'The Hobbit' Is Making Room for Some 'Lord of the Rings' Characters

[anam_moon]

"Lord of the Rings" director Peter Jackson's long-awaited film(s) of "The Hobbit" -- it'll be broken up into two movies -- will finally start shooting in February, which means he needs to nail down his cast for this adaptation of the J.R.R. Tolkien book that preceded "Rings." And this week it was announced that two big stars from the "Rings" trilogy were set to reprise their elven roles in "The Hobbit": Cate Blanchett and Orlando Bloom. That seemed like good news, but then we realized something: Their characters aren't even in Tolkien's book. So why are they going to be in the movie?