# Amazon Lord of the Rings series; The Rings of Power **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** middle-earth, amazon-prime, tv-shows-scripted\ **Created:** [March 3, 2019, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497 "2019-03-03T20:01:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 53
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1043 "2022-10-10T02:37:14Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Meanwhile, the Numenoreams crossed the ocean and galloped all the way to Tirharad, crossing a mountain range along the way, in no more than 18 hours Chyeah. I’ll keep going, but sometimes the stoopid burns. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1044 "2022-10-10T02:46:41Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > They’ve been playing fast and loose with travel times in a way that’d make Jack Bauer envious. Jack Bauer didn’t poop for 24 hours, it’s possible elves never do. ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1045 "2022-10-10T03:34:34Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Meanwhile, the Numenoreams crossed the ocean and galloped all the way to Tirharad, crossing a mountain range along the way, in no more than 18 hours. That’s late-season Game of Thrones quality movement! ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1046 "2022-10-10T03:41:51Z")
I get what you are saying but is there any good way to do long travel in a TV or movie where absolutely nothing happens during that time? It’s annoying but I am not sure how to deal with it better for TV/movies. They are all guilty of this. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1047 "2022-10-10T04:07:31Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > I get what you are saying but is there any good way to do long travel in a TV or movie where absolutely nothing happens during that time? Montage. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1048 "2022-10-10T04:42:24Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > Jack Bauer didn’t poop for 24 hours, it’s possible elves never do. Well, according to Durin it takes them two weeks just to decide to do so. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1049 "2022-10-10T04:44:40Z")
I liked how Raiders of the Lost Ark did it (showing a map with a line showing travel). Not sure that works here though. ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1050 "2022-10-10T04:53:20Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Honestly, I can’t even remember why or how Galadriel convinced the Numenoreans to launch a military expedition to the Southlands. It didn’t seem like she or anyone else knew what was going on there. The main reason for wanting to go there was that Galadriel discovered that Sauron’s rune was a map of the Southlands/future Mordor. Hence, she inferred that it was to draw his followers together there. I can’t remember exactly what, but it was something in the library of Numenor that facilitated that realization. There might also have been something that Halbrand told her, I can’t recall exactly. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1051 "2022-10-10T05:15:36Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Not sure that works here though. They’ve actually done that before; I remember when they showed a vision through the Palantir in Numenor which became a drawn map of the Southlands, which transformed into the actual Southlands, and then turned into a scene there. That only served to establish a change of scenery though, without expressing scale, either of distance or time. They could absolutely be showing old Middle Earth maps drawing out routes, then resolving into scenes, and showing dates, or at least saying something like “Two Months Later”. The way that they have little floating text showing where something is at the start of a scene. The same way they showed the Southlands title dissolving into Mordor. They can do all of that, it could work, but they don’t. I suspect they worry about those details intruding into the story and distracting away from the drama and suspense, and whatever. But when they gloss over those things, it really is detracting from the story. Sailing across the sea from Numenor is a massive undertaking that they made seem as easy as crossing a river, because they cut everything out. And they show one scene in the Southlands, cut to Numenor, go back to the Southlands for a while, where hours have passed, and BOOM here are the Numenorians! It’s great that their culture is advanced enough to have established warp travel already. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1052 "2022-10-10T05:33:48Z")
To be fair, even “Raiders of the Lost Ark” fudged this a lot. Harrison Ford hanging on the outside of a submarine and then making it across the Pacific in the same shape he started? Movies/TV do a LOT of time dilation to make the story flow (think most every cop show where they get a call at the police station then seem to teleport to the scene in moments when, in reality, it’d take them 45 minutes to get there). I guess I am saying I am not sure how much we should hold RoP to this time thing. Could they do it better? Maybe. I dunno. They probably could. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1053 "2022-10-10T05:45:59Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > You can’t have children in Valinor. Just of the elves we know, Galadriel, Celebrimbor and Gil-galad were all born in Valinor. > [@DrDeth](#): > > I am taking this from Arwens reaction to the fact she might have children if she stayed. Because she is in love with Aragorn, and he can’t go. And Elves only marry their soulmate. And don’t, apparently, have sex outside marriage. So _she_, specifically, wouldn’t have children if she left Aragorn. > [@What\_Exit](#): > > I number among those that like Tom Bombadil. Me, too. > [@DSeid](#): > > In this case the work is not wonderful for those with great amounts of pre-existing knowledge and expertise Speak for yourself. > [@Atamasama](#): > > But me watching… What the 🤬, Celeborn isn’t in this because he’s DEAD?!” > > I had to Google it I don’t understand this - it’s so _obvious_ that they’re doing bait-and-switch. Maybe my