Final Two Character Posters for The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies

The final two character posters for The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies has been released. The poster run began with Bilbo and now ends with Bilbo along with the Elvenking Thranduil who has his part to play in the battle. The others posters: Bilbo, Gandalf, Galadriel, Bard, Thorin and Tauriel.

New Poster for The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

Here is a new poster for The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies. It depicts a version of Bilbo that suggests he may be more involved in the trilogy's final fights then he was in the book.

Clip #5 From The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

The clips from The Hobbit continue as this next one features a scene that shows a little on how the Dwarves ended up in a bunch of barrels as seen in the various trailers.

Three Clips from The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

The marketing campaign for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is officially in full swing as the cast starts making the talk show runs around the world. Already in the states Ian McKellen appeared on The Colbert Report while Evangeline Lilly visited Craig Ferguson. Between those visits, EW and IGN, we now have three clips from the movie. The first two will seem familiar as bits were used in the movie's trailers. The first is a scene between Gandalf and Bilbo, the second between Tauriel and Legolas while the last is truly new as an Orc shrugs off the threats from Legolas and Thranduil.

Evangeline Lilly, Peter Jackson and Others Talk The Desolation of Smaug (Updated)

Not sure why but more than the usual number of sites posted their interviews with mostly Evangeline Lilly but also with few other actors from The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. Also have a few set reports. Usually this far away from release its one site posting something and the rest then posting about that first post. The timing is weird to me because usually this is the kind of thing you start seeing around two weeks before a movie opens, not two months. It might be worth reading as these questions will eventually be asked hundreds of times by reporters so for now the answers are less sales pitchy, longer and more spontaneous until the repetition results in the short and concise answers normally see.

Evangeline Lilly's interviews are probably the most interesting as she is clearly very enthusiastic about the role of Tauriel and is glad to be able to finally talk about it. I am starting to suspect she is a bit of a closet geek. The One Ring's set visit is also of interest as the writer was an extra on the New Zealand so provides his view of the experience. Worth while as written by a fan living a dream trying to report the experience rather then as a reporter who really isn't a fan and doesn't really care about the subject they cover (like most entertainment reporters). Links below.

Update: Added links to Dark Horizon's interviews with Ian McKellen and Martin Freeman.

Set Visit (The One Ring) - Set extra and fan discussing his experience on the set. Part of 1 of future unknown number.

Evangeline Lilly and Orlando Bloom (io9) - Discuss adding these characters to the story since are not in the book, in Bloom's case returning to the role and more.

Evangeline Lilly (Collider) - Seems Lilly tired of her gorgeous long hair and chopped it. Also talks at length about Tauriel, what the character brings to the story, and how different from other elves.

Evangeline Lilly (Dark Horizons) - Discusses casting, costume, adding a female to movie, elven ears, and filming.

Peter Jackson (HitFix) - The director talks 48FPS, using some of Guillermo del Toro's vision for the film, and more.

Luke Evans (Dark Horizons) - Discusses being cast, scale of the shoot, green screen work and more.

Set Visit (Yahoo) - 10 brief (and mostly meh) factoids from a set visit.

Ian McKellen (Dark Horizons) - He discusses differences in experience of shooting LOTRs vs Hobbit trilogies, green screen and more. A lot of it is a retread of questions he answered for Journey.

Martin Freeman (Dark Horizons) - Bilbo discusses pace differences between the two Hobbit films, demands of filing a trilogy, and not really filming with his Sherlock co-star Benedict Cumberbatch who voices Smaug the Dragon.

New The Hobbit Trailer Tomorrow, Two Desolation of Smaug Posters

The officially The Hobbit trilogy twitter account has revealed two new banners for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, one featuring Bilbo and the Dwarves and the other featuring the Elven King Thranduil (Lee Pace). In addition they wrote, "The new trailer for #TheHobbit: The Desolation of Smaug will be unveiled tomorrow (Tuesday, 10/1) at 6am PT / 9am ET!". A somewhat early sneak peak will also appear on US TV as the account mentioned, "Orlando Bloom and Sir @IanMcKellen will be introducing the new trailer for #TheHobbit on the @TODAYshow tomorrow! Tune in at 8am." Not sure if that means exactly at 8 or sometime in the 8 o'clock hour. Easier to just wait until it pops up online than slog through the Today show for it who will tease it umpteen different times and delay as long as possible for the potential ratings boost. So until tomorrow, enjoy the posters below. Trailer #2 is now out.

