13 sci-fi and fantasy shows you should watch this summer

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power — September 2 on Amazon Prime Video

Amazon is spending hundreds of millions of dollars to return us to Middle-earth. This new Lord of the Rings show, which is based on the appendices to J.R.R. Tolkien’s landmark books, takes place during the Second Age of Middle-earth, thousands of years before Frodo and Bilbo and Aragorn and most of those guys came on the scene. We will see some familiar faces — immortal characters like Elrond and Galadriel are around during this time — but the actors are all new.

This one is a big of a question mark. The amount of money Amazon is spending on the show gives it a lot of gravity; everyone will want to turn in to see what it’s like, regardless of quality. But will the piles of cash translate into a good story?

And really, this is just a sampling of what will be on this summer. We didn’t mention the new Star Wars series Andor, which we know is coming out sometime in the next few months but don’t know exactly when. Then there’s the fourth season of Roswell, New Mexico on The CW on June 3, the third season of Evil on Paramount+ on June 12, and the final season of Motherland: Fort Salem on June 21. If you’re at all interested in genre TV, the next few months are going to be a goldmine.

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