Fair this time! (I say someone because I could have sworn it was Entertainment Weekly, but now when I go to their site, I can't find it anywhere. It's on Yahoo! right now.)

I actually did have a different blog post planned which would follow up my last post about Rings of Power, but then this article was released, and it showed my point even better! 

One of the things I grumbled about in the last post was that, for a time in Tolkien's legendarium when very little was described, the writers play fast and loose with what little Tolkien actually described. People have worked very hard to justify "warrior Galadriel", going back to notes and letters and everything except the books, but the stuff that is plainly written in all the books and notes and letters was missing from their descriptions. For example, where are Celeborn and Celebrian, Galadriel's husband and daughter? They spent so much time talking about what was possible for Galadriel, but the never mentioned anything about the stuff we actually know about her! 

Well, with the new information about the Numenoreans, we finally get some info about what they did with what Tolkien definitely said happened. And... well. Let's play a game. 

The following are excerpts from the article. As I go through it, I'm going to make lots of comments, of course, but I'm also going to keep track of the things the show makers--or, it must be stated clearly, the article (I don't have a lot of faith in journalists)--get dead wrong. As in, there are literally specific words in Tolkien's book that prove them wrong. Not debatable, not "just why", dead wrong. I will, however, also be keeping track of what they get completely correct. Again, not interpretive, not debatable, not trying to understand something Tolkien didn't write--but when they are wrong about something he did write. 

So then... off we go! 

The article opens up by talking about how one of the directors was admiring the set. 

"Being on set was just breathtaking," Yip explains. "We were there for weeks, but every day I'd notice a new detail I'd never seen before, like graffiti etched into weathered stone, or a small shrine. There was a whole wall made out of oyster shells. Every corner you'd turn, there was just so much storytelling.

It's that storytelling — and that level of obsessive detail — that anchors The Rings of Power, Amazon Prime Video's sprawling new epic (debuting Sept. 2)... With a reported price tag stretching well above $1 billion, The Rings of Power stands to be the most expensive TV series ever made. More importantly, the series faces the scrutiny of millions of fans, all of whom have spent the last few decades poring over Tolkien's writing (and rewatching the beloved Peter Jackson film trilogy.)

Plenty of people have dug up Jackson’s quote about not inserting their own agendas into his trilogy, so I won’t repeat it here. All I can say is that the shots they have shown have looked cheap. And the costumes, oh the costumes… Galadriel’s golden dress looks like it came from Spirit Halloween.

Maybe we’ll be blown away by the actual sets when we finally get to see them. It is possible that the advertising is just terrible and the series really is wonderful. Remember Frozen’s advertising? It looked more like Ice Age than what we actually got. So, to be fair, maybe it’ll be good.

That devoted fandom is why Payne and McKay pondered every tiny detail on The Rings of Power — right down to each stone in Númenor. "It was one place that we were just laser-focused on saying, 'We need to get this right,'" Payne explains. "It's never been seen before. People have some ideas of what elves look like or what dwarves look like and what those kingdoms might look like. But Númenor was, in some ways, a blank canvas."

They treated entirely too much like it’s a blank canvas. Not just Numenor, but other stuff, too. For what it's worth, there should be something vaguely "Celtic" about it--in one of Tolkien's letters (one that they love quoting certain parts of), he talked about how it should have some Celtic designs in it, although in other letters he says he doesn't want too much, and... No, there's not a whole lot. 

If only we could have seen these glorious sets in the trailer...

Tolkien describes Númenor as the greatest human civilization in Middle-earth's history, a beacon of knowledge and culture that influenced the rest of the world. However, hubris and ambition rot the kingdom from the inside, and the island is ultimately destroyed, falling into the ocean like Middle-earth's version of Atlantis. In some ways, the story of Númenor could be seen as a cautionary tale for the show itself. If The Rings of Power succeeds, it could rise to unprecedented heights, leaving a legacy that could endure for years to come. If it fails, it could instead go down like the doomed island itself, destined to sink beneath the waves.

Arise! Arise, Readers of Tolkien! Teasers shall be ratioed! Prime accounts shall be canceled! A sore day! A proud day ere the sun rises!