genre-savvy stat is maxed out. > [@Atamasama](#): > > The only thing I can figure is that they want Galadriel to be single so that she can be in a romance I don’t get that impression. I think they just wanted her unencumbered so she could be a kick-ass warrior (because everyone knows wives can’t kick ass 🙄 ) > [@squeegee](#): > > Yet Sardoc is telling Gandalf that Greenwood the Great (Mirkwood) is within hiking distance. Huh? I’m guessing they’re somewhere in what will become the Brown Lands, given the garden-like nature of it with all those apple trees. So seeing Greenwood from a hill is certainly possible. But that’s way outside normal lava bomb range. Blocks the size they were looking at could only travel a kilometre or two at max (smaller ones can travel 10s of km). Maybe a passing Balrog dropped it? Yes, an African Balrog, not a European > [@Smapti](#): > > Meanwhile, the Numenoreams crossed the ocean and galloped all the way to Tirharad, crossing a mountain range along the way, in no more than 18 hours. Well, assuming they set out at the same time as stuff in Middle Earth was happening, and not weeks before… > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Harrison Ford hanging on the outside of a submarine and then making it across the Pacific in the same shape he started? It was only the Mediterranean, but yeah. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1054 "2022-10-10T05:47:18Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > You can do anything you want with their stories without using the lore as toilet paper. I have not seen anything they have done which is that bad. Compressed time a bit. And Elrond is the only one they needed from LotR. They didn’t actually need Galadrial. But they did need a strong female lead/star, due to constant complaints about that issue- so who else? > [@Smapti](#): > > Meanwhile, the Numenoreams crossed the ocean and galloped all the way to Tirharad, crossing a mountain range along the way, in no more than 18 hours. Did they specify the time? > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > To be fair, even “Raiders of the Lost Ark” fudged this a lot. Harrison Ford hanging on the outside of a submarine and then making it across the Pacific in the same shape he started? The Mediterranean. A little smaller. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1055 "2022-10-10T07:40:05Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Well, assuming they set out at the same time as stuff in Middle Earth was happening, and not weeks before… > [@DrDeth](#): > > Did they specify the time? The first episode ends with all the major groups watching the Stranger’s meteor cross overhead, so we know the same amount of time has passed for everyone since the show started. The events in the Southlands don’t seem to have taken longer than a week or two - certainly not the months it would realistically take to sail across the ocean and travel overland to Tirharad. (In comparison, in the books it takes Aragorn and his forces seven days to ride from Minas Tirith to the Black Gate, and the Rohirrim thought it was a big deal when he, Gimli, and Legolas ran 135 miles in three days pursuing the orcs that took Merry and Pippin.) The way the show is shot, episode 5 ends with the Numenoreans departing in the afternoon at the same time Adar’s forces are marching on Ostirith just after nightfall (I’m not sure how many time zones there are between Numenor and Ostirith, but it’s probably a few.) The battle for Tirharad rages overnight while the Numenorans cross the ocean reaching the shore at dawn, spend the early morning riding across land, and show up just in the nick of time to save the villagers sometime around second breakfast. If those events aren’t meant to be happening simultaneous to each other, they certainly don’t do anything to show it. > [@MrDibble](#): > > And Elves only marry their soulmate. And don’t, apparently, have sex outside marriage. IIRC, Tolkien wrote that sex outside marriage was literally impossible for elves, as the act of coupling is what defines them as married. Elves do not commit adultery, even accidentally, because they can tell by sight if another is married, and their soul would depart for Mandos before they could be raped. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1056 "2022-10-10T07:45:18Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I have not seen anything they have done which is that bad. Compressed time a bit. And Elrond is the only one they needed from LotR. They didn’t actually need Galadrial. But they did need a strong female lead/star, due to constant complaints about that issue- so who else? Moving Greenwood/Mirkwood to the Southlands. Creating a dependence on Mithril for elves is on par with suddenly making the Force be dependent on midichlorians in the Star Wars universe. Showing the Balrog to be awake already in the Second Age. There were numerous other WTF moments for me, but I think I might have forgotten them. What is “that bad” is going to vary from person to person. I mean, the “Brandyfoot” name really irritates me, though I’m not sure it’s a big deal to other people. It bothers me because it seems like they picked the name because they figured that Hobbits have names with “Brandy” in them, such as the Brandybucks. Except that comes from the Hobbits of the Shire giving the Baranduin river the nickname “Brandywine” as a joke, due to its color resembling that of brandy. So how are nomadic proto-Hobbits tied to a place name not chosen for thousands of years? (The Shire was established in the year 1600 of the Third Age.) Maybe we’re supposed to believe it’s just a silly coincidence. I see it as lazy writing. Going back to Star Wars, it’s like creating a show that takes place many years before the Jedi Order was created, and naming a character Jimmy Lightsaber. That kind of thing might not bother most people, but it really frustrates me as a viewer. