Amazon Wants to Turn Lord of the Rings into the Next Game of Thrones
theverge.com
theverge.com
What value would they even really add?
At least with the Game of Thrones, it was the first time it was adapted to television.
In the case of LoTR, there's already been a big budget production that won a ton of Oscars.
This seems very strange to me. Usually these studios want to try new ideas and less conservative. This smacks of a typical Hollywood studio problem, just regurgitating existing franchises into new mediums.
As you say, though, an end-to-end retelling of LoTR doesn't make much sense.
Honestly this seems like a late-to-the-party attempted at catch up.
I would have continued the series if I thought his writing were any good, in spite of the clearly repressed sexuality he was indulging himself in.
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/411971-i-cordially-dislike-...
https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2964059-letters-of-j-r...
I don't know - I've never thought to myself "I've had enough Tolkien stories represented in film". I'd love to see another representation.
I don't know - that was pretty much my reaction to the Hobbit movies - which were pretty dreadful. I didn't even bother seeing the 3rd one.
Tolkien did, however, create a very detailed and very rich world. There's plenty of backdrop there on which to write new stories whether or not they hew to anything specific that's already been written in that universe. On the other hand, there are plenty of rich worlds that authors have built over time. And most of them don't carry the baggage and weight of expectations that anything associated with Tolkien inevitably would.
ADDED: As noted elsewhere, the rights to other Tolkien works would have to be obtained.
What I meant is I'm not tired of the Tolkien universe and would welcome more. That's not to say I enjoyed the hobbit series whatsoever. For instance, I'd love to see another director try their hand at a Hobbit series on television. At least then I could pretend the Jackson-led Hobbit series didn't exist.
I watched season 1 a lot closer than 2 or 3, but it doesn't seem like they are doing a much world building as they tell each tale.
I don't want to spoil anything but there are multiple characters that exist in both, though obviously younger since season 2 takes place some thirty years before season 1. Some of it is subtle but very interesting once you realize it. I don't want to hint at it more so as not to spoil it.
In effect each season stands alone, you're correct that there's not much world building.
They left out the "Scouring of the Shire" which was one of the key chapters of the book that illustrated the main point of the entire story.
I'm still bitter.
I feel like this story would be a good mini-series or standalone movie.
Mine too! I also understand why it was cut, but it really ruined the movies for me.
I'll see your bitter, and raise you a curmudgeoning.
But many important things were cut from the books to make time. Tom Bombadil comes to mind. The many sorties and battles in the Two Towers were truncated.
And most importantly, as another commenter mentioned, the freeing of the Shire, which is integral to the entire premise of a hero's journey - that the hero must return to his homeland and share the hard won gifts with his community - was cut.
There's plenty in the books to warrant a series. Game of Thrones does ~9 hours per book and still had to cut characters and plot points. <2 hours per novel is pretty much always a huge compromise.
The books in ASOIAF are longer thsn those in LotR, there's more books, and ASOIAF books have a higher density of action vs. description. Yes, there were some elements cut from LotR in the Peter Jackson movies, so maybe you've got two short seasons of material.
The crucial thing about this is that it is a pitch by the Tolkien estate rather than to them. Christopher Tolkien hated the Peter Jackson movies [...snip...]
I was an avid reader of Tolkien as a teenager and the movies were a disappointment to me as well. Too much spectacle and derring-do, whilst I always enjoyed the construction of the world and the inner lives & secrets of the characters. The omissions made were sometimes grotesque: the removal of Tom Bombadil alone made the mockery of the books. Skipping the entire homecoming chapter of the hero's journey ("the scouring of the shire") is a common complaint and a travesty of storytelling.
However, Christopher Tolkien is the ultimate Tolkien purist, after a lifetime of curating his father's work. In the few interviews he gives he's clearly dismayed by any deviation from the original intent. I suspect he'd likely be unhappy with any TV adaptation as well.
Like many other Tolkien fans I'd much rather see an adaptation of The Silmarillion, which if anything is the more epic book of tales.
Anyone who goes to a theater looking for a completely faithful and literal adaptation of a beloved book is almost certainly going to be disappointed.
Would you help me understand why the scene was so important for you?
I love the books, but even I will admit they're are fairly dry with large, long-winded descriptions. Peter Jackson did a brilliant job with the movies, and I'm really not sure what could be done better or even differently (outside of a fan-fiction TV series).
