'Lord of the Rings' Television Series Officially a Go at Amazon

Amazon has been looking for a flagship series for its streaming service for a long while, and they may have just closed a deal on just that. The company has paid a whopping $250 million to acquire worldwide television rights to The Lord of the Rings series in a multi-season commitment with the potential for spin-offs.

That $250 million rights deal is believed to be the most expensive deal ever of its kind. That number also doesn't include the high costs of actually filming the show. If Amazon is hoping for the next Game of Thrones, this could potentially cost them over $1 billion for the series.

“The Lord of the Rings is a cultural phenomenon that has captured the imagination of generations of fans through literature and the big screen,” said Sharon Tal Yguado, Head of Scripted Series at Amazon Studios. “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.”

The new series is said to precede the events of The Fellowship of the Ring, but no one is currently attached to any LOTR-related project, so there's really no way of knowing what this series will be about.

This seems like a huge gamble on Amazon's part to make their way to the big leagues. They've found critical success in shows like Transparent, but they've yet to find a show that transcends into a cultural phenomenon like Netflix's Stranger Things or Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale. A lot will be riding on this series' success, making the search for a showrunner all the more important.

What do you hope to see in the upcoming Lord of the Rings series? Who would be a good pick for showrunner? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below. 

Personally: Damon Lindelof + LOTR + Game of Thrones budget = more highly anticipated than the birth of my first child.