Well, originally, that was almost undoubtedly led by Christopher Tolkien (who was pretty vocal in his dislike of the adaptations), but he died nearly six years ago.
It’s pretty clear to me that the family, as a whole, currently has no interest in selling any additional film/TV rights to his works, especially The Silmarillion. The Wikipedia article on the Tolkien Estate indicates that the directors are/were Christopher, his widow Baillie (who is 84), and J.R.R.'s grandson Michael George Tolkien (who is 82). The estate’s disinterest in selling additional rights might, I suppose, change when the current leadership of the estate changes in the next few years (due to death or stepping aside), but I’m not sure that I’d count on it.
The money guys in the studio forced Peter to turn it into a three part film. And there is lots of really good stuff in it also- the first of the three is quite nice and then they show the whole reason why Gandalf wanted Smaug out and why he left the dwarves- the Necromancer. Showing Galadriel at her power was fantastic. And nice to see Radagast. But yeah, too much CGI nonsense added in to pad an otherwise decent film. And of course after LotR we were expecting greatness.
My point with Elijah Wood’s age is that he was a dewy-eyed youth when he made the LotR movies, and now he is clearly middle-aged, with rougher skin on a wider canvas. The amount of AI de-aging that would have to be done on him would, I’m afraid, end up looking grotesque. Might as well have AI just create the part without his participation. Or set him up with motion capture, so it could all be CGI, like Gollum himself. I haven’t heard his voice lately, I wouldn’t be surprised if it too hasn’t roughened over the years.
Well, we’ll see in the event. Even I will probably catch enough snippets in clips to have an opinion on how well whatever technique they use succeeded.
Hobbits age more slowly than humans. Coming of age is, IIRC, 33, and in the books Frodo was 50. If Hobbit aging vs. human aging is linear, that’s about 27 or 28 in human years. That’s what Frodo should have looked like. But he didn’t. Using the same actor who looks 25 years older would be jarring, and I’d bet they won’t do it.
They could get away with an age like 44 (human) if they used a different actor. They could make a more interesting movie if they used an all-new cast (I’d spot them Gollum though). But they have bankable stars willing to prostitute themselves again, so why not use them?
I just happened to stumble across a scene with Radagast on HBO, and what Jackson did with that is unforgiveable. There’s something juvenile in Jackson that often gives his movies a likeable playfulness, but then you also get that.
The Professor had more thoughts on that failure bit later on. Radagast did not fail, he did other. Remember, first and foremost he was a Maia of Yavanna and he sought to protect nature from Sauron. So while Saruman completely failed and Gandalf succeeded, Radagast more or less did a different thing.
That’s my understanding, as well. As Peter Jackson describes in this BBC article, someone from Apple Music (their production company) had given the Beatles the LotR books while they were in India in 1968; they became interested in making a film adaptation. and wanted Stanley Kubrick to direct it. But, Tolkien himself apparently nixed it, as he didn’t want a rock group doing a film of his story.
(It was a year later, in '69, when the Professor finally did sell the film rights to the books, to United Artists.)
Yeah, I’m not going to quarrel with anyone for hating on the Jackson Radagast, but for me the portrayal worked. It got across his perceived “lightweightness” in terms of being able to understand or cope with problems of Peoples and big Serious Stuff like rings of power.
Honestly, I would kind of like it if someday somebody adds to the Middle-earth story universe an account of how Radagast actually coordinated animal/bird/insect resistance during the Wars of the Ring. He may not have been much of a Peoples person, but he took seriously dangers to wildlife and ecosystems.