The Hobbit movie is on!

Breaking news... The Hobbit, long delayed thanks to legal fighting between Peter Jackson and New Line, is on! And it's going to be two movies!

For the quick backstory: Peter Jackson sued New Line saying that he was underpaid for his work on the Lord of the Rings trilogy. New Line had the exclusive rights to produce a movie based on the books. Tolkien's family had to approve any filmmaker chosen to head the project. They wanted Peter Jackson. Thus, a three-way lockdown. Trick was, New Line's rights to the books were going to expire soon. So if they didn't get it made, they would lose the contract and the Tolkien family could re-bid the rights (which would be worth a fortune thanks to the success of the LOTR).

But it looks like Jackson and New Line have made up (surprise) so the movie can go forward. They are saying that it is going to be "the Hobbit and a sequel"...i can only assume that means they are splitting the book into two parts. If they are doing the Hobbit and then going to do the Silmarillion as movie...not sure that would really work :-)

Production is supposed to start "as soon as possible" which means the folks at WETA are probably already working on stuff, and Peter Jackson will start in full-time once he wraps up The Lovely Bones and does whatever he has to do as producer for Tintin, District 9, and the Halo movie (if it ever gets made).

For those not familiar, the only characters in common between the Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit are the main character, Bilbo Baggins (though he is much younger), Gandolf the Grey, and Golum. Andy Serkis will of course be back to play Golum as a CG character again, while Ian McKellen is assumed to be returning as Gandolf (though he'll be 71 by the time the first movie comes out). Bilbo was played in the last movie by Ian Holm, and while i loved his part, and there is always the possibility of fabulous de-aging technology, it is assumed that Bilbo will be re-cast. I'd really love it if they could somehow let Ian Holm play the character. Provide a great sense of continuity...but i just don't see it happening. I just hope they don't try to use Elijah Wood and change his look. LOTR survived with him as Frodo, but... yeah, let's not go there.