Uh, Mckellen is definitely aged out at this point. And I doubt a tv show has the budget or the pull for Weaving and Blanchett.
Spoilers Lord of the Rings TV series
- Thread starter Cyrus
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Apparently he would, to the tune of $200 mil upfront.
Everyone has their price.
The news would be easier to take if we knew who was going to lead this effort.
Right now it feels like nothing but a big corporate business deal and nothing else.
Was never the biggest fan of the movie Elrond. I enjoyed McKellen's performance for what it was, but he never had the right tone to for Gandalf for me. The definitive Gandalf for me was Michael Hordern from the BBC audio adaptation. Although Cate Blanchett nailed it as Galadriel.
I would love it if this new series depicted the First or Second Age, but I feel that may be too far back in time. As I am currently reading the Middle Earth stuff in "in-universe" order, I'm excited by the possibility of getting to see the events of the Third Age realized.
It's frakkin' Amazon mate...they have the budget to cast the Queen of England if they wanted to...
If they are going for 1 book = 1 season, I hope they take a Game Of Thrones approach to story telling (without the sex and violence of course).
OTOH, none of the books really lend themselves to TV, so a lot of creative rewriting is going to be needed to bring it to life. I also hope they take a different direction than the New Line films, kind of update the "real-world" a bit.
OTOH, none of the books really lend themselves to TV, so a lot of creative rewriting is going to be needed to bring it to life. I also hope they take a different direction than the New Line films, kind of update the "real-world" a bit.
How can someone age out playing a centuries-old angel? I'm certain McKellen can deftly play the role again if he was requested. And I'm sure Amazon can afford all three of them. They were able to afford John Goodman for two seasons of Alpha House when they were just getting started in the television business, plus Bill Murrary in two uncredited guest appearances for the same show.
I loved McKellen's performance as Gandaly, particularly his take on Gandalf the Grey, which was one of the brightest aspects of an otherwise clumsy effort in The Hobbit trilogy. That being said, I freely admit I haven't heard Hordern's take on the role.
I, too, I'm not the biggest fan of Weaving's performance as Elrond, although he was better in The Hobbit than he was in The Lord of the Rings. However, I would like him to return for continuity sake if he's willing and fits the story.
I'm hoping for a lot of the tales from the 2nd Age. The gates of the hidden city of Gondolin swinging open and the army of elves marching forth to save the day sent chills down my spine when I read The Silmarillion. Lots of great stories in the 2nd Age, many that set up much of the War of the Rings. Political intrigues, personal conflicts, epic battles, great love stories, magical artifacts -- just what they need to draw in Game of Thrones viewers...
If there is no Glorfindel, I'm going to be upset 
Though admitted pure speculation, this comment by Medwrat at The AV Club sounds pretty plausible to moi:
(Though my impression is The Silmarillion comprises most of Tolkien's "non-hobbit Middle Earth writing", not a small sliver of the same?)
Anyhow, what this comment imagines, and what seems most plausible to me, is the show will track the decades/years before the War of the Ring, not the centuries or eons prior. Maybe it'll even lead to a part of the war the movies didn't or barely covered, such as battles against the human tribes allied with Sauron.
Pretty sure they can’t do the Silmarillion. It’s hard to figure out exactly what’s going on, but unless Christopher Tolkien has had a sudden about face or been marginalized by whomever else is involved in the management of the family trust and his father’s literary estate, my guess is that they basically draw a line that accepts these works - The Hobbit and LOTR, the LOTR appendices, and the associated characters who were part of those stories - as out the barn door, so they might as well keep doing stuff (and making money) with them, because somebody’s going to be. I mean, nothing within reason is going to shit all over the sanctity of Tolkien’s carefully crafted universe as the recent video games anyway, right? “The Silmarillion” - which is really like the “part of the iceberg you can see above water” to the totality of non-hobbit Middle Earth writing Tolkien did, but it’s a useful shorthand - has been, and likely will remain, sacrosanct as long as somebody as humorlessly protective as Christopher is in charge.
(Though my impression is The Silmarillion comprises most of Tolkien's "non-hobbit Middle Earth writing", not a small sliver of the same?)
Anyhow, what this comment imagines, and what seems most plausible to me, is the show will track the decades/years before the War of the Ring, not the centuries or eons prior. Maybe it'll even lead to a part of the war the movies didn't or barely covered, such as battles against the human tribes allied with Sauron.
You'd have to spend a lot of time and effort to make a viable screen play (or in this case, a bunch o' them) out of the Silmarillion. It's insanely complex and jumps back and forth in time from the first age and before that and after and on and on...
In that way, leads madness.
In that way, leads madness.
Yeah, I've been figuring The Silmarillion is a long shot but you can't fault a guy for hoping.
Not quite. There are also The Children of Húrin and The Tale of Beren and Lúthien, although granted both stories are expanded versions of sections of The Silmarillion and were also edited by Christopher Tolkien. In addition those two, there are also Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth and the 12 books of The History of Middle-earth, but most of that material is early versions of material later used in The Silmarillion and The Lord of the Rings, but there might be isolated stories in those, too (I don't know with any certainty since I've never read them). The History of The Hobbit is similar to The History of Middle-Earth, but wasn't edited by Christopher (but was approved by him). The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien doesn't provide full stories, rather it fills in details that are absent from established works. Lastly, there's The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, but that's a very small portion. There might be something else I'm forgetting, but that's the bulk of the Middle-earth bibliography.
Gods, I hope not. That sounds boring and uninspired.
Which is exactly why The Silmarillion is ideal as an anthology television series.
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If this was going to be based on The Silmarillion or anything else that isn't DIRECTLY associated with The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, I can't see why that wouldn't have been part of the press release, but we'll see what, ultimately, ends up coming of this announcement.
Because that centuries old angel is always supposed to look the same. It's Wolverine, only stuck around age 65ish instead of 30 something. Ian Mckellen can't convincingly look the same as he did almost 20 years ago. He's aged too much for that.
As for the rest, I'll take your word for it, but I still doubt they'd be worth the money considering the only one most people would care about is Gandalf, and he would not work in the first place.
One of Tolkien's best works.
Isn’t that called “The Hobbit?”
Yes, it's his biggest work, but the point is The Silmarillion isn't his only work, far from it. The Children of Húrin and The Tale of Beren and Lúthien are full-length novels in their own right, plus all of the other works.
Which would be fine if he was suppose to be play someone who looks relatively young like Wolverine, but he's not. He plays someone who looks like an old man. Unless McKellen says he can't handle the physical rigor of filming such a role anymore, I don't see any reason why he can't continue to play Gandalf at point of Gandalf's life.
Just because he's still old doesn't mean it will work. Look at Gandalf in the original trilogy. Look at McKellen today. The difference is more marked than Hugh Jackman between X1 and Logan. If you're going to do a Logan style story were Gandalf actually can age a bit, you could get away with it, but people here are talking about a prequel, not a sequel, and if anyone were talking about a sequel, they'd probably be run out of town on a rail for heresey.
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Not quite. Children of Hurin was put into novel form, Beren and Luthien wasn't. The recently released "Beren and Luthien" is NOT a novel version of the tale as "Children of Hurin" was. It's nothing more than all of the previously printed versions of the tale gathered into one book. Christopher has said that the story was not as fleshed out as CoH was and could not be presented in novel form.
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