But that's not a problem for a TV series, which is why GoT --- despite being categorically worse source material! --- is in the aggregate stronger than the LoTR films, even if you leave out the execrable Hobbit movies.
Sounds quite faithful to me. The books are plodding, most of the characters are fairly simple, and there's entire chapters that describe rolling hills and lush forests...to say nothing of the songs.
I suppose this is still risky if they mess it up big time, but they've already got a built in audience of tens (hundreds?) of millions. The story has been proven (obviously), so if they do it in a slightly different way while adhering to the books perhaps it's a slam dunk, according to their research.
Another one that might be interesting is Glen Cook's Black Company series, but that is apparently also taken... http://deadline.com/2017/04/eliza-dushku-star-the-black-comp...
Kingkiller Chronicles movies and TV shows are coming
Stormlight Archive and Mistborn adaptations are coming
I'm pretty excited for the next few years.
The setting I'd want to see for a complex multi-party high-budget drama, is a fictional world in the age of sail. Conquerors, unlikely allies, traders, and even pirates.
It could have social commentary around first contact, exploitation, different belief systems, different social structures, relations with the crown.
And it'd be really ambitious if the cultures involved were somewhat evenly matched. A bit better technology on one side vs. home field advantage and numbers on the other. Possibly diseases going in both directions.
I know I'm repeating myself - but the Baroque Cycle gives you all of that and Isaac Newton in top form...
Conquerors? Check. Traders? Check. Pirates? Check. Unlikely allies? Checkcheckcheckcheckcheck.
And more:
Talking ships? Check. Sea monsters? Check. Marine battles with pirates, talking ships and sea monsters? Check, check and check. Intriguing characters with complex motivations? Oh yes check please. Magic? Check indeed. Dragons? Oh you have no idea.
If anyone reading this is a TV producer please find Robin Hobb and drown her in money.
LOTR, is there even enough content in the three books for a multiple season show? deviation becomes very difficult because the stories are widely known and all sorts of cliques exist around what is what. While the LOTR movies did good work with the books there is always the danger for Amazon that we would end up with a LOTR meeting a Hobbit style treatment so that it moves so far from the books that fans of the source material tune it out.
rehash, the fact they want to use a known story such as LOTR shows they are concerned only about money and not a good show. They are approaching it from the wrong angle
The ~15 year-old trilogy remains awesome, and needs no competitor. This is just going to needlessly mutate a familiar and well-received thing.
If Amazon wants to do something new, then Amazon should do something new under a different name, and not co-opt brand recognition for a cheap bonus.
It's all about the story. A high budget film with a mediocre story will still only be mediocre. A low budget film with an amazing story will more than likely still be amazing.
On the other hand, I'd love to see Ken Burns do _The Silmarillion_, a-la his treatment of _The Civil War_. It'd cut down on production costs, too :-)
If anything, I'd love to see The Silmarillion turned into a series. I think it lends itself better to bursts of short epic episodes and the stories are largely untold outside of the book.
But why you would ever redo the LoTR novels is beyond me. They are done by the movies... end scene.
Adding new material doesn't seem to me to be something the fans would allow.
I don't get how this idea ever got floated, as per South park a few weeks ago, Amazon are trying to Greenlite everything now?
GoT is about the victory of the historically downtrodden--women, eunuchs, slaves, "wildlings", bastards, and a dwarf--over the traditionally powerful men. GoT is full of sex and death. And, best of all, was totally unpredictable. (For the first six seasons, anyway)
LotR, on the other hand, is about the victory of a bunch of white males going to war against a multiracial army. Their goal: to help a white man from a "superior" race (the Numenoreans) reclaim his birthright: dominion over almost all of middle earth. The only two women in the books with any substantive role are Galadriel and Eowyn. Galadriel is in a no-win situation; most of her power is destroyed when the One Ring is destroyed. Meanwhile Eowyn, the scrappy shieldmaiden of Rohan, is rewarded for killing the Captain of the Nazgul by getting to assume a gender-normal role as the wife of the Steward of Gondor. (HT to David Brin for pointing a lot of this out first.)
Worst of all for the TV series, in LotR everyone already knows what's going to happen!
In the books, Gandalf states that expliitly: “Many are the strange chances of the world,' said Mithrandir, 'and help oft shall come from the hands of the weak when the Wise falter.”
In the movies, they even have the King of Gondor kneeling before the hobbits, just to drive the point home. It's hardly subtle.