Peter Jackson to Make "The Hobbit"

But who’s going to direct it? Jackson? Del Toro?

More questions:

• Will Holm be Bilbo? Will McKellen be Gandalf? Will Serkis be Gollum? (I ssssuspectsss three “yessssssses,” to those questionsses, my precious.)
• Most importantly… will it really be The Hobbit, or some huge, epic, dark attempt to match or surpass The Lord of the Rings? Remember folks… The Lord of the Rings is epic mythology. The Hobbit is a children’s story…
• Isn’t it just a little satisfying to see that New Line is turning to the work of a devout Catholic to restore all of the money they’re not making from Pullman’s His Dark Materials?
• If Jackson directs and Walsh adapts… will we get the Jackson/Walsh magic of The Fellowship of the Ring, with careful attention to character development? Or will this be the Jackson/Walsh of The Return of the King and King Kong, who are so preoccupied with blowing our minds with massive action sequences that we are never really drawn in to care much?
• The Hobbit has exactly zero major female characters. No doubt this will be viewed as a problem that must be resolved. How will they resolve it?
• Will this “second movie” that will supposedly bridge The Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring be a story worth telling, or a contrived plot designed to reunite actors from the original trilogy and give a boost to Orlando Bloom’s career?

The headline we’ve been waiting for…

The Oscar-winning Wellington film-maker and Hollywood studios New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios announced today that they had resolved their legal dispute. Jackson and partner Fran Walsh will serve as executive producers on two Hobbit movies.

Pre-production will begin as soon as possible and both will be shot simultaneously, tentatively in 2009. The Hobbit is likely to be released in 2010 and the sequel in 2011.

Jackson sued New Line in 2005 for unpaid profits, estimated to be about US$100 million, from the Lord of the Rings trilogy, which became a stumbling block to his being involved in The Hobbit.

Jackson and New Line said in the announcement that they had settled all legal action. “I’m very pleased that we’ve been able to put our differences behind us, so that we may begin a new chapter with our old friends at New Line,” Jackson said. “We are delighted to continue our journey through Middle-earth.”