Mercurius
Legend
And you just summed up the reaction to the The Hobbit movies....
Yes, although this has the potential to go a step further, given that the Hobbit was an adaptation of a Tolkien book (albeit, with liberties), while this series doesn't have much direct text to draw from. There's the Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales (which is mostly First Age, iirc), History of ME, etc.
So we're probably going to have lots of TV melodrama, titillation for GOT fans, and probably sociocultural messaging that will jar further from the Tolkien vibe.
Either way, I look forward to it, if for no other reason than that it will be high production fantasy on the screen.