At long last, there's a light at the end of the tunnel for those who have been patiently waiting for Amazon's new Lord of the Rings series, which has finally been assigned a release date of Sept. 2, 2022.

Season 1 of the highly-anticipated series just completed filming in New Zealand on Monday, and episodes will be rolled out weekly rather than released all at once. The epic new drama brings to screens for the very first time J.R.R. Tolkien’s fabled Second Age of Middle-earth's history. Beginning in a time of relative peace, thousands of years before the events of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings books, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth.

The ensemble cast includes Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Robert Aramayo, Owain Arthur, Maxim Baldry, Nazanin Boniadi, Morfydd Clark, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Charles Edwards, Trystan Gravelle, Sir Lenny Henry, Ema Horvath, Markella Kavenagh, Joseph Mawle, Tyroe Muhafidin, Sophia Nomvete, Lloyd Owen, Megan Richards, Dylan Smith, Charlie Vickers, Leon Wadham, Benjamin Walker, Daniel Weyman, and Sara Zwangobani.

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Image via New Line Cinema

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Showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay executive produced the still-untitled LOTR series along with Lindsey Weber, Callum Greene, J.A. Bayona, Belén Atienza, Justin Doble, Jason Cahill, Gennifer Hutchison, Bruce Richmond, and Sharon Tal Yguado, while Wayne Che Yip served as co-executive producer and Christopher Newman served as producer. Charlotte Brändström served as the show's director.

“As Bilbo says, ‘Now I think I am quite ready to go on another journey.’ Living and breathing Middle-earth these many months has been the adventure of a lifetime. We cannot wait for fans to have the chance to do so as well,” Payne and McKay said in a joint statement.

“The journey begins September 2, 2022 with the premiere of our original The Lord of the Rings series on Prime Video,” added Amazon Studios boss Jennifer Salke. “I can’t express enough just how excited we all are to take our global audience on a new and epic journey through Middle-earth! Our talented producers, cast, creative, and production teams have worked tirelessly in New Zealand to bring this untold and awe-inspiring vision to life.”

Amazon Studios also released the first image from the series, which will premiere exclusively on Prime Video in more than 240 territories and countries around the world. The Lord of the Rings books have been translated into around 40 languages and have sold more than 150 million copies, so there's a lot riding on this series, which didn't come cheap.

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