There's a lot of excitement for Prime Video's The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, though many fans are disappointed that Peter Jackson has no direct involvement with the show. He helmed the big screen trilogy and The Hobbit movies, and while this series has clearly taken its visual cues from his take on Middle-earth, why isn't he a producer at least?
It turns out the show's producers ghosted him!
Talking on The Hollywood Reporter's Awards Chatter podcast, Jackson revealed that he and Fran Walsh (who co-wrote The Lord of the Rings movies) were approached and asked if they wanted to be involved.
"I said, 'That’s an impossible question to answer without seeing a script,'" the filmmaker recalled, saying they promised to send over the first few scripts. However "they never showed up." Jackson would add, "That’s the last thing I heard, which is fine. No complaints at all."
Amazon was quick to respond to these remarks (before fans presumably started losing their minds) to say, "In pursuing the rights for our show, we were obligated to keep the series distinct and separate from the films. We have the utmost respect for Peter Jackson and The Lord of The Rings films and are thrilled that he is looking forward to watching The Rings of Power."
It sounds like involving Jackson could have created some complicated legal issues, but ghosting him? It's not exactly their best move. Still, he clearly holds no ill will against the series and appears to have moved on from Middle-earth (though we don't currently know what his next project is going to be).
The show, adapted from J.R.R. Tolkien's iconic series of novels, takes place during the Second Age, thousands of years before the events of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. This story is set to follow a cast made up of established and new characters as they "confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth" (a.k.a. Sauron).
The series boasts a massive ensemble, while J.D. Payne & Patrick McKay are set to serve as showrunners. The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power premieres on September 2.