Where does ITV stand in a world in which Amazon spends $250m on Lord of the Rings?

New CEO Dame Carolyn McCall has a tugboat in which to navigate waters filled with supertankers

ITV can't afford to rely audience-winners such as ‘Coronation Street’ (Rex)

Where does ITV fit in a world in which Amazon can spend $250m (£191m) just for the rights to a Lord of the Rings prequel series?

Production costs are likely to come in at $100m-$150m per season on top of that, and while all the ingredients are all there – big-name franchise, buzz, a global audience and the potential to reach it – it still might not be a hit. The odds are heavily in its favour, but that’s been true of plenty of expensive flops in the past.

Thing is, while it would be embarrassing, the write-off would be something a corporation like Amazon could easily take. ITV might break.

It’s a tugboat puffing along in waters filled with supertankers.

But, but, but, look at our Christmas ad sales! Yes, it’s true that the broadcaster sought to give its investors a few crumbs of comfort after reporting net advertising revenues (NAR) that fell by 9 per cent over the first three-quarters of the year.

Apparently some fast-moving consumer goods makers and grocers are returning to the market. They’ve spent millions on those insufferable Christmas ads we’ve all been hearing so much about, and they want to get them seen. It’s entirely possible that retailers have realised that, with the consumer pound under severe pressure, they’re going to have to compete hard if they want the post-Christmas numbers to look good.

As such, ITV expects that its final quarter will show an uplift in ad spending, so the NAR may only be down by 5 per cent on the full year when the finals are in.

The core problem, however, remains: ITV has long touted its ability to deliver the sort of mass audience the commissioners of those glossy Christmas ads are after. It just might not be long before there is no mass audience to deliver.

To be fair to the company, its controlling brains saw the danger some time ago. Its new CEO Dame Carolyn McCall, who joins the company in January, inherits a business that has been growing revenue from other sources at a fair pace.

ITV Studios might not be producing anything like Amazon’s Lord of the Rings prequel anytime soon, but it delivered a handy 9 per cent rise in revenues all the same.

Helped by a 41 per cent surge in online viewing, Online & Pay turned in growth of 41 per cent. ITV has 21 million viewers registered to its “Hub” which, notably, includes 75 per cent of the UK’s tech crazy 16- to 24-year-olds.

So it isn’t simply resting on the reliably big audiences for shows like Britain’s Got Talent and Coronation Street as it once did. It simply can’t afford to.

Even with those alternative revenue streams, the going report reads “heavy” as its US competitors fling billions around in the hunt for audiences. It isn’t just Lord of the Rings. It’s Star Trek: Discovery and Stranger Things and The Man in the High Castle and The Defenders, and plenty more besides the aforementioned shows that get viewed in the Moore household.

The streamers still account for a relatively small proportion of the overall UK viewership, it’s true, but they’re growing fast, and they’re spending money with the aim of turbo charging that growth.

If Ms McCall can keep ITV’s tug boat afloat in the choppy waters she faces, if she is willing to continue with the investment it will take to do that, and tell the her shareholders some home truths while doing so, she might even earn her no doubt grandiose salary package.

Alternatively, she could just fix up a deal. Her investors would surely take that.