TV: The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power - Amazon Prime Series

[Hivemind]

I'm kind of amused at myself that I gave more of a chance to Wheel of Time than this show. Put on the first episode, watched 20 minutes, left to help a friend with something, never picked the show back up. All the shit I've read about the show coupled with Wheel of Time being incredibly meh and actually being a fan of the LOTR property, I really haven't been able to work out the desire to continue just to see it.

I've shit on this show plenty, but it's better than Wheel of Time by a country mile. That's not saying much of anything tho, Wheel of Time was not only one of the worst media adaptations I've ever seen, but also just a really terrible TV show in general.

 

[Osprey]

I've shit on this show plenty, but it's better than Wheel of Time by a country mile. That's not saying much of anything tho, Wheel of Time was not only one of the worst media adaptations I've ever seen, but also just a really terrible TV show in general.

I didn't like Wheel of Time, either, but I found it more watchable than this show. At least early on, I could tell what WoT's basic plot was and wanted to understand what was going on. It got really dumb and I soured on it as it went along, but at least I started out thinking that it was decent and wanting to see where it went. This show was hard to get into and boring to me from the very first episode. The fundamental story wasn't good, IMO, whereas at least WoT's was (thanks to the novel that it was based on), even though it may've been mangled. That's my perspective, but we seem to agree that, either way, saying that one is better or more watchable than the other isn't saying much.

 

[Hivemind]

I didn't like Wheel of Time, either, but I found it more watchable than this show. At least early on, I could tell what WoT's basic plot was and wanted to understand what was going on. It got really dumb and I soured on it as it went along, but at least I started out thinking that it was decent and wanting to see where it went. This show was hard to get into and boring to me from the very first episode. The fundamental story wasn't good, IMO, whereas at least WoT's was (thanks to the novel that it was based on), even though it may've been mangled. That's my perspective, but we seem to agree that, either way, saying that one is better or more watchable than the other isn't saying much.

Ehh, as massively disappointing as Rings of Power was, there were several aspects that were still well executed. The acting, visual effects, set design, costumes, soundtrack, etc. were all various degrees of good-to-great. There were tons of flaws, and they're worth griping about. But overall it's still probably a 5/10 show overall. It's not great, but it's at least on par with with other streaming-fantasy content like Shadow & Bone or The Nevers (which are both equally flawed and forgettable).

Wheel of Time was just bad from start to finish, IMO. Terrible acting, visual effects that look like they're from a 90s sci-fi channel movie, costumes that look like something you'd find in a thrift shop - and that's on top of all the shortcomings it has in common with RoP (flat characters, poor dialogue, mystery-box plot, etc). About the only redeeming factor for WoT is the set design. This show is the worst among the many recent fantasy adaptations, and is basically on-par with something like Xena or Hercules, but with all the campy 90s fun drained from them.

 

[Osprey]

Ehh, as massively disappointing as Rings of Power was, there were several aspects that were still well executed. The acting, visual effects, set design, costumes, soundtrack, etc. were all various degrees of good-to-great.

I wasn't very impressed by most of those, personally, but I'm not going to argue over it.

This show is the worst among the many recent fantasy adaptations, and is basically on-par with something like Xena or Hercules, but with all the campy 90s fun drained from them.

It sounds like you haven't seen Willow.

 

[Osprey]

It looks like the show wasn't the success that Amazon portrayed it as.

Only 37% Of Viewers Finished Amazon's 'Rings Of Power,' Which Is Very Bad

Despite a billion dollar spend, the report says that just 37% of viewers finished Amazon's Rings of Power.

www.forbes.com

As for the 37% number, that’s bad. There’s no spinning that. Rival Netflix usually cancels most shows that come in under 50% completion. Squid Game, its megahit, had 83% completion. Sure, Netflix is in a somewhat different position, given that you can binge all their shows at once, so completion is easier. But you can turn to HBO instead if you want with its weekly airings.

The first season of Game of Thrones had more viewers by the end than it did at its premiere. House of the Dragon went down a little bit by the end, but you can blame that on a larger-than-usual initial surge because of its Game of Thrones connection. Meanwhile, just last month, The Last of Us more than doubled in its initial live viewership by the end of the season.

 

[blueandgoldguy]

It looks like the show wasn't the success that Amazon portrayed it as.

