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quote:Amazon to Adapt J.R.R. Tolkien’s Globally Renowned Fantasy Novels, The Lord of the Rings, for Television with a Multi Season Production Commitment http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=176060&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=2316587 Especially the part that the Tolkien Estate is onboard is interesting, not to be confused with Middle-earth Enterprises, who own the movie rights to The Hobbit and LOTR. This comes as a surprise considering how much Christopher Tolkien despised the movies, sometimes rightfully so. quote:"They eviscerated the book by making it an action movie for young people aged 15 to 25. And it seems that The Hobbit will be the same kind of film." I really wonder which age they are gonna pick and which stories. After all it's kinda hard to root for a hero/heroine since many of them meet a rather bitter end, with relatively few notable exceptions like Luthien/Beren or Earendil the Mariner. The Silmarillion or The Children of Hurin is no less reluctant with tragic deaths or bad things happening to good people than Game of Thrones. I guess the early First Age and the creation of Middle Earth can be ruled out, because things were mostly a Battle Royal of the gods. But anything coming after that should be fair game. I would totally watch a series which spends a whole season explaining the peculiarities of Hobbit cuisine.
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Nov 14, 2017 01:30
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| # ? Apr 20, 2024 04:24 |
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I already said most of these things in the Tolkien thread in the book forum but here are some thoughts I have on this: 1. A lot depends on how involved the Tolkien estate is here. This could turn out as something really unique or just an attempt to recapture the success of the Jackson movies. 2. Could this be a Silmarillion series? All the press has described it as a Lord of the Rings series, with only the most recent press release referring to it as a prequel. This suggests that what has happened is not that the rights to the Silmarillion have been sold by the Tolkien estate, but that something else is being adapted — possibly some of the cut-down Silmarillion material that was included in LotR. On the other hand, depending on point 1, this could be a situation where the Tolkien estate gives Amazon a relatively free hand to use material from Tolkien’s writings as a whole. On the other other hand, it could be that the Silmarillion rights are also part of the deal and no one has elected to mention that because everyone knows what Lord of the Rings is, but nobody knows what the Silmarillion is. 3. If not a full-on Silmarillion or Lord of the Rings adaptation, I think the fall of Numenor probably lends itself most naturally to adaptation from the other Middle-earth material. 4. Comedy options: The Book of Lost Tales as an anthology series. The Adventures of Tom Bombadil (musical). The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen, a 70-year-long romantic drama chiefly composed of the two leads looking mistily at one another. Hieronymous Alloy posted:Morgoth on ungoliant action. 5. Whatever it is, I really hope they go for different visual themes than the ones inspired by Lee/Howe/Nasmith’s art that the Jackson movies leant on. 6. Cautiously excited, but this is probably still a long way off. The kind of money they’re talking here, this will take a while to make.
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Nov 14, 2017 02:19
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I'm guessing it's probably gonna be a series of some sort but just a buncha separate unconnected short stories would be neat. And some real mundane poo poo. I wanna know what Dwarves get up to when not fighting orcs, and how Elves fill up all that time they have, and how generic city people go about their peaceful lives. All the poo poo that goes on when the world isn't all full of heroic journeys and stuff. Anyway, I heard it was several million just for the rights and nothing else, which seems pretty crazy. Hope that means somebody has a good idea or two
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Nov 14, 2017 05:25
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not sure how much hope to put into this without more information on who that infinite amazon money has lined up for the production side of this, writing especially it could be great, but it could also end up a travesty
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Nov 14, 2017 06:32
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Jeff Bozo said he said wanted a Game of Thrones so I think we're getting early Gondor. Numenor would be great but prequels tend to favor places that people already know. The War of the Last Alliance would make the most sense. It's full of stuff that movie watchers will recognize like Entwives, Dead Marshes, and the Black Gate.
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Nov 14, 2017 09:04
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It'll be interesting to see what comes of this. If they don't film in NZ it will just look wrong.
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Nov 14, 2017 09:28
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Christopher Tolkien just resigned as the director of the Tolkien Estate. There are a couple of his grandkids still running the estate and a few non family members. So big changes to the story are possible. (Incoming sperg) If The Hobbit hadn't been such a shitshow I'd be psyched for this but I'm kind of apprehensive about it. Especially if they're specifically trying to imitate GoT in tone and not just using it as shorthand for a high-production-value fantasy show. I'd love to see a fantasy show that isn't grimdark but it looks like having a bunch of torturers and rapists in the cast is the mark of a serious prestige tv show at the moment. The trouble is a lot of the best things about Middle-earth are the type that don't get put on the screen, like the Scouring of the Shire, or just the idea that the Battle of the Five Armies was less important than Bilbo and Thorin making peace and Bilbo going back to the Shire. They're not going to do a show about small Englishmen living in a little town and taking polite potshots at the Sackville-Bagginses every so often. Also a lot of the stuff that was worse in the Hobbit than LoTR is indicative of general tv and film trends right now, with everyone trying to out-epic everyone else to the point where the story is a mess. The action scenes that are good are the ones that don't drag on just for the sake of being the biggest and most epic ever - eg the Balrog scene on the bridge is actually pretty short and it's one of the best in the whole six films, while Gandalf v Sauron in the Hobbit repeats the same beats multiple times and gets annoying. Helms Deep, Pellennor Fields and the Black Gate all have their own coherent narratives and structure; Five Armies just throws whatever baddies they could render on the screen one after the other. And the biggest weakness of the Hobbit films was that they tried to have higher stakes than LoTR even though it didn't fit the story. The stakes should have been the people of Laketown, not the end of the world, because we already knew how that turned out and it made it meaningless. The escalating stakes thing looks pretty likely if they're trying to compete with GoT. So if they can hold back and not try to make the biggest, darkest, most epic show on tv it could be fantastic - if they focus on making a good Middle-earth show and not on trying to outdo Game of Thrones. But yeah, they're probably going to try and outdo Game of Thrones. I can't wait for the scene where Grima rapes Eowyn next to her brother's corpse.  TLDR If they make a good Middle-earth show then gently caress yes, if they make a bad Game of Thrones imitation then gently caress no. Goddamn Particle fucked around with this message at 23:42 on Nov 15, 2017 |
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Nov 15, 2017 23:31
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He didn’t “just” resign, he resigned at the end of August/early September, well before this new series was a thing. I dare say the new series is an effect here rather than a cause. e: I definitely agree with the substance of your post though. Tempered excitement.
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Nov 15, 2017 23:45
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HBO seems to want to make GoT series for the foreseeable future, so even if Amazon first tries a retelling of LOTR, if it's successful there's no reason not to think that they'd look at other stories set in Arda.
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Nov 15, 2017 23:52
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Here I am, praying that they get Lee Pace to reprise his role as Thranduil. I would watch the hhheeeeeelllll outta that.
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Dec 1, 2017 20:11
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| # ? Apr 20, 2024 04:24 |
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Amazon is making a LOTR series and it will be called Bombadil
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Dec 1, 2017 20:14
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