I love TV. I come from a time before streaming was a thing. I can tell you, definitively, that streaming is so much better. I still can’t binge-watch a whole season in one binge, but I definitely appreciate little to no commercials and not having to wait a week to see the next installment in most cases. Some of the shows on the list here make me wonder how much it costs to make a show. I mean, look at the set for GoT. Those sets are impressive. They use a ton of people to flesh out their armies. That has to be a pretty penny.
The question was asked what the most expensive shows to make are. I scoured the internet to get the answers for you. The answers may or may not surprise you. One show on this list hasn’t even premiered yet, but oh my Goddess, it is expensive. I am indeed grateful I don’t have to pay these bills. Let’s get into the top five shows I found.
The least expensive one on this list is The Game Of Thrones, at $15 million an episode. This show has impressively massive sets. It isn’t a couple of places like Lucifer, for example. Lucifer regularly takes place in four areas and doesn’t have multiple armies to fill out. GoT has CGI for the dragons, at the very least. My husband is only in season four, I think. So we are way late to the game. It isn’t my favorite show because of the violence towards women, and I have trauma from that, so I can’t watch it. I hope the women who did those scenes got bonuses for doing them.
Next, we have The Pacific at $20 million an episode. Writing this list, it just boggles my mind at the bill per episode. It’s insane. I won’t make that much in my lifetime. How can you pay that much to make one episode? Anyway, I digress. This was only a mini-series done by HBO and was the most expensive one they have put out in their history. Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks were a part of this show, and I imagine they weren’t cheap to hire.
Disney+’s Marvel shows like WandaVision, Loki, and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, for example, were $25 million per episode. I loved WandaVision and Loki. I haven’t watched The Falcon and the Winter Solider yet or some of the others. Between the movie stars such as Elizabeth Olsen and Tom Hiddleston, I can see that as a big-ticket expense as well as all the CGI effects.
Stranger Things was $25 million per episode. I only watched the first couple of episodes and haven’t picked it up again yet. My oldest, however, loves the show. It’s one of those she binges again and again. Winona Ryder is a reoccurring person, and she is a major star. The visual effects and fantastic sets, I am sure, raise the budget.
For a show that isn’t even out yet, Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power is the most expensive show at $58 million per episode. Pretty impressive if you ask me. From what I have heard and seen, they are making the show to be on par with The Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit trilogies. Both trilogies cost $93 million and $180 million, respectively. So with that knowledge, the TV series is a bargain but still the most expensive on this list. Though I suppose not really, if the first season for the show is ten episodes, the cost for the season would be at least $580,000,000.00. Never mind about it being a bargain.
I hope this answers the question. It was fun to look for this information and absolutely jaw-dropping. If I were given even a $1 million budget for anything, I would be overwhelmed with the amount of money allotted to me and fearful of the bills I would be shelling out for. I can’t even wrap my head around these prices.
Did you imagine any of these prices per episode? Can you imagine paying these prices per episode for a whole season, even if it was only ten episodes long, much less twenty or more? Let me know in the comments below. Until next time, have fun storming the castle!
