Home Entertainment Writer Philippa Boyens talks THE HOBBIT: THERE AND BACK AGAIN; says Thorin descends into madness

Writer Philippa Boyens talks THE HOBBIT: THERE AND BACK AGAIN; says Thorin descends into madness

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A lot has been said about writer/director Peter Jackson’s decision to turn JRR Tolkien’s 300-page The Hobbit into a 9-hour long movie trilogy, with most of it being “Double-You Tee Eff?!” That being said, the two chapters of the trilogy we’ve had so far have been pretty entertaining (the second way more than the first, if you ask me) and now we’re heading to the third and final part (it is the final part, hey Jackson?), The Hobbit: There and Back Again, which will finally give us the resolution to that crazy, dragon-tastic cliffhanger in The Desolation of Smaug.

Philippa Boyens, Jackson’s co-writer on all the Hobbit flicks, spoke to Empire about all things Hobbit, including why they chose to leave audiences hanging there:

“[It was a] natural break [in the story, and] the most obvious place to end the second film. It felt so natural that I got a shock when the audience got a shock! If you can imagine what transpires next and what’s coming, it’s quite a huge chunk of storytelling. Not only that, but you enter into the tone of the third film, which is very definitely – as is the book, by the way – moving towards the world of Middle-earth as it becomes in Lord Of The Rings. Some dark stuff goes on.”

Just how far along Jackson and co are on making that “dark stuff” happen might surprise you though:

“I can legitimately say right now that the third film doesn’t exist. Pete’s cutting it. As an entity, it’s coming together. Actually that’s not true – we have a rough assembly, so to speak, of the shape of the film and the performances. I am excited, because one of the storylines I care a lot about is the Thorin one.”

“Richard Armitage is extraordinary, as Thorin descends into madness.”

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And Thorin isn’t the only dwarf that finds himself in some dragon doo-doo, of course.. If you recall, four of the dwarves (Kili, Fili, Oin and Bofur) have to stay behind in Lake Town as the rest of the dwarven party headed off to the supposed final stop in their quest: the Lonely Mountain. The reason for this splitting of the group is not just because Jackson and Boyens have never seen a horror movie and thus don’t know that you never split up the group, especially when an angry, golden, firebreathing dragon is on its way.

“We made that decision [so we would] experience the attack on Lake-town through the eyes of people we’ve come a long way with. We wanted some of the dwarves to understand what happened in that firestorm, that holocaust that rains down upon Lake-town. Bofur (James Nesbitt) comes more into his own in the third film. A rift begins to open up. And I can’t say much more without going into spoilers for film three, but it’s primarily because we needed him to be there when the dragon attacks.”

And that dragon will be attacking on December 12, 2014, which is when The Hobbit: There and Back Again hits theatres.

Last Updated: March 18, 2014

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