QuoteWarner Bros. has made it official: It will be returning to Middle-earth.
On Warner Bros. Discovery's first-quarter earnings conference call on Thursday, CEO David Zaslav said that the company is "now in the early stages of script development" for new Lord of the Rings movies, which he says they "anticipate releasing in 2026" and will "explore storylines yet to be told."
The first film, from New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. Pictures, will be called Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum (working title), with Andy Serkis set to star and direct the feature, Zaslav says that director Peter Jackson and his longtime writing partners Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens "will be involved every step of the way." Boyens and Walsh will write the screenplay. The deal covers two films in the franchise.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/new-lord-of-the-rings-movies-2026-peter-jackson-1235894513/
Oof. Directed by Andy Serkis? What a bait and switch.
"Hunt for Gollum" being directed by and starring Gollum is just weird as hell. This doesn't sound like it'll be good, but I hope to be disproven. Serkis' track record is pretty mediocre, so we'll see.
If they had planned this after the Hobbit Trilogy, I'd have more confidence.
Right now, I have zero confidence this will be any good, aside from maybe production quality. But this seems like a desperation move by Warner Bros to recover from the general disaster of the Rings of Power: "everyone still likes PJ and everyone still likes Andy especially as Gollum, so maybe this will make some profit back...? We hope?"