Amazon buys rights for The Lord of the Rings TV series aimed to compete with Game of Thrones

Could this be the first TV series to dethrone Game of Thrones since it gained its immense worldwide following years ago? After all, if anything has the chance to do so, it’s J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings turned into a TV series.

Internet giant Amazon has decided to double-down on its TV approach by buying the rights for The Lord of the Rings as announced yesterday, with the new TV series being a multi-season prequel epic that takes place and time prior to Tolkien’s Fellowship of the Ring, promising new stories and untold events with a new cast of characters.

One of the reasons that made Amazon consider the deal as Jeff Bezos himself, as he had a Game of Thrones competitor in mind with a TV series that captures the epic scales, violence, and sexual themes that made the former ever so popular around the world. Despite declining to comment on how much Amazon paid for the deal, a report by Deadline website detailed $200-$250 million as an asking price for the TV rights which Amazon, Netflix and HBO fought over. This put The Lord of the Rings TV series at a similar cost to Bezos acquiring the entirety of Washington Post.

“The Lord of the Rings is a cultural phenomenon that has captured the imagination of generations of fans through literature and the big screen. We are honored to be working with the Tolkien Estate and Trust, HarperCollins and New Line on this exciting collaboration for television and are thrilled to be taking The Lord of the Rings fans on a new epic journey in Middle Earth.” Sharon Tal Yguado, head of scripted series at Amazon Studios, said in a statement.

The new deal, as well as Amazon’s intent to release its streaming service for free with nothing but ads as a revenue source, are two indicators to the company’s determination at competing with Netflix and Disney. If The Lord of the Rings manages to achieve similar success to Game of Thrones, this might be where TV streaming service game is about to get interesting.

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