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 7:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1057 "2022-10-10T07:49:27Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > The first episode ends with all the major groups watching the Stranger’s meteor cross overhead, so we know the same amount of time has passed for everyone since the show started. The events in the Southlands don’t seem to have taken longer than a week or two - certainly not the months it would realistically take to sail across the ocean and travel overland to Tirharad. The Harfoots travel on (small) feet from Southern Wilderland to lava-bomb range of Mordor. I don’t think that’s a week or two. This dude on Reddit stitched together [the on-screen map of their route](https://www.reddit.com/r/LOTR_on_Prime/comments/xmjgl8/spent_an_hour_assembling_the_map_of_the_harfoot/). ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1058 "2022-10-10T08:24:40Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > The Harfoots travel on (small) feet from Southern Wilderland to lava-bomb range of Mordor. I don’t think that’s a week or two. Well, that’s exactly the problem, isn’t it? Nobody is taking nearly long enough to travel anywhere. The Harfoots are within lava-bomb range of Mordor, but also close enough to Greenwood that they trust a man who’s barefoot, dressed in rags, unarmed, with no provisions, and who can barely speak to get there on his own. Elrond gets from Lindon to Eregion in a day, and has since traveled to Khazad-Dum, back to Lindon, and then back to Khazad-Dum again. Galadriel’s boat trip to Valinor lasts about 12 hours. Halbrand is now riding away from Mordor with an infected stomach wound which in a world without antibiotics ought to be fatal in less than a week, but the next episode is probably going to start with him and Galadriel arriving in Lindon, several thousand miles away. If everyone was travelling in real time, we’d have already passed Gil-Galad’s point-of-no-return date of “next spring” by which the elves will be doomed if they don’t have mithril. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1059 "2022-10-10T08:28:23Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Speak for yourself. And for what I observe others posting. I’ve not been reading many of either the less or more lore informed camps saying this has been a great show. More complaining about it than anything else. The point of the comment was not to complain about the show though. There’s enough of that in this thread. It’s more a thought I wondered about reading the detailed analyses by the lore heads. Possibly out of place for this thread and if so my apologies: does great subject knowledge sometimes lead one to engage critically intellectually and make it harder to just lean back and _experience_ a work? ---
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1060 "2022-10-10T09:25:36Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Maybe a passing Balrog dropped it? Yes, an African Balrog, not a European How did it grip them? And what is it’s airspeed? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 9:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1061 "2022-10-10T09:33:28Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > And for what I observe others posting. I meant you don’t speak for _me_, and I consider myself fairly well versed in the lore. If you prefer, “speak for yoursel_ **ves** _”. > [@DSeid](#): > > does great subject knowledge sometimes lead one to engage critically intellectually and make it harder to just lean back and _experience_ a work? I find my knowledge has enhanced my enjoyment of this specific show, without any concomitant desire for canonicity interfering. Any issues I have with the show are about pacing and in-story logic, not about canon violations. Hell, even the geology offences don’t faze me. And that’s a _big_ thing usually. But this is a literal Flat Earth, so I go with the (lava) flow… > [@Smapti](#): > > The Harfoots are within lava-bomb range of Mordor, but also close enough to Greenwood I think this is more the showrunners not knowing lava bomb range, not the geography. > [@Smapti](#): > > they trust a man who’s barefoot, dressed in rags, unarmed, with no provisions, and who can barely speak to get there on his own He’s a wolf-fighting wagon-hauling wizard, I think they think he’ll be alright. Plus he has an apple 🙂 > [@Smapti](#): > > Elrond gets from Lindon to Eregion in a day How do you know how long he took? > [@Smapti](#): > > Galadriel’s boat trip to Valinor lasts about 12 hours How do you know that? > [@Smapti](#): > > Halbrand is now riding away from Mordor with an infected stomach wound which in a world without antibiotics ought to be fatal in less than a week, but the next episode is probably going to start with him and Galadriel arriving in Lindon, several thousand miles away Why Lindon, and not any of the elf settlements between Mordor and there? Lothlórien is already long-settled by now. Eregion and the Woodland Realm are also closer. I mean, it’s still a long trip with a dying man… ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2022, 9:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497/1062 "2022-10-10T09:53:47Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > How do you know how long he took? Because it’s happening concurrently with the other storylines. Elrond is in Lindon at the same time Arondir notices the cow giving black milk; by the time he and Bronwyn have strolled to the next town over and discovered it in flames, he’s in Eregion, and that trip took at most a day, not the 2-3 months or so it’d realistically take to walk from Lindon to Eregion. It’d already be “next spring” by the time Elrond walked/rode from Lindon to Khazad-Dum back to Lindon and back to Khazad-Dum again. Here’s a timeline a redditor has worked out which puts the story at about six weeks, a little longer than I feel like it ought to be, but still nearly not long enough for all the travel that’s depicted, and he also points out that the travel times make no sense. [![](https://preview.redd.it/c2zm5n4gcts91.png?width=3061&format=png&auto=webp&s=55b497a1d3594458b3e0e75127149c4fc3b06b83) ](https://preview.redd.it/c2zm5n4gcts91.png?width=3061&format=png&auto=webp&s=55b497a1d3594458b3e0e75127149c4fc3b06b83) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497.md?page=52) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/amazon-lord-of-the-rings-series-the-rings-of-power/830497.md?page=54)