Lord of the Rings - [Amazon] *Spoilers*

sekiro

Where is the story coming from that IMDB have removed all reviews lower than 6 stars?

Right now I see that the show has 31.9% 10/10 reviews and 24.4% 1/10 reviews. Of course we all agree that those 1 star reviews are bots/trolls/incels/racists/sexists and the 10 star reviews are all legitimate users who watched the show and are giving a thoughtful take on things, right?

What is pretty interesting from IMDB is that they have a "top 1000 voters" section which is the 1000 people who submit the most ratings on IMDB as a whole. Their score for Rings of Power is 6.6. This is actually LOWER than the IMDB score for all users at 6.8.

Makes me wonder at the validity of claims of review bombing, bots, trolls etc if IMDBs top 1000 users are giving it a 6.6 but the bot and troll army is not able to drive the total user score lower than that.

I noticed also that the rating from US and non US is the same at 6.5.

Interesting that the rating is 6.5 from males and 7.4 from females BUT females under 18 give it a lower score (6.3) than males under 18 (7.2) which also removes the idea of this being just dumb boys angry at "diversity" or whatever. For over 18s there is still around a 1 star difference in the over all ratings between males and females.

Not sure why mainstream media outlets are so obsessed with the narratives of "review bombing" when even a quick bit of research into the stats shows that the 6.8 rating is actually very strongly supported by an overwhelming majority of 10/10s rather than being dragged down by loads of 1/10 bots. Only 28% of ratings are in the 8 to 3 star range.

I see now that in fact IMDB has actually removed ALL written user reviews that give the show anything less than 6 stars. So people can give the show a rating of anything between 1 and 10 but cannot leave a written review unless it's a 6 or higher.

WOW! That is really screwed up.

Check out this amazing 10 star review...

"Better than GOT & HOD.

This series respects source material very well, dont listen to the naysayers. The production quality is simply the greatest in the world. The story is very compelling. The dilogues are written by a poet. Every line spoken is gold standard. ........ One thing can not be more true- this is a extremely underrated series. The rating should have been atleast above 9. The cast is just great. No cast member seems unnecessary. The series is just like Peter jacksons movies but only longer. I did not come across a single thing or a single sentence that seemed unecessary. Overall one of the greatest shows i have ever watched."

Hahaha. Wow.

Love this comment from another 10/10 review the best though "As a REAL Tolkien fan, I couldn't have asked for any better. Anyone who complains otherwise isn't a Tolkien fan."

OK then.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (TV Series 2022– ) - User ratings - IMDb

sekiro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119579115#Comment_119579115

I find it to be a kind of fascinating approach to marketing. I would guess that for TV Shows and movies word of mouth can be such a strong driver of revenue. I think of how many times a friend or colleague has tried to convince me to give this show or that movie a try. I can imagine that being repeated millions of times all over the place. The flip side of that would be the damage that negative word of mouth can do to a show. Is it unrealistic to think that with years of access to data and market research companies have figured out that if you can successfully damage the credibility of negative reviewers or naysayers or whatever we want to call them then that's very advantageous.

Entertainment YouTubers are kind of like the ultimate word of mouth. Some beardy dude in his spare room can send out a negative view to 10s of thousands of potential customers on a whim. It's no longer the case that people hear about movies from a handful or people at work or from the marketing spiel they read in the local newspaper. It's impossible to ignore that because these YouTube folk can even post a "rebuttal" to positive media spin so even the normal method of inviting writers to a big fancy event and hoping that they understand "the implication" and give you positive press can be undermined.

So it follows logically that a good way to counter this would be to use smear tactics against people who don't like the product. Even if it just makes people hesitate at their place of work and think about the possible implication of saying "oh my god that new LOTR show is absolutely awful". You wouldn't want people thinking you are one of those sexist bigots now would you? So at least it may lessen some negative word of mouth.

As you say, it seems to be the main go-to for a lot of media corporations these days. I'm pretty sure they know exactly what they are doing. Look at Disney if you want an example. In actual fact they have no problem at all reducing the visibility of black people on their marketing in some regions and are not opposed to removing an LGBTQ+ moment for certain markets however in other markets they have no problem at all suggesting that actually it's the fans who are racist. Well, what's worse, some unhinged nerd sitting at home alone crying because there's a black stormtrooper in Star Wars or a the billion dollar company removing the black stormtrooper from their marketing materials because they want to make more money and it's best to just pretend that some people don't exist if it means protecting the bottom line?

