Weta Workshop has officially released the incredible Classic Series Legolas Greenleaf: Hunter of the Plains statue, and fans of The Lord of the Rings won’t want to miss this special edition. Capturing the Prince of Mirkwood during the unforgettable pursuit of the Uruk-hai across the plains of Rohan, this beautifully sculpted 1:6 scale collectible showcases Legolas in one of his most iconic moments from The Two Towers. With incredible attention to detail and Weta Workshop’s signature craftsmanship, it’s a centerpiece worthy of any Middle-earth collection. The statue is available now for $399.

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We hope you enjoyed this April Fools’ Day joke for 2023!

Just when we thought casting had been finalized for season two of Amazon’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, Amazon insiders have revealed an unexpected surprise.

Los Angeles, CA – Amazon Studios has announced that Orlando Bloom, break-out star of Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy, will appear in the next season of the The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.

Credit: Samir Hussein, Wireimage

Developers J. D. Payne and Patrick McKay confirmed that Bloom will appear in the second half of the season as Oropher – the grandfather of Legolas.

“J. D. was chatting with Orlando at an industry event and Orlando said that he wished he could step back into Middle-earth because he’d had so much fun the first time around,” said Patrick. “We put our heads together and came up with a way to have him play his own grandfather. This actually works well as Orlando is 25 years older than he was when the Fellowship of the Ring was filmed. Therefore, he’ll bring more depth and gravity to Oropher.”

Oropher was a Sindarin elf who led his people north to lands around the Mountains of Mirkwood. His motive was to move out of range of the Dwarves of Khazad-dûm and avoid the threat of Mordor. If the series continues through to the Battle of Dagorlad, we’ll get to see Oropher’s final battle and death.

Patrick wouldn’t give details of Oropher’s story arc but a source told TheOneRing.net that the character will be involved in the Silmaril storyline.

A separate source claims that Elijah Wood has also been approached for a cameo. However, John Rhys-Davies has flat-out refused to be involved in The Rings of Power because he “wouldn’t wear those bloody prosthetics again for all the jewels in Moria. Ishkhaqwi ai durugnul!”.

If you’re a fan of large scale pieces, and have been wanting The Lord of the Rings to enter that collecting space, then this is going to make your day! The folks over at Infinity Studio X Penguin Toys are now entering the frame. The first 1:2 scale statue from their new The Lord of the Rings line is none other than Legolas himself. Legolas comes in two editions: Ultimate with a price of $2,904(USD) and an edition size of 250 pieces; while the Premium is $1,734(USD) with an edition size of 600 pieces. Both versions ship next year and can be ordered from our friends at Sideshow.

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The awesome folks at Diamond Select Toys were cool enough to send us something pretty sweet to take a look at, and let you all know what we think. As we’ve mentioned in the past, they are doing a great action figure line in the same scale, for those who collected the Toy Biz figure line when the movies were out. These figures of course are updated, and created with today’s technologies; and it shows in how cool they are. The folks at DST sent us what started out as an unlikely friendship in Legolas and Gimli. These figures are out now, and come in at a price of $29.99. If you’re like me and have a copy of their 2021 SDCC Exclusive, they’ve let folks know what the packaging will look like and you can find that here. They’ve also announced a solo Gollum figure, and shown all the cool stuff it comes with along with a price; there’s a link to the blog post mentioning that here.

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Today we’re taking a look at three young actors who are all from New Zealand, and for whom this project with Amazon could prove the magic touch, to get their careers off to a flying start.

Leon Wadham, Ian Blackburn, Anthony Crum are cast in The Lord of the Rings Series from Amazon
Leon Wadham, Ian Blackburn, Anthony Crum are cast in The Lord of the Rings Series from Amazon
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It’s been an interesting couple of weeks… Since March 19, characters from Middle-earth, and other roles played by the same actors, have been battling it out to claim the title Champion of Middle-earth March Madness 2018. We started with four brackets comprising roles from The Lord of the Rings movies, other roles by those same actors, roles from The Hobbit movies, and alter-egos for those cast members. The brackets were mixed, to give actors a chance of coming up against ‘themselves’ – and indeed in Round 3 we did see Christopher Lee’s Saruman go up against his Count Dooku, and Lee Pace’s Ronan face his majestically-eyebrowed Thranduil.

Boromir fell in the first round, defeated by Gimli, but Sean Bean’s Eddard Stark did make it all the way to Round 3, where he was conquered by eventual semi-finalist Samwise Gamgee. Sam made it the furthest of all the hobbits; Merry and Pippin both went out in Round 1, and Frodo fell to Aragorn in Round 2. Both Martin Freeman’s and Ian Holm’s Bilbos were knocked out back in Round 1; they had tough battles, being drawn against Gandalf and Faramir respectively.

The elves fared rather better, with Galadriel, Elrond and Thranduil all getting through to the Elite Eight (though Legolas, alas, could not get past Aragorn in Round 1). Wizards Saruman and Gandalf joined the elves in Round 4; but poor Radagast was beaten by Dwalin way back in the first round. In the world of men, only Aragorn managed to get as far as the Elite Eight; Dr John Watson, Sherlock Holmes, Dr ‘Bones’ McCoy, Rudy, and Carl from Van Helsing all joined Eddard Stark in being vanquished in the Sweet Sixteen round.

Finally it came down to a duel between Elrond Half-elven and Gollum. The votes have been counted, and we can now announce, this year’s winner is…
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