PussyGalore
Meow
i watched S1 just to see what the hell it would be like. i never read the books and i am glad i did not because, from what i have been told, i'd be really pissed about the tv show!
to me the books sound interesting, i have been told, here, that the series does not resemble the books, even though Brooks stands by the show
i am sure it is in his contract to do so
the reason the books are intriguing to me,and maybe i will read them sometime-is because it seems that Brooks is not merely 'copying' ideas from Tolkien but that his world exists in our future and could easily fit into the whole theme of Tolkien's elves having been "in hiding" during the age of man
so, Brooks' work, could be seen as an extension of Tolkien's though I believe that was not his intention
The first book he wrote, The Sword of Shannara, was his version of LOTR basically. He fobs it off as being an homage of sorts because the similarities are obvious as hell and he has no choice but to admit it. The following books in the first trilogy deviate a little bit from the LOTR meme but they are still very "sword & sorcery" in terms of style. They are nothing like the TV show, which supposedly is based on that first trilogy. (If you like LOTR type books the first Shannara trilogy is worth a read.)
The TV show is a complete cock-up though. The only thing recognizable from the books within the TV show are the names of characters and places they travel to, that's it. How the characters act and the way the story plays out is nothing like in the books. And worse, the characters aren't likable. It's tedious to watch them move from scene to scene, spouting inane dialogue that is devoid of substance. (The scenes with Cogline and Eritrea are particularly bad in this regard. They are completely worthless in terms of advancing the story. The two characters repeatedly have short, extremely vapid conversations that amount to nothing. It's obvious that the writers just decided that they needed the two characters in the same scenes to burn up screen time.)
I can't help but see similarities between Shannara and STD in the way they are both playing out. Shannara started out heavily flawed, just like STD, and was heavily shilled, just like STD. Anyone criticizing the first season of Shannara was shouted down by the paid shills and fanbois, just like is happening with STD right now. But it's obvious that the Shannara folks couldn't keep up the pretense as proven by the failure of season 2. Granted, STD has a much bigger "machine" behind its promotion but still, I don't see it doing well come season 2. The story and characters are too repugnant to be redeemed and viewers know that.
The only thing it has going for STD at this point is the fact that it's not being televised on a ratings-based service. It's surviving solely because the ratings tabulation for streaming services are in their infancy and are heavily flawed and malleable. Once a more accurate way of tabulating ratings for streaming services becomes the industry standard then shows like STD will die a much quicker death.