Lord of the Rings Series Team Dismisses Rivalry With Game of Thrones Prequel

Prime Video's massive J. R.R. Tolkien-inspired series, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, and HBO's first Game of Thrones spinoff, House of the Dragon, arrive on their respective platforms less than two weeks apart. Rings of Power debuts on Sept. 2, and House of the Dragon comes on Aug. 21. Given the proximity of the high-profile fantasy show debuts, the internet has declared it the one rivalry to rule them all. But that's not how the Rings of Power team sees it. "I don't feel rivalry, not from me anyway. And I don't think from any of us or any of them," Robert Aramayo said during Rings of Power's Television Critics Association's summer press tour virtual panel on Friday. The actor has a unique perspective on the topic, considering he played Young Ned Stark in the Game of Thrones universe and takes the role of Elrond in Rings of Power. "I am really excited to see the show. It's gonna be awesome. I love that world. I love this world," Aramayo said. "I feel personally like the tapestry and the colors of both materials are so different. It feels quite different to me. But yeah, it's great. I mean, what we were talking about earlier with fantasy. I love fantasy. And so now we obviously get to watch more fantasy, which can never be a bad thing." Prime Video Shares First Look at Lord of the Rings Series in Super Bowl Ad The Rings of Power feels "distinct" from House of the Dragon and other shows on TV, said Cynthia Addai-Robinson, who plays Queen Regent Míriel. "There isn't anything else like this on right now. And this doesn't look like anything that's come before. So I think we really get to stand on our own two feet with this one. And that sense of rivalry, I feel like that's something that's just generated, but none of us feel that way," Addai-Robinson said. The actor noted it's a great time for genre enthusiasts: "If you're a fan of fantasy or just a fan of good storytelling, there's a boom time for you. You just get lots of good shows, lots of good stories." Morfydd Clark, who plays a younger, warrior version of Galadriel, as opposed to Cate Blanchett's more ethereal elf in Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings films, noted one benefit of appearing on The Rings of Power instead of House of the Dragon: "I just see other actors in armor and think, 'That looks heavy,'" Clark joked. The two towering budgets Rings of Power takes place thousands of years before The Hobbit and the original Lord of the Rings movie trilogy during the Second Age of Middle-earth, following the story of the forging of the 20 rings of power. Amazon paid $250 million just for the rights to the Tolkien stories, which cover the vast backstory from the appendices of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The eight-episode first season reportedly comes in around $58 million per episode, and five seasons are expected to cost the studio north of $1 billion. House of the Dragon, which tells the bloody history of House Targaryen, also has a massive price tag. Though HBO's tab is slightly less, with the 10-episode first season of the Game of Thrones spinoff reportedly coming in at under $20 million per episode, the company also spent a lot getting to this point. Before House of the Dragon made its way into production, HBO dropped $30 million on another pilot in the Game of Thrones universe that was ultimately scrapped. In addition, HBO is sinking even more into expanding the world of Westeros with several other series in various stages of development. As both series compete for eyeballs around the same time, the enormous budgets will likely have fans and critics looking to the audience size—which will be harder to measure on the streaming platforms. Still, Rings of Power co-showrunner J.D. Payne made sure to reiterate that for a rivalry to take place, there needs to be "animosity"—and he and co-showrunner Patrick McKay have none of that. Payne simply wished everyone well and said he was excited that there was more "good storytelling out there."