New casting leaks for Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum

As the start of filming nears for the next Warner Bros.-owned film set in Middle-earth, we are being treated to more than just a trickle of news about casting. Renowned scooper Daniel RPK has revealed that not one but two new actors are rumoured to be cast in The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum.

Given that Ian McKellen is headed to New Zealand to film starting this July, director Andy Serkis (presumably) reprising his acclaimed performance-capture portrayal of Gollum, that Orlando Bloom has said he’d hate to see anyone else play Legolas, and similarly with Elijah Wood and his Frodo (Frodo’s appearance was unofficially teased by McKellen last August), the big question was whether we would see Viggo Mortensen reprise his role as Aragorn. Aragorn is the lead character in the 2009 fan film based on the off-screen action relayed in Tolkien’s text, which briefly describes Aragorn’s hardships in tracking and capturing Gollum. The new production cannot avoid having Aragorn as a character. And indeed news of a recast broke in December, but it was not clear at the time if this would rule out Mortensen.

The new reveal, on Daniel RPK’s Patreon, is that British actor Leo Woodall looks to have been cast as Aragorn. He recently played the lead in the forthcoming thriller Tuner, appeared in Nuremberg, and voiced Bill Weasley in the full-cast audiobook of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

Image credit: her.ie

A leaked casting script teased a potential scene with “Young Strider”, a fellow Dúnadan, and a presumably-codenamed “female woodland sprite”, so we may well get additional Rangers, but perhaps also scenes with Aragorn at more than one stage of his life. Given the long-lived nature of the Dúnedain, the same actor could play Strider as a younger man as well as in the time-frame of the movie (Strider is famously 87 years old when Frodo first meets him, to Éowyn’s later shock in the films).

The other breaking news, unlooked for past a rumour from Knight Edge Media that there was a call for Gollum that included a lead actress in her 30s, is that Anya Taylor-Joy has been cast in an unspecified leading role. Taylor-Joy is no stranger to genre films, having filmed for Dune: Part Three last year (playing Alia Atreides), and voiced Princess Peach in the upcoming The Super Mario Galaxy Movie

Image credit: unknown

Precisely who Taylor-Joy could play is not clear, but we hear that there have been no casting calls for Cate Blanchett’s Galadriel or Evangeline Lilly’s Tauriel. As far as characters from Tolkien’s text goes, there’s little scope for a female lead outside Arwen, and indeed a poll of Fellowship of Fans Discord members put her as the most likely role. If so, this would be a second re-cast of a character from the 2001–03 New Line films, played to great effect by Liv Tyler.

Also in the Knight Edge Media article we learned that another actress was being cast, this time a supporting role, aged in her 50s. This one has a little more scope from the text, in that since we know a kid Sméagol is being cast (via more leaked casting scripts), this means we are getting the back-story of the young Stoor who will grow into the murderous Gollum. And a key part of this backstory is that Sméagol’s community has a matriarchal grandmother who ultimately casts him out after he finds the One Ring and starts using it to his own dishonest advantage.

Another option is Aragorn’s mother Gilraen, who dies roughly midway between when Bilbo leaves the Shire, and Gandalf returns to confirm the ring that Frodo inherited is indeed the One Ring (going by the Appendix B timeline; the film adaptation chronology is of course highly compressed). Gilraen has an extremely poignant scene in The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen, talking with her son shortly before she dies, talking about hope for their people, giving a potential linking scene pointing to Aragorn’s destiny.

Image credit: TheOneRing.net

This role being Gilraen seems slightly tricky if the continuity with Jackson’s film trilogy is to be maintained, given the timing, but not impossible: the film is said to be largely set in the time period between Bilbo’s leaving party and the Council of Elrond. It would mean a separate role for Sméagol’s grandmother, who, one can imagine, is not avoidable given Gollum’s backstory most likely told in flashback.

The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum is slated to hit theaters on December 17th, 2027. Knight Edge Media and TheOneRing.net last month had the exclusive on this official synopsis:

Before the Fellowship, one creature’s obsession holds the key to Middle-earth’s survival — or its demise. In The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum, we meet young Smeagol — an outsider drawn to trinkets and mischief — long before The One Ring consumed him and began his tragic descent into the tortured, deceitful creature Gollum. With the ring lost and carried away by Bilbo Baggins, Gollum finds himself compelled to leave his cave in search of it. Gandalf the Grey calls upon Aragorn, still known as the ranger Strider, to track the elusive creature whose knowledge of the whereabouts of the ring could tip the balance toward the Dark Lord Sauron.

Set in the shadowed time between Bilbo’s birthday disappearance and the Fellowship’s formation, this perilous journey through Middle-earth’s darkest corners reveals untold truths, tests the resolve of its future king, and explores the fractured soul and backstory of Gollum, one of Tolkien’s most enigmatic characters.

Directed by original cast member Andy Serkis, produced by Peter Jackson, and written & produced by Fran Walsh and Phillipa Boyens — the creative team behind the Oscar-winning trilogy — this live-action movie bridges the beloved films with new characters, returning heroes, and a deeply engaging origin story that resets the stage for, and changes everything you know about the legendary Lord of the Rings trilogy.