The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Powerlooks pretty impressive in some of the trailers released by Amazon in the lead-up to the show’s release, and that’d better be the case because the company ran up quite the cheque to produce what will be the most expensive series of all time.
To claim that milestone,The Wall Street Journalclaims that Amazon spent $715 million making theLord of the Ringsseries' first season, which translates to $89.37 million for each of the eight episodes that will start releasing on Prime Video in September. More interestingly, the business outlet notes that while the staggering figure is unheard of in the realm of television, all that money doesn’t seem like much when divided by the number of annual Prime subscriptions in the United States alone, since 5.1 million Prime users spending 139 per year is enough to foot the bill.
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Before theLord of the Ringsprequel came along, themost expensive TV productions ever wereStranger Things($30 million per episode), which raised its budget somewhat recently when compared to the show’s beginnings, as well as Disney’s crop of Marvel Studios series, whose VFX add up fast and tend to be in the $25 million region. The rest of the record-setters areThe Mandalorian($12.515m) as well as HBO’sThe Pacific,Band of Brothers, andGame of Thrones.Meanwhile, the likes ofFriendsandE.R.continue to provide some ’90s representation.
Besides the goal of establishing Amazon as a reputable studio and being able to turnRings of Powerinto the type of franchise that can spawn more content, having a confessed fan of J.R.R. Tolkien like Jeff Bezos certainly played towards that massive budget. At least for now,Rings of Powerhas passed its first test with critics, as most of the reviewers who got early accesscame out pretty satisfied withRings of Power, and many marvelled at what that towering budget looks like on screen.
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Powerwill premiere on Amazon Prime Video starting on Jun 23, 2025.
