Star-studded casts, pandemic nightmares, and a puppet that cost more than a mansion:
Can TV shows possibly get more expensive than this?
Taking the grand prize for the most expensive television production to date is The Lord of
the Rings: The Rings of Power, which came in at a whopping $58 million per episode.
An epic high fantasy series based on the world of J. R. R. Tolkien, The Rings of Power takes
place millennia before the events of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. When the rights to
a Tolkien TV series first went up for grabs, a bidding war erupted between major streamers HBO,
Amazon, and Netflix, with Amazon beating out its rivals with a hefty bid of $250 million.
"This could be the beginning of a new era."
In a world of AR sound stages and green screens, The Rings of Power stands out for its elaborate
sets and on-location shoots, which production designer Ramsey Avery says are meant to capture
the golden age of Middle-Earth, long before Sauron's villainous shenanigans start to drag
everything down. Factor in the elaborate costumes and full-scale ensemble cast,
and you've got a recipe for the priciest series ever made — in fact,
with a grand total of five seasons ordered and already planned in their entirety,
the show's total budget could come in at more than a billion dollars.
At a time when Netflix has been tightening its purse strings,
one show that the platform has funneled endless money into is the hit supernatural sci-fi series
Stranger Things. Since the show's $6 million per episode freshman season,
Netflix has gradually increased its budget while continuing to ramp up the
killer computer-generated and practical effects. Not only that, but, by 2018,
several of the show's cast were taking home paychecks of around $250K–$350K per episode.
It's estimated that the price tag for the fourth season came in at around $30 million per episode.
According to Netflix executive Ted Sarandos,
a hefty chunk of Season 4's spending increase can be attributed to COVID,
which, between the need for extra protocols and production shutdowns, hit the budget hard. Still,
it was money well spent. The show features some of the most beautiful CGI out there and
is a testament to the truly cinematic quality a well-executed streaming series can have. This
attention to detail even earned Stranger Things the Emmy for best prosthetic makeup in 2022.
The second prequel to Taylor Sheridan's hit series Yellowstone, 1923 follows the Dutton
family during the tumultuous years leading up to the Great Depression. Comparing his
latest show to Lawrence of Arabia in terms of scale, Sheridan told Deadline:
"I don't know what the Game of Thrones budgets were,
but I don't know how they could have been more than this."
One of the show's big-ticket items is its cast, an ensemble led by Hollywood legends Helen Mirren and
Harrison Ford — but this is just the beginning. To create the sense of life on a Montana ranch,
the series uses thousands of real cattle and sheep. And much of 1923 was filmed in
a span of overseas locations, including Malta, Tanzania, Kenya, and South Africa.
Filming during the pandemic also meant that COVID protocols upped the budget even further. Then,
of course, you've got the added cost of a historical series — it's no mean feat
to build and dress sets for a show set 100 years in the past. The grand total
for this gorgeously rendered drama comes in at around $30 million per episode.
"It's time. Alright, okay? Let's give 'em hell."
The MCU Disney+ series Hawkeye racked up a $150 million price tag during its six-episode run,
which comes out at around $25 million per episode. For the sake of comparison, Captain Marvel,
one of Marvel's theatrical releases, boasted a budget of around $152 million. As with many other
big-budget TV shows, one of Hawkeye's major costs was its star power: Jeremy Renner, who
reprises his role as the titular Avenger, is one of the higher-paid actors in the Marvel universe.
While his salary for the series isn't widely known, Parade reported that the actor made $15
million for Avengers: Endgame and likely took home a similar paycheck for Hawkeye. As the series was
primarily filmed in New York City, Georgia, and Ontario, they weren't exactly dropping much of
the budget on hauling an entire cast and crew from one exotic location to the next. However,
as is the case with many MCU shows and movies, Hawkeye will have required a significant amount
of CGI, which always ramps up the budget. Judging by the controversy stemming from the disappointing
effects in Episode 3, however, as well as greater complaints about pay and working conditions from
Marvel VFX teams, it seems that this is one area in which the franchise shouldn't be cutting costs.
As the first Marvel series to be released on Disney+, and the first of the MCU's Phase Four,
WandaVision was a much-hyped and well-received entry into the Marvel canon. Like the comics
themselves, the MCU keeps things fresh by serving up a variety of genres and storytelling styles,
and WandaVision is a stunning example of this. Starring Elizabeth Olsen as
Wanda Maximoff and Paul Bettany as Vision, the series finds the pair
trapped in a strange alternate reality that looks and feels like a laugh-track
sitcom. As the episodes progress, the pair transitions from one decade to the next,
traveling through sets inspired by some of the 20th century's most beloved TV shows.
"We are an unusual couple, you know." "Oh, I don't think that was ever in question"
Like other Marvel shows, WandaVision was given a generous budget of about $25 million per
episode — and it shows. Besides the lead duo's inevitably impressive earnings, the show featured
400 shots of VFX created by a team of 100 or so compositors. The sequence in which Vision
flies around Westview, for example, took months to produce… and effects like that don't come cheap.
Yet another entry in Marvel's Disney+ line-up,
Loki finds the God of Mischief joining the Time Variance Authority to repair the damage to the
timeline caused when he swiped the Tesseract in Avengers: Endgame. This wickedly fun time
travel twister is one of the best recent offerings from Marvel Studios, although,
with a budget of about $25 million per episode, it certainly wasn't cheap.
