Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#331

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:44 PM UTC

TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #318

subsubzero wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge LOTR/Tolkien fan ever since I was a kid, loved the Ralph Bakashi animated LOTR film from the 70's(great rotoscoping and creepy mood), absolutely loved the Peter Jackson trilogy, liked the hobbit animated films Rankin and Bass(good music!, weird animation?), even found enjoyment in the newer Hobbit trilogy(3 movies for 1 small book? Smaug was great though!). After seeing this amazon trailer though I am beyond dis…

> there are so many interesting tales Tolkien wrote that have not seen the screen Beorn! Completely left out of the Hobbit movies https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Beorn

[deleted]

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#332

Post by b112 » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:44 PM UTC

Clubber wrote: post #229

adventured wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a great list for that premise. The Amazon Lord series not only lacks stars, it lacks famous mid-tiers as well. West World had Ed Harris, Evan Rachel Wood, James Marsden, Thandie Newton, among others. These are mid tier actors that are quite well known (even though they're not superstars). Breaking Bad had as its lead a very prominent television actor in Cranston. Malcolm in the Middle was a hit tv show that had a…

I forgot about Ed Harris, I think he's way higher than mid-tier; he's very good and has been around forever. West World was probably a bad example thinking about it. >a very prominent television actor in Cranston He wasn't very prominent (he certainly is now). The show was for a particular demographic (later GenX) but that's about it. I'd say it was on par with That 70's Show . He was in a few Seinfeld episodes too.…

And in Star Trek and B5!

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#333

Post by auggierose » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:44 PM UTC

prepend wrote: post #18

Obviously, I’ll wait and see once it comes out. But it seems odd to spend so much and not have a single established creator that has put out great content. And not to involve Jackson seems off because even having him in a consulting role would be a good sign. Looking at the imdb page this seems like a corporate driven project rather than a creator driven project with lots of different directors that haven’t don’t any…

Given this other recent fantasy show on prime was just horrible, I am not surprised by this. Strangely, a lot of people liked it! Maybe it is going to be the same here. Don't even remember the name of this other show.

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#334

Post by buscoquadnary » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:45 PM UTC

layer8 wrote: post #305

djbebs wrote: post #59

So much money for something that I can already tell will flop... I really don't understand why they put people who have no connection with the IP in charge of this. It's really quite sad to see such a beloved world getting an adaptation that is destroyed by poor writing and design by committee

The IP is only used for its value as a brand. There’s an argument to be made that such productions are prone to diminishing the value of the brand if they turn out to be subpar. On the other hand, mainstream consumers usually aren’t too demanding. So brands tend to get watered down to minimal viable mediocrity.

I see that argument a lot but my thought is that people just aren't looking at a long enough time frame, I mean everyone was excited for fantastic beasts and it was considered okay, but it made a ton of money because of the brand. But then they made the second one which the general reaction to seems to be "What the HECK?" but it still had decent sells because people liked the brand and most importantly didn't realize they didn't like it until after they had seen it, now fantastic beasts 3 had incredibly low returns because all the brand had been burned at that point.

I think a huge problem is that especially, in the tech sector where things move so fast, people don't realize that many things, especially societal matters can move very slowly from a human perspective. I mean everyone how many big name tech companies do you know off the top of your head that are dying now, slowly, but still making money because of inertia? Some things just take a while someone who loves something can eventually have their love of that thing burned if it goes poorly for long enough.

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#335

Post by subsubzero » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:46 PM UTC

TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #318

subsubzero wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huge LOTR/Tolkien fan ever since I was a kid, loved the Ralph Bakashi animated LOTR film from the 70's(great rotoscoping and creepy mood), absolutely loved the Peter Jackson trilogy, liked the hobbit animated films Rankin and Bass(good music!, weird animation?), even found enjoyment in the newer Hobbit trilogy(3 movies for 1 small book? Smaug was great though!). After seeing this amazon trailer though I am beyond dis…

> there are so many interesting tales Tolkien wrote that have not seen the screen Beorn! Completely left out of the Hobbit movies https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Beorn

Beorn was in the 1st Hobbit briefly, but he could have more screen time! I forgot about one character that never saw the light of day in any film(cartoon or movie) Tom Bombodil, he was a strange character even for Tolkien's universe and was rumored to be a demi-god. I would rather see stories about him than what amazon is sending out.

