This is the year of Smaug for fans of Middle-earth. We’ve already had a great trailer giving us a solid look at the head of the Dragon and cool teaser poster. Weta Workshop has produced another exclusive again for this years Comic-Con and it follows the Dragon theme I previously mentioned. This year for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug they will have a T-Shirt with the title of the movie on the front and the eye of Smaug as we see it at the end of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The shirt will be limited to only 500 shirts and can be had at their booth 3513B.
Tag: Comic-Con
“I made a promise, Mr Frodo. A promise! ‘Don’t you leave him Samwise Gamgee.’ And I don’t mean to! I don’t mean to.”
— Samwise Gamgee to Frodo
The Fellowship of the Ring
Last year at Comic-Con 2012 two Hobbits made an appearance as one of the newest entries to Sideshow Collectibles The Lord of the Rings statue line. The two Hobbits fans got a glimpse at were the Ringbearer himself and the most loyal friend you could ever have Samwise Gamgee. These two make their appearance in this line as we see them towards the end of The Return of the King in the Orc armor they get from Cirith Ungol. The regular release for this statue gets you two amazing head sculpts of Elijah Wood and Sean Astin, while the exclusive gets you these two headsculpts wearing the Orc helmets they find with the armor.
PACKAGING
Graphically the box of the Frodo/Sam statue follows the same path as previous releases from this series. You have the front and back panels, which are black with The Lord of the Rings and Frodo/Sam done in a shade of Silver. While on the sides of the box you get an image of the statue from two different angles. The material on the outside of the box continues the matte finish we’ve seen with the last several boxes in this line. The Styrofoam on the inside has once again done its job of making sure the statue makes it intact, and to help with the multiple sculpts they’ve been wrapped separately in a cushion wrap.
SCULPTING
Gabriel Marquez and the uber talented Trevor Grove were tasked with bringing Frodo/Sam to life. These are two of the best likenesses I’ve seen of either character in the years I’ve been collecting Middle-earth. What’s great about the Frodo sculpt besides the likeness is the pain/agony Frodo is going through by this point in the story. We know that the Ring has finally worn him down and this very much comes through in the final product. Samwise is loyal and loves Frodo. Its one of the best things about the character because he is willing to give his life to make sure Frodo succeeds. I think this comes through in spades with the Samwise sculpt. He has that look of protection on his face as if something is about to come at Frodo and keep him from finishing the task.
Sideshow has a great history of making the costumes the characters wore in the movies translate into polystone. This is another case where they were successful in making that happen. The Orc costumes have tons of leatherwork involved and not brand new leatherwork either. This comes across very nicely in the sculpt of both the leather and the chainmail with both having knicks, dents, and holes to make it look worn. One thing I love about the sculpt is the gloves. I love how they’re sculpted where the fingers do not fill the gloves. If you ordered the exclusive you get both sculpts wearing the Orc helms they steal from Cirith Ungol. These helms look worn and just like we saw on screen during the movie. You also don’t loose the likeness with the Sam helmeted sculpt nor the feeling of agony from Frodo’s eyes. You also get a couple of weapons with this statue with those being the Orc sword and of course Sting which Samwise carries. Finally, the base is really well done with the rocks giving you the feel that they’re crossing The Plains of Gorgoth.
PAINT
As I said earlier the sculpts are really well done, but that can be lost if the paint is not done very good. That did not happen with this statue as the skin tone is fantastic and has the proper amount of dirt/ash to complete the look both characters had at that point. The eyes are also well done on both statues with Frodo being exceptional allowing the emotional rise/fall he’s going through to come through in the sculpt. Another great job was done on the outfit of the two characters with the worn looked sculpted being enhanced to look worn by the paint job. These outfits very much feel the way they looked on screen that some Orc has been living in for sometime. The same can be said for the Orc sword with it looking rusted and worn from years of just being out in the elements. You can say the same for the base with the look you see of Mordor coming through loud and clear.