Only 37% Of Viewers Finished Amazon's 'Rings Of Power,' Which Is Very Bad

Despite a billion dollar spend, the report says that just 37% of viewers finished Amazon's Rings of Power.

www.forbes.com

That sounds like a disaster. 37%?! I wonder if there is anyway to stem the tide of loss in viewership. I don't know if there has been any tv or streaming show in history that has suffered a dramatic loss in viewership over the coarse of a season and be able to improve their ratings afterwards? Seems impossible given its hard to bring back viewers once initial impressions have been made.

This is Amazon though so they can afford to go ahead with their original allotment of 5 seasons even if the ratings are far less than ideal. They did spend a billion on this thing so they might as well see it through.

Hopefully there are some lessons learned from this in the end. Don't mess around so much with cherished source material of an iconic novel and create a bunch of mediocre fan fiction.

 

[PeteWorrell]

It was always obvious it was a flop. The word of mouth was negative before, during and after the show aired. The general reaction and reception was very much reminiscent of Ghostbusters 2016 the movie that nobody wanted exactly like this show.

 

[The Crypto Guy]

It looks like the show wasn't the success that Amazon portrayed it as.

Only 37% Of Viewers Finished Amazon's 'Rings Of Power,' Which Is Very Bad

Despite a billion dollar spend, the report says that just 37% of viewers finished Amazon's Rings of Power.

www.forbes.com

Oh god, that is brutal. That's literally the definition of a complete failure with the amount of money they spent. And I remember some people actually thinking this was better and did better than House of the Dragon.

How do you even make a second season with that information?

 

[I am not exposed]

I didn't like Wheel of Time, either, but I found it more watchable than this show. At least early on, I could tell what WoT's basic plot was and wanted to understand what was going on. It got really dumb and I soured on it as it went along, but at least I started out thinking that it was decent and wanting to see where it went. This show was hard to get into and boring to me from the very first episode. The fundamental story wasn't good, IMO, whereas at least WoT's was (thanks to the novel that it was based on), even though it may've been mangled. That's my perspective, but we seem to agree that, either way, saying that one is better or more watchable than the other isn't saying much.

I concur.

The first episode of Wheel of Time at least had me somewhat intrigued. So much so I watched the second episode straight away. But I didn't finish the season as I just really stopped caring about the characters and each episode just seemed to get worse. The only character I had some interest in was the Asian warden and companion.

I didn't get past the first episode of 'Rings of Power'. Very boring and nothing about it intrigued me enough to keep watching. I can't even remember what happened in the first episode because it was so unmemorable!

 

[RandV]

Yeah that's not good. I enjoyed the series but I'm a fantasy nerd, I can see how it lacks appeal to a broader audience. There's so much more they could have done with a billion than just dropping that for the rights to the property before even getting to production.

 

[Tawnos]

Yeah that's not good. I enjoyed the series but I'm a fantasy nerd, I can see how it lacks appeal to a broader audience. There's so much more they could have done with a billion than just dropping that for the rights to the property before even getting to production.

I was just thinking the same thing. I also liked the season. I liked Wheel of Time too... but fantasy doesn't have broad appeal. Studios were fooled into thinking that it does because of the success of Game of Thrones, but GoT is barely a fantasy show.

 

[Make]

I was just thinking the same thing. I also liked the season. I liked Wheel of Time too... but fantasy doesn't have broad appeal. Studios were fooled into thinking that it does because of the success of Game of Thrones, but GoT is barely a fantasy show.

It's frustrating because both could have been a lot better imo. As a WoT book fan I think the first book had potential for a better adaptation. Then there were some issues with Covid restrictions and Mat's actor leaving mid season that dragged down the end of the season to a disappointing finish. It also didn't help that Amazon gave their version of GoT 8 episodes instead of 10 despite the source material being just as complex if not more than GoT.

RoP for me was an even bigger disappointment because I expected it to be Amazon's flagship product. It looked nice enough but was completely lacking in soul. I couldn't really get interested in any of the characters and mostly found them annoying. Angry Galadriel was an awful lead character. Then there was ridiculous stuff like surviving a pyroclastic cloud unharmed.

It shouldn't have been possible to make such mediocre shows from the source material but somehow they pulled it off.

edit: My point being that I don't think this was a failure of fantasy's appeal rather than a failure of production and writing.

 

[Tawnos]

It's frustrating because both could have been a lot better imo. As a WoT book fan I think the first book had potential for a better adaptation. Then there were some issues with Covid restrictions and Mat's actor leaving mid season that dragged down the end of the season to a disappointing finish. It also didn't help that Amazon gave their version of GoT 8 episodes instead of 10 despite the source material being just as complex if not more than GoT.

