I think this will be a controversial movie. The story is about grief and can only be understood if you take it as an allegory. If you try to understand it at face value, you will be confused and disappointed, like some of the commenters here. By the way, this is kind of storytelling is not that far fetched from Ghibli movies, but this is certainly not as easy to consume as Totoro, for example. As someone who lost two parents a year ago, this was highly emotional for me and it made a lot of sense.
It's not the worst movie, but doesn't live up to the original by any means. The biggest problem is that the whole premise is a plot device and the characters also make completely unfounded decisions just to move the plot forward.
I was quite skeptical when I heard about the absurdly high budget, but after two episodes I'm pretty optimistic about this show. The simple concept of seeing the events that took place before the events of LoTR actually works really well. The CGI is tasteful and looks nice, instead of tacky and in-your-face (which was a real risk with this budget...). They also weren't afraid of using practical effects where appropriate and that really elevates the overall visuals.
Old characters are built to show the beginnings of the arc they arrive at when we see them in LoTR much later. New characters have realistic motives. Politics are sensible from all sides. What's too early to judge just after two episodes: will there be apt character development and a sensible story arc? I hope so.
I'm also pretty happy about the casting, especially Morfydd Clark who really shines as Galadriel. To people complaining about the diversity: this didn't even cross my mind when watching. If you have a problem with it, ask yourself why. Hint: It's a "you" problem and the word begins with a big fat R.
I have to admit I was kind of rooting for Amazon to fail at this just because I have so many problems with what Amazon is. But setting that aside, this is a very promising show and worth watching.
I wanted to like this movie but I just couldn't. The concept of the Multiverse is interesting, but it was simply used as a device to get out dead ends due to lazy writing and lack of foresight. There is always a bigger gun, there is always secret magical book, there is always yet another copy of the book after it was destroyed.... Nothing has any consequence. It all felt like something I would have written when I was 12 years old. The dialogs barely made any sense, most of the time they were just word salad. Very, very disappointing for the franchise. The only interesting character was America but she was merely a plot device.
I'm waaay overdue watching this, and finally did. In 2022, so many movies and TV shows spoon-feed the narrative to the viewers: look, this is the bad guy, he's doing evil stuff and looks evil. This is the good guy: he may have flaws, but he's just human, you know? Or here's a guy you originally thought was evil, but turns out that he was just hurt badly. Character development, because he's good, actually.
Watching BSG in 2022 is a breath of fresh air. The characters are complex, multi-dimensional. They make mistakes and more importantly: those mistakes have consequences. There is a lot of nuance in the relationships between the characters and the writers kept these relationships extremely consistent.
There is also real character development. Not only for the better: very often, quite the opposite. These changes are real: they affect the story and the characters relationships as well. And why wouldn't some people change for the worse? They are experiencing unprecedented hardships, injustice and tragedy.
Finally, something we don't see often: the story is a complete arc. I'm not claiming that the writers knew from the start where the story would end up, but they had a lot of foresight. So when the finale came, it felt complete, logical, like things were flowing in that direction from the beginning.
