The Hunt for Gollum Gets a New Update as Warner Bros. Confirms Another LOTR Film by Stephen Colbert
Tuesday night, March 24, being Tolkien reading day, Peter Jackson and Warner Bros chose to honor fans by announcing Lord Of The Rings: Shadow of the Past. It is the long-awaited second LOTR live-action film that was announced to be in the works by writer Philippa Boyens in October 2024. The biggest shocker, however, is that the film will be written by The Late Show host Stephen Colbert and his son, marking a new twist in Warner Bros’ nearly three-decade-long attempt to recreate the magic of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Colbert’s long-running late-night show at CBS is set to end in May, a fact he and Jackson alluded to in the announcement while explaining how he suddenly got the time to work on Shadow of the Past. He is a longstanding fan of the Lord of the Rings franchise, although this will be his first time penning a feature film. According to Colbert, the idea for the film originated from reading the six chapters from JRR Tolkien’s Fellowship of the Rings that didn’t make it into the trilogy.
“The thing I found myself reading over and over again were the six chapters early on in the fellowship that y’all never developed into the first movie back in the day. It is basically the chapter ‘Three is Company’ (Chapter 3) through ‘Fog on the Barrow Downs’ (Chapter 8), and I thought, wait, 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?” Colbert said while speaking to Jackson via video call.
Colbert said it took him years of working with his son, Peter McGee (Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Blue Bloods), to frame the idea that eventually got the approval of both Newline and Warner Bros two years ago. In October 2024, Philippa Boyens confirmed that there would be a second film after The Hunt for Gollum, while also dismissing an earlier allegation by Gandalf actor Sir Ian McKellen, who had mistakenly suggested that The Hunt for Gollum would be a trilogy. Philippa Boyens, who co-wrote the flagship trilogy, is also part of the team writing the Colbert-led spinoff.
The details of the story’s place in the timeline are still unclear, although Colbert insisted that it will not disrupt Tolkien’s books nor Jackson’s films. Its official synopsis at Warner Bros says, “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.”
The announcement brings the confirmed number of Lord of the Rings projects currently in development to three, including The Rings of Power Season 3. The most anticipated of them, however, is Andy Serkis’s The Hunt for Gollum, which has been in the works since 2024. The film, which is currently filming in New Zealand, will be released in 2027, with Serkis directing and also reprising his role as Gollum alongside Ser Ian McKellen, who plays Gandalf the Grey.
The film follows Aragorn, who is sent by Gandalf on a mission to find Gollum in a bid to prevent the deformed creature from falling into Sauron’s hands and likely giving away news of the One Ring. The Warner Bros update by Peter Jackson includes a rare behind-the-scenes look at the team working on the film, including shots of Serkis in his motion capture gear as he portrays Gollum. “Andy is doing a terrific job. It is looking amazing. The script is coming together really well, and I think it is gonna be a really good film.” Peter Jackson said as he promised to give further updates as the production continues.