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119583443#Comment_119583443

Its not that you cannot give it 1STAR - i do not know whether these are being removed also - it would not surprise me

Its that you cannot then explain, why, you gave it 1 STAR in the Viewer Review section - you cannot write a review and give the show 5 STARS or less -

There were large quantities of 5 star, 4 star, 3 etc etc reviews - and yes a lot of one star reviews too - IMDB have deleted them

So if you were unaware of this removal, you would therefore assume that the lowest score review for the show is 6/10

BTW you can ACTUALLY STILL WRITE a 1-5star review - it just wont ever appear on the site

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119583840#Comment_119583840

But it will still be used to calculate the average rating.

Dufflecoat Fanny

Tried to watch it twice now I don't think I'll bother a third time. In fact I'm going to refer to it as The Rings of Scour.

Wrongway1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119583179#Comment_119583179

No that's your interpretation of what I said so for clarity...

I do of course think they might not be genuine if something is actually exceptional the balance would surely be weighted with 9,8,7's following on, no?.

Look at that new Marvel thing, do I believe that could be a 10 en masse no yet as discussed diehards have swanned to give it such in response to those who gave it a 1 not because it's actually one of the best shows ever and it happens all the time!!

Liamtechs comment one show has killed IMDB, f'n lol man!

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119583544#Comment_119583544

I find that its like a massive version of the old saying, 'well YOU WOULD say that wouldnt ye?' - its that old saying writ large. I agree with you RE Disney and the Finn Minimization scandal - The hypocrisy of the company knows no bounds? I guess it doesnt to be honest. Remember when disney put out fun loving family oriented material!

But IMHO, the tried and true method of slandering your audience has gained traction. We have covered Doctor who enough, and star wars has been mentioned too.

• Batgirl is cancelled before its release. Is it because the studio honestly hated the material, and felt it would further damage the already floundering DCEU? (which is what the actually stated when making the cancellation public) - NOPE - its apparently because Hollywood doesnt like Latinos
• Cowboy Bebop - was it cancelled because it was a travesty adaption of one of the greatest Anime's of all time - which utterly changed the main characters? NOPE - its cause 'horny male viewers' didnt like the outfit of the female character #misogyny - This cancellation was one of the most public for 2 reasons. Firstly because Netflix decided within 15 days of dropping the first season, that it was a hopeless cause - a record fast cancellation i understand. And secondly, one of the screen writers had a LITERAL MELTDOWN on twitter and began screaming at fans, that it was their fault the show was cancelled, and that they ought be ashamed they didnt embrace her 'vision' (and this after she stated that one of her inspirations for the show, was an SJW Trans Activist on twitter - never mind the fact that she didnt actually need inspiration beyond the highly successful original)

But i digress - what ever happens with LOTR, we can comfortably predict a few things. If this show fails - it will not be due to

• Poor writing and dialogue a child could best
• completely changing the central characters
• writing inconvenient characters out (Galadriel's hubby anyone?)
• adding characters in who have no business being there (Wizards for a start)
• Warping the timeline of the Second Age of Middle earth, and condensing events that occur thousands of years apart
• Taking a simple story of deception and lies by Sauron, and turning into a 50 odd hour snore fest

No it wont be for these reasons - it will have failed due to

• Men not liking powerful female characters with agency
• Racism
• Toxicity among fandom
• Review Bombing

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584167#Comment_119584167

At the end of the day you are welcome to your opinion. I for one did actually value IMDB as a place i could go to, and see what people were saying about a show or production

• I went there when Strange New Worlds turned out to be fantastic - and was delighted to see that most agreed it was outstanding!
• I went there to see what people thought of the warped version of Cowboy Bebop - and was content that it wasnt just me - the show was terrible and most fans agreed

Now, thanks to this. IMDB's credibility is in question. They will not allow you to write a critical review of certain shows - Credibility is tarnished. You can laugh at my reaction if you want, but i ask you, do these things not matter? Perhaps you dont care about IMDB, which is fine! Some people just watch and decide for themselves - and they dont care what others think. Shocking as it is for me to be here, on a TV Forum, discussing a TV Show, i actually like to engage with other viewers. Compare notes, did i miss anything, what did you folks think of 'this' or 'that' -

