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Why Elon Musk is mad at The Rings of Power and what is review bombing

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Why Elon Musk is mad at The Rings of Power and what is review bombing

“Tolkien will be turning in his grave”: in the Italian evening yesterday (Monday, September 5), Elon Musk tweeted like this, receiving over 21 thousand retweets and over 210 thousand likes and thousands and thousands of comments. In which he himself has increased the dose: “More or less every male character seen so far is a coward, an idiot or both. Only Galadriel is braveintelligent and nice “.

Tesla’s number one, notoriously fond of fantasy, as well as technology, was referring to The Rings of Powerthe tv series set in the world of the Lord of the Rings produced by Amazon and available in streaming on Prime Video from 2 September. And Musk isn’t the only one who thinks she isn’t beautiful, compelling, or otherwise fitting for the name she bears. That she has disappointed expectations, in short.

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Review bombing and review blocking

It’s a problem that Amazon is also well aware of: the ecommerce giant, after spending nearly $ 500 million just to make 8 episodes that make up the first season, blocked the possibility for subscribers to review it for a few days. A little bit is not to see the series massacred by negative commentsbut there is not only this: there is also the problem of the so-called review bombing.

This term, which has been in the Internet dictionary for more or less 5 years, indicates the storm of reviews (usually negative) that hit a product to cripple it and prevent its success. It concerns the most diverse areas: in 2019 it hit Family Link, the Google app used by parents to control children’s smartphones; on Maps, bathing establishments that do not accept animals are victims (for example); during the pandemic there were many cases of review bombing against Italian bars, restaurants and shops asking for the Green Pass to customers. As you can understand, review bombing strikes regardless of the actual quality of the product: you give a low or very low rating to a restaurant not because you eat badly in that restaurant, but because the owner has taken an unwelcome position on something.

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Also to Rings of Power it went like this: to date, despite the intervention of Amazon, the series has a very low rating on Rotten Tomatoes (just 39%) and as well on the Internet Movie Database, which by the way is owned by Amazon: 6.8 out of 10with nearly 25% of people giving it an objectively incomprehensible 1.

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What is the problem with The Rings of Power

Why is all this happening? What’s wrong with this series, seen by anyway 25 million people on the day of the debut and instead much appreciated by critics?

According to Tolkien fans, the reasons are mainly two, which are actually two sides of the same problem: the (alleged) non-fidelity to the works of the British writer. Which mainly materializes in two aspects: one of the protagonists is an elf, but he has dark skin. He is an African American elfsomething perhaps inconceivable in the 1940s (when The Lord of the Rings it was written), but today quite normal. The other problem, well underlined by Musk, is the strong and decisive one presence of female characters: not only Galadriel, but also Nori, Poppy and Bronwyn. Again: inconceivable in the 1940s (the whole world of Middle-earth is definitely male-driven), but normal nowadays.

This is about review bombing and those very low ratings given for no reason, but there is more. There is that the series is actually less pleasant than expected: at least in the first two episodes it is slow, with little rhythm and few noteworthy moments. But there was some to be expected that it would be like this: The Silmarillion, the book from which it is (roughly) drawn, is itself slow, with little rhythm and few noteworthy moments. It is boring, in short. But this Tolkien fans knew. The real ones, of course.

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