By We’ve already heard about Cate Blanchett’s return as the elf Galadriel in the upcoming Hobbit films. And that makes sense, since Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) meets her on his journey. But now we hear word from Deadline that Orlando Bloom will be returning as Legolas, and that’s when things get a little strange for me. I mean, it’s great that the same actor is reprising his role, and I hope every applicable actor does. But the thing is, Legolas doesn’t actually appear in The Hobbit. They visit his home of Mirkwood and meet Tranduil, his father, but you don’t see any mention of Legolas’s dashing good looks in Tolkein’s text.
We knew that The Hobbit was being stretched into two films to add more content (and likely to rake in more money), so this could be one of those measures. It could just be a cameo, but it doesn’t sound like one, so either Legolas is going to play into the Mirkwood portion of the story somehow, or he’s going to be involved in that whole “bridging the plot” section in the second film after they’ve finished with that whole Smaug business.
Either way, the reason why they’ve brought him back is clear: girls dig Orlando Bloom. It’s a shame they haven’t locked down more crucial actors like Ian McKellen (Gandalf the Grey), Andy Serkis (Gollum), or Hugo Weaving (Elrond) yet, actors of characters who most definitely will appear in the film because they were in the book. Apparently, the talks have been “arduous” so far. I really hope they come to an agreement though, as a Gandalf without Ian McKellen’s booming voice just wouldn’t be the same.
[Deadline via Empire]