IndieWire
Kevin Jagernauth
July 21, 2011

Peter Jackson Confirms The Obvious: No ‘Hobbit’ At Comic-Con

Update: Warner Bros. has dropped a look at all the dwarves posing together. Check it out below.

On the eve of Comic-Con, director Peter Jackson hit Facebook to reveal the news that we all already sort of knew anyway (or that most people made an educated guess about)—“The Hobbit” would not be coming to San Diego. At least not this year. While admitting that Warner Bros. and New Line were more than game to attend (duh), Jackson felt coming now would be far too early, but hold fast Middle Earth fans, because next year “The Hobbit” will be there in force. As a salve to those who were hoping for a bit more to be revealed, a new video blog from the production has landed. But if you’re tired of dwarves, you might want to skip this one.

This latest peek behind the curtain of the production unsurprisingly spends of most of its times focused on the thirteen dwarves who will go on the Quest of Erebor to the Lonely Mountain with Bilbo Baggins where they will square off against Smaug. Interestingly, Jackson notes that one of the reasons he wasn’t keen to direct “The Hobbit” initially was due to the unenviable task of trying to manage that many characters on screen, but also admits that now that he’s in the thick of production, he’s actually grown to enjoy the ragtag bunch. The rest of the video has production team members recounting their favorite moments thus far on the shoot—which is currently on a hiatus and will resume in the fall—with sneak peeks of Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett and Christopher Lee to reward the patient.

“The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” arrives in theaters on December 14, 2012. Check out the video and Jackson’s message to fans below.

Good news and bad news today. Bad news is that we won’t be doing any Hobbit presentation at Comic Con in San Diego this year. New Line and Warner Bros were very happy to support a presentation, but I declined, simply because I felt it was too early. There’s so much more of the films still to shoot. I just wanted to get that out there, because I’ve seen various references to the possibility of something Hobbity at Comic Con. Hate to disappoint anyone. But something tells me we will be there in force next year.
Now for the good news…
We’ve just finished a new video blog, covering a little more of the first block of shooting. So please enjoy this—at least you don’t have to travel to San Deigo to see it!
I’ve been on the go since wrapping the first shooting block, but I’m about to settle down and get into the much delayed 20 Questions. I’ve a few half-written and will get those done very, very soon! I promise!
Cheers,
Peter J