Lord of the Rings TV show

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by ianuaditis, Nov 13, 2017.

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  1. EddieMann

    EddieMann I used to be a king...

    Location:
    Geneva, IL. USA.
    I think he sold "the book". To be treated with as the buyer saw fit.
     
  2. Chris from Chicago

    Chris from Chicago Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes

    I don't think this is going to be popular here but... to an entire generation... the LOTR movie series IS the definitive version. I've read and enjoyed the books. And I don't like science fiction at all (can't stand Star Wars) and I pretty much feel the same about fantasy. But the movies were great. And they made a ton of people interested in seeing the story through to the end. The movies also made people go out and try reading the novels who would never have otherwise done so. Were they over the top? Yeah. Were they overly violent and flashy? You betcha. But to deny their importance in bringing this story to a new generation would be short sighted. You can debate which is greater (see the Shining) but the debate is not as one sided as this thread thus far would have you believe.
     
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  3. EddieMann

    EddieMann I used to be a king...

    Location:
    Geneva, IL. USA.
  4. Erik Tracy

    Erik Tracy Meet me at the Green Dragon for an ale

    Location:
    San Diego, CA, USA
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  5. I don't think the LOTR movies are being denigrated much in this thread and I agree they are important and successful interpretations for the screen. The Hobbit was another thing entirely and an artistic failure IMO. But I think there are several other good stories that can be extracted from Tolkiens works, particularly The Simarillian and the LOTR Appendices, that could make for excellent episodic TV.
     
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  6. Chris from Chicago

    Chris from Chicago Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes

    I couldn't even sit through the Hobbit movies.
     
  7. Erik Tracy

    Erik Tracy Meet me at the Green Dragon for an ale

    Location:
    San Diego, CA, USA
    Well, PJ & Co won't have anything to do with the Amazon series, so I'd suggest if we want to re-open that can of....ah...discussion...we start a new thread about the movies. :p
     
  8. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    ...and telling stories by the fire, don't forget that! Yeah, forget showing, let's tell!
     
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  9. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    "Net points" is the punchline of jokes told in Hollywood. Unless you have a percentage of the gross, you're not getting anything.
     
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  10. Ginger Ale

    Ginger Ale Snackophile

    Location:
    New York
    Think I'll just read the books again.
     
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  11. Bryan

    Bryan Starman Jr.

    Location:
    Berkeley, CA
    Agree. The films are a beloved part of pop culture at this point. Which is why I'm skeptical about this new TV show, because it will have to meet a pretty high bar in the public's mind.
     
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  12. timind

    timind phorum rezident

    Read the books a few times in the 70s and not really interested in seeing another LOTR movie. Now if they give me a series based on the life and times of Tom Bombadil, I'm in.
     
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  13. Chris DeVoe

    Chris DeVoe RIP Vickie Mapes Williams (aka Equipoise)

    Oh right, you just lust after that hot Earth Mama Goldberry.
     
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  14. EddieMann

    EddieMann I used to be a king...

    Location:
    Geneva, IL. USA.
    [​IMG]
     
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  15. xdawg

    xdawg in labyrinths of coral caves

    Location:
    Roswell, GA, USA
    The Brothers Hildebrandt paintings are awesome!
     
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  16. Ignatius

    Ignatius Forum Resident

    Bombadil's part reminds me that if his and all the others' songs from the trilogy had been...ah...recreated in the movies they would have bombed.
     
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  17. Spaghettiows

    Spaghettiows Forum Resident

    Location:
    Silver Creek, NY
    Depending on the extent of what material Amazon was able to get their hands on, I think this could make for very compelling television. No need to remake "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy or "The Hobbit" specifically, although I bet that they could improve greatly over Jackson's "The Hobbit".

    However, I am a great fan of Tolkien, but not a purist. The purists will likely not agree, but I bet they would still watch.
     
