quote:
I dont think that’s true.

Superhero movies were making money for decades before LOTR.

Not really. All there really was was Spider-Man and X-Men. Batman being a success in 1989 isn’t much of an argument. Batman Begins was a minor success in 2005.

Now maybe they would have done Iron-Man, but such a gamble of the entire MCU, no. Maybe ten years later, but Lord of the Rings is what made them take the gamble.

Just NO

LOTR didn't have anything to do with the MCU. The MCU happened because Marvel was smart and lucky.

Smart- Iron Man was a lower tier character, but one that translates great to film. He's a dude in a suit, that can be done.
Lucky- they cast Robert Downey Jr, who hit it out of the park.
Tony Stark is the billionaire playboy superhero we can relate to, not Bruce Wayne. You have all the money and everything, why be brooding and emo? Tony's a player who had pole dancers on his private jet. He has classic sportscars in his garage. He's smarter than you, and he will frick your girlfriend after telling you he's smarter. And when he comes back to America after being stuck in the desert, he wants some Burger King. And then when he's asked, he says frick it, I'm Iron Man in the press conference.

That's knowing your target audience, every young male who goes to a superhero action movie will say frick YEAH to everything he does. Especially when Downey nails it as well as he did.
The MCU built on that, and nailed the All American (Steve Rogers) and Viking mildly smug "I'm better than you, because I'm a god" (Thor) mindsets as well.
And it took all three working together onscreen, with a Hulk cameo that we've all wanted, to nail Avengers. After Avengers, the blueprint was there and they rolled with it until they exhausted everything and the actors decided to move on.

As for LOTR, if not for the original Star Wars trilogy, if it ever got made it would have been condensed into 1 film, because you don't know if you get to make the others. Strip 6 and a half hours out, and you don't have nearly as compelling a story. It was greenlit because people were convinced it would be the Star Wars of the Fantasy genre.

I don't think LOTR was the reason for GoT, either. I think Rome had a lot more influence, that was great but got too expensive. HBO learned from Rome and found a suitable new candidate for their next sword series.