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

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

#371

Post by ryantgtg »

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

No he wasn’t. He’s in 2/3 of them.

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

#372

Post by jowday »

deelowe wrote: post #367
jollybean wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In TV 'Mr. Big' is usually the 'Showrunner'. Basically the original creators. It's like a form of creative production and management. For film, the Director is often kind of the version of 'Showrunner'. If the director was the one doing the pitching, raising the money - they they are that. If it's a big IP asset, like Star Treck, then it's different, sometimes a team effort. Like Kathleen Kennedy is the 'Big Honcho'…

Am I the only one struggling to understand this? Are 'Mr. Big' and 'Showrunner' references to something specific? Why are these terms in quotes?

He’s putting those in quotes because they’re generally not formal positions that are explicitly credited, but are informal phrases referring to whoever has final creative control over a series.

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

#373

Post by tptacek »

philistine wrote: post #364
jowday wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 scr…

Actually, you could say we're in the middle of a transition. All the Marvel shows have used one director for the whole season of their shows, and they're not the only ones to have moved on to this format. As for OP's point, with the series' budget so high, a gun-for-hire TV director might not be accoustemed to the staggering budget they have to manage.

Not one of the Marvel Shows would break any reasonable TV top 10. The "1-2 showrunners, a writers room, and a rotating cast of directors" model is unimpeachably successful; it got us Breaking Bad, The Wire, The Sopranos, Deadwood, The Americans, and Mad Men, among many others.

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

#374

Post by [deleted] »

verve_rat wrote: post #220
synu wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's amazing how they managed to go from beloved franchise to salted earth in one season. People used to rewatch the seasons, but not so much now that they know where it's all headed.

Yeah, it could have been a franchise for the ages, even maybe another Star Wars... maybe. But that last season killed all that dead. Hell, there might have a way to rescue it until the last couple of episodes. It was truly remarkable to watch potentially billions of dollars of future value evaporate in real time.

[deleted]

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

#375

Post by JauntyHatAngle »

tptacek wrote: post #368
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…

Having Jackson even nominally involved in the project would be a pretty terrible sign for me, after the Hobbit fiasco (which in turn colored my appraisal of ROTK and, in particular, the extended LOTR editions). As for the writer's room on this show, it looks solid to me: * Jason Cahill wrote a bunch of episodes for The Sopranos * Justin Doble wrote 4 episodes in S1 and S2 of Stranger Things, and those are the only tw…

Minor quibble, but add Charles Dance to your big name actors list. I can't think of any others though... dinklage was kind of known I guess?

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

#376

Post by racl101 »

AlwaysRock wrote: post #315
snickerbockers wrote: post #299

This is going to be terrible. I can't imagine the SHEER FUCKING HUBRIS modern TV writers must have of they think they can write a fanfic that stands next to Tolkien's greatest work. These writers' only experience is working on a 4th film in JJ Abrams' Star Trek reboot universe which ended up getting cancelled too.

Quality doesnt matter anymore. It will get views because it has a brand attached to it and lots of people already have prime. I don't know what their break even number is but prime is fucking expensive. If this pushes 1% of people who are on the edge of buying prime and not buying prime into making that decision its a massive win for them. I don't think it will be any good. But 95% of film and tv is terrible and it k…

> I don't think it will be any good. But 95% of film and tv is terrible and it keeps getting made.

Yep.

And unlike Netflix, Amazon has deep pockets, to take such a huge gamble.

Personally, based on everything I've heard I've set my expectations to be very low.

I could take it or leave it.

I'll wait for people to watch it and if they tell me it's not good I won't even bother.

I love this series so much to not sully my memories of it by even watching this to find out just how bad it is.

I don't need the currency of being able to bitch about it or complain or to say that I knew it was gonna suck.

That's how much I like the original Peter Jackson movies.

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

#377

Post by smsm42 »

subsubzero wrote: post #309
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…

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…

Numenor alone has enough to make a good series - you've got epic characters, great events, powerful kings, beauty, love, treachery, doom, magic, battles, betrayal and ruin. I've seen decent series done on much less than that.

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

#378

Post by lliamander »

Sebb767 wrote: post #75
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never even bothered with Season 8.

And you'll be happier if you keep it that way :-) The only worse ending I know is that of How I Met Your Mother. Just skip the last two episodes there, seriously.

I hated the ending of HIMYM at first, but now I'm good with it.

Part of my change in heart comes from rewatching the series, it seems to me that they had this as the intended ending all along. I also think it serves as an interesting commentary on the notion of love and romantic attachments that Ted struggles with throughout the show.

But overall I am frustrated with the film industry's overall obsession with subverting expectations. Viewers want some sort of payoff, and withholding that can really burn people who've invested time into watching content (especially for long running TV shows). You can sometimes achieve payoff even while subverting expectations, but too often you end up with an incoherent mess.

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

#379

Post by deelowe »

jowday wrote: post #372
deelowe wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Am I the only one struggling to understand this? Are 'Mr. Big' and 'Showrunner' references to something specific? Why are these terms in quotes?

He’s putting those in quotes because they’re generally not formal positions that are explicitly credited, but are informal phrases referring to whoever has final creative control over a series.

That sounds like it's all a bit made up then...

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

#380

Post by mrob »

b112 wrote: post #338
runarberg wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

In Lord of the Rings, humans, elves, and orcs can all interbreed, so they are all the same species.
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