Anyway thats just me

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119583861#Comment_119583861

that i dont know - i suspect that everything about the IMDB score is being altered

My reason for having this suspicion relates to Rotten Tomatos, which as of yet, has not removed any reviews or Criticism -

Rotten Tomatos rates LOTR-TROP at 39% which is about where it ought be - the first 2 eps were not great - it could improve, we will just wait and see

IMDB has it at 6.8/10 - this is clearly due to their alterring the numbers IMHO

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584432#Comment_119584432

take a look and work it out yourself. 6.8 is the weighted average and 6.2 is the current arithmetic average.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7631058/ratings/?ref_=tt_ov_rt

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584489#Comment_119584489

right but the 10 star review bar has SHOT UP - coincidentally and unrelated im sure, they are no longer accepting scores under 6 -

Where as Rotten tomatos has it at 39 - lets call that 4/10 by IMDB standards -

Look IMDB are refusing to even comment on this - they have commented on AMAZON not allowing reviews within the prime platform, but they will not answer emails or queries on their own site

so no reviews under 6 - and LOTR-TROP coincidentally goes above 6 - ???????

Im interested in your thoughts but do go and confirm what is happening, as its a fact - you cannot negatively review LOTR TROP - period

TheIrishGrover

To be honest, I never trust any 1/10 OR 10/10 reviews of anything. Whether it's a TV show/movie or product. IMHO, anyone giving a 1/10 or 10/10 has an agenda.

Speaking purely as a television experience (And ignoring existing lore), I found it quite good. Is it perfect? No. Absolutely not. Is it an abomination? No. Absolutely not.

Production values are simply amazing. It is hard to believe that this is a TELEVISION SERIES (Alright, a staggeringly expensive one). It does wear its connection to Jackson's trilogy on its sleeve. From musical ques to design to cinematography.

The Irish accents on the Hardfoots is a bit jarring but, I'm assuming for non-Irish people these are just fine and quite.... country-folk fantasy-ish 😀. I thought the Dwarves were great and Khazad-Dum looked fantastic (Excuse the spelling).

Again, speaking PURELY as a television show experience, I thought Galadrial was pretty good. Not perfect, but good. I liked the character of Arondir a lot. I like the angle of humans resenting elves. Thought that was interesting.

So I'm enjoying it for what it it: Its own thing. Barely related to the existing lore and barely related to Jackon's trilogy. And you must remember: This show is meant to appeal to as wide an audience as possible so I'm willing to accept it as what it is. It would not be financially sound to make an extremely faithful adaptation of existing lore, for many reasons: Some things simply are better on page. The reference material is not narratively structured. While, yes, there are many dedicated and knowledgeable fans out there, you cannot make a show that just appeases them. This show (Every massively expensive show) needs to appeal to tens of millions of people who all subscribe to your service (Or are willing to start using your service on the back of the show).

TLDR: I think it is pretty good for what it is and I will continue to watch it.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584569#Comment_119584569

I know that no reviews less than 6 stars are publish on imdb. I have never said anything to the contrary. I said that they are including those scores when calculating the average. I did the maths so you don't have to.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584569#Comment_119584569

The average review score has dropped since this morning. It is 6.2 now, it was 6.3 this morning.

TomSweeney

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119582783#Comment_119582783

I know right ? Like the uproar over Cate Blanchett in the PJ films ... and the abuse she got!! - oh wait no she didn't , cos what you wrote is completely disingenous and false.

TomSweeney

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119583046#Comment_119583046

Of course some will claim that Drinker himself is toxic, entitled, incel, racist, xenophobic etc etc etc - and nothing you, (or I) can say, will change their minds -

If they watched his content and truly listened, they could not in good faith still say that.

Can all this rubbish about the reviews getting deleted or whatever be moved to another thread? Painful trying to read this thread.

nullzero

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584884#Comment_119584884

This is now the latest battle ground of the culture wars I'm afraid.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584865#Comment_119584865

the PJ films were 20 years ago. the world has changed and not always for the better. we have a whole spate of stuff lately aimed at female leads. Prey in particular springs to mind. so not false.

