Amazon taps Doctor Who and Wheel of Time director Wayne Che Yip for its Lord of the Rings series

Amazon’s as-of-yet untitled Middle-earth-set series is currently in production, and the company has announced a new director joining the project: Wayne Che Yip, who’s worked on a number of genre shows, including Deadly Class, Doctor Who (“Resolution“), Doom Patrol, Hunters, Into the Badlands, Preacher, Channel 4’s Utopia, and Amazon’s forthcoming adaptation of The Wheel of Time (episodes 3 and 4 to be precise).

The streaming service announced that it had picked up the rights for a project set in J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy world, and a recently-released synopsis for the show officially revealed that it’ll be set in the distant past, and is expected to follow the rise of a key evil figure in the mythology: Sauron, setting up the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.

Ahead of production, Amazon renewed the series for a second season, and has announced a huge cast of characters that’ll be featured in the show. The series snagged Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom director J.A. Bayona to helm the first two episodes of the series, and it looks as though Yip will follow up with four of the first season’s installments.

In a statement, Yip said that it was “a true honor to be invited into the world of Tolkien by J.D. & Patrick and Amazon Studios. Every day I look forward to working with the incredible team here in New Zealand as we humbly contribute to the legacy of the greatest stories ever told.” 

There’s no release date for the series as of yet, but with the series currently in production in New Zealand, it seems as though it’ll be arriving on our screens before too much longer.