More than twenty years on, and we're still often struggling to find fantasy movies that pull us in and deliver such an epic scale as Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy did. So, Warner wants to keep us in the lands of Middle-earth, by inviting us on yet another adventure based on Tolkien's classic literature.
Revealed in a video marking the celebration of Tolkien Reading Day, The Lord of the Rings: Shadows of the Past is the working title for an upcoming sequel which looks to fill in some of the gaps missed in the first telling of Tolkien's work. But, to avoid remaking or treading over the old story, it'll be framed as a sequel, drawn up by Stephen Colbert, his son Peter McGee, Peter Jackson, and screenwriter Philippa Boyens, who helped develop both Tolkien trilogies for Warner Bros.
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The film's official logline reads as follows: "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."
It'll revolve around Colbert's idea for including certain parts of The Fellowship of the Ring that were missed out from the book adaptation. Namely, chapters three and six, Three is Company and Fog on the Barrow-Downs. Two chapters aren't enough to make a movie, so we imagine there's plenty more story to be found. Shadows of the Past doesn't have a release date yet, but it is coming after The Hunt for Gollum, which is scheduled for a 2027 premiere.