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Stephen Colbert, famous devotee to J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth, is co-writing a Lord of the Rings movie with his son.
Warner Bros. announced early Wednesday that Colbert will script The Lord of the Rings: Shadow of the Past along with series veteran Philippa Boyens and Peter McGee, Colbert’s son. Producer Peter Jackson revealed Colbert’s involvement in a social media video that introduced a “very special partner” on the film.
“It took me a few years to scrape my courage into a pile to give you a call, but about two years ago I did,” Colbert told Jackson. “You liked it enough to talk to me about it, and ever since then, the two of us have been working with the brilliant Philippa Boyens on how to develop this story.”
Colbert said that a few years ago, while talking with his son, he thought of a potential framing device for the film, which follows a new adventure for Sam, Merry and Pippin 14 years after the passing of Frodo.
WATCH | Peter Jackson, Stephen Colbert announce new Lord of the Rings adaptation:
“You know what the books mean to me, and what your films mean to me,” Colbert said. “But the thing I found myself reading over and over again were the six chapters early on in The Fellowship [of the Ring] that y’all never developed into the first movie back in the day.”
“I thought: ‘Oh, wait, maybe that could be its own story that could fit into the larger story. Could we make something that was completely faithful to the books while also being completely faithful to the movies that you guys had already made?'” added Colbert.
Long line of adaptations
Shadow of the Past follows a long series of Lord of the Rings adaptations, including from Jackson. After his trilogy of films, the producer/director created the trilogy of prequels based on Tolkien’s The Hobbit. He then helped produce the anime The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim in 2024.
Meanwhile, Shadow of the Past will come after Andy Serkis’ upcoming The Hunt for Gollum, which is also produced by Jackson and is set to arrive in theatres next year.
Then there is the Amazon Prime prequel series — unconnected to Jackson’s adaptations — The Rings of Power, which was widely reported as being the most expensive show ever created when its first season released in 2022.
With a price tag estimated around $1 billion US, it received generally favourable reviews. While filming has reportedly wrapped, the show’s third season does not yet have a confirmed release date.
Amazon spent a reported $1 billion US making the first season of Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, a series CBC’s Eli Glasner calls ‘epic and elemental. An amazing start.’
And alongside a veritable slew of other well-received video games— from 2003’s The Return of the King to the Middle-Earth series in the 2010s — 2023’s The Lord of the Rings: Gollum was widely derided as one of the worst video games of all time.
2025’s cozy game Tales of the Shire, from Avatar costume and prop design company Wētā Workshop, received more mixed reviews.
According to an unconfirmed report from Insider Gaming, a new Lord of the Rings game intended to compete with Hogwarts Legacy is rumoured to be in development.
As a lifelong fan, Colbert has repeatedly shown off his near-encyclopedic Lord of the Rings knowledge. He has often had the cast and crew of the various Lord of the Rings films — including Jackson — on his show, while frequently challenging guests to stump him on obscure trivia questions.
To mark The Fellowship of the Ring‘s 20th anniversary in 2021, he reunited much of the cast for rap tribute to the franchise in a segment on The Late Show.
“Lord of the Rings is, without a doubt, the greatest trilogy in movie history,” he said ahead of that skit.
The Late Show on CBS is to air its last episode on May 21 after the network announced it was cancelling the series last July.
