Check out the Full article on Weta’s appearance: WETA TO ATTEND SUPANOVA SYDNEY AND PERTH IN JUNE

List of Middle-earth celebs making an apperance:

• John Callen – Oin the Dwarf
• Adam Brown – Ori the Dwarf
• Jed Brophy – Nori the Dwarf
• Karl Urban – Éomer
• Mark Ferguson – Gil-galad

Supanova attendees will get the chance to see and listen to:

Graham McTavish – Dwalin. Graham McTavish (born in 1961) is a Scottish actor who has played an impressive array of characters in a slew of Pop cultural franchises. He played the character Warden Ackerman in Red Dwarf in five episodes of series 8. McTavish has also had many supporting roles in British dramas and films such as Casualty, Jekyll, The Bill, Taggart and Sisterhood. Recently, McTavish appeared in the 2011 film The Wicker Tree, Robin Hardy’s sequel to his 1973 film, The Wicker Man. He has had an “Unexpected Journey” to International stardom playing Dwalin (Brother of Balin) the Dwarf in Sir Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit films.

Stephen Hunter – Bombur. Stephen is a New Zealand actor and voice over artist, currently based in Sydney, Australia. His film and Television career started with Ladies Night in 1995 and has continued to include stints on All Saints, Love My Way, Spirited and Rescue: Special Ops. It was announced in 2011 that Stephen was to play the role of Bombur: brother of Bofur and one of the company of 13 dwarves who retake the Lonely Mountain in Sir Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit trilogy. He has since filmed Field Punishment No.1 in the Role of Aussie Bill which will be released in 2013.

Dean O’Gorman – Fili. Dean O’Gorman is a photographer and artist based in New Zealand. He got his start in the television movie, The Rogue Stallion at the age of fourteen, and Raider of the South Seas, both of which were released in 1990. He then won the role of Nurse Harry Martin in the New Zealand soap opera, Shortland Street and has appeared in both Hercules and Xena multiple times. In April 2011 he was cast as Fili the Dwarf in Sir Peter Jackson’s three-part film adaptation of The Hobbit. Kili and his Brother Fili are the youngest dwarves of the 13 and are Thorin Oakenshield’s nephews!

Sylvester McCoy – Radagast (as a Gold Coast exclusive guest). McCoy was starring at the National Theatre in “The Pied Piper”, a musical play written especially for him, when he learned that the BBC was looking for a new lead actor to replace Colin Baker in “Doctor Who” (1963). He later won the role as the seventh Doctor. Following “Doctor Who,” McCoy continues to work extensively in theatre, radio, opera, television and films. McCoy can be seen in the latest blockbuster film The Hobbit (as Radagast the Brown) and can still be heard playing the Doctor in the Big Finish audio productions of Doctor Who.

The dates for Supanova are:

• Melbourne – April 12-14 at Melbourne Showgrounds
• Gold Coast – April 19-21 at Gold Coast Convention and Exhibition Centre

You can find out more and buy tickets here.

There are no panels on Preview night, so this is the perfect time to explore the exhibit hall and visit all the vendors that will have LOTR and Hobbit related products. Here is a still growing list of booths to visit, including the booths that we will be sharing space with:

Badali Jewelry – #530/532 (and one home of TORn during SDCC)

Sideshow Collectibles – #1929

Warner Bros. – #4545

WETA – #3513B (second home to TORn)

Donato Arts – #4503

Gentle Giant – #3513

LEGO – #2829

Make sure to stop by and visit the TORn staff at both booth locations to purchase shirts and buttons, and have the chance to play any number of LOTR themed games. You will also  be able to get more information about TORn’s Hobbit Premiere Tour in November. And starting on Thursday the WB is going to have a full on fan experience located outside the convention center between Hall H and the Hilton Bayfront Hotel. Included in that experience will be some LOTR events such as video game play of Guardians of Middle-earth and LEGO the Lord of the rings: 3D Street Art. You will find all the details at http://comiccon.thewb.com/

THURSDAY:

Please accept our invitation to join TheOneRing.net in one of the convention’s opening panels. We will be in room 6DE starting at 10:15am, please pay attention to the convention center’s instructions on the proper entrances and exits for the panel room. Remember to wear your Tolkien themed costumes, we will be having a Cosplay meetup directly after the panel, out on the Terrace behind the Sails Pavilion. Later in the afternoon you will be able to choose from seeing Elijah Wood on the Wilfred panel, at 4pm in the Indigo Ballroom at the Hilton Bayfront, or of seeing Karl Urban moderate the Masters of the Web presentation at 4:30pm in room 24ABC.

FRIDAY:

This will be a fairly light day for Tolkien programming, but you can see a few LOTR cast members today. First up will be Sean Astin at 10:15am in room 6BCF for the Go Green: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles presentation. You can then have fun the rest of the day, enjoying the WB event outside, or wandering the exhibit hall, and then end your day with John Noble. At 7:15pm in room 6A, you can see a presentation for Dark Matters: Twisted but True, a show on the Science channel hosted by John Noble.

