It’s not strange that The Lord of the Rings is receiving the animation treatment—after all, J.R.R. Tolkien’s trilogy was initially mainstreamed by Ralph Bakshi’s 1978 film, which established many of the visual designs that now define the material and heavily influenced Peter Jackson’s Oscar-winning trilogy.

The War of Rohirrim” also feels conspicuously closer to 1990s direct-to-video release than an heir to some of the grandest big-screen fantasy storytelling of the past 25 years.