Quote Originally Posted by Talakeal View Post
Why make a prequel when all the actors have aged almost twenty years since the original?
There's actually quite a bit of time between Hobbit and Fellowship - I'd forgotten just how much. The Hobbit takes place in 2914, while Fellowship begins in 3018, so over a century passes in the interlude. This also hits on some weird factoids like how Aragorn (born 2931) is in his eighties when he joins the Fellowship. Non-numenorean humans are more realistic in age, with Boromir in his early forties during the events of Fellowship.

For prequel purposes the best point to focus on is 2957 to 2980, when Aragorn was running around the map having adventures and working for Rohan and Gondor under an assumed name. Thengel is king of Rohan, Ecthelion is Steward of Gondor, all non-humans appearing but not slain in The Hobbit are alive. So, you recast a younger Aragorn - since he's half his Fellowship age you can use a twenty-something heartthrob for the part - and have him as the lead. You throw in a dwarf companion - perhaps Gloin, father of Gimli but any of the more martial Hobbit dwarves works fine - and an elf companion, who you probably want to be a woman, probably invent a character from Lothlorien since we know Aragorn has spent time there (given how few named female characters there are in Middle earth in general, this show is going to have to invent a lot of females).

It's important to keep Gandalf, Saruman, and other notables out of this. A good option is to utilize the Blue Wizards, supposedly active in the east - where we know Aragorn travels - to help drive the plot. This also allows the invention of major villains in the form of a leader of the Corsairs - who Aragorn helps to defeat in 2980 - and of the Haradrim - probably black numenoreans. Also, going to need to throw in some kind of Haradrim turncoat who sides with Aragorn as a major character to avoid coming off as blatantly racist (which is going to be a heavy lift from the start). Human enemies make sense because they are cheap to utilize than orcs.