Tolkien lawsuit over

A potential impediment to the travels of diminutive adventurer Bilbo Baggins has finally been removed. A seemingly eternal lawsuit by the Tolkien heirs had been looming over THE HOBBIT like Sauron’s blazing eyeball, but the matter has now been resolved, allowing a small hairy man to freely roam Middle Earth.

The Tolkien Trust and publisher HarperCollins had alleged they did not receive a long-promised percentage of the LORD OF THE RINGS movies’ box office… which ultimately amounted to several billion dollars.

This absence of remuneration could have led to a legal challenge preventing Guillermo del Toro and Peter Jackson’s pair of HOBBIT movies from proceeding. The Tolkien trustees now acknowledge the movie’s right to live, walk, eat, sing, walk, eat, and fight Smaug.

Jackson himself had already sued studio New Line over profits from the trilogy, which previously slowed down his HOBBIT plans. But on the plus side, that probably helped give us DISTRICT 9 sooner…