Lord of the Rings series!?

For discussion of Amazon's new television show "The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power"
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kzer_za
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by kzer_za »

With the lack of recent news after the initial rollout I am starting to worry Yguado's departure may show some kind of major internal turmoil on the project. But only time will tell I suppose.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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My best guess is that the recent lack of news was mainly caused by marketing concerns. With the release of the final season of Game of Thrones, the unrelated Tolkien film, and of several major summer blockbusters in the last few weeks the producers probably thought it wise to postpone any further major announcements until (at least) early June. It would be strange however if we do not get any direct info in the next couple of months.

On a related note: G. R. R. Martin recently broke the news that Amazon has hired one of the more prominent writers from Game of Thrones, Byran Cogman, to help them “out on their big Tolkien project”.(1) TORN erroneously has called Cogman the new “leading" man for the LotR series – which still might turn out to be true, but for all that we know now he might only be a consultant. I would not read too much into this (currently) – it would be an overstatement to conclude from this that the series will have the same tone, style, etc. as GoT.

I do not want to turn this into another thread about the level of quality (or lack thereof) of the final seasons of Game of Thrones. That said, the LOTR series will be shaped (for better and/or worse) by GoT. This is somewhat ironic, given the fact that Game of Thrones would never have been possible if it were not for Jackson’s films. The license of the LOTR series, in return, would probably not have been acquired by Amazon without the success of Game of Thrones. I would like to make two points, however (no spoilers here):

The less-than-stellar reception of the final season of Game of Thrones (from many critics, casual viewers, and readers alike) could actually have positive repercussions for the LOTR series. It might allow the main writers of the LOTR series to break with certain conventions that were established by Game of Thrones – thereby I mean conventions that are alien or even hostile to the spirit of Middle-earth (not the Middle-earth of Jackson but Tolkien himself). This is a rather far-fetched hypothesis and the writers might as well decide to go into the exact opposite direction.

On the flipside, and this is a much more sober point, it is a commonly (and not unreasonably) held belief among many readers of the books that Game of Thrones saw a decline in quality in later seasons, i.e., more precisely after the TV series surpassed the narrative of the books. A lot of this is brought down to certain characters and other minutiae but on a fundamental level the series often no longer managed to organically and holistically tell its story. Once they ran out of detailed source material, the screenwriters simply had a hard time to connect the dots (the issue was not so much where the dots were located – but fill in the details between them and it gets tough). This is a dark omen for the LOTR series in my opinion. The writers really only have the dots to work with (Númenor, The Forging of the Rings, The Last Alliance). Some of the worst moments from Jackson’s films, especially in the Hobbit, occur when the writers started to invent entire new scenes (prominent examples such as the funeral of Théodred excluded). If the writers of Game of Thrones could not maintain the quality of a series that in so many ways matched the tropes, sentiments, and cravings of modern TV audiences, what can we expect of LOTR? Is there any hope for an artistically and intellectually stimulating work (produced by the behemoth Amazon)? Only a fool’s hope, it seems…

On a more curious note, come to think of it, it is nearly certain that some of the (at least minor) GOT veteran actors will be cast in the LOTR series. There are only so many good (read: British) actors that are fairly cheap; if the series manages to go over multiple seasons, there will be some strangely familiar faces showing up.

(1): http://georgerrmartin.com/notablog/
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Voronwë the Faithful »

We'll, they won't likely be familiar to me, since I've never seen even a second of Got. ;)

I saw the news about Cogman, but it is too ambiguous to make any judgements about it. The overall success of GoT certainly is likely to have some influence on the M-e show, but it is a different world and I feel confident that the show-runners and writers will respect that.

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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by kzer_za »

For what it's worth (and I've never seen GoT, though I've read the books), Cogman seems to generally be considered the best of the core writers on Game of Thrones, more responsible and thoughtful than the "D&D" showrunning team.

