The Lord Of The Rings: Miranda Otto Provides Update On The War Of The Rohirrim
Miranda Otto is famous for her iconic portrayal of Éowyn from Peter Jackson's adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy. Éowyn is King Théoden's (Bernard Hill) niece, a romantic admirer of Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), and of course, she's remembered for her badass beat down of the Witch-king of Angmar.
In 2022, two decades after hanging up her sword and retiring from the shieldmaiden life, it was revealed that Otto would be getting back in the saddle. The Australian actress is reprising her role in Warner Bros.'s upcoming anime "The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim." The events of that movie, which is slated to release in early 2024, take place more than two centuries before Éowyn's time-restricted heroics during the War of the Ring. The movie will address the time issue by having Otto play an older version of Éowyn narrating the story of her people's past heroics.
Since the announcement that she was joining the project, mum's been the word, that is, until Otto finally provided an update in a pair of back-to-back interviews in mid-May with Express and MetroUK. "All I can say," the actor told Express, "is that I'm narrating as Éowyn, for 'The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim.' I haven't seen the full animation yet. I've done the pre-record, which is what you start with. And that was super fun, it was Philippa Boyens who got in touch with me about doing it, who was one of the writers for the original movies. She's [consulting] on this, and she got in touch with me to see if I would do it, and I thought it was a lovely way to return to the character."
A new way to portray an old character
While Otto's responses were generally tight-lipped (which is to be expected with nearly a year to go still until the movie is released), she did share a couple of fun details about the current state of the project. Regarding the impact that an anime prequel could have on the larger cinematic Tolkienverse, she told Express, "I thought doing an animation would be a cool way to further develop the whole canon of stories."
As far as the production of her new Middle-earth film is concerned, Otto explained (as paraphrased by Metro) that she has completed the initial recordings during the animation process and was slated to do further recordings in the next six to 12 months.
Being that she is reprising the character in animated form, Otto didn't need to go through the grueling hours of makeup or on-set acting. "There is not an enormous amount I have to do," she told Metro, "but it was a fun way to keep the character going in some way so many years later." In the same interview, she added, "It's been fun to go back and find the voice again and try to think of the character older and see if it is similar enough to my voice back then."
Otto's report is all-around good news. It finally provides a glimpse into one of the two major Middle-earth cinematic projects (JD Payne and Patrick McKay's "The Rings of Power" is the other) that have been announced since "The Hobbit" trilogy wrapped up nearly a decade ago. These won't be the only projects down the pike, though, as "The War of the Rohirrim" is the first in a slate of Middle-earth motion pictures that Warner Bros. has cryptically announced they'll be producing in the future.