Halls of Stone

This episode shows what the show could have been if it had ditched the ridiculous Harfoot storyline. Once it can focus on the stories of Elvendom, Sauron and Numenor - the epic stories - it unfolds its full potential. I really wish the showrunners had not intertwined so many different storylines instead of concentrating on a few like they did in this episode. I feel like they felt the fans would miss the Hobbits too much, so they included the abomination that is the Harfoots. Its a shame because the set design and acting are amazing and my biggest fear is going back to the Harfoots and pseudo-Gandalf in the next episode.

This is the frist episode that truly felt like a Lord of the Rings adaptation to me. I liked season 1 and season 2 so far but that Episode just raised the bar. The tention througout is brilliantly crafted. Saurons decieving is masterfully written.

The structure of this episode is way better than before and it focuses on the main themes in this season. The lack of a certain storyline does help this matter a lot.

It resonates with the charchters and you will actually feel for them. A task the show was lacking a bit as of now. For me by far the best episode of the whole series. If the continue like that for this season and the coming ones. My god we are in for a ride.

This episode really gave the series some momentum going forward now with some of the action and thrill of the characters becoming more serious to the reality of what's happening with the rings. Took a season and a half to get us here but fingers crossed the show kicks on now and shows its true potential.

Hoping that the remainder of the season will show some clever decisions from our lead characters in order to work together to fight against Sauron and not to be mislead over and over (Calabrimbor).. hoping the High King will listen to his council and send Aid to the ones who will need the help of the elves.

Halls of Stone is a marked improvement on the previous episode, with some stunning sequences and captivating scenes, but can't quite fully escape the weaker points of the Rings of Power.

It was always going to be a challenge to condense source material which takes place over hundreds of years into a short timescale, and I would have preferred the show to take place over a much longer timescale to give us a much stronger feeling of the immortality of elves and differing lifetimes of Dwarves and men (including those from Numenor), but this episode does a much better job of condensing events in a coherent way than Rings of Power has done previously.

There's far fewer line lifts from elsewhere given to characters here and fewer out of place Easter eggs. I appreciated that. There's a stronger feeling of it's own identity here, and I think the show is stronger for it.

The biggest complaint I have with the show is the pacing and the way it balances the multiple storylines in each episode.

However, this episode was mostly engaging from start to finish, focusing on what's important, THE RINGS OF POWER themselves. This is an episode that doesn't have any action, mostly just dialogue, but the conversations between Annatar and Celebrimbor are absolutely riveting, seeing Sauron being all smirky is also entertaining in a way, the scenes with the Dwarves are also really good, giving more stakes because of the rings themselves.

The only thing that slowed down the episode a bit was the Numenor plot, but still not as slow as the Nori, Theo and Wizard scenes

So overall, that is why I think this episode was the best of the entire show so far and I have many reasons to believe the next 3 episodes can easily top it *wink* (battle for eregion)