They did have a license to LotR, and cite the Appendices of LotR as what it's adapted from in the show credits. It radically departs from these to the point whe

They did have a license to LotR, and cite the Appendices of LotR as what it's adapted from in the show credits. It radically departs from these to the point where there's really nothing in common other than a few character names and the idea that some people made some Rings. Tolkien did not write that much on the Second Age - of course most of the story would have to be made up! Even including all Tolkien writings, the Appendices of LotR still constitute probably the biggest source on the SA. I don't expect anyone thought they could do otherwise. But rather than filling out the outlines of a story, the writers chunked it in the trash and made their own thing with the same label. (And frankly, the writing is not very good, particularly for a billion-dollar show. It's watchable, but nobody is ever going to mistake it for a tour-de-force masterpiece. The writing is the quality you'd expect from a low-budget scifi channel show.) I don't see anything necessarily wrong with that[1], but I am puzzled why people seem determined to defend it as "they did everything they could." They definitely did not, they made a creative decision. Probably the best thing to do for someone who likes Tolkien is to regard this as someone filming their AU fanfic and to come into it with zero expectations. [1] The thing that is wrong with it is that Tolkien would have hated it, as he would have the movies. I do find this very depressing. But I don't think a series that Tolkien would have liked could have been made in 21st century America, so I didn't come in expecting that.