I shouldn’t have watched the first episode as tired as I was this morning. I caught myself falling asleep, but rewound it back to where I last remembered and went from there. That happened twice during the first 35 minutes.

For the last half, I was awake and a little more engaged as it went on.

Good grief this is a beautiful show. The settings, the towns/villages, the costumes, the creatures. Simply stunning.

The effects are stellar and good attention to details (was that an ent shaking a tree as the meteor flew across the sky?)

I’ll watch the second episode later today… when I’m more awake.

I’m not a hardcore LOTR fan, so whatever changes and additions that are made are lost on me.

I’m liking it so far.

Watch both episode last night and loved it. Like the actress playing Galadriel and the special effect are amazing. I do have one question

I'm no finding anyone to connect to. Morfydd Clark is conventionally beautiful but doesn't have the presence of Cate Blanchett. I realize they are trying to introduce a bunch of stories and it's the trend of modern television to switch around storylines but I like to stick with one until it lands. Big fan of the movies and this show falls short so far. Will keep watching.

I watched both episodes, but I took a lot of breaks during and in between due to the glacial pacing. I love the LOTR movies and thought The Hobbit movies were ok, but I'm not enthralled by this so far. I will keep watching in hopes that it gets better. If I can make it through The Wheel of Time, I can make it through this. After two episodes, I can already tell the Theo character is going to be annoying.

no need at all for a response. You made it into something it certainly wasn’t. It was a mention of another show, in comparison. God forbid.

I'm five minutes into it and just in general I'm in a bit of a funk because of life issues and I hate this so far because it's depressing the hell out of me even further.

I heard somewhere that Prime says if this series isnt a hit they may stop doing original series like this. Anyone else hear that? The Boys does well for them sooooo....

Zero chance this isn't a hit worldwide and zero chance they stop making content.

Richard Newby, who is a freelance writer, wrote a piece on the Hollywood Reporter about the backlash this show has gotten from racist trolls online.

Twitter

I liked the first two episodes a lot. I didn’t think either the first or second episode was slow and even though there was a lot of jumping around, introducing characters, it felt like it moved at a solid pace.

My one complaint is that I find the Harfoots super annoying and every time they were on screen the story felt like it ground to a halt. The Starman doesn’t seem particularly interesting and feels like he dropped in (literally!) from a different show.

The characters aren’t quite as endearing as the original LotR cast but that’s asking A LOT and it’s only been two episodes. I’ll give it a bit more time developing these characters.

But so far, so good!

Enjoyed episode 1. It did feel long, but production values are crazy.

Unfortunately the wife didn’t care for it, so looks like I’ll be watching the rest on my own!

I thought the first episode started dragging a little though I was still happy to be back in Middle-Earth. The second one was much better paced and I am interested to see where it goes. Thought the orc was really well done and more in line with LOTR than The Hobbit where they went full CGI.

I can't imagine being someone who might like this but let's their racism get in the way. And apparently people are saying Galadriel is a "Mary Sue," showing they have absolutely no understanding of Tolkien. Just miserable people.

Also, the scene where the kid eats the strawberry in the second episode had to be a callback to Denethor disgustingly eating the tomato in Return of the King, no? I caught a few little nods to the films though nothing over the top.

There's a callback in the first episode when the . In RoTK it was the other way around at the end of that film. That was a badass scene, though.

Just started a bit ago. The introduction of the Hobbits was pretty fun.

a lot of setup - as expected.

I like casting of Galadriel

my son is disappointed the music is original

Yeah the music isn’t quite as memorable but at least they got Howard Shore involved again.

I also didn’t realize J.A. Bayona directed the first two episodes. The Orphanage is one of my favorite horror movies. Of course, he also directed Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, which is absolutely terrible.

I think the series looks beautiful so far and I've been having no major issues with the way Tolkien's world/characters are being depicted. But - wow - that first episode was a slog to sit through, and while the second one was a bit better, this is still far from the "must-see" television we were promised/that a series with this kind of budget should be.

Zero chance Amazon will let it fail is more like it.

I never read the books. Will "the worm" show up again?

I know all the books fairly well, including the appendixes and The Simarillion. The first two episodes look beautiful, but there appear to be a lot of unnecessary changes from the books. Why are the Harfoots here? The giant can’t be Gandalf, the time-line doesn’t match up. A lot of other stuff like this.

Not amazing but I'm enjoying it so far, and it looks gorgeous. I read the LOTR appendices and The Simarillion, but that was decades ago, and I don't remember enough about them in order to determine how faithful this show is. I'm guessing there are a bunch of changes though, which were probably necessary in adapting this. I read that since Amazon only bought the rights to the remaining Middle Earth material, they can't directly reference anything from The Hobbit or LOTR (but this show takes place further in the past anyway, so probably not an issue)

I like it, it looks great and I'm entertained, that's all I want. I kind of enjoy the slower pace, it's nice not to be bombarded by fights, explosions and an orgy of special effects every 10 min. And it seems not everyone agrees, but I found the Harfoots hilarious. I assume the dude who fell from the sky is a wizard?

My wife seems to be really into this now that she sat down while awake enough to stay up. She even went over to youtube to check out videos that help explain things a bit and give the history and theories on where the show is going. She is very invested...we'll see if she stays that way.


Im also enjoying this. Im in for the long haul.

Pros:
-It's....Colorful
-Fan of the actor playing Elrond
-Overall the story seems a repeat of of LoTR yet it feels fresh-ish
-Anxious to see the Rings being created.

Cons:
-Harfoot scenes. I don't like the vibe. Too upbeat and corny. The Hobbits were the same but the Harfoots representation is pushing the narrative hard.