The return of dragons on the small screen has been a huge hit. Now it’s time for the return of the elves and dwarves. — The Associated Press
The hour-long episodes are stuffed with action and humor but buckle up: Payne and his co-showrunner Patrick McKay plan to use a 50-hour canvas to explore their nuanced characters and complex histories. These first eight episodes are like an appetizer.
Morfydd Clark grew up in Wales to parents who adored Tolkien’s epic book series and her dad read her “The Hobbit” when she was 9. The films came out when she was 11, accelerating the obsession. Now she finds herself playing a young Galadriel, a powerful elf played later in the films by Cate Blanchett.
“Middle-earth is a fundamentally optimistic and hopeful place. He was writing about positive values and friendship and brotherhood and underdogs,” McKay said. “He was telling you that in the darkest, deep of Mordor — in his wasteland — friendship could win the day and good could triumph over evil.” “It’s a very heterogenous world and if it wasn’t, we’d be dealing with dystopia,” said Trystan Gravelle, who plays a royal advisor in an Atlantis-like kingdom. “I think it’s very fitting as well in 2022 that we reflect that as well. And I think it enriches everything. The world’s a richer place for it.”
The production — rated TV-14 for violence versus the “Game of Thrones” prequel which is TV-MA for violence, language, and nudity — is one of the most expensive in history, with Amazon spending at least $465 million on the first season in New Zealand, where the series employed 1,200 people directly and another 700 indirectly. In total, the season has reportedly cost $1 billion.
“We really tried to just go back to Tolkien. That was our mantra from the beginning: ‘Just go back to the books, go back to the books, go back to the books,’” said Payne. “We always have Tolkien at the base of what we’re doing.”
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