Fans of Tolkien’s Middle Earth remain divided about Peter Jackson’s version of The Hobbit. Originally slated to be a two-part film, the adaptation will ultimately be hitting theaters as a trilogy.
Yes, it’s great that Peter Jackson made the trek back to the Shire once again and will hopefully pick up right where he left off, but at the same time, many wonder if a trilogy is really warranted.
At least one Hollywood website, Deadline, asked if there was enough story to make The Hobbit a trilogy, while other film sites put it a little more bluntly – accusing Peter Jackson and Warner Brothers of making a cash grab.
Still, if you’re a fan of Jackson’s Tolkien adaptations, you probably can’t get enough right? So now reports have come in there will be even more of the Hobbit to enjoy down the road.
No, there isn’t going to be a fourth movie, but as Collider confirmed, there will be an extended version of the first installment, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, for home video. This edition will be available in the fourth quarter of 2013, which is about a year away from Unexpected’s theatrical release on December 14, 2012. With The Hobbit now on track to be a trilogy, you wonder what else we could possibly see, but for Tolkien and Jackson fans, this should especially be a treat.
In other Hobbit news, not only is Andy Serkis returning tooffer up more Golum, Benedict Cumberbatch is also going to provide a motion capture performance as Smaug the dragon. Cumberbatch is playing the villain in the next JJ Abrams Trek flick, Star Trek Into Darkness, and he’s also up to play Jullian Assange in an upcoming DreamWorks movie.
As Cumberbatch told Total Film, motion capture is “very freeing, once you put the suit on and the sensors. I’ve never felt less encumbered, actually. You just have to lose your sh*t on a carpeted floor…with four static cameras and all the sensors. Then the boys at Weta [Peter Jackson’s FX company] work their magic.”
