Elijah Wood Says Amazon's $1B Lord Of The Rings Series Is 'Crazy'

He might not be involved in the upcoming The Lord of the Rings series that will air on Amazon but Elijah Wood certainly has a lot to say about the Amazon show. For one, the Happy Feet star thinks it's crazy that the studio is ready to shell out $1 billion to produce the adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's work.

In a recent interview with IndieWire, Wood was surprised to find out just how much money is being prepared for the Lord of the Rings series. "That's crazy to me," he said. However, Wood also stated that the amount of money required had probably been made possible by the success of the Peter Jackson films.

"That wouldn't have happened back then because the Tolkien estate didn't know what they had as much as they do now," Wood said. "It's all a product of the world they live in. They know now what they have, they know how lucrative it is."

Granted, the Lord of the Rings trilogy looked and felt grand. Nevertheless, Wood insists it still felt like a smaller project compared to the films being released these days.

"The thing that was wild about Lord of the Rings was that it felt like an independent movie, made by [Warner Bros. subsidiary] New Line in New Zealand," Wood said. "It was kind of tucked away. If that movie was made now, it would be under very different circumstances and a much larger machine. That doesn't mean it can't have soul. It's just harder to do that."

Wood certainly has a point considering that the LOTR films seemed ambitious at the time they were being filmed. Either way, he is certainly looking forward to what Amazon has in store for everyone.

"We have no idea what this is going to be like, and it could be great," Wood said. "Maybe they'll go to New Zealand and shoot a bit there for visual continuity. Who knows? Lord of the Rings just felt like a movie made by this small cottage industry out of New Zealand that had never made anything on that scale before. It's a completely untested thing. But I'll be watching. I'm curious."

Wood's most recent work was providing the voice of Jace Rucklin in the animated series Star Wars Resistance.

Related: The Lord of The Rings: Gollum Announced For 2021 Release