First Images Of "The Hobbit" Released

By Larry Yepez Jr.

Attention Lord of The Ring fans! Although we are all waiting for winter to come to see Frodo and the gang at it again, we have got tempting news for you. The fist official images of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey were released exclusively to Entertainment Weekly magazine.

The pics of Middle Earth went public yesterday, revealing the first on-set images of the very anticipated film. A prequel to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Hobbit is also being filmed in New Zealand by the Oscar-winning director Peter Jackson.

The first image is of Sir Ian McKellen in his iconic role of Gandolf the Grey, smoking his pipe as he so seriously ponders on the trunk of a massive Ent, a tree which in the trilogy is the ancient shepherd of the forest.

The second image is of Martin Freeman taking on the role of Bilbo Baggins. He is apparently reading from a scroll as a group of Middle Earthers stare from a hole in the wall that seems to be the hobbit's dining room.

In a third image we see Freeman sitting on a table taking direction from Mr. Peter Jackson. The curious thing about this image is the hobbit's feet which are tremendously large and hairy. A couple of other pictures show Jackson himself posing on The Hobbit set.

The popular book by J.R.R.Tolkien has been split into two films. The first one is The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and the second is The Hobbit: There and Back Again. The cast and crew have embarked on a 254 day shoot to recreate more than 1000 pages of the book.

Much of the cast will be coming back from the Lord of the Rings trilogy, like Cate Blanchet, Hugo Weaving, Elijah Wood and Andy Serkis (Gollum). There are also other stars in this film including Barry Humpheir a.k.a. Dame Edna as the Goblin King, and Evangeline Lilly as beautiful elf Tauriel.

Are you excited about the new hobbit films?

Tags Andy Serkis, Barry Humpheir, Blogger: Larry Yepez Jr, Cate Blanchet, Elijah Wood, Evangeline Lilly, Hugo Weaving, Lord of the Rings, Peter Jackson, Sir Ian McKellen, The Hobbit