Lord of the Rings - The War of the Rohirrim
Kenji Kamiyama
Enjoy the LotR universe again. It's a good entry with great voice acting and fine enough lore liberties.
A non-epic standalone in the LotR universe focusing on local power struggles 100 years preceding The Hobbit. The War of the Rohirrim uses the Tolkien universe backdrop nicely with some teaser and fan service. Overall, it filled in the blanks with good use of creative license for the lore. Trope-y for sure in parts. Tolkien tropes, e.g. eagles. Anime tropes, e.g. drawn out door closing scene. Movie tropes, e.g. Helm’s deep callback.
Voice acting is top notch led by Brian Cox but everyone else performs nicely in their roles. The score also drives those powerful moments that give you literal goosebumps (if you're somebody who has frisson).
The animation was fun, although there were a few minor clashes between the 2D and 3D style. But the 2D style hand drawn is the vast majority of it and is truly excellent, especially at its height.
And you can argue IP constraints put this through too tight a production turnaround, but I'll always argue constraints can force great things, especially when something > nothing.
If you’re like me, you love LotR universe enough to enjoy it no matter where you’re dropped into it (be it The Hobbit or the PS2 classic LotR: The Two Towers, which I sank an unholy amount of time into).
I had a good time going back to Middle Earth and the anime-spin fit brilliantly. I recommend to anyone and hope those returning to LotR similarly enjoys this one for what it’s worth.
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