Production on The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum officially began on July 15, 2026. In a video shared by Warner Bros., director and lead Andy Serkis confirmed filming is underway.
The core creative team from the original trilogy returns. Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens wrote the screenplay and are producing alongside Peter Jackson and Zane Weiner.
The film occupies a specific and largely undocumented stretch of Middle-earth history: the roughly 17 years between Bilbo’s departure from the Shire on the night of his eleventy-first birthday party and the Fellowship’s passage through the Mines of Moria. Appendix B of The Lord of the Rings traces this window in bare outline. Gollum wanders for years after losing the Ring, is captured by Aragorn near the Dead Marshes around T.A. 3017, and is delivered to Thranduil’s halls in Mirkwood, from which he escapes not long before the War of the Ring begins. Gandalf provides additional context at the Council of Elrond. Unfinished Tales contributes further notes on Gandalf’s own movements through this period. None of those sources gives Gollum’s experience as a primary narrative at anything approaching his own vantage point.
Boyens described the film as “an intense story…told through the perspective of this incredible creature.” What Tolkien seeded across Appendix B and the Council of Elrond chapter is more than enough raw material to build a coherent film. Whether the production stays close to those texts or fills the silence with invention will be the central question when it opens on December 17, 2027.
The Hunt for Gollum is the first of two new standalone Lord of the Rings films in development at Warner Bros. Earlier reporting raised questions about whether the project might be split into two parts. Boyens addressed that directly: “I can tell you definitively it isn’t two films.” One story, one film. A second, separate production is also in development.