Seriously, though, I'm stunned at how united the Tolkien fandom is. Every ad for this show that I've seen on Facebook has overwhelmingly critical comments (of a most stern kind), and YouTube, oh YouTube... It's pretty amazing when Amazon has to unlist their videos for shame and rejection.  

The Rings of Power isn't a direct adaptation of an existing Tolkien novel.

It doesn’t qualify as an adaptation of anything Tolkien wrote, but I’ll explain what I mean later.

Instead, it's inspired by the author's extensive notes, published in the appendices to The Lord of the Rings.

“Instead”? What is the “instead”? Is it that it’s “inspired by instead of adapted”? Or is it, “extensive notes instead of an existing novel”? Or both? The answer to this question changes how the series is supposed to be understood.

After Amazon closed its multimillion-dollar deal with the Tolkien estate in 2018, the streaming giant began soliciting pitches from different creators. The winners were Payne and McKay, two largely unknown writers whose highest-profile job at that point was uncredited work on the Star Trek franchise... Despite their relative inexperience, Payne and McKay were lifelong Tolkien geeks, and their pitch centered on a story they themselves had always wanted to see on screen: the Second Age.

I truly am curious to know how they won out. One of the YouTubers I listen to says that studio executives like to hire inexperienced writers because they don't have the seniority to tell the studio "no" when they need to. 

Also—and I know this isn’t McKay and Payne, but I have to mention this somewhere—have you heard some of the dialogue in the trailer? The exchange between Galadriel and Elrond? It’s not great.

"We were not interested in doing a show about the younger version of the same world you knew, where it's a little bit of a prequel," McKay explains. "We wanted to go way, way, way back and find a story that could exist on its own two feet. This was one that we felt hadn't been told on the level and the scale and with the depth that we felt it deserved."

…? It absolutely is in the same world. That’s exactly what it is. It literally is in the same world and it literally comes before the Third Age. That’s how it works.

The Second Age occurs thousands of years before Bilbo or Frodo Baggins were even born, but the era includes some of Middle-earth's most significant events, from the forging of the rings to the rise of the evil Sauron.

In other words, it's a prequel.

Okay, technically that’s not enough for something to be a prequel. If you have a six-book series, Book 4 isn’t really a “prequel” to Book 5. I guess McKay and Payne are saying they want their series to have a status bigger than “serving to make the Jackson films more fleshed out”, and I can respect that.

But does anyone else remember, from the Vanity Fair articles, how they described Galadriel? For a refresher, here's what they said about Galadriel:

...this young hot-headed Galadriel…how did she ever become that elder stateswoman?

So... they want you to have backstory for a character that clearly explains how that character got to be the character they were in the work that you've already seen? 

What exactly do they think a prequel is? 

The era begins in a time of peace, but tension lurks throughout the land. The elves have founded the great kingdom of Lindon, but some fear that evil is creeping back into Middle-earth. Meanwhile, the dwarves are at the height of their power, living large in the underground realm of Khazad-dûm.

The island of Númenor is ruled by the queen regent Míriel (Cynthia Addai-Robinson), and this seemingly idyllic paradise is facing tensions of its own. Númenórean royals are human but have elvish blood, and for years, they've been friends with their immortal counterparts. Over time, however, a schism appears, as some residents continue to pledge their loyalty to the elves and the godlike Valar, while others ponder a more modern, independent future (and become increasingly afraid of their own mortality). The showrunners note that Tolkien never wanted his stories to directly echo real-world politics, and they feel the same way about The Rings of Power. Still, Payne points out, there's something deeply relatable — and timely — about the anxieties and political divisiveness wracking this fictional island.

Okay. Lots to unpack with the Numenoreans. Let the game begin!

1. Tar-Miriel was the queen, not the queen regent. Her father was Tar-Palantir, the last faithful king of Numenor. Right: 0. Wrong: 1.

2. The description of the schism is correct. I’ll give them one point for that. The reason they don’t get two points is because they left out a rather important detail: the Elvish blood the Numenoreans carry comes entirely from Elros. The brother of Elrond. And, given that Elrond is an important character in the show, that’s some important information to share. Right: 1. Wrong: 1 

"Tonally, we wanted [Rings of Power] to reflect [Tolkien's] main story points of friendship and good and evil," Yip says. "One of the ideas is: How far into the darkness are you willing to go to do the right thing?"