Freeman, Evans Wrap on The Hobbit

Two more cast members are forever done filming scenes for The Hobbit trilogy. Martin Freeman (Bilbo) and Luke Evans (Bard the Bowman) have completed their work on the films. Evans final day was July 10th as noted by his tweet "Final day in Middle Earth." Peter Jackson marked Freeman's final day with a post and image. He also added a pic of Benedict Cumberbatch (voice and motion capture for Smaug).

Tonight Martin Freeman finished his last shot as Bilbo Baggins. The end of an incredible two and a half years. I cannot imagine anyone else in this role - a character that Martin has nurtured and crafted with love and great skill.

We have said goodbye to our elves, humans, wizards and now the hobbit. We now enter our final 2 weeks of pick-ups, and it's wall to wall dwarves. These pick-ups have been gruelling and intense, but I'm so happy with what we've been shooting. These next two movies are going to be pretty great!

Freeman Interview For The Hobbit Home Video Release

Today The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is out on Blu-ray and DVD.  As part of that Collider has released a video interview (below) with star Martin Freeman as he discussed the movie.  The 10 minute interview is pretty entertaining, if only to try and figure out the very dry British humor that sometimes makes it difficult to tell when he is being literal or not.

Highlights:
- Seen movie 6 times, five times in 48fps but not in IMAX
- Thought first day was "exciting".  Has rehearsed the Riddles in the Dark (Bilbo meets Gollum) before filming it on that first day.
- Felt he was the guy for Bilbo (and most LOTR fans had agreed as name came up long before The Hobbit has even started pre-production)

Freeman: Filming Restarts in May

Since the decision was made to turn The Hobbit into a trilogy was made after initial principle photography has been completed, there is now more to film. According to Martin Freeman it seems the cast will assemble in New Zealand starting in May. No specifics provided on exactly what is being filmed but safe to assume that it will probably involve at least a few scenes for The Desolation of Smaug and lion share probably for There and Back Again. From Hollywood.com:

"I am going back at the end of May for all of June and July. I suppose the thing is, this is not finished. We literally have to go and finish it. It's not a new adventure like on a television show. It's the same story. It's the same gig I started in January 2011. I think it'll be really fun because the crew is quite close and the cast are close and we like working on it. I'm anticipating it."

Martin Freeman On Filming Riddles in The Dark

In an interview with i09.com, Martin Freeman discusses filming the "Riddles in the Dark" scene that first introduced Gollum and his discovered of a gold ring. Highlights below, full interview here.

How did Peter Jackson direct you to handle the ring?
Martin Freeman: With curiosity, I think. That was what we kind of went for. When I first see it, when it drops out of Gollum's pouch in the goblin tunnels, to just literally notice it and go "oh." It's just a flash of color in this dark place. A flash of gold. And as I get closer just to have curiosity and not to imbue it with a great kind of force or a sense of epic-ness. Like a trinket. Then there's something magpie-ish about Bilbo and he thinks, oh I'll have that that might come in handy. But there's no sense of a semi religious import.

Hobbit Week on The Colbert Report Clips

This week The Colbert Report held its "Hobbit Week" to promote The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Stephen Colbert is a huge fan of Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings trilogy often making references to both on his show. Last summer he was invited to the set for an unconfirmed cameo. Below are links to the full episode and the The Hobbit specific segments from each of the four episodes.

Videos
The Pundit: Or Colbert and Back Again Opening
December 3 - Full Episode | Opening | Sir Ian McKellen | Sign-Off
December 4 - Full Episode | Opening | Martin Freeman | Sign-Off
December 5 - Full Episode | Opening | Andy Serkis | Sign-Off
December 6 - Full Episode | Opening | Sir Peter Jackson | Sign-Off

Peter Jackson On Casting Martin Freeman, Trilogy Choice

In a press conference to promote The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Director Peter Jackson discussed the casting Martin Freeman as Bilbo Baggins and defended the decision to expand The Hobbit into another trilogy.

"Martin was the only person that we wanted for that role, and that was really before we met Martin. We knew him from The Office and Hitchhiker’s Guide [to the Galaxy], and we just felt he had qualities that would be perfect for Bilbo. The stuffy repressed English quality. He’s a dramatic actor, he’s not a comedian, but he has a talent for comedy."

Because Martin was contracted to BBC's Sherlock, "We were in trouble. I was really panicking. I was having sleepless nights. We were probably six weeks away from the beginning of the shoot, and we hadn’t settled on anyone else, and I was torturing myself by watching Sherlock on an iPad at 4 o’clock in the morning."

