Showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay already have 5 seasons of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power planned out and know what the final shot will be. Following Peter Jackson's massively successful adaptations of J.R.R. Tolkien's high-fantasy works, The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, for New Line Cinema, The Rings of Power will be Amazon Studios' first foray into Middle-earth. In 2017, Amazon bought the television rights to Lord of the Rings for $250 million and made a 5-season commitment to the Rings of Power show, worth about $1 billion in production costs, making it the most expensive TV series ever made.
Though they are technically uncredited on the film, one of Payne and McKay's most high-profile projects was writing a draft of the script for 2016's Star Trek Beyond. The duo was hired for the Lord of the Rings series in 2018 with the rest of the creative team being announced a year later. Alongside Payne and McKay, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom's J.A. Bayona acts as an executive producer and directs the first two Rings of Power episodes. The series is primarily based on the appendices of The Lord of the Rings, set during the Second Age of Middle-earth, and features a diverse ensemble cast from all around the globe.
Talking to Empire for their exclusive cover story, Payne and McKay revealed they already have 5 full seasons of Rings of Power planned out. Even more impressive than that, Payne said they know what the last shot of the series finale is going to be. Read what he shared below:
We even know what our final shot of the last episode is going to be. The rights that Amazon bought were for a 50-hour show. They knew from the beginning that was the size of the canvas – this was a big story with a clear beginning, middle and end. There are things in the first season that don’t pay off until Season 5.
It's quite rare for writers to plan out a show's entire story before the first episode airs, even for adaptations of previously published material, given that a series could be canceled after the pilot or not renewed following the first season. Both the Rings of Power showrunners and Lord of the Rings fans have the benefit of knowing exactly how long the show will run for. This allowed the writers to plan specific plot points in season 1 that will be directly paid off in the fifth and final season.
Over 5 seasons, The Rings of Power will weave together one over-arching storyline following numerous Elves, Dwarves, and Harfoots set against the backdrop of major historical events from the Second Age, including the forging of the titular magical artifacts and the rise of the Dark Lord Sauron. Though the show will feature many new characters and plot lines, it is all based on the mythology of Tolkien's work. While it's entirely too early to begin speculating what the final shot of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power may be, it will start to become a bit more clear with each passing season, starting with the season 1 premiere on September 2.
Source: Empire