The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is in a peculiar state at the moment, with half the fandom trying to convince everybody else that the Amazon adaptation is an absolute travesty of Middle-earth and all it stands for, and the other half hoping that the show will manage to turn this middling streak on its head and rise to the bar Peter Jackson set all those years ago with his trilogy.
As the community continues to wonder exactly where The Rings of Power rates in their personal listicles, House of the Dragon showrunner Ryan Condal has addressed all those rivalry comments. Check it out below during today’s roundup of Lord of the Rings developments.
How the ‘Rings’ crew created that epic Mount Doom sequence
With its budget just falling short of $1 billion, The Rings of Power is the most expensive production in the history of the entertainment industry, and that certainly shows in the breathtaking visuals and seamless CGI that accompanies each episode. The most extreme flaunting of Jeff Bezos’ blank cheque for showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay showed itself in the sixth episode, “Udûn,” when Mount Doom erupted and created the lands of Mordor. Now, the show’s director of photography has broken down the elements comprising that scene, and they’re neat enough to blow your mind. Who knew that it would take so much work just to showcase a one-minute cataclysm?
‘House of the Dragon’ showrunner reaffirms there’s no rivalry with ‘The Rings of Power’
Since becoming a worldwide phenomenon in the early 2010s, Game of Thrones fans have pitted it against Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, but that literary rivalry has never been as strong as it is in 2022 when both House of the Dragon and The Rings of Power are airing in the exact same time window. The former’s showrunner doesn’t see it like that, however, noting that the two shows fuel one another. “One feeds the other,” Condal tells TheWrap, reaffirming the wonderful era that fantasy fans live in at the moment.
‘Rings of Power’ fans are still awestruck by the show’s visual prowess
Even if you find it difficult to praise The Rings of Power for its narrative or character arcs, you can’t deny that the show is absolutely gorgeous to behold. Unbelievable, even. From the epic prologue that gave us a glimpse of the War of Wrath against Morgoth, to the amazing vistas of Lindon and the Southlands, not to mention Numenor, Amazon’s take on Middle-earth is in no shortage of aesthetic value. We can only hope that as the show pushes forward in its planned five-season run, the quality of the story manages to catch up to these amazing visuals.