TomSweeney

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584894#Comment_119584894

Prey was decent enough and watchable though!

Again, read my and liamtech's other posts, there is perfectly valid explanations of why JRR Tolkien fans are not happy with this that has nothing to do with sexism, racism or any other -ism!

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584929#Comment_119584929

i'm responding to your post. it was decent and watchable but still got a shedload of abuse because the lead was a woman. so not false.

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584929#Comment_119584929

And, to add, perfectly valid explanations why someone who has never read Tolkien might be unhappy with it as a dramatic presentation...

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584767#Comment_119584767

Well, im happy to do maths, and equally happy for you to do it for me too - My point is that i do not know what is going on - and neither do you - maths has nothing to do with this

Prior to this, IMDB Scores were based on both reviews by viewers, and simple Star Ratings - a user could simply mark a show out of 10 - and leave it at that

OR - if he wanted to he could then compose a short review, which would appear on the Viewer Review Page

Enter LOTR-TROP

Written reviews at 5 or below stars, are no longer listed - at all

So, you can take the figures listed and we can work out a score based on those - yes - simple enough maths, and i thank you for confirming that

Do we know for a fact that every time someone simply scores it at 1 star (or 2, or 3, etc for that matter) - that the site is taking these scores? No, we can no longer state that factually.

What we can say factually, is what we have observed for the last 48 odd hours - Around the time IMBD stopped allowing Low star Written reviews to be posted, the ratings began to incrementally rise.

so a few possibilities

• When IMDB stopped showing 1star to 5star reviews, the general audience began to like the show - and began rating it higher and higher - with a LARGE amount of people scoring it at 10/10 - i.e. Phenomenal
• OR When IMDB decided to play censor, they also stopped counting any additional 1 to 5 Star Ratings -

Given that it is now possible to write a 1-5 star review, upload it - have IMDB email you to thank you for your review - but then watch as it is never posted, with no indication that there is anything wrong given to the user - no feedback - I dont think its a stretch to say that currently - a user may

• Go to IMDB
• Score LOTR TROP at 1 to 5
• Be thanked by IMDB for the rating
• And for IMDB to completely ignore the rating, and not add it to the score

Can you say differently? Can you explain how suddenly the show has soared in its rating? Is there a relationship between censoring reviews, and the score suddenly increasing?

Im not arguing with you BTW - I just sense a complete unwillingness on your part to accept what is happening - interested in your thoughts

Respectfully

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584773#Comment_119584773

As of now -

Brian?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584873#Comment_119584873

He's an awful reactionary twat though. I've heard him express many misogynistic and toxic viewpoints. I genuinely can't understand why any watches this type of review, why do people want to be told what to think of something.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119585060#Comment_119585060

easy for you to check. just add a 1 star review and see if it increases the number of 1 star reviews,

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119585066#Comment_119585066

That is the weighted average. the arithmetic average is 6.2

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7631058/ratings/?ref_=tt_ov_rt

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584873#Comment_119584873

Drinker's content doesnt matter. It never has. His views do not match what certain people want to hear - rather than say,

'I disagree with you drinker, but i respect your right to an opinion'

They must attack him as racist, misogynist etc etc etc yada

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119584894#Comment_119584894

The world has changed, you are absolutely right - but please try to understand one, very simple fact: (its really quite simple, so just consider it before replying)

The world HAS CHANGED - but TOLKIENS WRITINGS ARE THE SAME AS THEY HAVE ALWAYS BEEN

See he wrote a story - he actually composed something - which was very well respected, and loved, and admired. If his work of creative genius, does not match precisely your view of this 'changed world' - That is very unfortunate

For you...

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119585132#Comment_119585132

wtf are you on about? veiled insults are a nice way to discuss something.

liamtech

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119585088#Comment_119585088

Can you provide links to examples? Some evidence please!! I would like to hear Critical Drinker 'express many misogynistic and toxic viewpoints'

Otherwise, to quote Christopher Hitchens 'what can be asserted without evidence, can also be dismissed without evidence'

why do people want to be told what to think of something.

I dont know @Brian? , honestly, why do people want to be told what to think??