RoP for me was an even bigger disappointment because I expected it to be Amazon's flagship product. It looked nice enough but was completely lacking in soul. I couldn't really get interested in any of the characters and mostly found them annoying. Angry Galadriel was an awful lead character. Then there was ridiculous stuff like surviving a pyroclastic cloud unharmed.

It shouldn't have been possible to make such mediocre shows from the source material but somehow they pulled it off.

Angry Galadriel is great. Really, I have no issues with her at all. The journey from Angry Galadriel to Serene Galadriel is clearly the story they're telling and we only have the first chapter of that story. The only thing that's going to annoy me is if The Stranger really turns out to be Gandalf. Still holding out some foolish hope that they're misdirecting us. Overall, I enjoyed the season without being blown away by it. There were some missteps like the pyroclastic cloud and weird time gaps while riding horses, but like I said I liked it.

I'm looking forward to watching WoT with fresh eyes before season 2 comes out. Personally, I'm not against re-tellings of stories and changes that can come along with that. But I was in the midst of reading the series at the time and the changes to Perrin and Mat's backstories frustrated me. I've since finished the series, so I won't be clouded by that.

 

[Jussi]

I concur.

The first episode of Wheel of Time at least had me somewhat intrigued. So much so I watched the second episode straight away. But I didn't finish the season as I just really stopped caring about the characters and each episode just seemed to get worse. The only character I had some interest in was the Asian warden and companion.

I didn't get past the first episode of 'Rings of Power'. Very boring and nothing about it intrigued me enough to keep watching. I can't even remember what happened in the first episode because it was so unmemorable!

As someone who has not read the books, that show did not hook me until the 4th episode. It became much more enjoyable after that. Wasn't perfect but I liked the last episodes of the season. I'm looking forward to season 2. Much more than I am for season 2 of the topic of this thread...

 

[RandV]

I was just thinking the same thing. I also liked the season. I liked Wheel of Time too... but fantasy doesn't have broad appeal. Studios were fooled into thinking that it does because of the success of Game of Thrones, but GoT is barely a fantasy show.

If it's done well it can have broad appeal. Like the normal or extended edition movie version of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy has a run time comparable to a TV season, consider how much more exciting that was to to the TV show. That's mass appeal. While obviously you can't compare the budget of a TV show to a movie, the disappointing part here is with how much money they spent buying the property they pretty much could have.

While they paid the $$$ for the name brand, personally outside of big Tolkien nerds I just don't think there's that much appeal for more Middle Earth. The best story there has been told. Where Tolkien was influential outside his writing was in spawning imitations, he set the standard for what we consider 'fantasy' with the biggest imitator being Dungeons & Dragons. Why couldn't they have made a big budget D&D TV series? It's being well receieved in theatres right now, and also that's the best fantasy series on Prime already is the animated Legend of Vox Machina.

Or in my opinion what could be the next big thing in fantasy that is not part of the general public knowledge is Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive. It's got the problem of being too big for a movie and too expensive for a TV series, personally I think it would be perfect as an animated series with a style similar to Arcane. But I mean if Amazon had over a billion $$$ to blow trying to get the next GoT, they probably could have done the Stormlight Archives.

 

[Tawnos]

If it's done well it can have broad appeal. Like the normal or extended edition movie version of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy has a run time comparable to a TV season, consider how much more exciting that was to to the TV show. That's mass appeal. While obviously you can't compare the budget of a TV show to a movie, the disappointing part here is with how much money they spent buying the property they pretty much could have.

While they paid the $$$ for the name brand, personally outside of big Tolkien nerds I just don't think there's that much appeal for more Middle Earth. The best story there has been told. Where Tolkien was influential outside his writing was in spawning imitations, he set the standard for what we consider 'fantasy' with the biggest imitator being Dungeons & Dragons. Why couldn't they have made a big budget D&D TV series? It's being well receieved in theatres right now, and also that's the best fantasy series on Prime already is the animated Legend of Vox Machina.

Or in my opinion what could be the next big thing in fantasy that is not part of the general public knowledge is Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive. It's got the problem of being too big for a movie and too expensive for a TV series, personally I think it would be perfect as an animated series with a style similar to Arcane. But I mean if Amazon had over a billion $$$ to blow trying to get the next GoT, they probably could have done the Stormlight Archives.

