Lord of the Rings

New episode, we talked about some old film or something

https://www.megaphonic.fm/bythebywater/45

So this time around we tackled two of the shorter non-Middle-earth works...

https://www.megaphonic.fm/bythebywater/46

And we did one of the big ones here -- Gollum:

https://www.megaphonic.fm/bythebywater/47

Plus we finally have an episode guide up:

https://www.megaphonic.fm/bythebywater/episodes

Wait, what?

Warner Bros. Pictures is revamping the “Lord of the Rings” film franchise.

Get the details here: https://t.co/XfHSGK6zfh pic.twitter.com/Te23J4STah

— Variety (@Variety) February 23, 2023

I hope that these are new versions of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings

LOTRCU

If we get movies about the fall of Gondolin, Beren and Luthien, and Ungoliant and the distruction of the trees of Valinor that'd be cool

that article isn't clear at all on what these are, I certainly hope they are not remakes.

LOTRCU

Ha, made the same joke to my cohosts. (We are not sanguine.)

Here's the key part here:

Freemode, a division of Embracer Group, made the adaptive rights deal for books including “The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit.” The pact will be billed under the name Middle-earth Enterprises.

Embracer, who have been hoovering up a LOT of things, took over the rights from the 'original' as such Middle-earth Enterprises, who cashed out about a year back after holding onto them for fifty years -- that was the company that Saul Zaentz organized when he got the Hobbit/LOTR film rights in the early 70s, after they were briefly held by UA directly. Everything you've seen since on a cinematic or staging front, plus various other merchandising things that fall under that general umbrella, ultimately were controlled/licensed from the Zaentz team, first as Tolkien Enterprises and then as Middle-earth Enterprises as noted, a name this new venture is now incorporating. (The Rankin-Bass adaptations were the weird stepchildren that fell into an unclear rights void.) Anyway, by this I mean Bakshi's film, the two Jackson trilogies, even the stage musical from the 2000s.

akm is correct on what these are or aren't supposed to be. They could, if they wanted to, go for remakes. They could do works derived from Hobbit/LOTR. Embracer made noises about doing separate films based on characters a while back. That they've partnered with Warner Bros rather than doing something separate does make a certain sense; WB would like to hold on to their franchise opportunities and Embracer doesn't have to build from the ground up. In ways, this is just a recalibration of the original Zaentz situation when it came to dealing with studios/producers interested in developing things.

If you're wondering about how the Amazon show exactly fits into all this: Amazon used a carveout in the rights specifically regarding TV. They can do whatever they want within the scope of that deal, but it applies strictly to Hobbit/LOTR material, nothing more, which is why so much of the first season was, in essence, invented nonsense.

It's worth further noting that all this is due to Tolkien himself agreeing to a rights deal back in the late 60s, which specifically only covered the two key works published at the time, Hobbit and LOTR. Everything else published since is the estate's to deal with, and Christopher Tolkien absolutely refused any further licensing or rights deals. His own son Simon is now the de facto head of the estate and they were willing to do the Amazon setup precisely because it gave them some space for negotiation themselves, as far as we can tell, but that was it, and none of the posthumous publications have had their rights sold, from The Silmarillion on. Until or unless that changes, anything further developed in this new deal has to essentially be, much like the Amazon series, invented fanfic, with vague head-nods towards canon as such.

BTW, the Mike De Luca mentioned in the Variety piece has his own history with New Line and WB. Frankly I'm not thrilled to see his name back here, per this 2011 piece. I remember when he was originally fired from New Line:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/confessions-mike-de-luca-161111/

And a bit of further context to keep in mind -- there already is this film due next year, which was started some time back; this deal had nothing to do with it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings:_The_War_of_the_Rohirrim

even the stage musical from the 2000s

the what now?

Enjoy our episode about it!

https://www.megaphonic.fm/bythebywater/16

Plenty of links and more info in the show notes there.

Anyway here's a concise overall rights explainer:

https://gizmodo.com/lord-of-the-rings-rights-explained-amazon-warner-bros-1850157744

this time they can get some important things RIGHT

* more bombadil
* eagles carry the ring
• "one does not simply walk into mordor" (three-seat tandem)
• turning back roald dahl-style to the uncensored early texts, galadriel is a GNOME

New episode doncha know

https://www.megaphonic.fm/bythebywater/48

Plus news of our first live episode...

Recording episode 49 this weekend -- but here's where to find us for episode 50!

https://www.megaphonic.fm/live-2023

Basically if you can make it to Portland on April 22...

So for our annual April Fool's as such, and even more appropriate given the day, we tackled a truly terrible knockoff:

https://www.megaphonic.fm/bythebywater/61

i made my kid read the mere description for The Sword of Shannara and he was absolutely appalled.

i think the "Soon a Skull Bearer, dread minion of Evil, flew into the Vale, seeking to destroy Shea. To save the Vale, Shea fled, drawing the Skull Bearer after him...." actually angered him.

Such poetic language.

Have enjoyed this twitter discussion this weekend
https://i.postimg.cc/zfFGD39T/IMG-9206.png

Keeping it to the Fellowship only, I agree with the main analysis that Frodo and Aragorn should swap; Frodo hasn’t got the arm for right field and you can hide him in left. I don’t think a hobbit should be shortstop, frankly, that should be Legolas.

Someone was saying “You can’t have a hobbit play second” to which someone responded “the Astros run out Altuve at second every day”. The hobbits are a problem for the infield, but you’ve got to play them. Boromir has to cover the hot corner to prevent it becoming a complete shitshow and you just hold your breath with the right side of the infield.

Durin’s Bane and Gandalf have an epic battle. DB keeps fouling off pitches, Gandalf keeps coming with the craziest shit you’ve ever seen. It’s a stalemate. Ultimately DB strikes out but Gandalf gets pulled due to pitch count. Who comes in, in relief? What???

Gandalf the White!

— Tyson, Lewis’ Number 🍉 (@TyMoIsSecret) April 13, 2024