The Hobbit 150 Behind the Scenes Images, Article and Martin Freeman Interview

New Zealand Stuff has posted two articles for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. One is a interview with Martin Freeman as he discusses getting cast as Bilbo, taking over the role from Ian Holm. In other is a behind the scenes look at the film. Links below. In addition ComicBookMovie has posted 150 behind the scene images that is really a catalog of all the ones previously released (including the 60 from yesterday) so if got behind its a useful way of catching up but otherwise nothing new to see. If don't want to click through each one, the thumbnail list is here.
Martin Freeman | Behind the Scenes

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey Set Visit Reports and Factoids

It seems the press moratorium has been lifted on The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey as several media websites have posted reports on their visit to the set of the movie this past June, along with interviews with Sir Peter Jackson, Sir Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, and Richard Armitage. Based on similiar information popping up in both sites, I think the interviews were done in a conferencing type environment and not one-on-one. Below are links to the reports found so far with a few noteworthy highlights.

Dark Horizons: Set Visit | Peter Jackson | Ian McKellen | Martin Freeman | Richard Armitage
Collider: Set Visit | Peter Jackson | Ian McKellen | Martin Freeman | Richard Armitage | Richard Taylor (VFX)

Highlights:

The Hobbit: Bilbo and Pig Image Shows Scale

Entertainment Weekly has posted a new image from The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey as part of its fall movies story. The image probably doesn't seem remarkable at first except look at the scale. It shows Bilbo (Martin Freeman) running past a pig that fits the hobbit race scale. Even something as minor as running in a field of grass required more than a little Hollywood magic to pull off.

The Hobbit Production Video #8 - Final Days of Filming

As Peter Jackson promised during the 2012 San Diego Comic Con, the production video #8 has been released. The video provides a behind the scenes look at The Hobbit panel held that Saturday. The video teases some of the bits shown during the con (mostly the cast/crew greetings) while the rest focuses on the final days of production with look at the sets, Andy Serkis last day directing 2nd unit, final day of principle photography and a whole lot more. If interested, I have compiled video links to more then 100 panels that were held during the con here.

Video #1 | Video #2 | Video #3 | Video #4 | Video #5 | Video #6 | Video #7

SDCC 2012: The Hobbit Panel Video

Below is the full The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey panel that was held Saturday at the 2012 San Diego Comic-Con. The video does not include the 12 minutes of movie footage (summary here) that was shown due to copyright but it does show the Q&A that followed.

SDCC 2012: The Hobbit Panel with Movie Footage

Saturday was a big day for the San Diego Comic-Con as lots of movie panels were held including the panel for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey where 12 and half minutes of The Hobbit footage were shown. The footage has not been posted online but Peter Jackson indicated that at least some of it would be used in an upcoming production video. The info below is culled from Heat Vision, Collider and The One Ring.

Footage Description
- Shot of the Shire as voice over of Gandalf saying "Far to the east lies..."
- Gandalf, Bilbo and dwarves at Bag End discussing goal of recovering their treasure from the dragon Smaug with Thorin saying "Rumors have begun to spread,” he says, “The dragon Smaug has not been seen in many years… Perhaps the vast wealth of our people lies unprotected … perhaps it is time to take back Erebor!"
- Discussion of a plan with need of a burglar to steal a map from Smaug that will help with taking Erebor. Something Bilbo agrees with not realizing that is his purpose in the adventure.

The Hobbit Entertainment Weekly Cover, Gallery

It has been a while since we have had anything cool come from the Hobbit outside of the production videos but thanks to the San Diego Comic-Con, that drought may come to an end. It starts with this week's Entertainment Weekly issue that is a preview of next week's con with 10 pictures to enjoy. Some are from filming, some seem to be frames from the movie but most are just the actors in full character makeup looking awesome. The pictures show Bilbo in Mirkwood Forest, Gandalf in front of Bags End, the company of Dwarves, Elrond, Galadriel, and more. The start of the gallery can be found here.

Serkis Briefly Talks Hobbit Motion Capture

In an article about how Hollywood ignores the real acting that occurs with motion-capture, Andy Serkis commented briefly on how motion capture was used on the set of The Hobbit when he reprised the role of Gollum for the film. As for the image, it was first posted by Collider. It shows Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) with Sting. Based on the webbing on Bilbo and in the background, this is a scene involving a fight with the giant spiders of Mirkwood.

What’s changed as a result of Weta's new active-LED system used for "Apes" is that there are no longer any breaks in the capture sequences: "Every reaction, every emotion, every acting choice and beat happens there and then," Serkis emphasized.

Indeed, that's what happened when Serkis revisited Gollum after a 12-year absence for "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" (December 14). Shooting live on set provided a more dynamic sense of play in his scene with the young Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman). "The way we approached the scene was very much to treat it like a chamber-theater piece, where we could experiment and try different things out," Serkis explained. "Of course, the other significant change now is that we're using facial capture, so my facial muscles are driving the facial muscles of the digital puppet."