I'm not convinced any of this would have mass appeal though (whatever my preference for Mistborn over Stormlight might be ).

Game of Thrones is the only highly successful fantasy TV show to date. The problem with trying to replicate that with other fantasy series is that GoT is mediocre fantasy mixed with broad, high quality political intrigue and most of the focus is on the intrigue and not the fantasy. Viewers loved the brutality, the sex, and the feeling that none of the characters were safe (a reputation unearned for experienced fantasy readers IMO). In other words, the things that made GoT popular with broad audiences aren't hallmarks of fantasy overall, but within the genre they're fairly specific to GoT.

The problem here is that little of those non-fantasy specific things that you see in GoT exists in LotR or WoT aside from political intrigue in WoT, which doesn't happen until later books. They don't especially fit the ethos of either series. But I also think the people in charge are aware of this, so they try to identify elements where they can bring it closer, like with introducing Tar Valon politics so early in the WoT series. All that serves to do is muddy the waters and make the product more unfocused than it could be.

 

[RandV]

I'm not convinced any of this would have mass appeal though (whatever my preference for Mistborn over Stormlight might be ).

Game of Thrones is the only highly successful fantasy TV show to date. The problem with trying to replicate that with other fantasy series is that GoT is mediocre fantasy mixed with broad, high quality political intrigue and most of the focus is on the intrigue and not the fantasy. Viewers loved the brutality, the sex, and the feeling that none of the characters were safe (a reputation unearned for experienced fantasy readers IMO). In other words, the things that made GoT popular with broad audiences aren't hallmarks of fantasy overall, but within the genre they're fairly specific to GoT.

The problem here is that little of those non-fantasy specific things that you see in GoT exists in LotR or WoT aside from political intrigue in WoT, which doesn't happen until later books. They don't especially fit the ethos of either series. But I also think the people in charge are aware of this, so they try to identify elements where they can bring it closer, like with introducing Tar Valon politics so early in the WoT series. All that serves to do is muddy the waters and make the product more unfocused than it could be.

I like the Mistborn series for the big screen personally, which Sanderson is trying to make happen but with difficulty getting a good script is making a stab at it himself. In general though while I maybe wouldn't bet on Stormlight Archive having 'mass appeal', consider what big geek properties have it: Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Harry Potter, Game of Thrones. If anything else here can crack it why I'd pick Sanderson's work is while also being a damn good stories the guy is a master world builder making his worlds distinctly unique. Then having a reputation as the 'magic systems guy' for the mass appeal angle he drops in something akin to 'fantasy Jedi' into those worlds.

Geeking out some more the way I internalize it is if you use Star Wars OT to reference these big fantasy series Tolkien is A New Hope with the classic hero's journey, GRRM is ESB with the dark & gritty ending where Han gets frozen in carbonite and Luke gets his hand chopped off, Sanderson is RotJ an inspirational ending with Vader redeeming himself killing the emperor to save his son.

 

[Tawnos]

I like the Mistborn series for the big screen personally, which Sanderson is trying to make happen but with difficulty getting a good script is making a stab at it himself. In general though while I maybe wouldn't bet on Stormlight Archive having 'mass appeal', consider what big geek properties have it: Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Harry Potter, Game of Thrones. If anything else here can crack it why I'd pick Sanderson's work is while also being a damn good stories the guy is a master world builder making his worlds distinctly unique. Then having a reputation as the 'magic systems guy' for the mass appeal angle he drops in something akin to 'fantasy Jedi' into those worlds.

Geeking out some more the way I internalize it is if you use Star Wars OT to reference these big fantasy series Tolkien is A New Hope with the classic hero's journey, GRRM is ESB with the dark & gritty ending where Han gets frozen in carbonite and Luke gets his hand chopped off, Sanderson is RotJ an inspirational ending with Vader redeeming himself killing the emperor to save his son.

Consider some things with the properties you mentioned.

Lord of the Rings: Essentially first in its genre (fantasy books)
Star Wars: Essentially first in its genre (sci fi/fantasy movies)
Harry Potter: First real exposure to reading for an entire generation
Game of Thrones: already mentioned what sets it apart, and essentially first in its genre (fantasy TV)

There are X factors that just don't exist on most other properties. I really like Sanderson, but without any of those factors, I don't see his stuff having the success we're talking about. Keep in mind, I'm not saying it won't have success. It'll just be genre success. That's good enough for me and maybe you, but it's not what Amazon is looking for... especially with the LotR stuff.

