Finally, Peter Jackson is going to make The Hobbit. No word if he or someone else will direct yet.
I would like to take this time to remind everyone just what Gandalf is up to, history-wise, in the time between when he takes his leave of the Dwarves at the edges of Mirkwood and shows up again at the Battle of Five Armies:
He gets together with Galadrial and a bunch of elves (and I believe Saruman and Elrond but I’m too lazy to check) and they all go attack Sauron at the citadel of Dol Guldur in southern Mirkwood, which is where he’s skulking at that point.
Of course in The Hobbit this is only alluded to as “driving the sorcerer out of Mirkwood” or something like that. But this is Peter Jackson’s version we’re talking about, so you can be sure that scene is going to get some serious footage.
Kick ass.
Actually, here’s my early prediction: since they’re apparently going to make two movies, the second one being a Hobbit “sequel” with material bridging the time until The Lord of the Rings, I’ll bet they’ll fudge the chronology a bit and have the storming of Dol Guldur as the climatic moment for the second movie.