Overall
Frodo and Sam come in with a price tag of $275 which for two statues in one is a really solid deal. The exclusive has an edition size set at only 500 pieces while the regular has an edition size of 1000 pieces world wide. Both items are currently in-stock but do not miss a chance to own this fantastic statue!
“I’m glad to be with you, Samwise Gamgee…here at the end of all things.”
– Frodo to Sam after the destruction of The One Ring
The Return of the King
SPECIFICATIONS
Frodo and Sam have an edition size of 500 pieces World Wide for the Exclusive and 1000 pieces World Wide for the Regular. The dimensions for the Frodo/Sam are as followed: 14″ x 8.75″ x 8.5″ (H x W x D)
PHOTOS
At 5:32 EST, ComicCon in San Diego as portions of last December’s trailer were shown. I’m paraphrasing much of the 3-minute 
discussion with Geoff Keighley because Andy talks VERY fast when he’s excited; but the meat of the interview is here. Continue reading ““All Access Live” on Spike TV’s interview with Andy Serkis”
Visitors to the TORN panel at Comic-Con got a sneak peek at a very exciting adventure, and now it’s time to let everyone know. TORN has teamed up with TheHobbitBlog.com to send Gandalf around the world with our Gandalf World Tour!
The Gandalf World Tour is a year-long, global event that kicked off at our Comic-Con 2011 panel and will conclude at Comic-Con 2012. TheOneRing.net is managing and supporting the event and hopes fans like yourself will choose to participate!
The goal of the Gandalf World Tour is to document Gandalf’s travels around the world, with pictures and video of Gandalf at amazing landmarks over the course of the year. Gandalf’s adventures will be documented through the GandalfWorldTour.com website, Facebook, Twitter, and right here at TheOneRing.net!
If you’re interested in hosting Gandalf, simply fill out the form at GandalfWorldTour.com. We’ll send you more details and confirm your participation. For those of you who have responded after Comic-Con, we have collected your names and will be in touch shortly.
Please let us know by next Wednesday, August 31. The adventure is beginning! And you may be wondering, is Gandalf going on our DragonCon Roadtrip? Heck yea he is! [GandalfWorldTour.com]
The annual popular culture celebration is over but our coverage continues. If you visit TheOneRing.net/live you can see highlights from our streaming experience. In addition we have articles coming from our one-on-one with actor and director Andy Serkis and the press conference with Peter Jackson and Steven Spielberg (not to be confused with the panel discussion) so look for more content in the coming week.
We also will feature updates on our Traveling Gandalf that all fans can hopefully participate in. Thanks sincerely to those who purchased t-shirts, watched us live and read our stories. Finally, expect The Hobbit to impact SDCC in a huge way in 2012 and TORn will be there to bring it to you but we suggest getting tickets before it sells out as it always does. Come join the fun in 2012.
Some TORn coverage from Comic-Con 2011:
Peter Jackson suprises fans at Comic-Con!
Collecting the precious
Luke Evans interview
Official image of the Dwarves
There it is, right near the top of the newly released Comic-Con Thursday programming schedule: “10:00-11:00 TheOneRing.net: Hobbit Talk”.
That means Comic-Con is having TORn back to talk Hobbit with fans and media at one of the biggest and best popular culture celebrations in the world. Our own staffers Quickbeam and MrCere will take the stage to deliver multimedia images and words, rumors and truths and maybe even deliver a secret or two. Garfeimao and other TORn staff will be distributing some select items to the always supportive fans. Other staffers, like the mysterious Calisuri collaborate on the presentation to make it as full of information and fun as possible. Our team will also be reporting on everything Middle-earth related that we can dig up at the event that starts with preview night on July 20 and runs through the weekend.
As always TheOneRing.net is not-for-profit (nobody gets paid) and in fact, the site supports literacy charities, so look very soon for a t-shirt remnant sale to help cover our expenses for this big show.
The Thursday start time means, from past experience, that as soon as convention doors open, attendees will find the way to room 7AB in the upstairs of the conventional hall to line up for the always capacity crowds that leave many standing in the hall waiting to get in. Continue reading “TORn to deliver ‘Hobbit’ news at Comic-Con”