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Over the weekend, our friends at TheOneRing.net and Nerd of the Rings held a special fan panel at San Diego Comic-Con for all things Lord of the Rings, including the first footage for The War of the Rohirrim animated film. They first showed an intro from longtime Lord of the Rings screenwriter Phillipa Boyens, introducing the upcoming anime footage as she couldn’t attend the panel herself.
The footage featured the lead, Hera, daughter of Helm Hammerhand, as she comes into contact with Wulf years later after being childhood friends. (Wulf is a Dunlendinger, who are the antagonists against Rohan at this time). The clip showed Helm Hammerhand (played by Brain Cox) alongside Hera. The clip then changed to a second scene with Hera must fight a Mumikil. She blows Rohan’s great horn to announce the incoming attack to anyone near by. The clip ends with Hera headed into the “forbidden forest” (i.e., Fangorn Forest) to lead the Mumakil away from her fellow travelers.
Producers Joseph Chou and Jason DeMarco took the stage to discuss the process of creating the anime. Chou, known for his love of Japanese anime, was told Warner Brothers wanted to make one set in Tolkien’s legendarium. He was given two hard years to get the film made, and he was the one who brought on director Kenji Kamiyama. Eventually, fellow New Zealanders Phoebe Gittins and Arty Papageorgiou boarded the project to pen the script.
DeMarco also mentioned that after Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh boarded the project as producers, they had a bit of a “learning curve” regarding how animated projects are made. You can’t just redo an entire scene on the fly like a multi-million dollar live-action film because of the months it takes the artists to draw the sequence, but they soon became fans of the medium. The final section of the panel ended with a behind-the-scenes video that featured actors Gaia Wise voicing the lead character Hera and Miranda Otto returning to voice Éowyn. In addition to the revelation, most main actors have backgrounds on stage, not familiar with film or animation. They also revealed that ADR work for the main cast had just been completed last week in London.
We also recently learned from DanielRPK on Patreon that the first trailer for the movie is “ready to go” and will come out “sometime in the next few weeks.” However, that is always subject to change depending on the situation. The rest of the panel, including the interview with the president of Middle-Earth Enterprises, Lee Guinchard, is here. They also handed out a map of Rohan and pins to all the fans in attendance at the panel before closing.
The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim hits theaters on December 13th
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