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#336

Post by missedthecue » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:46 PM UTC

mmalachowski wrote: post #25

cs702 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Keep in mind that Amazon needs to get only ~0.2M incremental Amazon Prime subscribers to recoup the investment. The lifetime value (LTV) of a Prime subscriber has been estimated at ~$2,300.[a] You can play around with the figure, but given that every LOTR fan is going to want to watch this series even if it sucks , I wouldn't be surprised is Amazon ends up getting far more than ~0.2M new Prime subscribers because of…

In Poland Amazon Prime is only 10 usd / year. So the math is much harder outside the US.

Wow that sounds like an amazing value, even with differences in purchasing power. Is amazon's retail network decent in Poland?

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#337

Post by rglullis » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:47 PM UTC

workingon wrote: post #317

rglullis wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, please... no one is complaining about having minorities. The point is retconning a different type of "diversity" into a story just for the purpose of marketing for the current consumer base and its cultural sensitivities . Taking a cultural landmark and just repackaging it (new version with 20% more "minorities"!) where the race of the actors does not change anything for the story being told is just cheap tokenis…

There is a long history in theatre of casting people in roles who aren’t the same as the character. Notably men would often be cast in female roles. Maybe, just maybe, if seeing a brown elf ruins a show for you the problem isn’t with the show.

"Fun" fact: men would play women because acting was considered a very low class activity, and women that acted were seen as prostitutes.

Anyway, you just missed the point and I am not in the mood of arguing with someone who can't understand nuance in thought. Have a good day.

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#338

Post by b112 » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:50 PM UTC

runarberg wrote: post #326

bsaul wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

although i wouldn’t have worded it the same way, there’s definitely something true in your comment. I’m still amazed that people keep torturing stories made at different eras with different mentalities to try and promote today’s philosophy instead of coming with original materials. If you want diversity and black people on screen, why not create stories about the amazing empires that ruled the african continent in th…

You do know that Lord of the Rings is a fiction right? It happens in a reality where literal magic exits. I mean does the story specify the skin color of every character? Does it say that every elf is white skinned? I mean this is in a magical world, for all we know hobbits skin tone changes with age like that of Chimpanzees, being light when they are young, and darker as they get older. Or maybe non-binary genders a…

Different species, not races.

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#339

Post by runarberg » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:52 PM UTC

prepend wrote: post #174

AlexandrB wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love how it's fine for there to be dragons and magic in fantasy. But minorities ? That's a bridge too far.

I hear this argument quite a bit and think it’s shallow. Of course, I’m not against diversity in casting, but am against bad arguments. Stories have internal consistency. So while Tolkien has dragons and magic, they all make sense together. If a character pulls out an iPhone it doesn’t fit and detracts from the stories. Saying “but iPhones? That’s a bridge too far, how can you believe in dragons but not iPhones.” The…

> Tolkien goes into genealogy of characters so switching the skin color requires lots of other changes to maintain that sense of reality.

But Tolkien didn’t specify what traits inherit in which races did he? How do you know how skin tone inherits in this magical world?

Even in our universe we have species such as Chimpanzees which grow darker skinned as they age? How do you know the same doesn’t happen with wizards? In our natural world color is indeed quite dynamic. Even human skin tones, hair colors, etc. are quite dynamic in our world (even among related individuals). In a magical world there is nothing preventing the different races from being even more dynamic and diverse.

Re: Amazon spending $465M on season 1 of The Lord of the Rings series

#340

Post by jowday » Tue, Jul 05, 2022, 4:53 PM UTC

prepend wrote: post #18

Obviously, I’ll wait and see once it comes out. But it seems odd to spend so much and not have a single established creator that has put out great content. And not to involve Jackson seems off because even having him in a consulting role would be a good sign. Looking at the imdb page this seems like a corporate driven project rather than a creator driven project with lots of different directors that haven’t don’t any…

> Looking at the imdb page this seems like a corporate driven project rather than a creator driven project with lots of different directors that haven’t don’t anything remarkable and seem to have just done other Amazon shows.

With the exception of, say, the first season of True Detective, most TV shows use multiple directors. The director on a TV show is usually in charge of the technical execution of the writers script - they’re not making many creative decisions the way a movie director does. The creative authority on a TV show generally rests on the lead writer(s), not the directors. When people talk about the Sopranos, they talk about David Chase; Breaking Bad, Vince Gilligan. And in both of those cases they had teams of writers under them who would write different episodes. This didn’t stop those shows from having a strong auteur-driven vision.

In the case of the LotR show, the lead writers are JD Payne and Patrick McKay. I think they’re passionate about Tolkien from what I’ve read. Look them up if you want to know more.