From Hollywood to Middle-earth, ‘Lord of the Rings’ Biggest Fan Is Trying His Hand at the Franchise
A long-buried secret, you say...
Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema had a surprising announcement to celebrate Tolkien Reading Day this year. In addition to The Hunt for Gollum, we learned that Stephen Colbert is writing a new Lord of the Rings movie, working title Shadow of the Past, with his son Peter McGee and OG franchise scribe extraordinaire Philippa Boyens.
Here’s the official synopsis of the new film:
Fourteen years after the passing of Frodo – Sam, Merry, and Pippin set out to retrace the first steps of their adventure. Meanwhile, Sam’s daughter, Elanor, has discovered a long-buried secret and is determined to uncover why the War of the Ring was very nearly lost before it even began.
We’ll get to what Fellowship: TNG has to do with this in a second. The announcement came direct from Peter Jackson and Colbert himself, which you can watch via YouTube.
“You know what the books mean to me,” Colbert says to Jackson in the video, “and what your films mean to me. But the thing I found myself reading over and over is the six chapters early on in The Fellowship [of the Ring] that y’all never developed in the first movie back in the day. It’s basically […] ‘Three is Company’ through ‘Fog on the Barrow-Downs.’ I thought maybe that could be its own story that could fit into the larger story. Could we make something that was completely faithful to the books while also being completely faithful to the movies that you guys had already made?”
The Late Show host goes on to say that he brainstormed this concept with his son, screenwriter Peter McGee, and developed a framing device. They then got more Jackson and more folks involved, et voila!
What happens in those six unadapted chapters?
Two words: Tom Bombadil. The chapters that Colbert highlighted follow Frodo and his three friends as they first depart the Shire and meet a fan favorite Tolkien character who was recently brought to life on screen by Rory Kinnear in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. The film omits this character and speeds through this portion of the plot to get them to the village of Bree, where the four hobbits meet Strider a.k.a. Aragorn. But this leg of the journey has some significant-ish side quests in the book.
In chapter three, “Three is Company,” the hobbits have dinner with a company of elves in an enchanted glade. (It’s because of those elves that Gandalf and Aragorn discover the Black Riders are already chasing their little ring-bearer.) In the next two chapters, “A Short Cut To Mushrooms” and “A Conspiracy Unmasked,” a hobbit named Farmer Maggot offers to ferry them across a river and they develop a plan to pretend Frodo has moved to a nearby community. In chapters six and seven, “The Old Forest” and “The House of Tom Bombadil” they meet and spend a few nights with the enigmatic Tom and his wife Goldberry. Then, in “Fog on the Barrow-Downs,” Frodo gets captured by a spooky and demonic creature called a barrow-wight in a great fog. Tom Bombadil saves him, and the hobbits continue on their way.
Throughout these chapters, readers learn sprinkles of Middle-earth history (long-buried secrets, perhaps?), some philosophizing about the nature of war and nature itself, as well a lot of singing.
Why is Elanor Gamgee in this?
This is where it gets interesting. TikTok user itsbreabird considers Samwise Gamgee’s daughter to be an unsung hero of The Lord of the Rings and explains how, in-universe, she’s the one responsible for preserving the tales of Bilbo and Frodo’s adventures. She’s the one who inherits Bilbo’s There and Back Again manuscript, also known as the Red Book of Westmarch.
We also know, thanks to Professor Tolkien’s appendices, that Elanor lived in the kingdom of Gondor for a while as one of Queen Arwen’s maids. She later married a hobbit named Fastred. If you’re going to pick a “next generation” Tolkien-verse character to follow, Sam’s eldest daughter is an excellent choice.
How do we feel about this? On one hand, the only Lord of the Rings fan whose opinion I care about more than my own is Colbert’s. If he’s happy, I am happy. On the other hand, I’ve seen how other so-called “fans” react when a franchise with a boy hero reboots with a girl hero front and center. It’s difficult to have a nice time in that environment. It’s bad out there, y’all! I hope for the best and will try not to manifest hate with my own pessimism. But I can feel the eyes rolling and the knives sharpening.
I love everything Rings of Power is doing with Galadriel. Stepping outside of Middle-earth, I’m the person who asked for young Leia in Obi-Wan Kenobi, loved every minute of Mon Mothma’s incredible arc on Andor, and embraced new characters like Rey, Rose Tico, Mae and Osha. Those are, truthfully, the stories I wanted to see as a child and teenage fangirl. But the vitriol is just so loud, and it ends up feeling like these female characters become sacrificial lambs to the IP industrial complex. Protect Elanor!!
(featured image: New Line Cinema)
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