Hey, guys!
So yesterday we got probably the biggest news for the Middle-earth fandom since we found
out that Amazon had acquired rights to make a tv show.
Multiple outlets have reported that Warner Brothers and New Line Cinema have struck a
deal with the Embracer Group, who now owns Middle-earth Enterprises, to make more movies
in the world of Middle-earth.
Now, I wanted to cover what we know this means, and just as importantly what it does not mean.
There’s a lot of speculation happening and I thought it would be good to clear some things
up before adding some speculation of my own - including a list of potential stories that
could be adapted.
And finally, I’ll explain why I think the film and tv rights for Middle-earth being
with two different studios may be a big win for fans.
One of the first misconceptions I’m seeing floating around - even in some news outlet
headlines - is that Warner Bros are remaking The Lord of the Rings.
And there is zero indication this is the case.
A direct quote from the folks at Warner Bros says:
“But for all the scope and detail lovingly packed into the two trilogies, the vast, complex
and dazzling universe dreamed up by J.R.R.
Tolkien remains largely unexplored on film.
The opportunity to invite fans deeper into the cinematic world of Middle-earth is an
honor, and we are excited to partner with Middle-earth Enterprises and Embracer on this
adventure.”
The key phrase here is that they’re going deeper into the world of Middle-earth.
Another quote mentions honoring the past as they look to the future.
While I will continue to proclaim that an animated series of The Hobbit or The Lord
of the Rings would be great (and could return many of the original cast as voice actors
AND finally give us Tom Bombadil and the Scouring of the Shire), they are clearly looking at
other stories from Middle-earth to tell at the present.
From my understanding, Warner Bros essentially has the same rights in film form that Amazon
has for tv - that being the pages of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, including the appendices
found at the end of The Lord of the Rings.
A quick note, if you’ll recall from The Hobbit days, MGM owns the distribution rights
to The Hobbit, while Warner Brothers has the production rights.
I’ve not seen any update on this aspect whatsoever, but if this is still the case,
it would mean that Amazon, who bought MGM last year, would now own distribution to any
future Hobbit films.
So just as before, WB have the rights to make, but not release films based on the Hobbit,
and MGM, now Amazon has the rights to distribute such films, but not make them.
Yeah…it’s kind of a mess.
But as we said, they’re not talking remakes, so that likely won’t be a factor here.
Another quick clarification - there is nothing from The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, or
other First Age Tolkien books at play here.
So no First Age stories are on the table for potential adaptations.
Those rights still remain with the Tolkien Estate and would have to be negotiated directly
with them.
Another big question is - will these new stories in Middle-earth tie into the existing world
created by Peter Jackson in his six films.
We already know that the War of the Rohirrim anime film in production at Warner Bros will
- they’ve even brought on some of the key players from the Lord of the Rings in artists
John Howe and Alan Lee, Richard Taylor and Weta, and Philippa Boyens.
It’s also of interest that after news of the Warner Bros/Embracer agreement dropped,
Peter, Fran, and Philippa released a statement saying:
“Warner Brothers and Embracer have kept us in the loop every step of the way.
We look forward to speaking with them further to hear their vision for the franchise moving
forward.”
Now, I don’t know if Peter Jackson has a desire to go back to Middle-earth, but with
all the things we’ve learned in the decade since the release of The Hobbit films - like
the insanely short pre-production time he was working with combined with the studio
mandates to make 3 films instead of two and to add in the awful love triangle element
- I’d love to see Peter get a chance to return to Middle-earth with a proper production
timeline and without studio interference.
Should Peter not be involved, or his aesthetic for Middle-earth not be pursued, I don’t
think it’s necessarily a death knell for these projects.
There’s certainly room for other visions of Middle-earth to come to fruition.
Just as I was excited by the idea of Guillermo del Toro’s vision of The Hobbit that regretfully
didn’t come to pass, it could be cool to see a different vision for the world.
That being said - there’s no denying the incredible achievement Peter, Fran, Philippa,
Weta, and the entire team accomplished on The Lord of the Rings trilogy.
In my opinion, it remains far and away the best - and it’s certainly the most successful
- visual adaptation of Tolkien’s world, and returning to that cinematic vision is
the possibility I find most intriguing..
Naturally, after learning of new movies coming, and learning they’re not remaking The Lord
of the Rings, we fans immediately launch into speculation of what stories might they tell
in these new films?
