I watch the extended versions regularly, at least once a year. I disagree with everything you said. They are masterpieces. But, this is Unpopular Opinion, so bravo.

For me it’s the pacing. The movies are like 11 hours long, and 8 of those hours is just reaction shots of Sam and Frodo gazing lovingly into each other’s eyes.

Seriously, you could shave a few seconds off of every shot and lose nothing. It’s just how Peter Jackson directs. His King Kong was the same way. You’re supposed to use long reaction shots to let important moments sink in, but he does it after every line.

The music was great. I’ll give it that.

Tolkien stans burn me out so much. I’m fed up with them only slightly more than the faux dominion over fantasy that everyone else gives to Tolkien himself.

The only people I’ve ever met who share this opinion are people who’ve spent their entire life viewing things that are fast-paced action movies or movies where characters are defined entirely by a handful of quippy one-liners and a melodramatic flash back and then have all of their character development confined to a singular moment of epiphany. Movies where they would be alphabet level predictable if they didn’t move onto the next hackneyed trope at whiplash inducing paces.

If you spend your entire life watching the cinematic equivalent of cocaine of course sobriety is going to be boring.

The “Lord of the Rings” is not a character driven book and the same goes wirh the film adaptations. It is plot driven with heavy focus on world building, which can either make it an amazing or a boring experience. Depending on your preferences.

Based on the list of your favourite films (excellent, BTW, some of my own favourites are there) you seem to prefer character driven ones. So I can easily understand why you find the LOTR films boring.

LotR trilogy is an adaptation of an already classic tale, specifically stylized after legends and folk stories. It’s seeming naivity and lack of newer approaches is intentional and suggested by it’s source material. It is a compelling journey into the Middle-Earth, where said tone is complimented by thosands of competent people in it’s production, together creating an extraordinary piece that can hardly be reproduced anytime soon or matched in it’s own league of fantasy-aligned stuff.

Favorite movies are: Memento, Reservoir Dogs, Everything Everywhere All At Once, The Shining

While LotR wasn’t shy of looking older (to buy some ale, eh?), every one of your favorite movie is characterised by explicit use of newest post-modern tropes or approaches.

RD is Tarantino’s first mixtape of what he liked in movies with some layers of abstraction and purely staged interactions, The Shining is a theme park of moments where Stanley can go full Kubrik, Memento is an intentional Nolan’s sabotage of a plot structure to create a new experience, and EEAaO is an impressive patchwork of gags, drama and trope reversals fit so tightly in it I thought I’m scrolling bits on tiktok. All ace at something they are meant to.

It’s not to say that one is easily better than the other, but they are hardly comparable because they don’t strive to do the same thing, and if you are into movies that play with your expectations and try hard to keep your engaged and puzzled, you’d obviously have a hard time with movies that paint their own picture for you to observe and vibe with.

That’s, like, your taste, lemming.

Never felt compelled to see the movies, but the books were some of the most pompous, boring things I ever read. Multiple pages of battle songs, crap like that? I read the entire trilogy and The Hobbit, waiting to get to the “good part”, for it to click in. But it never did.

OP, did you read the books? By today’s standards, they may be a tad boring, but these were the books that created the clichhés in the first place. The movies were pretty decent for their time (although RotK was waaaayyyyy too long), but I did not feel that the books were done much justice. And there was too much ‘humorous’ dialougue shoehorned in. The Legolas-Gimli-Bromance was hard to watch, even then. That in and of itself makes the movies overrated.

Also, as for ‘there are no surprises’, the story of the movies differed from the books. LotR fans were unpleasantly surprised by that.

Off-topic: the Hobbit movies were abonimations. I fucking hate them.

I think the problem is you’re not watching the extended versions… All in one showing… Without bathroom breaks… Like a normal person…

I find it believable that this is truly an unpopular opinion.

That said, I watch the movies at least once every year with family and/or friends and a truckload of snacks and beer.

I’m all for valid criticisms, but mediocre dialogue and one-dimensional characters? And your fave movies are Momento and Reservoir Dogs? The math ain’t mathing.

Like what you like, but I call bullshit. Logging this under “I said some controversial shit to stir up online discourse.” Enjoy my downvote, sir.

You should be grateful, what I remember from the books is something like “and they rode and rode and rode and rode and rode again and kept riding and rode and rode”.

Rewatches movies

Complains there’s no surprises

I mean it’s no Crank starring Jason Statham but don’t worry. I’m sure they will release another Fast n the Furious sequel for you soon.

As someone who had a LOTR wedding theme, take your upvote and get the fuck out of here.