Barely two years after the Christopher’s death in January 2020, however, that same cynicism toward the industrialized forces of IP-exploitation is beginning to look prescient. While J.R.R. Tolkien’s books were never the sacred texts his son and likeminded fans espoused, they also deserve more reverence than the current trends explored by media companies who are always on the lookout to expand a story’s “universe” until its narrative has the vastness of an ocean… and often the depth of a puddle. “Other opportunities include exploring additional movies based on iconic characters,” Embracer said in a statement, “such as Gandalf, Aragorn, Gollum, Galadriel, Eowyn, and other characters from the literary works of J.R.R. Tolkien, and continue to provide new opportunities for fans to explore this fictive world through merchandising and other experiences.” More than a decade after movies with titles like X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) and Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018) started popping up, the idea of a movie centered on Gollum reads almost like an April Fool’s Day headline. Lord of the Rings Presents: Gollum’s Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. After all, Gollum (or the hobbit formerly known as Sméagol) is depicted both in Tolkien’s novel and subsequent Peter Jackson movies as a hideous, wretched creature driven mad for centuries by the One Ring until he’s transformed into a cave dweller who chows down on raw, squirming fish with his rotten teeth. Jackson arguably spent the right amount of time on Gollum’s tragic beginnings during a prologue for the movie Return of the King, which was created specifically for the screen. In six minutes of screen time, we get more than enough to understand the pitiable degradation of Sméagol. To spend a whole movie on that, presumably with an invented backstory of Sméagol being a strapping hobbit with a devil may care attitude, a rolodex of modern blockbuster-ready quips and one-liners that sound good in a trailer, and an ill-fated love interest who could set-up her own line of films (or perhaps a streaming series?), is somewhat comical. Yet that idea seems as inevitable as the prospect of one day watching the Gandalf movie wherein instead of a literal gray wizard, we get a hunky antihero who has a lot to learn about wizarding. Perhaps Michael Fassbender is available? Nonetheless, it’s been less than 10 years since Disney’s massive explosion in Star Wars content began hitting the big screen with 2015’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens (remember when “Star Wars” meant monumental cinematic events at the theater?). And even at that time, some of us took a skeptical stance toward then-Disney CEO Bob Iger’s stated desire to have a new Star Wars movie in theaters every year thereafter—forever. In 2014, I called it “Supersizing Star Wars,” and wondered if new Star Wars movies would eventually lose the mystique that once engulfed that saga. Could they one day come to more closely resemble Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe? Which is to say, “Oh, here’s the next one.” In retrospect, that might have been too generous since Disney and Lucasfilm have abandoned the one-Star Wars movie per year model in favor of three Star Wars TV shows in the same calendar period. Pretty soon they should be able to have at least one out for every fiscal quarter. The name of the game in intellectual property management appears to now be constant—endless—expansion and growth. The one-movie-a-year model didn’t particularly serve Lucasfilm well in the long run when movies went into production without settled character arcs (never mind finished screenplays), and even the far more successful balancing act within Marvel Studios’ quality control system is hitting arguable hiccups in Phase Four, where three movies and four TV shows a year is leaving fans a tad divided. Middle-earth still has an allure because its world seems so vast, yet our window into it is so small. Lord of the Rings is a massive epic that defined our understanding of “fantasy” as a genre for the last 70 years. Yet other than that one sprawling book—and the three films it spawned—the only other truly finished work from Tolkien’s hand is the svelte and shimmering children’s story, The Hobbit. Yes, The Silmarillion exists for the hardcore fans, but that work is an amalgamation of Tolkien’s stories, notes, and unfinished ideas that were stitched together after his death. Beyond that remains the Lord of the Rings appendices, which are again keyholes through which we view the origins and destinies of a handful of characters. For whatever perceived grumpiness is ascribed to Christopher Tolkien, he managed to maintain the mystique around his father’s work for nearly 50 years after John Ronald Reul Tolkien’s death. This includes after Hollywood turned it into an exciting and bankable brand in the 21st century via successes that ranged from the glorious (the Lord of the Rings movies) to the mixed (The Hobbit trilogy).