And while some may be anticipating some crappy cash grabs like Bard the Bowman: Quest for
the Black Arrow, I think there’s some incredible stories in the pages of the appendices that,
if done right and done well, could make for excellent films.
Looking at the project currently in development at Warner Bros, I think, gives us a clue to
the stories they will tell.
The anime feature film War of the Rohirrim will tell the tale of Helm Hammerhand and
the invasion of Rohan by the Dunlendings - a tale found in Appendix A of The Lord of the
Rings.
Immediately after hearing the news, I came up with half a dozen potential stories we
could see, and added a few more to my list after our stream last night…
Eorl the Young - Sticking with the Rohirrim, it could be really cool to see an adaptation
of how Rohan came to be.
We’d follow their first King Eorl as they come to Gondor’s rescue in their battle
against orcs and a group of Easterlings under Sauron known as the Balchoth.
This story would also have the bonus of a potential cameo or small role for Galadriel,
as she briefly comes into the story.
The Angmar War - The most popular idea put forth by fans, including myself, has definitely
been the Angmar War.
Within this story, we would get the fall of Arnor - the mannish kingdom the Dunedain rangers,
including Aragorn, descend from.
As far as returning characters, the biggest would be the Witch-king - who would serve
as the main villain of this story.
With the men of Arnor being descendants of Numenor, and the Witch-king himself likely
a former Numenorean lord - there’s potential for interesting connections between the two
warring factions - not to mention flashbacks.
This war takes place over the course of nearly 600 years, and depending on how in-depth they
are willing to go into this war and the various victories and defeats, it could potentially
be a mutli-movie series.
Aside from the Witch-king, we could see the return of Elrond, whose realm of Rivendell
is at one point besieged by the Witch-king during this war.
Galadriel and Celeborn eventually send reinforcements from Lorien, so we could see them return as
well.
Perhaps most exciting would be the possible debut of fan-favorite Glorfindel - the great
elf warrior who fortells that not by the hand of man shall the Witch-king fall.
And let’s not forget - the hobbits send fighters to the climactic Battle of Fornost.
Young Aragorn - We know this was one of the ideas pitched for Amazon’s series years
ago, but another potential tale is the story of Aragorn before the events of The Lord of
the Rings.
After the tragic death of his father when he is just two years old, Aragorn is raised
in Rivendell by Elrond.
After going on early adventures with Elrond’s sons Elladan and Elrohir, Aragorn would go
on journeys of his own in the lands of Rohan and Gondor.
The climax of such an adaptation could be Aragorn’s battle with the Corsairs of Umbar,
before he sets his sights to travel to the South and East.
Again, such a story could see the return of Elrond, as well as the debut of Elladan and
Elrohir.
It would likely require a recast of Aragorn to portray a younger version - though I wonder
if we could see a brief return of Liv Tyler as Arwen.
The War in the North - Not to be confused with the video game of the same name, this
popular option would be one closest in timeline to The Lord of the Rings.
While we’re all familiar with the War of the Ring in the south of Middle-earth, simultaneously
there are battles being waged in the north.
The lands of Dale and Erebor are besieged by Easterlings, while the realms of Lorien
and Thranduil’s Halls are attacked by orcs from Dol Guldur.
This would tie-in most strongly to Peter Jackson’s existing 6 films, as we would see familiar
locations like Dale, Erebor, Mirkwood, and Lorien as well as some key returning characters
that don’t factor into the events happening simultaneously in The Return of the King.
Galadriel, Celeborn, Thranduil, and Dain Ironfoot could all return to play major roles, in addition
to King Brand of Dale - the grandson of King Bard the Bowman who we met in the Hobbit.
While those are the ideas with the most immediate potential, there’s yet more.
There’s The War of the Dwarves and Orcs, which we briefly glimpsed in the The Hobbit
trilogy - though with some pretty major changes to the books.
The War of the Dwarves and Dragons, which would take place after the Fall of Khazad-dum
and tell how the dwarves came to live in Erebor.
The Kinstrife in Gondor - which is essentially the tale of a civil war in the great southern
realm.
Balin’s Expedition to Moria - of which we see the aftermath in The Fellowship of the
Ring and features a few of the dwarves we met in The Hobbit.
