00:00We cannot achieve victory through strength of arms. Not for ourselves, but we can give Frodo a chance.
00:08Get excited, Lord of the Rings fans. Middle Earth is coming to the small screen.
00:12Amazon Studios is officially going to make a Lord of the Rings TV series.
00:16The retail giant and streaming outlet announced Monday that it has acquired global television rights
00:22to the LOTR franchise, based on the best-selling novels by J.R.R. Tolkien.
00:26Amazon has handed out a multiple-season commitment, and the series will be produced in-house
00:31at Amazon Studios, alongside the Tolkien Estate and Trust, publisher HarperCollins,
00:36and Warner Bros. Entertainment's New Line Cinema.
00:38The series will be set in Middle Earth and explore new storylines that take place before Tolkien's
00:43The Fellowship of the Ring. The deal includes a potential additional spin-off series.
00:47Amazon's new head of scripted series called Lord of the Rings a cultural phenomenon that has captured
00:52the imagination of generations of fans through literature and the big screen. She added,
00:57We are thrilled to be taking The Lord of the Rings fans on a new epic journey in Middle Earth.
01:02The news comes ten days after word leaked that Amazon Studios was exploring a potential TV show
01:07based on the fantasy series and subsequent feature film franchise, which was produced by New Line Cinema.
01:13The Lord of the Rings novels were named Amazon customers' favorite book of the millennium in 1999.
01:18A representative for the Tolkien Estate and Trust and HarperCollins said,
01:21We are delighted that Amazon, with its long-standing commitment to literature, is the home of the first-ever
01:27multi-season television series for The Lord of the Rings. Sharon and the team at Amazon Studios have
01:32exceptional ideas to bring to the screen previously unexplored stories based on J.R.R. Tolkien's original writings.
01:38It comes as little surprise that Amazon Studios has emerged as a home for The Lord of the Rings TV series.
01:44Given the genre-focused programming push Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has mandated.
01:48The news comes as multiple outlets have been looking for a large-scale hit a la HBO's Game of Thrones,
01:53as the competition to cut through a cluttered landscape of more than 500 scripted originals continues to grow.
01:59On that side, Disney announced last week that it is developing a live-action Star Wars TV series for its coming
02:06SVOD platform, as other outlets look to compete with streaming giant Netflix.
02:10For more on this story, head to THR.com and Lord of the Rings fans, storm the comments to let us know
02:16how you feel about this new TV series. For The Hollywood Reporter News, I'm Tiffany Taylor.
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