House of Dragons VS Rings of Power

[Huntn]

I was going to title this:
Why is House of Dragons > Rings of Power?
…then I realized that not everyone may feel this way.

Anyway, I’ll proceed based on my opinion that HoD is better.

• story execution +HoD
• pacing +HoD
• acting =
• direction ?

House of Dragons Season 1 is the setup for the coming war over succession. It included 2 breaks that push the story ahead 16 years. Actually I have thought the story was on the slow side, and I think the breaks made it feel more like a flashback. But as I acclimated to the new characters, I appreciated the timing, and the story seems to grow in gravity, with the last episode full of tension with a significant event, making me want more.

Rings of Power Season 1 has good acting, great scenery, but the story seems abbreviated, possibly a bit too simplistic, and I’ve questioned some of the lore. It strikes me as not bringing anything new and memorial to the franchise.

 

[JBGoode]

I've already stated my feelings about RoP in other threads so for me it's no contest. House of the Dragon is superior in every single way as far as I'm concerned. I do hope the rumors I've heard about the RoP show-runners being sidelined are true and that Amazon can salvage the mess they made for future seasons. I don't want RoP to fail, but after a stunningly bad season one I'm having a hard time imagining how they are going fix it.

Anyway:

House of the Dragon- fantastic acting, scenery, dialogue, plot. It was a bit boring in spots and the time jumps were annoying but I had no major complaints with the first season even the really dark episodes that looked fine to me. I still haven't watched the finale but I expect to be satisfied.

Rings of Power - great scenery, mostly good acting but the dialogue is truly horrible in places where they're trying to sound Tokien-ish and failing miserably. Pacing is horrible with a lot of irrelevant scenes that should have been cut - the amateurishness really shows here. Very questionable story choices that include drastic change in character personalities (Galadriel) and lore. The whole thing w/Mount Doom, the eruption, and the fact that anyone survived it is one of the stupidest things I've seen on television in a long time. The whole thing felt like a medieval fantasy CW drama and not what it could have been. It was not Tolkien.

 

[mischief]

GoT lost me with their rape obsession. I have zero interest in seeing how they used to rape in Ye Olde Westeros. Matt Smith was already eyebrows deep in the "creepy older guy paired with suspiciously young girl" with Doctor Who. This is def not an improvement.

RoP, much like She-Hulk, Captain Marvel, Wandavision and the Disney SW trilogy does the unforgiveable by having strong female leads and challenging the egoes of geek/nerd gatekeepers worldwide.

So far as I have verified against Silmarilion and the numerous reports that a huge body of unpublished notes were made available exclusively for production I don't really have any complaints outside of the voluminous and bilious reaction of Fanbois that have no room for anything they haven't already seen.

 

[Huntn]

I've already stated my feelings about RoP in other threads so for me it's no contest. House of the Dragon is superior in every single way as far as I'm concerned. I do hope the rumors I've heard about the RoP show-runners being sidelined are true and that Amazon can salvage the mess they made for future seasons. I don't want RoP to fail, but after a stunningly bad season one I'm having a hard time imagining how they are going fix it.

Anyway:

House of the Dragon- fantastic acting, scenery, dialogue, plot. It was a bit boring in spots and the time jumps were annoying but I had no major complaints with the first season even the really dark episodes that looked fine to me. I still haven't watched the finale but I expect to be satisfied.

Rings of Power - great scenery, mostly good acting but the dialogue is truly horrible in places where they're trying to sound Tokien-ish and failing miserably. Pacing is horrible with a lot of irrelevant scenes that should have been cut - the amateurishness really shows here. Very questionable story choices that include drastic change in character personalities (Galadriel) and lore. The whole thing w/Mount Doom, the eruption, and the fact that anyone survived it is one of the stupidest things I've seen on television in a long time. The whole thing felt like a medieval fantasy CW drama and not what it could have been. It was not Tolkien.

Rings of Power- The creation of Mt Doom was far fetched, whose idea was that? If Mithril is more than strong light weight metal, maybe, I’ve not researched this as compared to lore. In the LOTR trilogy (movie) it simply said 19 ring were gifted to elves, dwarves, and men with one secret master ring that controls them all. Now I don’t know how close this is to lore, but it sounds good to me as compared to the story here.

 

[dmr727]

I feel like these two are comparable only in the sense that they're in the fantasy genre. House of Dragons is the better written and acted show IMO, but I found enjoyment and disappointment in both too.

My wife absolutely loved GoT (until the last season, of course!) and is somewhat enjoying HoD, but has no use at all for the LotR universe. Not the books, the movies, or RoP. Like many nerds I enjoy both, but I think my wife demonstrates that these shows might scratch different itches. She loves the soap opera-like backstabbing and political maneuvering in GoT, whereas her review of Peter Jackson's LotR trilogy is essentially, "It's pretty, but it's just a bunch of people walking around from place to place, there's a CGI battle, then they walk somewhere else. And I really don't like all that flowery elf s**t."

 

[Huntn]

I feel like these two are comparable only in the sense that they're in the fantasy genre. House of Dragons is the better written and acted show IMO, but I found enjoyment and disappointment in both too.

My wife absolutely loved GoT (until the last season, of course!) and is somewhat enjoying HoD, but has no use at all for the LotR universe. Not the books, the movies, or RoP. Like many nerds I enjoy both, but I think my wife demonstrates that these shows might scratch different itches. She loves the soap opera-like backstabbing and political maneuvering in GoT, whereas her review of Peter Jackson's LotR trilogy is essentially, "It's pretty, but it's just a bunch of people walking around from place to place, there's a CGI battle, then they walk somewhere else. And I really don't like all that flowery elf s**t."

What?? 😲 They are on a mission to destroy a ring, not just any ring, but The Master Evil Ring, against Great odds, the Evil Mastermind and everyone’s after them!! Explain to her that this is an amazing adventure!! Most interesting, when I read the books, I was utterly enchanted with all things elvish, especially Rivendell.

​

Mysteriously, my wife has reacted in the same way GoT, HotD 👍, LOTR, RoP 👎. 🤔 I’ll assume that the possibly is that, not have been vested in the books can make a difference?