With a darker tone with more politics and moral ambiguity, there is more possible overlap between Game of Thrones and the Second Age than the late Third Age. However Arda is still decidedly not the same as Westeros and shouldn't try too hard to chase its success.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Alatar »

Was just coming here to post that. For anyone who doesn't want to click through, a director has been attached to the LotR TV Series:
Bayona’s first feature film, the critically acclaimed thriller The Orphanage, executive produced by Guillermo del Toro, premiered to a ten-minute standing ovation at the Cannes Film Festival and later won seven Goya Awards in Spain, including best new director.

Bayona most recently directed Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, which grossed more than $1.3 billion worldwide. He also directed the features The Impossible, starring Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor, and A Monster Calls, starring Sigourney Weaver, Liam Neeson, and Felicity Jones, as well as the first two episodes of Showtime’s hit series Penny Dreadful.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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I'm also glad to hear the Second Age re-confirmed. Honestly, the worst-case pessimist side of me was afraid that Yguado's departure and a long period of silence meant things were in chaos and they might fall back on Young Aragorn just to get something made.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Voronwë the Faithful »

While I'm glad to get confirmation, I was not really too worried about that. The map rollout was just too detailed and specific for them to not go in that direction. And there really is little indication that Yguado was the driving force behind the production, despite being in charge when the deal was first done.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Voronwë the Faithful »

Lord of the Rings’ Series at Amazon Taps First Cast Member (EXCLUSIVE)

No word about who she is playing, but it is worth noting that the first cast member is female.

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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Beutlin »

Ah, an Australian: Hollywood's cheaper resource pool for British-looking actors. ^^

"sources say she would be playing a character named Tyra."

If the sources are correct about the name (and the casting for that matter), Kavenagh will probably not play an elf but a human or maybe even a dwarf. Tyra, or more accurately Thyra, is a name of Old Norse origin (like Gandalf, Gimli, Gloin, etc.). If that is actually her character's name in the series, let us hope they do not pronounce it in a modern fashion but with a close front rounded vowel for the "y" (as in French "lune")

Of course, as some have already speculated on "TORN", Tyra might simply be an early-production name; in fact this is the more likely scenario. If we follow these speculations, Kavenagh might as well have been cast as the new Galadriel.
If true, not an ideal choice: Although considerably younger in the Second Age, Galadriel was still one of the wisest and oldest elves in Middle-earth at the time. I could not find anything reliable about Kavenagh's age, but she looks very young indeed (at most, early twenties) and she recently played a 14-year-old in a theatre play (1). Another possibilty is that they go for a general "adolescent" approach for the elves, i.e., all elves will look like (very beautiful) humans in their late teens and early twenties. That would be mind-boggingly stupid, but I cannot rule it out 100 per cent.

(1): https://www.theage.com.au/entertainment ... 522wh.html
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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I'm guessing Erendis, though who knows if they really have the rights to do stories from UT?

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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Frelga »

Do we know how long the series is supposed to run? If they expect several seasons, hiring young actors could be a cost-effective approach to casting characters who don't age. Orlando was looking a bit creepy in the Hobbit.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Voronwë the Faithful »

They are contracted for five seasons, I believe. Plus possible spin-offs.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Voronwë the Faithful »

A new video put out by LOTR on Prime announcing their creative team (officially including Tom Shippey as "Tolkien Scholar" and John Howe as "illustrator/Concept Artist")
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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I'm slightly disappointed at no Alan Lee, but not really surprised - Lee is a decade older than Howe and definitely seems like the type who would want a quiet retirement at this point.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Voronwë the Faithful »

Yeah, they had a great dynamic working together and bringing different but complementary approaches.

But it is still good to have Howe onboard.

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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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The German Tolkien society has posted an interview with Tom Shippey about the amazon series.
https://www.tolkiengesellschaft.de/3091 ... tronprime/
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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The bad news is that Shippey's involvement seems quite limited. The good news is that, assuming he is right about the legal stuff, the Estate has some degree of veto power.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

Post by Alatar »

That's not necessarily good news.
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Re: Lord of the Rings series!?

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If Christopher's successors are willing to give them the Second Age for a format they know will require a good amount of invention, I don't think they're going to be taking a tightfisted purist approach. But it's good to have some accountability.
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