With plenty of material to tap into the mythos of Lord of the Rings, there will always be room for new adventures in Middle-earth. The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim is the first project to hit the big screen in the past decade, representing a bold leap into the uncharted waters of animation, but it won’t be the only fresh undertaking to expect. There’s already Rings of Power, which picked up steam following a second season, while the upcoming live-action film Hunt for Gollum is set to revisit the complex character of Gollum / Smeagol.
What the pic brings to the table, though, is the possibility of even more animated films. Speaking to The Playlist, screenwriter Philippa Boyens, whose credits include The Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit films, offered a tease of the franchise’s future, including potential new projects on both the animation and live-action front.
“There’s a lot of [possibilities], when you look at it, there’s a lot of things in there, actually. One of the things this [War Of The Rohirrim] story has shown us is that a stand-alone story works really successfully within the world of Middle-earth and I would genuinely — because I’ve fallen in love with the form — love to see another anime,” shared the scribe. “But that depends on the audiences out there, your audience, fans of not only the original trilogy but that vast anime audience. I’m really interested to see what they think.”
Boyen added, “So we’re in the audience’s hands. If there’s an appetite for it, we’ve got more stories. There’s a ton of stories left to be told there and some really, really interesting ones. But my preference would be, after Hunt For Gollum, would be to look at those standalone stories. And then if we got really ambitious — there are some epic, particular stories that could translate into that more traditional epic trilogy format that was the original Lord Of The Rings, the war of the rings story.”
It remains to be seen if any of these ideas will eventually be realised, but The Lord of the Rings: The War of Rohirrim serves to tide over the wait for now. The film is now out in select territories, including Singapore, with a 13 December premiere slated for the U.S. As for The Hunt of Gollum, a release date has yet to be set.
Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth’s theme on her Spotify playlist can get. A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia’s greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really.
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