No, I’m not talking about the animated War of the Rohirrim movie that’s coming out this December; I’m very excited about that one. The movie I’m talking about is the new Gollum movie that’s rumored to be coming out in 2026. I know I’m late to talk about this, but as casting announcements are floating around and the plans made official, I think it’s time to share my thoughts on this matter.
First of all…why? We just got a videogame that centered around Gollum last year and according to most of the reviews I’ve read of it, it sucked and did really poorly. Just from having watched the gameplay, I can see why that was. The animation was sloppy, the elves did not look Tolkienian, Sauron was nowhere in sight…there was so much wrong with it. You would think that after that, people would maybe want to distance themselves a bit from Gollum and stick to the original film portrayal of him, but no.
Is Gollum a good character? Yes, but he’s only a good character within the full story of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien only gave us enough about Gollum to let us know that he was once a hobbit who was corrupted by the Ring, was cast out by society, and became a weird little cave gremlin who only comes out after “the Precious” is lost, and even then, the ensuing chaos that comes of that isn’t even fully flushed out because it isn’t necessary to the plot. All we needed to know about Gollum was what was needed for the story at large and that was it.
While we could – in theory – get an interesting story about Gollum in the form of a movie, the number of creative liberties that would need to be taken to fill in the plot holes is worrying, especially in today’s overly sensitive culture that lacks the morals that were so integral to Tolkien’s work. While some solace could be taken in the fact that this movie has Philipa Boyens, Peter Jackson, and Fran Walsh working on it, they would still be working in a completely different writing climate than they were in the 90’s, one that would be demanding that everything be as politically correct as possible if they want the movie to be successful. That by itself could destroy the movie, even if Gollum’s story was fully flushed out.
My second concern with this is the age of the actors. While this wouldn’t have been a problem in 2015, the fact of the matter is that the original cast of The Lord of the Rings is getting old. Viggo Mortensen is 65 and while he still looks great for his age, I doubt that he could come back to reprise his role as Aragorn, especially not as a young Aragorn. Andy Serkis is 60 and – once again – I have concerns about how well he would be able to move as Gollum. On top of that, Ian McKellen, who is 85, is already voicing concerns that he will not be able to take up his beloved role as Gandalf because he could be dead by then. This is something else that could absolutely destroy the story as we have grown so used to watching these specific actors play our favorite characters. While, yes, AI de-aging software exists, I would be worried about it looking hokey, especially as characters move around.
Lastly, people are tired of the uninspired remakes and sequels that are constantly being added to their beloved franchises, especially as Hollywood is using them to push more and more of their agenda onto the people. Just look at Star Wars: The Acolyte, a prequel to the original Star Wars, which is being called the “gayest Star Wars series” or Disney+ remake of Doctor Who, which featured several drag queens from Rue Paul’s Drag Race in episode 2. While I would love to say that Peter Jackson would be against putting that type of crap in the new Gollum movie, the studio he was working with when filming The Hobbit did force him to make up a love triangle between Legolas, Kili the dwarf, and Tauriel, a character who was never in the book. On top of that, I think much of the Tolkien fandom has lost faith in Hollywood to adapt the Professor’s work after we saw what Amazon did to it when they released Rings of Power. Though there is still a chance that this could be a good movie, I don’t think there’s much hope for it.
Until next time,
M.J.
The Tanuki Corner 
Leave a comment