Amazon MGM Studios Head Suggests The Rings of Power Five-Season Deal is Uncertain Amid Potential Leak of Season 2 Finale’s Viewership Numbers [UPDATE]

In a recent interview with Variety, Head of Amazon MGM Studios Jennifer Salke briefly talked about The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power when asked about if the show would stay in the U.K. after the company acquired Bray Studios where the fantasy show is filmed. While the focus on the show was very brief, Salke provided numbers on viewership and also spoke about The Rings of Power five-season deal which is not as set in stone as many fans believe it to be.

When asked by Variety if there were any changes to The Rings of Power’s 50 episode commitment Salke answered,

“I don’t think so. [That] commitment is never the thing that’s driving what we’re doing. We’ll continue to make the show as long as we see global customers loving it and watching it to the point where — it is a business. Obviously, we need a large amount of people showing up. And there are a large amount of people, so there’s no debate about whether or not the show will continue.”

Given her statement, it is clear that the potential for Amazon to cancel The Rings of Power is a possibility that is dependent on the show’s ability to draw in viewers. Despite what ardent fans of the show have said about Amazon’s $250 million deal with the Tolkien Estate, the five-season deal is confirmed to not be absolute. As of the posting of this article, Amazon has yet to announce that The Rings of Power Season 3 has been confirmed. Amazon’s focus on global viewership numbers is not surprising given how domestic views for The Rings of Power Season 1 were at 37% who watched the entire season compared to 50% global viewer completion. 

When it comes to The Rings of Power viewership numbers, Amazon has been slow to provide that information and, when it has, doesn’t offer any specific details. When asked about Season 2’s audience reaction, Salke reiterated that 55 million global viewers tuned in, which she disclosed last week at Amazon’s UK Upfront presentation. 

However, that number, while impressive-sounding, confirms the trend that Season 2 is underperforming compared to Season 1. Last month, Amazon revealed that Season 2 had reached 40 million global views within the first 11 days and then accumulated only another 15 million views for the next 23 days. Which means the show dropped from 3.6 million daily viewers during the first 11 days down to 652,000 viewers per day afterwards. Unfortunately, these numbers also don’t specify how many of these views were counted for completely watching the episodes or partially watching.

Meanwhile, analytic firms Nielsen, Samba TV, and Luminate reported their statistics which shows a trend of around a 50% decline in viewership for Season 2 when compared to Season 1.

That said, we must point out a discrepancy between the Variety article and a tweet from Variety promoting it, which provides contradicting viewership numbers. According to Variety’s tweet, Salke said that it was 70 million global viewers. Which, if accurate, means that this is up 15 million from last week. Considering that The Rings of Power Season 2 finale aired last week, October 3rd, the 70 million figure could be the correct one and an inadvertent leak regarding the performance of the Season 2 finale (we were not a fan of the finale). 

Though take this bit of news with a grain of salt until Variety updates the article or the tweet (which they have not since the posting of this article).

What that number might be for The Rings of Power Season 2 is anyone’s guess without more specific information. But it is highly doubtful that the Season 2 finale can account for the whole 15 million views since viewers could have been rewatching earlier episodes during the past week since it aired. Unfortunately, Amazon has been very coy with what little information it puts out when it comes to the $1 billion show.

But if the 20 million figure is correct, and not a mistake on Variety’s part, how many viewers do you think tuned in to watch the Season 2 finale since it aired last week?

Variety also brought up The Embracer Group, which owns a majority of the Tolkien IP, and whether or not Amazon might be trying to acquire the company to which Salke simply stated, “We’re always talking about those opportunities but I don’t have anything to share.”

If Amazon were to acquire The Embracer Group, it would give them rights to The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogies but, more importantly, merchandising rights which covers video games, board games, merchandising, theme parks, and any movies related to Tolkien.

UPDATE: Variety has deleted its original tweet and reposted it with corresponding numbers aligning with the article (which we had asked for clarification before posting this news article). Which brings up the question of where did that 70 million figure come from? Was it from Salke herself or did Variety make a mistake? Unfortunately, Variety didn’t offer any clarifying statement for the mistake for its retraction. Either Salke did provide that figure, accidently leaking the potential performance of the Season 2 finale or Variety made a huge mistake.

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