Amazon, Warner Bros in Talks for LOTR Series Adaptation: Variety

Hound and Arya road trip is the best bit.

That was early on, before they lost guidance from the books.  As Lance and I had noted a while ago, when they had the books doing the heavy lifting of getting the plot straight, it freed up the writers to explore character vignettes not given in the books.  "Maybe I'll have two chickens" and most of the dialogue surrounding it never happened in the books (the scene happened, not the chickens), and it was brilliant.  I also think the "chaos is a ladder" dialogue was brilliant, but in the books Varys and Littlefinger never have a private conversation.  It was just the writers seeing their chance and taking it.

Once they outran the books they became bogged down trying to write plot AND character.  Both suffered, but occasional nice moments still happened.  "Your lips are moving, and you're complaining about something.  THAT'S whinging."

I guess I was staying away from TORN in those dark years.- Halfy

{{TORN should be stayed away from at all times, their souls are for sale for an exclusive. }}

Forest Shepherd wrote:*cough* Seasons 5-8 *cough*

They still had bones of the books to go with and there were some good bits in there but it was when spectacle had taken over from substance.

About half way through series 6 is where it completely lost it coupled with the main dudes trying to rush the rest for their upcoming Star Wars trilogy... which then got canned.

I enjoyed all seasons apart from the last one. It was a massive let down. Specially Danny and Bran.

Well, Daeny and Bran were set by decree. It will be interesting to see how GRRM makes sense of it, assuming he survives to the last book. If D&D hadn't rushed the last season perhaps those two arcs wouldn't have felt like a sudden crash into a brick wall.

halfwise wrote:Well, Daeny and Bran were set by decree.  It will be interesting to see how GRRM makes sense of it, assuming he survives to the last book.  If D&D hadn't rushed the last season perhaps those two arcs wouldn't have felt like a sudden crash into a brick wall.

We both know that he won't!

Mrs Figg wrote:I enjoyed all seasons apart from the last one. It was a massive let down. Specially Danny and Bran.

I thought the Night King was the biggest pile of fox shit.

You mean he's threatening all of humankind, a wave of darkness flowing implacably out of the north; the Red Witch couldn't stop them, the Dothraki couldn't stop them, dragons couldn't stop them, but a kid leaping out of the trees with a knife takes him right out and they all keel over?

Yeah, it felt good for about 5 seconds.

I was too busy laughing to feel good.

Those ship designs make me want to look up historical counterparts. They're straight out of a Chinese junk with those... battens they're called. But I don't remember ever seeing a design that's split in half, with twin masts for each. Quite different!

{{ Are you talking Amazons ships Forest or is this still shitting on GoT? (I never watched it so I dont know if it had ships) }}

Back to Amazon.
These ones:




The design is a strange one, with those paired masts making for a big gap in the middle of what would normally be a continuous sail.

As usual a good eye. Didn't catch those side by side masts - one of the boats in the background of the bottom picture has two masts forming a triangle, which makes more sense structurally.

I am guessing it is a design aesthetic to make Numenor look grand and decadent. I would be interested to see how functional it would be as visual designers don't normally think about physics.

{{ Its certainly an interesting choice, doesnt look practical to me (this is where we need Dave to pop back in with some ship knowledge) but aesthetically I agree it looks eastern, which is an odd choice to choose as your influence for a realm that is the furthest westward you can go. }}

An odd choice? You seem to be under the mistaken impression that the creators give a shit about what Numenor may have remotely been like in Tolkiens view.

This looks to me only to be designed as eye candy. No other thought has gone in to it.

Well that's not quite fair. Consider the thoughts of this fellow here:


He talks about how good fantasy design is more often a pastiche of real-world influences. This makes the constituent parts recognizable and believable in our eyes and, if the combination of influences is well-thought out, the overall effect is a unique appearance for a fantasy culture but one that still feels grounded in reality.

In this case, thought has been put into it, or else we would just get a ship design lifted whole-cloth from the real world: literally just a junk or a Roman bireme or a Venetian galley. Instead, we have something that is, I believe, new: a hodge-podge that gives the Numenoreans a unique appearance. We see the Oriental-looking sails with battens, we see the extremely-curved stern of the Phoenician ships that Petty mentioned. (Not prow, Petty. Prow is the bow, the front of the ship, and these are the stern!) And the combination makes for something different.

But is it good? I think there are too many other factors involved to say yet. We must watch and then decide. (Or not watch, and have healthier crabbit levels no doubt, lol.)

Pettytyrant101 wrote:{{ Its certainly an interesting choice, doesnt look practical to me (this is where we need Dave to pop back in with some ship knowledge) but aesthetically I agree it looks eastern, which is an odd choice to choose as your influence for a realm that is the furthest westward you can go. }}

Yes, Dave could offer real insights. I only pretend to any kind of ship knowledge, based on some interest over the years and Patrick O'Brian novels.

That form/function guy talks way too much without enough examples.

The sound track is available for free on amazon music.  You have to install the app. [url= https://music.amazon.com/albums/B0B9CJ445S] https://music.amazon.com/albums/B0B9CJ445S[/url]

I listened to it so you don't have to.  Howard Shore wrote the main theme song.  Doesn't stick in the ear, but I wasn't impressed with the main title for LotR either.  The rest is by Bear McCreary.   Maybe they'll have more resonance when heard in context.  I sort of wonder how much of the movie music we love only sounds great because we have an emotional context that goes with it?

So I'm reserving judgement until I see the damn thing.

https://www.tropfanscreening.com/home/


The first two episodes to be screened for free in select theaters around the world on August 31st: two days before they are released online.

The nearest one is over the hill from me in San Jose. Shall I go and report back on the nature of the audience?

I remember reading that you have to be premium member of Cinescape or something like that. So the audience is going to be a weird one in any case.

New trailer.  They're just digging themselves deeper with crap ass dialogue.  Ishmael the elf is still pulling bowstrings with that odd backwards hand.

Wait, I just noticed the title of this thread is "Amazon, Warner Bros...." What does Warner Brothers have to do with this?

Both Amazon and Warner Bros were in talks.