As you've probably guessed, Loki stars Tom Hiddleston as the MCU's favorite trickster,
and, considering he was reported to have been paid $8 million for his very brief role in Avengers:
Infinity War, it's safe to say that a decent chunk of the show's budget went toward his paycheck. All
that money at least seems to have paid off, however: Many fans and critics agreed that
the series felt more like a film than a TV show, and the first season was nominated for six Emmys,
including one for costumes and another for outstanding production design.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier enjoyed a comparable budget to WandaVision
and Loki at around $25 million per episode. The show takes place a few months after Avengers:
Endgame, which ended with Sam Wilson taking up Captain America's shield. Anthony Mackie
and Sebastian Stan reprised their roles from the movies, and the show didn't exactly skimp
on its supporting cast, either. Not only that, but The Falcon and the Winter Soldier
was partly filmed in the Czech Republic, and the COVID outbreak of 2020 completely halted
production for several months too, likely adding a significant number to the show's final cost.
While some critics felt the show's early pacing could have been better, overall,
it drew praise for its social commentary and the chemistry between its leading actors.
Falcon and the Winter Soldier's budget is clearly well-spent too, making it an
enjoyable series overall — even if it isn't the strongest limited series Marvel has produced.
These days, a blockbuster movie budget is hardly a rarity in the world of TV production. In 2001,
however, it was practically unheard of. Produced by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks,
Band of Brothers was the most expensive television production to date with a budget
of $125 million — which would be closer to $200 million today. The ten-part miniseries
follows Easy Company, a group of World War II paratroopers from the 101st Airborne Division,
from training through their deployment on D-Day and, ultimately, to the very end of the war.
A large portion of Band of Brothers' budget went to support the massive ensemble cast, many of whom
were relatively unknown at the time of filming but have since gone on to become famous faces today.
"Looks like you guys are gonna be surrounded."
"We're paratroopers, lieutenant. We're supposed to be surrounded."
In the interest of depicting the war as accurately as possible, the filmmakers and cast consulted
many of Easy Company's surviving veterans, invested in authentic uniforms and equipment,
and poured plenty of cash into realistic pyrotechnics. The effort paid off,
with many World War II veterans and history experts alike agreeing that
the series presented one of the most accurate portrayals of World War film ever produced.
The Pacific is a 2010 production that serves as a companion piece to Band of Brothers.
Much like its older sibling, The Pacific became the most costly television series
ever produced at the time of its release — in total, HBO spent around $217 million.
According to co-executive producer Tony To, the commitment to realistically filming battle scenes
was tremendous. Take the landing at Peleliu, for example, which took four days to film and
came in under budget at around $5 million. The scene featured upwards of 300 actors,
each of whom was clad in perfectly duplicated 1940s military uniforms
that had been faithfully crafted on period looms. On top of the costs of working with a large cast,
producers had to factor in pricey practical effects, props, and pyrotechnics, with production
costs coming in at around $270,000 per filming day. Fortunately, producers were able to cash in
on rebates by filming in Australia, slashing the show's total cost by about $20 million.
House of the Dragon is a prequel to HBO's absurdly
successful fantasy drama series Game of Thrones. And, like Game of Thrones,
House of the Dragon features an extra-large ensemble cast of several dozen actors,
many of whom were already well-established names when filming began. The first season's
budget was around $200 million, which comes out to about $20 million per episode. In comparison,
the budget for the final season of Game of Thrones was around $15 million per episode.
Fans of George R.R. Martin will be glad to know that Westeros is getting the treatment
it deserves after cost-cutting led to some not-so-flattering moments in Game of Thrones,
with Martin noting the first season's small-scale jousting tournament as a
particular disappointment. Judging by the incomparable tourney in House of the Dragon,
it's clear that the producers are going out of their way to avoid making the same mistake twice.
The first of several live-action Star Wars shows to be released on Disney+,
The Mandalorian is a space western set a few years after Return of the Jedi.
"This is the way."
"This is the way." "This is the way."
A few factors accounted for the show's price tag, which equated to roughly $15 million per episode
— not least of which was its production studio. The Mandalorian was the first series to pioneer
StageCraft technology, a type of all-around AR wall that allows actors to work against
computer-generated backdrops. A key benefit of this technology is that it creates more realistic
lighting rather than forcing the VFX team to duplicate it when working with a green screen.
Among the show's more surprising expenses was Grogu. Rather than dump a creepy CGI
creature into the series, producers chose to go old-school Star Wars with a twist,
by investing in a foot-tall robotic puppet — one that cost $5 million to build.
The Book of Boba Fett is a Disney+ Star Wars series that serves as a spin-off
to The Mandalorian. The story follows the iconic bounty hunter Boba Fett as he takes over Jabba the
Hutt's criminal organization on Tatooine. While the seven-episode series wasn't as well-received
as The Mandalorian, it came with a similar price tag of around $15 million an episode.
While The Book of Boba Fett doesn't have a multi-million dollar puppet on deck,
it does have its own costly mascot of sorts in the uncannily young Luke Skywalker. Although
de-aging technology is improving as it becomes more widely used, it remains a costly investment
for any production. Besides smoothing out the effects of time with CGI, the show's many tech
experts also used an application called Respeecher to rewind time on Luke's voice,
since vocal cords tend to change over time. The final result? Well, the jury's out on that one.