Live data from Hacker News

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

winteriscoming.net

411–420 of 605 posts

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

#411
post #397
post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Just like donkeys and horses then?

Donkeys and horses produce infertile mules. Elves and humans produce fertile offspring. Aragorn has elvish ancestors.

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

#412
post #340
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 scr…

i would argue that in many cases, having multiple directors is actually one of the great benefits of television and even within the constraints of a show, they still have considerable freedom to define the tone. tv is also a great format for relative unknowns to find their voice. steven spielberg was an 'unremarkable' tv director until he worked on Columbo and his episode- The Perfect Murder was a breakthrough that still stands apart to this day. similarly, put together any two episodes of the x files and the range is pretty incredible, Grotesque and Jose Chung's From Outer Space are only a few episodes apart and they might as well be entirely different shows.

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

#413
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…

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'…

> the showrunner

This term seems to have entered common usage quite recently.

Q: Why?

"In United States network television [the showrunner is] typically credited as an executive producer"[0]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Showrunner

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

#414

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.

It's probably just a job. Some Amazon executive says, "Hey, can you write us some Lord of the Rings episodes for X dollars?" Writer says, "Sure." I don't think hubris enters into it, the same way that construction workers don't usually compare their output to the Roman Colosseum. I also don't think that the Tolkien universe is somehow sacrosanct. If the show sucks, then it sucks - it doesn't take away from the origin…

The problem is that these things don't exist in a vaccuum. The funko pop doesn't really matter, its not taking many resources from other projects. This show potentially is taking resources, talent, money etc. If it sucks, that means chances are there will be a very long dry spell before investors decide to try another Tolkein work. So it does kind of take things away from the fandom if it does end up sucking and burning money without much to show for it.

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

#415
post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure that we've not seen the end of The Expanse 's universe.

I hope you're right, but they had an entire scene in the last episode where the main characters complained at Bezos for cutting off funding. This is not the mark of a show that they plan to renew. :-(

Haha. Duarte is playing a different game than bezos... I hope. That scene is already in the book.

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

#416

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.

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…

> where the race of the actors does not change anything for the story being told

So what's the problem with casting someone of a different race then? There are plenty of talented non-white actors in Hollywood that get passed over for roles because the "canonical" race of so many classic characters is "white". I agree that the motivation at the corporate level is sometimes to check a "diversity" check box - but for the actors this means getting work and getting paid as opposed to not.

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

#417
post #55
post #22

They should have taken 100M of that and fund the remaining three seasons of The Expanse.

This would have been great! Allthough, as far as I heard, one of the reasons for stopping was the time jump in the books (full disclosure: I didn't read the books).

There is a time jump. But come on, put some gray hair on and some makeup.

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

#418

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…

Quality matters if you care about having a cash cow and not just a one off. Paramount+ is big on telling us halo TV's first episode set records on their service, but I haven't seen any data from other episodes which is telling. I don't think that a series scoring 6 on rotten tomatoes can continually smash records and continue to look like a sound investment for media buyers.

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

#419
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…

Besides Sean Bean — who was far from A-list — how many of the Games of Thrones cast were well-known? Jason Momoa and Pedro Pascal, who’ve probably had the most post-GoT success so far (and who were two of the most popular/memorable characters on GoT), didn’t have widespread recognition before GoT.

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

#420

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.

Despite their popularity, tolkien's works were considered simplistic and juvenile. And tastes do vary, but the books aren't particularly great
Post reply on HN