Whether you’re a Tolkien obsessive or the sort of dabbler who doesn’t give an Ent’s conker what a Silmarillion is, it’s not hard to see why reactions to The Rings of Power have been … mixed.
There’s a scene in The Return of the King where Pippin is staring across the calm, still mists of Pelennor Fields, waiting for Sauron’s orc armies to lay siege to the city of Minas Tirith. “It’s so quiet,” he says. “It’s the deep breath,” says Gandalf, “before the plunge.” That’s how Amazon’s bazillion-dollar take on Tolkien felt for its first five episodes. A buildup – albeit an astonishingly bonny one – to something big, gripping and hugely exciting that was yet to happen.
