frankiexx-74078 Don't go into this expecting a great show. It's pretty cheesy, storyline is pretty predictable, and a lot of the characters make pretty stupid choices (especially in season 2, ugh Will) throughout the show, which is frustrating to watch. But if you're looking for something to watch while you're bored or just some background noise, then by all means.

Irondragon61 I was a Terry Brooks fan since his very first book "The Sword of Shannara" so when I heard they were making a series of one of his books I was very excited. That excitement went away very quickly. The series bares almost no resemblance to the books, and Terry is as much to blame as anyone. When I saw how he responded to fans' complaints, fans that were loyal fans as I was, he lost me as a fan. He was rude and arrogant toward people that made him rich. Basically telling them to get over it. Not to mention he is just using the series to push his very liberal point of view. Very very disappointed in the series but more importantly in Terry Brooks.

nexx-43314 I've never read any books. I liked the first Season. It wasn't the best I've ever seen but I liked the actors and it reminded me of low budget fantasy series from the 90ties. The story was actually interesting, I loved the connection between modern world and fantasy world and it ended with suspense so I was really interested what was going to happen in Season2. Unfortunately Season2 obviously got passed to another network, it took 100 years to make and when it started it sucked. The plot was dragging all over the place, the acting got worse and had many copy-paste story elements from you're typical low budget series. Everything was so predictable and unbelievable. So yeah, Season1 is watchable, skip Season2.

medwards-85263 It has taken me a long time to get around to writing this review, as I was constantly hoping things might get better and I might come to love this series. Unfortunately is has not, and hence, here is my rather disgruntled opinion. Terry Brooks is a justifiably much lauded author, who has penned numerous best selling novels since his first Shannara novel came out in 1977. Whilst the first book, The Sword of Shannara, is, in all honestly, a well written but blatant 'homage' to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, (albeit with a little Celtic mythology and a neat idea about this fantasy world being set far in our future after an unspecified apocalyptic collapse of human civilisation) from the second novel, The Elfstones of Shannara, Brooks demonstrated a highly innovative take on epic fantasy. As a young man The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings was my first experience of fantasy writing, Shannara was my second. For me personally only the work of David and Leigh Eddings is more gripping, entertaining and invigorating than that of Brooks. So it was that when I first heard that a screen version of these wonderful novels was finally actually happening and not just rumoured, I was naturally very hopeful, but also apprehensive, especially when I realised the series was being made for air on MTV. When I heard that Brooks was personally involved in helping the construction of the world, narrative and scripts, I sighed with relief. Good, surely now this will be fine, right? Wrong.The truly great thing about the Shannara novels is how they concentrate on the psychological as well as physical impact of magic on, not only the victims of magical attacks, but the users of any form of magic.The books are dark, full of lots of twists and turns, and often laced with heavy and justified paranoia. For instance the main 'good' magic wielders in the series are those few remaining members of the ancient 'Druid Order', but these people often turn out to be hiding the full truth of the missions they ask people to undertake, or outright lying and manipulating people and their emotions in order to meet the ends they wish to pursue. Some small fragments of the intensity and originality of the books series does remain in this show, which is why I have given it a rating of three stars instead of one, which was my initial instinct. However, the show has been highly stylised and tailored to appeal to an imagined audience of fevered 'Twilight' or 'Hunger Games' teen fans, desperate for yet more melodramatic fairytale nonsense. The use of modern 'teen-appeal' popular music, MTV style editing techniques and focus on fashion, style and 'pretty' actors rather than depth of story, well rounded characterisation and building a sense of the historical depth and richness of the world unfortunately serves to render this programme nothing but style over substance. One of the most anticipated moments from the excellent book Elfstones, when the horde of demons finally break through the magical barrier of the Forbidding and flood in an almost unstoppable tide of destruction to the highly defended raised Elf city of Arborlon, a sequence that takes several brilliant action packed chapters of the book to elucidate, here is whipped through in what seemed like about five minutes, and looked to little more than a bunch of badly costumed dancers prat-falling about in a forest. I won't go into any more of this, as all any reader of this diatribe needs to really know is do not bother watching this show, unless you want to laugh at something naff. Read the books instead, even the very worst of which is over a thousand times better than this dire dross.