Why TV studios should stop playing it safe when it comes to fantasy

Earlier this week, Amazon Studios announced that it had secured the rights to adapt J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings as a television show for multiple seasons. It’s a huge get for the studio, which was charged by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to find the “next Game of Thrones,” in its drive to entice a global audience to its Prime service.While I’m personally intrigued by what a TV version of Lord of the Rings might look like, the announcement poses a very reasonable