Jeff Bezos Shuts Down Writer’s $250 Million Lawsuit Over ‘Lord of the Rings’ Series
Aug. 14 2023, Published 6:15 p.m. ET
A judge dismissed the bombshell lawsuit that accused Jeff Bezos and Amazon of writing off an unknown author’s work for their Lord of the Rings series, RadarOnline.com has learned.
According to court documents obtained by RadarOnline.com, following a hearing this week in Los Angeles Superior Court, all claims filed by Demetrious Polychron were dismissed.
As we first reported, earlier this year, Polychron filed a $250 million lawsuit against Bezos, his company, and the estate of J.R.R Tolkien for copyright infringement.
In 2022, Amazon released The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, which was a fantasy series set thousands of years before the events in The Hobbit and The Lord of The Rings.
In his lawsuit, Polychron claimed the Amazon show stole from his book The Fellowship of the King — which he admitted was inspired by J. R. R. Tolkien’s books.
He claimed to have left a copy of his manuscript at Tolkien’s grandson’s home in 2019 after unsuccessful attempts to contact the estate in an effort to work together.
His suit claimed, “These wholly original distinct and separate characters and storylines compose as much as one-half of the 8-episode series as released and published by Defendants. In many cases, Defendants copied exact language” from his book.
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“In other instances, Defendants copied images that match the book cover and descriptions as created in the book as authored by Polychron,” the suit read.
In response, Bezos and Amazon denied all allegations of wrongdoing. “The law does not support the absurdity of this lawsuit,” the motion read.
Bezos bought the newspaper in 2013 for $250 million.
The defendants said an “aspiring author wrote an unauthorized novel that he advertised as a “pitch-perfect” sequel to” Tolkien’s iconic book series, which “scrupulously followed” Tolkien’s “established mythology” and featured numerous characters, locations, and plot points copied from Tolkien works without permission. While this is a copyright infringement case, this aspiring author, Demetrious Polychron, is not the defendant, but rather the plaintiff, contending that the authorized Amazon original series, The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power, somehow infringed his infringing novel.”
Bezos said Polychron admitted his work was influenced by Tolkien’s work and character — and therefore, he cannot sue for infringement.
The Amazon founder demanded the entire case be thrown out and his legal bills be paid by the author.