The Rings of Power’s ‘Adar’ gets closer to the ideal Lord of the Rings show

It's fair to say the first two episodes of Amazon Studios’ The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power left me underwhelmed. The approach J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay took to adapting J.R.R. Tolkien’s world in “A Shadow of the Past” and “Adrift” struck me as paradoxically over- and undercooked, with too many plot threads and too few new ideas. Where was the clearly defined quest set against a lived-in world brimming with unexplored new vistas that defined Tolkien’s own work? Waiting just around the corner in the Prime Video series’ third episode, “Adar,” as it turns out.

https://www.polygon.com