Anya Taylor-Joy Is Joining The Hunt For Gollum —As An Elf
But what kind of elf do we have here?
It doesn’t get more ethereal than Anya Taylor-Joy. The actress always looks right at home in a heightened world, whether that be Robert Eggers’ take on ancient Iceland or a far-flung desert planet centuries in the future. She’s spent a lot of time in desolate wastelands as a result, so much so that the actress recently joked about being typecast as a “desert creature.”
“People love to put me there,” Taylor-Joy told L’Officiel, “and I do feel a real affinity for it.” The feeling is mutual for audiences, too — many are looking forward to seeing Taylor-Joy step into the role of Alia Atreides in the upcoming Dune: Part Three. After that trip to Arrakis, however, Taylor-Joy is taking a break from the desert altogether. Her latest project will bring her to a different, but no less iconic, locale: the woodlands of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth.
After months of rumors, Taylor-Joy has officially joined the cast of The Hunt for Gollum, the latest addition to Warner Bros.’ Lord of the Rings universe. She’ll co-star as Seren, a Sindar Elf from the Woodland Realm, and one of a handful of new characters slated to appear in the film. Though there’s some intel on The Sindar (aka “Grey Elves”) found in Tolkien’s appendices, no character named Seren appears in any of the source material. Like The Hobbit film trilogy — which created a new female lead in Tauriel (Evangeline Lilly) — The Hunt for Gollum is filling out its ranks with a hero created specifically for the screen.
That said, because The Hunt for Gollum is drawing upon actions and deeds which Gandalf narrates in the second chapter of The Fellowship of the Ring — “A Shadow of the Past” — the idea that various unseen characters might have assisted Aragorn in the pursuit of Gollum makes a certain amount of sense. In the book, we’re told that before Aragorn and Gandalf tried to find Gollum, “the Wood-elves tracked him first.” So, it’s reasonable and possible that Taylor-Joy is playing one of these Wood-Elves, who would have had knowledge of Gollum, as he made his way through Mirkwood. Could Serkis combine some canon of Grey Elves with Wood Elves? Maybe. Maybe not. But the chronology would work out in favor of Taylor-Joy playing an elf who resides in Mirkwood.
There’s still so much mystery surrounding The Hunt for Gollum, and Taylor-Joy’s role is just a drop in the ocean, but her involvement does tinge the upcoming film with a sense of real adventure. Since it was first announced, it was hard to shake the feeling of “been there, done that” — The Hobbit trilogy had already tested and proven the limits of Middle-earth, making another prequel feel like far more than overkill. The idea of a film that fleshes out Gollum’s backstory still sounds super tedious, but with a promising cast shaping up around the misunderstood villain, here’s hoping The Hunt for Gollum finds a way to make it all worth it.
