The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy is heading back to Netflix – but it might only be a temporary stay.
Revealed in a New on Netflix press release, the world’s best streaming service will become home to Peter Jackson’s award-winning film series on February 1.
The announcement brings and end to a near three-year wait for the trilogy’s return to Netflix, and marks the first time that all three movies will be simultaneously available on the platform. However, the movies will only be available to stream on Netflix in the US. UK viewers will have to sign up to Now TV to watch them on British shores.
The Lord of the Rings’ reinstatement on Netflix is a curious move. One of Netflix’s biggest rivals – Prime Video – is home to The Rings of Power, which acts as a pseudo-prequel series to J.R.R. Tolkien’s legendary fantasy book series and, by default, Jackson’s movies.
It’s also unclear how Netflix’s latest licensing deal will impact The Lord of The Rings trilogy on HBO Max. Currently, all three movies are watchable on Warner Bros. Discovery’s (WBD) main streaming platform. Warner Bros. was indirectly responsible for distributing the films in the early 2000s – it owns New Line Cinema, the subsidiary behind Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. So it would be strange if WBD removed the three films from its HBO Max back catalog to allow Netflix to stream them exclusively.