The Vanity Fair Article

I read the Vanity Fair article over Rings of Power and I have concerns. I don't have concerns over the diversity of the cast or the inclusion of more femme characters, so if you're here for that, you're not going to get it. I'm fine with both.

I am, however, concerned with three things mentioned in the article. I know the article isn't the set-in-stone facts of the show so I'm keeping an open mind. However, I am still concerned. 

The first issue is the way they're condensing time. I knew they would have to, given that the Second Age spans several thousand years with lots of time spent between major events. I knew we would mostly see the highlights. However, condensing things to one extended event that happens in the lifespan of our human characters is not the way I would have gone about it. It's not logical. 

I thought the way they would do it would be to have their Elves as the main and consistent cast with a revolving cast of the other races. Honestly, that would have shown the time passage in a really smooth, if heart-wrenching way. And the thing is, that kind of IS one of the themes of the Second Age. Elrond loses his twin and then watches generations of his twin's family be born, grow up, and die. Losing people he loves is the basic theme of Elrond's life, really, culminating in his loss of his daughter during the Third Age. 

This brings me to my next concern, actually. They described Elrond as politically ambitious. I guess that could mean a lot of things, but to my mind, it seems that he is trying to GAIN power, which, again, is not in any way how this character is presented. Elrond has royal blood from several different royal families and he was raised by his kidnapdads foster fathers to rule. He never wanted that though or at the very least, felt it wasn't his place. Instead, he supported Gil's rule and advised him. Eventually, this leads to him ruling his own area, but not by his own ambitions. 

The person who is ambitious to rule during the Second Age is Galadriel. And look, I'm not saying that in a bad way. It seems to me that Melian used Galadriel's time in Doriath (where she was basically an unofficial political hostage) to teach her to rule, to be the next Melian, given that Melian probably knew on some level her own sojourn in Middle Earth was coming to an end.  

I felt like Galadriel's plotline in this series was the easiest to translate from the book. She founds a city with her husband and asks her second cousin to come help them run things. Her cousin makes some seriously bad decisions and they fight about it.  She ends up leaving the city after his political overthrow and goes to live with one of her husband's kinsmen. Later her cousin realizes he made some seriously horrible mistake and gives her a Ring as a way to make amends. It is an emotionally intense plotline with a full gambit of emotions. There is no need to change from this.

And you know, maybe it's still there. I know there is a lot of secrecy around the show and they don't want to spoil things for people. Second Age has one of the best Villain Reveals ever and if they can pull it off, they can probably make the show a masterpiece. To do that, they probably do need to keep some details obscured at this point.

No matter what they do, I'm still going to watch the show. My tastes often skew from other people and the general hype around things (I happen to love Sims 4's Star Wars game pack, for instance), and know that there will be things I probably love about Rings of Power.

Okay, actually, I'll be honest here. All they have to do is make Sauron delightfully evil and I'll be happy. As long as his evil is keeping me entertained, I should be fine.