Amazon has kicked off the marketing and promotion for its streaming service Prime Video’s upcoming ‘The Lord of the Rings’ prequel TV series. The lavish, super-expensive series is said to be Amazon’s attempt to unearth its own ‘Game of Thrones’ equivalent. The official social media accounts for the series have been launched. Along with them is an interactive map of Middle-earth and a quote by the books’ author JRR Tolkien, stating, “I wisely started with a map – J.R.R. Tolkien”. One tweet, with a photo of Middle-earth’s map, read, “Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,” which is part of the whole epigraph to the book, which goes, “Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky, Seven for the Dwarf-lords in halls of stone, Nine for Mortal Men, doomed to die, One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne, In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie. One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them. In the Land of Mordor where the Shadows lie.” Peter Jackson directed ‘The Lord of the Rings’ for New Line in three installments The ‘Lord of the Rings’ series is said to be the most expensive web series ever with a budget of an incredible 250 million dollars, which is about the same as some of today’s bigger-budgeted films. The series will apparently have five seasons. Amazon bought the television rights to the franchise for a reported 1 billion dollars, outbidding Netflix. Peter Jackson directed ‘The Lord of the Rings’ for New Line (a division of Warner Bros) in three installments. The films became huge commercial and critical successes, bagging 17 Academy Awards in total. The final installment, ‘The Return of the King’, alone took home 11 trophies. Amazon had to include New Line and Warner Bros in discussion so that footage from the films could be used potentially, according to a report in The Hollywood Reporter published in April 2018. JD Payne and Patrick McKay are attached as writers to the project. They will not suffer for the lack of material, as JRR Tolkien, the writer of the books, wrote copiously about the history of Middle-earth, the world where the franchise is set. For instance, Sauron was only the second Dark Lord of the Middle-Earth. Before him, Morgoth, the Devil equivalent and Sauron’s master, had spread darkness upon the world. The world is incredibly rich in content and just waiting to be mined. Peter Jackson’s movies, including ‘The Hobbit’ series, one could say, barely scratched the surface. Published in Daily Times, February 17th 2019.