‘Lord Of The Rings’: Philippa Boyens Says Ideas Exist For More Anime, Plus A Potential New Epic Trilogy
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‘Lord Of The Rings’: Philippa Boyens Says Ideas Exist For More Anime, Plus A Potential New Epic Trilogy

We already know that there is going to be plenty of “Lord of the Rings” content over the next several years. There’s the Prime Video series, “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power,” that doesn’t seem to be slowing down. Then you have the new anime film, ‘The War of Rohirrim.” And don’t forget the live-action ‘Hunt for Gollum,’ which is in the early stages of development. However, according to a member of the ‘Lord of the Rings’ brain trust, there is the possibility of much more ‘Rings’ content in the years to come. 


Speaking in an upcoming The Playlist interview, Philippa Boyens opened up about the future of the ‘Lord of the Rings’ franchise. Specifically, she talked about the possibility we can see more animated films, as well as a potential new epic film trilogy. And we know the studios love ‘Rings’ trilogies. 

Boyens said when one delves into “anything Professor Tolkien wrote, you see the layers and layers of story that’s underneath there and how interconnected they all are.” So are there more interconnected stories to be told within Middle-earth, perhaps a story all about elves, or wizards or something else? Boyens wasn’t specific, but suggested they have unlimited options and tons of ideas including potentially more anime films.

“There’s a lot of [possibilities], when you look at it, there’s a lot of things in there, actually,” she said. “One of the things this [‘War Of The Rohirrim’] story has shown us is that a stand-alone story works really successfully within the world of Middle-earth and I would genuinely—because I’ve fallen in love with the form—love to see another anime. But that depends on the audiences out there, your audience, fans of not only the original trilogy, but that vast anime audience. I’m really interested to see what they think.”

Boyens also said, the ‘LOTR’ brain trust have a wealth of ideas to work on, many stand-alone films, potential sequels to ‘War of the Rohirrim,’ and another, larger, more epic trilogy in the vein of the original ‘LOTR’ films.

“So we’re in the audiences hands,” she continued. “If there’s an appetite for it, we’ve got more stories. There’s a ton of stories left to be told there and some really, really interesting ones. But my preference would be, after ‘Hunt For Gollum,’ would be to look at those stand-alone stories. And then if we got really ambitious—there are some epic, particular stories that could translate into that more traditional epic trilogy format that was the original ‘Lord Of The Rings,’ the war of the rings story.”

Clearly ideas were swimming in her head. “No I need to go take a nap, you’ve exhausted me,” she laughed. “Cause now my brain is starting to think about these stories.”

— Reporting by Rodrigo Perez