We Have Our First Image, Premiere Date, and maybe a New Setting For The Upcoming Amazon Lord of the Rings Series
(Deadline) Developed by J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay, The Lord of the Rings series is described as an “epic drama” set in the Second Age of Middle-earth — thousands of years before the events of the Lord of the Rings films and the novels by J.R.R. Tolkien on which they were based. The series brings to screens for the very first time J.R.R. Tolkien’s fabled Second Age of Middle-earth’s history. Beginning in a time of relative peace, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth.
Headlining the ensemble cast are Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Robert Aramayo, Owain Arthur, Maxim Baldry, Nazanin Boniadi, Morfydd Clark, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Charles Edwards, Trystan Gravelle, Sir Lenny Henry, Ema Horvath, Markella Kavenagh, Joseph Mawle, Tyroe Muhafidin, Sophia Nomvete, Lloyd Owen, Megan Richards, Dylan Smith, Charlie Vickers, Leon Wadham, Benjamin Walker, Daniel Weyman, and Sara Zwangobani.
It’s going to be set in the second age, thousands of years before the events of both cinematic trilogies. J.A. Bayona (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom) is directing the first two episodes, with JD Payne and Patrick McKay leading a writing team that is supposed to include Gennifer Hutchison (Breaking Bad) and Bryan Cogman (Game of Thrones). Amazon Prime has sneakily put out a lot of amazing original productions the last few years, so the possibility exists here for the series to be incredible. It will really come down to the screenwriting, because as we saw from the Hobbit trilogy, SFX and large-scale action can only take you so far with a well known property.
Development on the series began in 2017. In November of that year, Amazon purchased the television rights to The Lord of the Rings for nearly $250 million. Subsequently, the studio made a five-season production commitment, worth around $1 billion. Given this commitment, the Amazon Original is making history as the most expensive TV series ever mounted.
You might be thinking "Wow, that is a shit-ton of money to pump into a show that doesn't have any big names in it", and you would be right! The budget of all three LOTR movies was $281 combined, which is almost what Amazon spent on the the TV rights alone. Presumably, a lot of this budget is going to be going towards making sure this world is as large scale and immersive as possible. Again, my hope is simply that this doesn't mean the movie will be overly dedicated to large scale CGI.
Some sniffing around in the replies of the tweet will tell you that the trees in the background imply that this takes place in Valinor. Here is a map of middle earth with Valinor highlighted by the red circle along with the 2 trees, Laurelin and Telperion, up on the right. I put a yellow circle around what was basically the entire scope of both trilogies.
This would apparently imply that the city in the picture is Tirion, home of the Noldor. Now, this series is supposed to be set in the second age, but the trees being around still would mean that we get glimpse of he first age as well.
This should be exciting for LOTR fans everywhere, because we have been in a dead zone of content for what should be an incredible lucrative property.