Um. I’m not sure what this guy means. Does he mean, how far while fighting against the darkness? Like Frodo and Sam went into Mordor? Or does he mean how much you embrace the darkness? Because if that’s what he means—Boromir. Boromir wanted to use an evil ring to do good, and we all know how that turned out. 

At Númenor's center is the royal Míriel, who is wrestling with how to guide the home she loves into the future. "When it comes to playing a character that holds such a lofty position, I can't say that I necessarily relate to what it is to be a queen," Addai-Robinson says with a laugh. "But I think there is something relatable about how isolating that can feel, and how you're grappling with things that no one else can really understand."

Queen? Or queen regent? Those are two different things. The earlier paragraph definitely said queen regent. Didn’t it? Did my eyes just read wrong?

Míriel is aided by her close counsel Pharazôn, played by Trystan Gravelle. (No spoilers, but Tolkien readers know him as one of the major players in Númenor's eventual downfall.) His son Kemen is played by Leon Wadham. "When you see the set of Númenor, it's like you're walking through [Pharazôn's] mind," Gravelle teases. "When you see these epic statues and this wonderful masonry, you're walking through the mind of a person that's burdened by his own mortality and is very concerned about what legacy he's going to leave behind."

3. Oh yes, spoilers! Pharazon isn’t Miriel’s counselor (nor is he her counsel—that’s not a person), he is her husband and her cousin. Here’s how the Alkallabeth describes them:

“And it came to pass that Tar-Palantir grew weary of grief and died. He had no son, but a daughter only, whom he named Míriel in the Elven-tongue; and to her now by right and the laws of the Númenóreans came the sceptre. But Pharazôn took her to wife against her will, doing evil in this and evil also in that the laws of Númenor did not permit the marriage, even in the royal house, of those more nearly akin than cousins in the second degree. And when they were wedded, he seized the sceptre into his own hand, taking the title of Ar-Pharazôn (Tar-Calion in the Elven-tongue); and the name of his queen he changed to Ar-Zimraphel.”

I guess the only reason they changed their relationship is to remove this, but you could still have made Tar-Miriel the Queen! Right: 1. Wrong: 2. Incidentally, there's no mention of them having a son, or of Ar-Pharazon ever having a son. But there's no mention of him not having a son either, so...

By the way, remember the aforementioned split between the Numenoreans? The “Tar” in Tar-Miriel’s name is important, because that’s how you know what side she’s on. Same with Ar-Pharazon. “Tar” is “ruler” in an Elvish language, and “Ar” is the same word in the Numenorean language. Those kings and queens who were loyal to the Elves and the Valar used Elvish names, and those who weren’t did not, but Tolkien didn’t expect you to memorize Elvish and Numenorean names, so he added Tar and Ar. It was a simple way to immediately tell which side kings were on. Why did they take that out?

But maybe that’s just the journalist.

Fortunately, Númenor also has hopeful allies, like the sea-faring Elendil (Lloyd Owen) and his son Isildur (Maxim Baldry). The young Isildur is Aragorn's direct ancestor, and fans know he will grow up to face off against Sauron, slicing the ring off the enemy's hand. But for now, he's just a young sailor trying to find his place in Middle-earth. "You know where he goes, but how does he get there?" Baldry offers. "That's what is exciting about this show: You see Isildur as a young man at a crossroads."

4. Elendil isn’t an “ally” of Numenor, he is Numenorean. He is descended from Elros. This means he is of the royal line of Numenor (but more removed from the throne than Tar-Miriel or Ar-Pharazon). Being a descendent of kings is what gives Aragorn the right to be king in the trilogy. Being descended from Elros is what gives Isildur and Elendil the right to be kings of Numenoreans in Middle-earth. I know that goes against modern sensibilities, but Tolkien’s world doesn’t always follow modern sensibilities. I’ve actually already written about this (before I knew anything about Rings of Power, ironically enough), in this post. Right: 1. Wrong: 3. To be fair, of all of them, this one sounds most like it could be the journalist's fault, but I'm not sure how I'm supposed to know one way or the other.