 

[Hivemind]

Lord of the Rings: Essentially first in its genre (fantasy books)
Star Wars: Essentially first in its genre (sci fi/fantasy movies)
Harry Potter: First real exposure to reading for an entire generation
Game of Thrones: already mentioned what sets it apart, and essentially first in its genre (fantasy TV)

?????

Each of these were pivotal landmarks in their respective genres, but none of them were firsts.

 

[Tawnos]

?????

Each of these were pivotal landmarks in their respective genres, but none of them were firsts.

Sorry, amend Lord of the Rings to high fantasy, which is what people typically mean when discussing the fantasy genre this way... but obviously Alice in Wonderland, Wizard of Oz, Sword in the Stone, George MacDonald, etc came before Lord of the Rings.

There's a reason I was using essentially though. Probably should've explained that. I didn't mean first in chronological time, I meant first more as in first experience. So while there were works like them that came out before, these were first for the wider culture, the result of which was the creation of franchises surrounding them. In the context of this discussion (what books have a chance of doing well on the level Amazon is looking for), I think this is important.

My fault for not using more precise language.

 

[Hivemind]

Sorry, amend Lord of the Rings to high fantasy, which is what people typically mean when discussing the fantasy genre this way... but obviously Alice in Wonderland, Wizard of Oz, Sword in the Stone, George MacDonald, etc came before Lord of the Rings.

LOTR didn't invent High Fantasy, either. It was absolutely a pivotal work in high fantasy that has served as an archetype for many other authors and stories since, but it wasn't the first. Depending on exactly how you define it, you can source it back thousands of years (including The Iliad and the Odyssey) to the Dark Ages (Beowulf and Arthurian legends), or to late 19th and early 20th century works (Phantastes, The Well at the World's End, the Oz series, and some of HP Lovecraft's more narrative-focused works - such as The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath).

There's a reason I was using essentially though. Probably should've explained that. I didn't mean first in chronological time, I meant first more as in first experience. So while there were works like them that came out before, these were first for the wider culture, the result of which was the creation of franchises surrounding them. In the context of this discussion (what books have a chance of doing well on the level Amazon is looking for), I think this is important.

My fault for not using more precise language.

In that distinction they get the "first" title in a post-hoc fashion because of their success. That, in itself, renders the distinction without predictive power. You're essentially viewing them as different because of survivorship bias. Any future successful fantasy adaptations suddenly become a new "first" in whatever slight permutation they have.

 

[Tawnos]

LOTR didn't invent High Fantasy, either. It was absolutely a pivotal work in high fantasy that has served as an archetype for many other authors and stories since, but it wasn't the first. Depending on exactly how you define it, you can source it back thousands of years (including The Iliad and the Odyssey) to the Dark Ages (Beowulf and Arthurian legends), or to late 19th and early 20th century works (Phantastes, The Well at the World's End, the Oz series, and some of HP Lovecraft's more narrative-focused works - such as The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath).


In that distinction they get the "first" title in a post-hoc fashion because of their success. That, in itself, renders the distinction without predictive power. You're essentially viewing them as different because of survivorship bias. Any future successful fantasy adaptations suddenly become a new "first" in whatever slight permutation they have.

I'm not that interested in getting into a semantics discussion about what defines a genre. This whole conversation is about success. If you want to just limit it to "first achieve mainstream success" or whatever, I don't really care. It's not really important to my point. RandV is who brought up those properties and I think it's hard at this point to compare them.

What I'm trying to say with all of this is that, at this point, these series have a built in advantage that newer shows and movies aren't going to get. Without that advantage, I'm skeptical that we'll see any crossover success on newer properties and I think that's especially true in the fragmented entertainment market we live in today. Established franchises will always have an easier time punching through those walls than genre authors like Sanderson. They could make a fairly high quality version of his works, but the chances of it being any bigger than Locke and Key (to use an example of a quality fantasy TV show that isn't especially well-known) are pretty small. Game of Thrones managed it because of the other factors I mentioned: brutality, sex, political intrigue, and severe limits on the amount of fantasy being shown.

On some level, I think that's what we're seeing across the board in the fantasy genre. Geeks are going to watch and there's money to be made there, but there isn't Game of Thrones money to be made on these properties. And if you add quality issues to the mix? You're not even going to get as much of that geek money as you could and you're not going to keep crossover viewers on existing properties either.