SATURDAY:

With the WB panel in Hall H in the afternoon, it is expected that some of you may line up, maybe even as early as Friday night. In that instance, TORn will be there to help you out. Maybe not the whole night, but don’t be surprised if we pop up from time to time to host a game or two, give out some goodies, and basically, turn the Line into a Line Party. If you feel like taking a break from waiting to get into Hall H, you can find John Noble signing autographs for an hour, starting at 1:30pm out under the Sails Pavilion at table AA19. But please do make sure you are inside Hall H by no later than 2:30pm for the WB panel. The schedule listing promises looks at Pacific Rim, directed by Guillermo Del Toro, a quick look at Man of Steel, and a presentation for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey with Peter Jackson and numerous cast on hand.

SUNDAY:

The last item where you can find a LOTR connection is the Fringe Panel, starring John Noble, running at 10am in Hall H. After this, treat yourself to a complete run through the exhibit hall to ensure you have not missed any collectibles, games and fun before heading home. TheOneRing.net will be there till the very end, so please stop by, as often as you wish. Mae Govannon.

But this DragonCon had significant differences as well. With an over 2,500 mile journey from Los Angeles to Atlanta sponsored by War In The North, this convention featured the Fellowship of Drivers on The Road to DragonCon. They not only went there but back again with the help of Badali Jewelry and Anglotopia.net.

And on content partner Stickam.com, TORn was the most watched event for the week and the month. A special thanks to those who supported the trip with personal meetings, donations, texts, phone calls and other help.

The journey helped promote the forthcoming video game but it also served as a chance to get one of the Gandalf World Tour statues to Europe. (A story coming soon!)

TheOneRing also presented two panels on the two forthcoming Hobbit movies but because the first one was standing-room only, a third was added to accommodate more attendees. Presented by TORn staffers Deej, Greendragon,
MrCere and Quickbeam, the panels took a look at what is known and then speculated about the structure, division and tone of the films. Three of the staffers also attended a further panel discussing putting the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis on the big screen.

Tolkien programming ran around the clock as part of the Tolkien Track, giving Tolkienites plenty of content in a packed weekend. In a late surprise, Sylvester McCoy was announced as a guest and although he was part of the British Track of programming, he talked briefly about his role in The Hobbit and even suffered a question from the TORn staff. And we promise a full write up with more pictures soon!

Make your plans for next year as it will be like Christmas Eve before the Hobbit movies arrive the following December.

Peter Jackson In-depth Part 1 of 2

Peter Jackson In-depth Part 2 of 2

This interview takes place on eve of Peter Jackson’s departure to the FOTR premiere in London. Peter Jackson talks about his childhood & past films, his thoughts on Hollywood, inc. footage of various films he has made and also includes footage of some of his childhood home made films on Super 8mm!
Year 2001.

Lotr – Extras

Ever wondered how many New Zealanders as extras where in the LOTR movie trilogy? This article does the maths & attempts to find out! see how some of the extras had a blast to pass the time!
Year 2004.

NZ TTT Premiere Interviews

TTT Interviews the day after the NZ Premiere, Dominic Monaghan, Billy Boyd, Elijah Wood, Peter Jackson, Karl Urban, they are also asked what the strangest questions they had been asked by reporters
Year 2002.

Reclaiming the Blade

The sword, in whatever form, remains an important feature in cultures around the globe. It remains a symbol of the warrior in an age when many of us never need to fight anybody. Daniel McNicoll has directed a documentary, “Reclaiming The Blade,” that explores the sword and its standing in contemporary society and uses many examples from popular culture to do it.

Narrating is the incomparable John Rhys-Davies and featured are many of the swordsmen from the Peter Jackson films including Viggo Mortensen and Karl Urban and craftsmen from Weta Workshop. Tying the two gargantuan franchises together is the swordsman and master stuntman who killed Obi-Wan Kenobi on screen, Bob Anderson.

Long un-credited as the blade choreographer, it was Anderson who gave the Darth Vader and Kenobi the action drama that spoke to all ages and cultures. It was Anderson who instructed the LOTR cast and planned the sword action in the film.

McNicoll spoke with TheOneRing.net to give us the lowdown on his film that appears in stores everywhere on July 7, but is available now at swordmovie.com, reclaimingtheblade.com and on iTunes.

TORn: Give people a big picture view of your movie.

DM: Well, its all about swords and sword related martial arts and fight choreography. I did an interview with a magazine and the woman I spoke with saw the film and she said, ‘You know, this is not your father’s documentary’. And I kind of liked that. I had a kind of sigh of relief because really we put a bit more into it; it’s not a dry documentary. We just tried to go epic with it. It’s kind of an epic journey with the sword covering history and looking at a lot of celebrities.

There is a lot of “Lord of the Rings,” stuff but in addition to that we have some great “Star Wars” stuff. We have Bob Anderson, the man who trained Mark Hamill in the original trilogy. Bob has worked with everyone from Errol Flynn to Johnny Depp. Bob is a bit of a legend.

TORN: How did this project start for you?

