Amazon’s Lord of the Rings series receives early season two renewal

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

We are still a few months out before the first season of Amazon's Lord of the Rings series begins shooting, but fans of the upcoming show will be happy to learn the streamer has already greenlit a second season. Amazon studio head Jennifer Salke confirmed the news at the company's holiday party this past weekend. (Can you imagine all the pints and Longbottom Leaf that were consumed at that sucker? Hooo boy.) While it might sound premature to greenlight a second season before pre-production has even begun on the first, it's important to note that when Amazon Studios acquired the rights in 2017, the deal was for multiple seasons.

What the second season pickup also entails is that audiences won't have to wait as long between the first and second seasons. The writers room is already being reconvened for season two and will have plenty of time to explore Middle Earth. Moreover, season one will go on hiatus for four to five months after episodes one and two have filmed. It's standard practice for straight to series orders, as it gives producers more time to analyze footage and see what adjustments, if any, need to be made. This strategy worked well for Game of Thrones as the pilot episode had to be completely reshot. And we all know how that show turned out.

Amazon Studios' Lord of the Rings series will not be an adaptation of the novels or a remake of the Peter Jackson trilogy. Instead the show will explore stories from the world of J.R.R. Tolkien previously untold. Anyone who's ever read the English author knows he wrote hundreds upon hundreds of pages detailing the mythology of Middle Earth, so the source material is ripe for plucking. Plus there's zero reason to remake what I consider to be a perfect trilogy.

Lord of the Rings starring Will Poulter, Markella Kavenagh, and Joseph Mawle begins shooting next year with an expected release date sometime in 2021.