 

[Hivemind]

I'm not that interested in getting into a semantics discussion about what defines a genre. This whole conversation is about success. If you want to just limit it to "first achieve mainstream success" or whatever, I don't really care. It's not really important to my point. RandV is who brought up those properties and I think it's hard at this point to compare them.

What I'm trying to say with all of this is that, at this point, these series have a built in advantage that newer shows and movies aren't going to get. Without that advantage, I'm skeptical that we'll see any crossover success on newer properties and I think that's especially true in the fragmented entertainment market we live in today. Established franchises will always have an easier time punching through those walls than genre authors like Sanderson. They could make a fairly high quality version of his works, but the chances of it being any bigger than Locke and Key (to use an example of a quality fantasy TV show that isn't especially well-known) are pretty small. Game of Thrones managed it because of the other factors I mentioned: brutality, sex, political intrigue, and severe limits on the amount of fantasy being shown.

On some level, I think that's what we're seeing across the board in the fantasy genre. Geeks are going to watch and there's money to be made there, but there isn't Game of Thrones money to be made on these properties. And if you add quality issues to the mix? You're not even going to get as much of that geek money as you could and you're not going to keep crossover viewers on existing properties either.

My point is - you can say that before each of these franchises debuted as well, though. You're defining their "first" status and "built in advantage" based on them having success. Thing is, they didn't have that status until they found that success. Just as Lord of the Rings didn't preclude Game of Thrones or Harry Potter from finding success much afterwards, these franchises don't stop other IPs from finding success. Your argument is akin to someone in the mid-2000s making a statement about how Batman already has an established success in theaters, and that Marvel movies wouldn't have that same advantage.

As another example - Harry Potter is neither the first nor last young adult fantasy series to jump from the pages to the screens. It came well after The Never Ending Story, and Twilight and Hunger Games followed Harry Potter as wildly popular young adult transitions (with Twilight also ticking the fantasy box) to the screen in the years that followed. They may not have quite the same lasting power, but both have box office gross over $1.3B for their franchises (and the top two Hunger Games movies each grossed more than any individual Harry Potter movie).

Do I think Stormlight Archives has that level of crossover appeal? Not particularly. But I also never thought that the MCU would become the most dominant force in media. I do think fantasy video game adaptations might prove to be more fruitful (with something like the ever-rumored but always-denied Netflix Zelda adaptation being a potential leap). The Witcher, which is both book and video game, did very well as a streaming-level hit on Netflix, with crossover appeal propelling it to the #1 slot on the platform for more than a year (albeit spurning book fans with season 2, and its subsequent spinoff series being terribly received), and season 1 still ranks as the 3rd most viewed season of any Netflix release in its first 28 days.

 

[Jack Straw]

LOTR didn't invent High Fantasy, either. It was absolutely a pivotal work in high fantasy that has served as an archetype for many other authors and stories since, but it wasn't the first.

Well, I'm not sure that LoTR should even be considered "high fantasy". My understanding is that high fantasy is set in an alternate, fictional, world- like Game of Thrones. "Low fantasy" (actually a thing apparently) is set on earth, in the real world. LoTR is set on Earth, roughly 4000 BC. I don't think the phrase "high fantasy" existed at the time he wrote it, but I suspect Tolkein would object to the term (he objected to a lot of things people said about his work). I realize this is kind of a semantic argument but I would call Tolkein's work fictional mythology, or even fictional folk tales. Much more in line with things like the Nibelungenlied than with Game of Thrones or other "high fantasy".

Sorry, I'll get off my soapbox now.

 

[RandV]

Well, I'm not sure that LoTR should even be considered "high fantasy". My understanding is that high fantasy is set in an alternate, fictional, world- like Game of Thrones. "Low fantasy" (actually a thing apparently) is set on earth, in the real world. LoTR is set on Earth, roughly 4000 BC. I don't think the phrase "high fantasy" existed at the time he wrote it, but I suspect Tolkein would object to the term (he objected to a lot of things people said about his work). I realize this is kind of a semantic argument but I would call Tolkein's work fictional mythology, or even fictional folk tales. Much more in line with things like the Nibelungenlied than with Game of Thrones or other "high fantasy".

Sorry, I'll get off my soapbox now.

I get what you're saying, so someone like Neil Gaiman is 'low fantasy'... but it seems like a very loose technicality to drop LotR into that category. Apart from the name "Middle Earth" nothing about it in any way resembles Earth. Who knows what Tolkien would say but if you just read the books without any of the behind the scenes back story you'd call it 'high fantasy'.