DM: I started writing a screenplay around the time that the Lord of the Rings films started coming out. I was doing some research about swords and sword fighting to just find out some historical background. When I went on the Internet I noticed there was a large number of groups calling themselves European martial arts groups. Martial arts to me had always seemed to be Asian martial arts and samurai blades. I was quite fascinated with all these groups in Europe and America and I thought, ‘You know this would make a great documentary.’

TORN: During this process, what surprised you? What came up that you didn’t expect?

DM: From the very beginning I had no idea it would take as long. I never knew it would grow so big. I think initially our ambitions for the film, they were a little bit more reserved. We didn’t go out saying we were going to try to get Viggo and John Rhys-Davies and all this but it just kind of grew on us.

It takes forever to make a film. It took us a while at least. We will be doing a lot of publicity this summer. Every step of the way seems to take longer than you think it would take. Even finding the story took a while. It really was a labor of love for three years. If you told me when I started that it would take three years I don’t know if I would have started.

TORN: I know you worked with some of the guys from Weta. What was the starting point? How did all of these things fall into place?

DM: We weren’t sure who was going to narrate it for a while. We thought maybe Liam Neeson was going to narrate it, I don’t think I have ever mentioned that to anybody. Eventually we came around to going with John Rhys-Davies. What was great about John, the main reason we picked him I think, is that he read the script and he really got it and enjoyed it and he seemed to really have some enthusiasm for it. It turned out great to have him onboard

Another big milestone for us was definitely Bob Anderson. Tracking him down was not easy. He is 80-plus years old and everyone I called, either they had no idea how to reach him or it was just a roadblock. Eventually we met him and gained his trust and I told him that I really wanted to make part of the film a tribute to his career.

TORN: What about Viggo Mortensen

I don’t know if you know this but he worked with Anderson on not only “The Lord of the Rings,” but a little film called “Alatriste,” who was sort of a Spanish freedom fighter. It is a tough film to get a hold of because they never released it here. Once we had Bob, you know Viggo is just a huge fan of his. He is a cool guy, he doesn’t really do things for money he does it if he thinks its cool and he thinks Bob Anderson is cool
TORN: John Rhys-Davies has been good to us at TheOneRing and he has a tremendous voice, were you able to spend a lot of time with him?

DM: Oh yea. He is a great guy and I am happy to say I am working on a couple of other projects with him. He is just a great artist and a very friendly person and a very generous person.

TORN: For his audio work, did you have the visuals put together first or does he go with the script and then you add the visuals? What is the process?

DM: That is a really good question. I love to talk about film making stuff. I am a filmmaker first. Basically, what I did, my narration was in there, not that we would keep it but to get a sense of the timing and a sense of the rhythm and flow of the film. I didn’t want to go into the studio with John Rhys-Davies and have him read a bunch of stuff we weren’t going to use or have to go back and call him. I really wanted to knock it out in one shot.

The words on a page don’t really come exactly the same when someone speaks them. The film was almost completely finished (When Rhys-Davies recorded.) It made his job easier of course but even on the day of recording, I have to tell you, we were still making little tweaks and John actually made a couple of changes. You know, minor things that really helped.

TORN: How much time were you able to spend with Bob Anderson?

DM: He is a lot less busy these days. He is 80-plus years old and he is not doing a lot of movies anymore. It seems like every movie he does he says that is the last one. He is another very generous person but these days he does have a bit more time. We met up with him at one of his homes so it was nice to relax. We were able to pick his brain for a bit. One line that Bob Anderson said that really stuck in my mind – it’s actually in the special features, we have on disc two about four hours of extra stuff – he said, ‘You know I don’t feel like I found the sword, I feel like the sword found me’. It was almost like he was destined to make these wonderful scenes like in “The Princess Bride,” It was something he was meant to do.

TORN: A film needs to be seen like a script or a book needs to be read. Who is this film for? Who is going to find and love this film?

DM: I hope the answer to that is everyone. Really anyone interested in an entertaining movie because from the beginning I wanted it to be entertaining, that was the biggest thing for me. I wanted to use music and the connections I have with the music industry that inspired me, something really engaging. I would hope on that level it’s really for anybody. I think our movie obviously has a draw to anybody interested in “The Lord of the Rings.” It is a wonderful film for anybody interested in that or “Star Wars.” Martial arts of course, the four-hour bonus disc has a lot of great stuff on it. Obviously there is some “making of,” stuff, there are extra interviews with Viggo talking about The Flame of the West and his sword. There is some great extra stuff on Weta Workshop that we couldn’t fit on the film. There is actually over an hours worth of videos, training videos for martial arts, even hand-to-hand stuff. If you have a bully you are dealing with, there is some excellent stuff on that.

We actually do another documentary on how to make a sword, from a block of steel to an actual sword. So if you are at all interested in history or swords; that is where we will find our audience.

Take a look at this scary as heck ‘Trek Yourself’ feature..enjoy!

The man who brought us Eomer last night picked up a Best Supporting Actor award at New Zealand’s Qantas Film and Television Awards for his role as policeman Nick Harvey in the movie Out of the Blue:

Thanks to stuff.co.nz for the news!