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  18. Erik Tracy

    Erik Tracy Meet me at the Green Dragon for an ale

    Location:
    San Diego, CA, USA
    Most are.

    Never liked their interpretation of orcs though - more like green hogs.

    I think Tim Kirk's '75 calendar hit closer to the mark, as far as Tolkien calendars go, imho. :p
    [​IMG]
     
    Last edited: Nov 15, 2017
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  19. xdawg

    xdawg in labyrinths of coral caves

    Location:
    Roswell, GA, USA
  20. Erik Tracy

    Erik Tracy Meet me at the Green Dragon for an ale

    Location:
    San Diego, CA, USA
  21. His Masters Vice

    His Masters Vice W.C. Fields Forever

    Yes indeed. I guess the Tolkiens foresaw that to an extent, and specified that the percentage had to be paid immediately after the studio recovered 2.6 times the original production cost. Of course, New Line were inflating that figure with many other items (allegedly). The Tolkiens got a nice settlement in the end, so I guess they "won".

    It seems that only the Film rights (and associated merchandising) were sold in the original agreement back in the late sixties. The Tolkiens had always taken a very firm line about any kind of technology not specified in the original deal - so no (broadcast) television or shows available via internet streaming. Also, any books about PJ's movies have to be directly related to the content of the movies themselves, so no spin-off novels were allowed.

    As for the question of whether this new show will be worth watching - who knows? It all depends on who is involved in the writing, directing, acting and production. Just like any other show. The potential audience is fairly large - anyone who has read the books (tens of millions), any who saw PJ's films and is curious (also tens of millions, I expect) and anyone who likes the look of the trailers or is a fan of the actors (if they choose name actors). This is a HUGE gamble by Amazon, but they have money to burn.
     
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  22. Spaghettiows

    Spaghettiows Forum Resident

    Location:
    Silver Creek, NY
    Weren't those animated Rankin-Bass productions of The Hobbit and Return of the King made-for-TV? Somebody must have obtained TV rights for those.
     
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  23. Jim B.

    Jim B. Senior Member

    Location:
    UK
    Yes!

    The LOTR film trilogy was great, the Hobbit should never have been a trilogy. Both had serious problems which I think will date them quickly in all the 'superhero' nonsense, like one guy fight 20 Orcs and winning, the daft chase scenes (that one in the Hobbit film in the mountain with the falling bridges, dire).

    I would really like to see a well done Ursula Le Guin Earthsea series, think that would be amazing and it's much better written than most fantasy works.
     
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  24. Mr Bass

    Mr Bass Chevelle Ma Belle

    Location:
    Mid Atlantic
    Middle Earth is an entire (literary) world set out in greater than average detail. So it would not be difficult to set independent stories in that framework. The average novel presents independent stories about our Earth after all. Whether the public would accept that is not for me to judge. The sf novelist Jack Vance set a variety of separate stories in his Dying Earth series as one example. Edgar Rice Burroughs had different stories set in Barsoom (Mars) as another.
     
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  25. His Masters Vice

    His Masters Vice W.C. Fields Forever

    Good point. I know that when the BBC did a radio adaption in 1981 they had to deal directly with Tolkien's publishers (George Allen & Unwin) to get the rights, not the company that owned the film and merchandising rights (Saul Zaentz's "Tolkien Enterprises"). I suspect that the Rankin-Bass productions got by via a loophole as they were still technically standalone films, just films produced for television, not a "TV series". It's been a while since I've seen a copy of the original 1969 agreement for the film/stage/merch rights. NOTE: Technically there are two agreements ... one for the Tolkien family, and one for Tolkien's publishers, who already owned some of the IP because they agreed to split the original profits of LOTR 50/50 with Tolkien (!) back in 1954.

    In broad terms, what the Tolkiens' sold were "Film, stage, and merchandising rights". That being said, we've seen computer games marketed under the "Middle Earth" banner, which I assume are somehow allowed as a form of "merchandising" of the PJ films.
     
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