Amazon has invoked a pause on reviews of Prime Video content at a time when its “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” is awash in bad reviews.
The pause was noted by The Verge, which explained that the policy was originally designed to prevent so-called review bombing in which one movie or show is flooded with terrible reviews.
The Verge said Amazon explained through a representative that the idea was to be sure bots were not taking over the reviews.
Bad reviews are a fact of life though, for the show that offers a new take on the “Lord of the Rings” saga. Amazon has said its 25 million global viewers in the day it premiered is a very positive sign.
Rings of Power is so bad.
I couldn’t even laugh at how bad it was because I got a headache in the first five minutes trying to process what I was watching.This series is an insult to the intelligence of anyone who has ever read a book or watched a movie.#RingsOfPower
— Hylia Yggdrasil (@Hylia_Yggdrasil) September 2, 2022
House of Dragons is Bad, Rings of Power is Bad.
Turns out Wokism just turns everything it touches into just bad.
— Kibs (@CapnKibs) September 3, 2022
Over at The Hollywood Reporter, the news is that the show has “overwhelming negative reviews.”
The site Rotten Tomatoes gives the first episodes a 2.4 audience score.
For example, a reviewer named Brendan C, opined, “The writers are stunningly incompetent in that they do not know how to construct a narrative. The problem is not just that there are too many storylines, although there are, but that none of them would work on its own.”
Oh and the map of middle earth were good.
— 1/4 Black Garrett (@QTRBlackGarrett) September 1, 2022
“Each is dramatically inert and wanders without clear direction; one character spends an entire episode backtracking on an earlier choice just to get back to where they started. In addition to this, there is an overreliance on dialogue which is not nearly as impressive as the writers clearly think it is,” he wrote.
“It’s really amazing that so much work went into something so bad. I like the actors, and the effects and costumes are well made, but there are fundamental failings of character and story,” he wrote.
Some attacked the critics.
Funny how racist trolls are mad at Rings of Power for changing the “author’s vision” by casting POC, but are ALSO mad at the Sandman series for casting POC, even though the author Neil Gaiman says that’s what he wants.
Maybe it’s not about “the author’s vision” after all. ?
— Dr. Erik Wade (@erik_kaars) September 3, 2022
A reviewer using the initials MT was terse.
“I’m really disappointed in this — I was up for it in a big way (big Tolkien fan) but this show is so bad in just about every conceivable way that I think it’s best to just forget it exists and move on,” MT wrote.
Over at IMDB, more than 25 percent of those rating the production gave is a one on a 10-point scale.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.