Bored of the Rings

by Patrick Smith '26 on October 9, 2022
A&E Staff

Arts & Entertainment

A Review of Amazon’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is odd on a conceptual level. It’s an expensive adaptation of the appendices for The Lord of the Rings trilogy, a collection of Tolkien’s notes about the history and characters of Middle Earth and The Silmarillion. It’s also notably set in the Second Age of Middle Earth, thousands of years before most of the beloved characters from the novels have even been born. Beyond this, it’s helmed by two inexperienced show runners that spurned the possible involvement of Peter Jackson, the man responsible for the best Middle Earth adaptations to date. Did it work out? It’s hard to say. There have been five episodes released at the time of writing, and while interesting ideas have reared their heads now and again, much of the show feels slow and stagnant.

Nearly every scene is absolutely decked out in a mountain of computer-generated effects. The sky, trees, and a lot of the environments are digitally edited. It’s disorienting and often visually unappealing. There are some genuinely impressive shots and locations, but most feel very bland or fake. In the original films, Jackson displayed an innate strength for fantasy landscape composition and intelligently only utilized CGI for things that genuinely could not be done practically. Despite the show runners’ insistence on keeping Jackson separate from the project, they still attempted to reverse engineer his filmmaking style. It’s all very odd and indicative of the muddled creative process that led to this project.

In terms of writing, the show feels unpolished and confused in what it wants to accomplish. Much of the story is inspired by Tolkien’s work in The Silmarillion, although due to legal issues the writers could not use the narratives presented in that body of work. Galadriel has been reimagined as a Wonder Woman-esque warrior, Elrond is blander and softer than his appearance in the original trilogy, and everybody else on the ensemble cast is original and largely forgettable. Galadriel in particular feels poorly written. She’s clearly meant to be an incredibly powerful and stoic character, but she comes off as tedious and unlikable. There isn’t anything to relate to in her character; she’s always right, and her attitude feels sourer as opposed to the stoicism they were likely looking for. Plot wise, the show has felt slow and disjointed. There’s a hunt for Sauron after his apparent disappearance long ago, a mysterious man from the sky, Elrond’s assistance to an elven smith, and evidence of a resurgence of orcs. All of these are fine ideas, but they’re presented in a way that feels completely dispassionate. Five episodes in and barely any plot progression has occurred since the events set up in the first episode. It’s a slow-burn style of narrative, but without the tone or complexity to pull off that kind of structure.

An aspect of the show that feels evident beyond the attempts to conceal it is that much of the show feels devoid of Tolkien’s signature character and vision. Tolkien’s work has heart and personality, and feels well-developed and lived in. It manages a tone that feels serious and stoic while also incorporating whimsical elements and a charming, friendly atmosphere. The Rings of Power does a constant tonal flip-flopping between dour melodrama and slapstick. The creators also seem to lack the attention to detail for the intricacies of Tolkien’s world, for example, they completely ignore the fact that Tolkien’s female dwarves have beards despite their push to have female dwarves in a prominent role onscreen for the first time.

Everything about The Rings of Power feels dispassionate about its source material, and ultimately unsure of itself. It may have been a smarter decision to just create a new fantasy universe or adapt a popular contemporary series. Tolkien’s work imposes too much pressure for most creatives to live up to and will be inevitably judged with absolute scrutiny to see if it is representative of Tolkien’s beautiful world. The Rings of Power is often bland, at times even feels soulless, lacking both the character of Tolkien’s work and the quality of Jackson’s adaptations.

Bursting the PC Bubble: World Reacts to Recent Burnings in the Amazon Rainforest

by The Cowl Editor on August 29, 2019

National and Global News

Wildfires continue to engulf the Amazon rainforest.

Thomas Edwards ’20

News Staff

For nearly a month, the Amazon rainforest, the largest rainforest in the world, has had several thousand wildfires burning through it.

Wildfires are generally common in the Amazon during the dry season, which usually runs from August through mid-November. However, according to the data from Brazil’s National Space Research Institute (INPE), there has been an 84 percent increase in fires across the country from the same period last year.

What is causing this unusually high number of fires in the Amazon? Currently, there are roughly 9,500 fires burning in the Amazon rainforest. The Amazon produces larger amounts of moisture and humidity than other forests, making it more resistant to wildfires, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The first believed culprit is deforestation, according to Greenpeace. In a release on Aug. 22, Greenpeace stated that forest fires and climate change operate in a vicious cycle. “In addition to increasing emissions, deforestation contributes directly to a change in rainfall patterns in the affected region, extending the length of the dry season, further affecting forests, biodiversity, agriculture and human health,” Greenpeace stated in their release.

With deforestation fires increasing, so too do greenhouse gas emissions, increasing the overall temperature of the Earth. As the temperature increases, extreme weather events, such as major droughts, occur more often.

The second believed culprit is farmers taking advantage of the dry season to clear land for livestock and more farmland.

The farming industry and international trade are the primary drivers of deforestation in the Amazon, with more than 75 percent of it coming from cattle ranching and soy bean production — two of Brazil’s main exports.

Most of the fires currently burning across the Amazon are man-made for the purposes of clearing land for agriculture. The forest, however, is not the only thing at risk from these fires. The native wild life and native communities are in the direct path to be enveloped and consumed by these fires.

Experts and activists blame Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro for the fires and their destruction, citing Bolsonaro’s environmental and indigenous people’s policies. Since taking office, his administration has rolled back environmental protections and cut staff from both environmental and indigenous rights agencies.

Bolsonaro recently fired the head of the INPE, due to a report released that showed higher rates of deforestation under Bolsonaro’s administration.

His administration had also cut $23 million from Brazil’s environmental enforcement agency as well as dismantled policies that protect the Amazon, instead working in favor of advancing economic priorities, such as agribusiness, mining, and fossil fuels.

According to the Articulation of the Indigenous People of Brazil, violence towards indigenous communities and their lands have been on the rise under Bolsonaro’s presidency.

Some indigenous rights groups say that Bolsonaro’s anti-environmental stances are contributing to the land disputes and violence faced by their communities. Some believe that Bolsonaro’s rhetoric about wiping out indigenous communities has emboldened people to use violence to remove Native communities from their land in order to take posession and sell it.

Experts believe that international political pressure may be the only way to stop the current devastation. French President Emmanuel Macron called for the state of the Amazon to be at the top of the agenda ahead of the G7 summit.

Early on Tuesday, August 27, Macron was joined by others in the G7 to pledge $22 million in aid to Brazil to assist in combating the fires. Bolsonaro rejected the aid, claiming Macron had ulterior motives, stating in a tweet that Macron “disguises his intentions behind the idea of an ‘alliance’ of the G7 countries to ‘save’ the Amazon, as if we were a colony or a no-man’s land.”

The Brazilian government, on top of refusing the aid, also threw in an insult towards Macron with a reference to the Notre Dame Cathedral fire in Paris this April.

“Thanks, but perhaps these resources are more relevant to reforesting Europe,” stated Bolsonaro’s chief of staff, Onyx Lornezoni, to the Globo broadcast network. “Macron cannot even avoid a predictable fire in a church that is part of the world’s heritage, and he wants to give us lessons for our country?”

The message of the Brazilian government to the rest of the world, in essence, is to mind their own business.