I'll admit when I first heard about this project it certainly had my attention, but sweet Jesus Lord Of The Rings is already a niche, anime even more so a niche, so combining the two is a bold move shall we say. Set roughly 200 years before The War Of The Ring we follow the rule of Helm Hammerhand and more importantly his daughter Hera, who when confronted by the son of a rival clan to claim the throne are pushed beyond both's limits in a quest to reclaim a homeland and slay a few Mumakils along the way. And for a runtime of over 2 hours they don't really rush any part of it, however I can absolutely say that the overall writing in all aspects needed some work. Not that it's bad exactly, but just needed some extra polish. Obviously I'm an easy ass sell for redhaired badasses, and Gaia Wise as Hera is a good lead that is both easy to understand and easy to cheer on but what surprised me was she's not action hero all the time, she gets beat, she gets kidnapped, she has moments of sadness and distress but when push comes to shove she ain't backing down. Brian Cox as Hammerhand does indeed command respect and to see any adaptation of this famed figure of the expanded history of Middle-Earth is damn cool to see and a plot point regarding him once they reach Helm's Deep was easily my favorite part of the film. Luke Pasqualino as Wulf, oh my God this is zero percent the actor's fault but this antagonist is so one note and completely uninteresting, always the relentless warmongering mad dog when I genuinely thought the relationship between him and Hera would have added some much much needed dimension to get better invested in the story, but alas. Also shoutout to Miranda Otto for being our narrator, you still friggin' rock! The animation is...interesting, often combining 3D backgrounds with 2D characters leading to the result being a sometimes janky but serviceable style, that still lends itself to some gorgeous scenery and can lean into more visually striking fights than live action could deliver. The score is decent, and I won't lie hearing the Rohan theme on theater sound systems after 21 years was beautiful. But yeah, the story and characters while decent didn't pack nearly the punch the trilogy did and just to piss off a select few of the fandom, I'd rather watch Rings Of Power again though that is highly unfair comparing a series to a singular film, it is unequivocably true for me. And doing a pinky finger's worth of research to learn this movie was made entirely just so New Line Cinema wouldn't lose the Lord Of The Rings rights really doesn't do this movie any favors in the long run. It absolutely leans into the visual style of those films from the Oliphaunts, to another Watcher in the water, exact copies of Edoras and Helm's Deep in terms of architecture, Orthanc popping up at a point, some lines of dialogue are similar but not exact to quotes from the trilogy, may or may not be a welcome surprise cameo from one of the classics, and that's all cool to see do not get me wrong. I'm a fucking nerd for this stuff and have been since I was 6 or 7 so trust in me when I say I did not walk in to slash and hack this movie. It's decent, it's okay, undoubtedly for megafans of this series to even watch in the first place, and hey man it is entirely feasible for many to walk out of this more happy than I was. I give it 2.5 stars, 7/10! What a week, and thankfully next week will be much easier with just an In Retrospect and new release to a highly anticipated video game series.
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