By It’s hard for me to vocalize my opinion on the Lord of the Rings series nowadays. While the series was best known for the stunning Peter Jackson trilogy that defined an era of cinema, since then, Warner Bros. has tried relentlessly to turn it into yet another massive franchise for which to exploit greedily. If the Hobbit trilogy wasn’t enough, we also have Rings of Power, that atrocious Gollum video game, and now an anime film, The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim. It’s not that everything WB has put out since acquiring the license is bad, but it just doesn’t feel special anymore. It all feels like part of some massive need to create more franchises from which to profit.
I guess you could say that I went into War of the Rohirrim with dampened enthusiasm since I’ve grown increasingly numb to the need of companies to keep any and all franchises relevant at all times, but I was still excited about it. Why? Well, it’s an anime for starters, and I will always vouch for a mainstream anime release solely due to how niche the genre still is across the globe, but I suppose it’s also because I still want to enjoy further adventures in Middle-earth. I like Peter Jackson’s films, and this felt at least a bit more interesting than the soulless third entry in The Hobbit. By the time the credits rolled, I can’t say I was enamored with the film, but I liked it more than I thought I would.
The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim
Director: Kenji Kamiyama
Release Date: December 13, 2024 (Theatrical)
Rating: PG-13
Set hundreds of years before the events of Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, War of the Rohirrim is a story that follows one of the legendary kings of Rohan, Helm Hammerhand (Brian Cox), and his daughter, Hera (Gaia Wise). Initially, life in Rohan is relatively peaceful. Still, after a brief altercation with one of his lords resulting in Helm accidentally killing him, a war breaks out between Rohan and Wulf Dunlending (Luke Pasqualina), the son of the slain lord. Wulf seeks vengeance, leading to a bloody campaign against Helm and every member of his family, with Hera the only person left to save her people given that Wulf used to be a childhood friend and wants to marry her, despite Hera abhoring the idea of being married to anyone.
Honestly, the plot isn’t much to write home about. One of the benefits of the earlier films in the series was that, due to their extended length, the wide scope of each film’s conflict felt fleshed out. Grand battles felt huge simply because a lot of time was dedicated to establishing why the battle was important and how a victory or defeat would change the war. Here, the same scale is present – we are dealing with the fate of all of Rohan – but it never has enough time to develop properly. So much time is spent fleshing out the characters within the first half hour that when the conflict finally begins, it feels like the movie is focused on the wrong elements.
The characters are fine, for the most part, but fairly generic. The film is led wonderfully by Brian Cox’s Helm Hammerhand, but not because of anything Cox did. Honestly, his performance is merely okay, but the way the story frames Helm and his actions makes him feel like this larger-than-life figure. You almost wish that Brian Cox played into the grandiosity of the role since the animation and actions of the character do all of the heavy lifting. If anything, the only other interesting character of the bunch is Wulf, a villain in all of the best ways. He lies, cheats, ignores his advisors, gives into provocation, and has absolutely no honor all in the name of enacting his revenge. In other words, he is a villain I absolutely love to hate. The rest of the cast? Take them or leave them.
Copyright: Warner Bros
We spend the most time following Hera despite how Helm and Wulf are the two people who move the plot forward. Because of this, Hera is sidelined for the majority of the film, except in the few instances where the film remembers that she’ll become the main character and she needs to do something. She’ll take part in an action scene here and there and have a few dramatic conversations with other characters, but that doesn’t change the fact that she’s fairly one-note and only steps into her own in the last half hour. The rest of the cast barely registers, like her two brothers, her attendant, and the comic relief squire, all of whom have individual scenes that ultimately amount to little.
So because The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim tries to focus on its characters so much, it has the adverse effect of not fleshing out the overall conflict. The story is ultimately a footnote in the grand canon of Middle-earth, something the film even admits at the beginning via narration, so it makes it hard to get invested in what’s happening. When the climax is underway and we start to see all the pieces finally fall into place, it’s hard to elicit any excitement over it. Again, say what you will about the sheer time commitment it takes to watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but at the very least it’s all emotionally satisfying to watch and thrilling to see every subplot contribute. You feel like the conflict grew and developed naturally, but not so here.
I admit that this review feels pretty damn negative, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t like the film. Sure, I’m criticizing virtually everything about the overarching narrative and how the film decides to flesh out its barely present characters, but it’s all still competently done. There’s nothing egregious about The War of the Rohirrim and it’s nice to see a director and studio leap at a chance to add their own interpretation of Middle-earth that is far removed from Jackson’s vision. It’s just all fairly standard and boilerplate. It’s interested in giving the fans exactly what they want. Here’s an original story that has never been told before, a character or two that fans may recognize which hints at larger conflicts to come, and a happy ending to send people off with a smile on their faces.
Copyright: Warner Bros
I will say that if you’re going into the film expecting a visual spectacle, or even animation that rivals the stuff produced at powerhouse studios like MAPPA or Trigger, then you’ll be sadly disappointed. Again, it’s not that the animation is bad, but it’s just not all that memorable. The character designs are nice and the fight scenes are good, but there’s nothing immediately noteworthy about the work that Sola Entertainment did. It’s consistent at the very least, so there aren’t any moments in the film that are an affront to the senses, but it’s all just so… okay.
That’s really where I come down with The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim. It’s a perfectly okay movie. It has its moments, like anything having to do with Helm Hammerhand, but even then, those moments aren’t amazing. The lows aren’t low, but when it’s at its worst, it’s just a bit boring. I was fighting to stay awake towards the end of the first act, but once the film decided to leave its mediocre character development behind in favor of larger action scenes, it did improve slightly. Granted, only slightly, but that’s still better than nothing.
If you’re a diehard Lord of the Rings fan, then The War of the Rohirrim will most likely satisfy you. It’ll give you everything you want, make you reminisce about the Peter Jackson movies, and then you’ll move on with your day. It’ll most likely become a footnote in the franchise, much like the last animated movie made by Ralph Bakshi, but it’ll quickly fade from the spotlight in favor of its much more illustrious older siblings. At the very least, it’s probably the best Lord of the Rings content to come out in the past few years, so that has to count for something I guess.