Also, tell me again how this isn’t supposed to be a prequel? Sounds like the actor for Isildur doesn’t agree. "You know where he goes, but how does he get there?" is some very prequel-sounding talk.

Addai-Robinson, Gravelle, Owen, and Baldry all play characters who loom large throughout Tolkien's work — but the actors caution that although you might know how their story ends, the journey can still hold surprises.

Surprises? Do you mean stuff Tolkien never wrote nor intended? Because I know the story of Elendil, Anarion, and Isildur. I know how they get there. It’s not hard to learn that. So the only way I’m expecting to be surprised is if you make stuff up.

But to be fair, maybe they only mean people who’ve watched the Jackson trilogy.

"There are signposts on the way," Owen explains, highlighting his regal mariner as a prime example. "Ultimately, those of us that know the lore know Elendil ends up helping to lead the Last Alliance of elves and men. But how he gets there? Tolkien hasn't written the man in three dimensions, and that's the gift of this [show]."

I will say that I don't think this section is "prequel-talk" (at least, not for the Jackson films), because I highly doubt people who only watch the trilogy know what Elendil did. He was there--he's Isildur's father, and he dies when Sauron smashes him with the mace, and the sword that broke but that Isildur used to cut off the ring belonged to him--but I don't remember anyone saying Elendil's name until Aragorn calls it "the sword of Elendil".  

One new character is Isildur's sister Eärien, played by Ema Horvath. Invented for the series... Tolkien wrote that Elendil had two sons: Isildur and Anárion. (At the start of Rings of Power, Anárion is off screen.)...

Offscreen, or another “wrong” point? This actually frustrates me. Why are you adding new characters when you can’t put in the characters that already exist? There’s also another character they left off—Elendil’s father Amandil. Remember how the Numenoreans live much longer than normal Men? Elendil’s father was still around. Now for the aforementioned spoilers: Ar-Pharazon leads a fleet to try to land at Valinor, which is forbidden for Men to do. Elendil’s father left for Valinor before Ar-Pharazon did, not to challenge the Valar but to beg for forgiveness and mercy for Numenor, just like his ancestor Earendil did for all of Middle-earth. (The Valar do not grant mercy, a wave covers Numenor and drowns all of them, including Tar-Miriel, except for the followers of Elendil, who were all in ships—the wind carries them to Middle-earth, where they establish Gondor and Arnor.) But no, we can’t have that! We need to invent a new character, because… why?

If any of them dare say one word about Tolkien not having enough strong females… they demoted Tar-Miriel, making her regent instead of queen, not Tolkien. They literally took away one of his female character’s power. No. No, no, no. Update! This video points out that Miriel was never truly the queen (starting at around 11:30) because Ar-Pharazon immediately usurped Miriel. So I guess, in that sense, Amazon is giving Miriel more power than the effectively had. However, they're taking away the power that was rightfully hers, and demoting her true authority, so I stand by my point that they have no right to claim they're improving female anything in Tolkien. 

For fans worried about conflicting canon, McKay and Payne point to one of Tolkien's published letters, where he wrote about wanting "other minds and hands" to create art in his legendarium. "We feel like we're taking up the gauntlet that he himself put down," Payne adds. "He gave us what we like to say are the stars in the sky that we have to connect and draw the constellation in."

Right: 1. Wrong: 3. Plus plenty of questionable stuff. You do not get to claim you are filling in the constellation when you ignore the stars! This is what I meant when I said this doesn't qualify as an adaptation of anything Tolkien wrote. One out of four being correct is not an adaptation. 

At the end of my last blog post, I said this:

My issue with this show is that they seem to be relying too heavily on what they can do, rather than what they should do. "Tolkien never said Galadriel didn't fight, therefore we're definitely going to have fighting in a war be a major part of her character." That sort of thing. And there's a lot of it--far more than, "This is what Tolkien did say, so this is what we're doing." They seem to be relying too heavily on what they aren't forbidden to do, rather than on what they should do. 

After reading about the Numenoreans, I feel completely justified in thinking that. They haven't been true to what Tolkien explicitly stated, and I can't see a genuine reason for it. Maybe we'll find out later, but I'm not holding my breath.