And in one of the few tales that could take place AFTER Lord of the Rings - they could
tread the same ground as the upcoming Return to Moria game and tell a tale about King Durin
VII leading the dwarves to finally reclaim Moria.
Just an aside, but it could be really cool if they were able to tell this is such a way
where Durin remembers his former lives and we use those flashbacks to tell the overall
story of the dwarves and Khazad-dum.
And if Warner Brothers chose to play in the same sandbox of The Rings of Power, they could
even look to the Second Age, perhaps telling a story of the creation of the Rings of Power
and the War of the Last Alliance, which we saw in the prologue of the Fellowship of the
Ring.
There’s obviously no shortage of stories that *could* be told here.
The most important thing to me, and I think to most if not all fans, is that the stories
are adapted WELL.
We’ve seen adaptations of Middle-earth for over 50 years now, ranging from incredible
masterpieces to mind-bogglingly terrible.
But if things are done well, and done right - capturing the magic of Tolkien’s world
and the heart of his stories, it could make for some great films.
Finally, I want to touch on the uniqueness of the situation we’re in.
We now have two different studios with rights to produce adaptations from the pages of The
Lord of the Rings, the Appendices, and The Hobbit.
After Amazon acquired the tv rights, I said Warner Bros retaining film rights *could*
be a big win for fans because it will naturally breed competition.
Say War of the Rohirrim rides in in April 2024 and just absolutely rocks - with more
WB productions on the way, that will absolutely put pressure on Amazon to up their game on
Rings of Power and whatever other projects they may wish to pursue.
And the same is true in reverse - if War of the Rohirrim flounders and Rings of Power
season 2 wows fans, that will put pressure on Warner Bros to make their future films
better.
Now obviously, the hope is that the adaptations we get from both studios are great - but I
think each studio knowing someone else is out there making Middle-earth adaptations
and vying for fans' attention and admiration could be a win for fans.
However this plays out, it’s sure to be interesting - and hopefully will result in
some great stories being told from Middle-earth.
I’ll leave you with one last wildly-speculative, hypothetical situation to discuss in the comments.
Seriously, I’m gonna go nuts here, so fair warning…
Imagine if, come San Diego Comic-Con this July, Warner Brothers has a Middle-earth panel
to announce upcoming projects.
They begin by announcing the creation of a overseeing Executive Producer role to oversee
this, for lack of a better term, Middle-earth Cinematic Universe (the Me-see-you).
They introduce this person by bringing onto the stage, Sir Peter Jackson.
Peter then goes on to announce one or two upcoming projects in early stages of development
- both being filmed in New Zealand with effects by WETA.
Perhaps they announce…
. The Angmar War - a film or two, maybe even
a trilogy - depicting the epic 600-year struggle of the men and elves of Eriador against the
Witch-king.
Or A War in the North film, welcoming to the stage the returning cast of Cate Blanchett
as Galadriel, Martin Csokas as Celeborn, and Lee Pace as Thranduil.
Or A Young Aragorn film, telling the early life and adventures of the future king.
Peter now welcomes to the stage Hugo Weaving returning as Elrond and Viggo Mortensen, not
returning as Aragorn, but taking on the role of Director.
He returns to Middle-earth to help craft this story and pick a young relatively unknown,
up and coming actor he can coach and mold into a younger version of his iconic character.
And while we’re at it, maybe they announce the returns of John Howe, Alan Lee, and Howard
Shore for at least one of these films.
And down the road if War of the Rohirrim is a hit, perhaps they announce an Eorl the Young
follow-up animated feature.
I will say, I’m certainly not looking for a massive slate like Marvel (even they have
talked about pulling back on their number of projects per year).
Let’s just hope WB is wise enough to go at a realistic pace and emphasize quality
over quantity here.
Like I said - it’s all wild speculation at this point.
I’m sure some will be bursting with excitement and others cringing in terror at what’s
to come.
Personally, I’m pumped about this news and some of the possibilities give me chills just
thinking about them.
I’ve always said - we can’t get great adaptations of Tolkien’s world if adaptations
aren’t being made.
It’s true now, just as it was true back before the Lord of the Rings trilogy began
filming.
Come what may, I’m going to enjoy the ride as we learn more about these projects, and
as any good adaptation will also do, point people toward the books - which will always
be the best place to experience the magic of Middle-earth.