This weekend, Ian McKellen had a bit of Hobbiton-disturber-of-the-peace energy about himself when he revealed at a fantasy convention in London that Frodo Baggins would appear in Andy Serkis’ upcoming Lord of the Rings prequel movie, The Hunt for Gollum. Frodo is far from the only familiar face who has been teased as making a potential appearance in the film (due out in 2027), but he is a particularly interesting one considering the chronology of events we already know from Tolkien’s books.
When Is The Hunt for Gollum Set?
Speaking to Empire Magazine late last year, producer Phillipa Boyens said that The Hunt for Gollum “falls after the birthday party of Bilbo and before the Mines of Moria” during the events of The Fellowship of the Ring. We’ve already seen parts of that journey in both the theatrical release and extended editions of the film. Galadriel’s prologue covers Bilbo’s finding of the ring (before, again, we see that covered even further during The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey), and we see moments of Gollum’s torture at the hands of Sauron’s forces pointing the Ringwraiths to the Shore. Several scenes added in the extended cut see members of the Fellowship acknowledge that they are being tracked by Gollum by the time they have arrived in Moria.
In the chronology of Tolkien’s own writing, events play out similarly, but we learn that, in contrast to the perception of the movie, those events take place over a much, much longer period of time.
Wait, How Many Years Passed Between Bilbo’s Party and the Formation of the Fellowship?
One of the things most poorly conveyed from the books in the film adaptation of Fellowship is that almost two decades pass between Gandalf leaving Frodo in the Shire after Bilbo departs for Rivendell and the meeting of the council of Elrond that puts into motion the quest to destroy the One Ring once and for all.
In Tolkien’s writing, Bilbo’s 111th birthday celebration takes place in the year 3001 of the Third Age, and in that same year, Gandalf recruits Aragorn to track and find Gollum’s whereabouts, after the two first crossed paths almost half a century earlier. Gollum had left his cave dwellings in the Misty Mountains in 2944 to search for the halfling who took the ring from him and was captured in 3009 by Aragorn. After being brought to the realms of Mirkwood for interrogation, Gollum flees the elven realms while they are attacked by the forces of Mordor almost a decade later in 3018—a year after Gandalf, as seen in Fellowship of the Ring, rides to Gondor’s capital, Minas Tirith, and uncovers information leading him to believe that Bilbo’s magic ring is indeed the One Ring of power. The Council of Elrond, where Gandalf details his history tracking Gollum in the books, takes place in October of that year.
That means Gollum’s capture by the forces of Sauron and the torture that eventually leads to him sharing his knowledge of the ring’s location occur at some point in the almost 70 years between leaving his mountain home and his capture by Aragorn. And that which is conveyed as weeks or months at best in the film adaptation of Fellowship of the Ring is actually seventeen years. The only real acknowledgement that a significant passage of time has occurred is Bilbo’s own aging, although that can be in part credited to his vitality no longer being sustained by the One Ring.
What Was Frodo Doing in the Years Between?
The answer is that we simply don’t know, beyond the fact that he continued to stay at Bag End after Bilbo’s departure from the Shire and that he kept the ring hidden as per Gandalf’s request. We know that, at Gandalf’s request when he went to Aragorn to discuss finding Gollum, Dúnedain rangers kept watch over the Shire, which probably means that Frodo wasn’t exactly running around Middle-earth for fun during that time, so he presumably stayed living the same life he had since coming under Bilbo’s guardianship.
So, How Could Frodo Be in The Hunt for Gollum?
Well, the easy answer is that Frodo doesn’t have to be a hugely involved character in however the film portrays its version of the passage of time from Tolkien’s books and writings. Peter Jackson’s film trilogy already played loose in communicating, for the most part, the years that pass between the events of Fellowship, Two Towers, and Return of the King, and we don’t know enough yet about what kind of time frame Hunt for Gollum will spread its own interpretation over.
But regardless of that, Frodo is at least present in three largely vague points: the opening, set with Gandalf departing the Shire and recruiting Aragorn after Bilbo’s party; the ending, which presumably climaxes with Gandalf’s return to the Shire to confirm his belief that the One Ring has been found; and then literally anywhere between those two points, waiting out for word from Gandalf and living his best halfling life. Any role Frodo would have in Hunt for Gollum could be incredibly slight.
The film could also take the approach The Hobbit trilogy did with its own Frodo appearance. There, Frodo appears in the framing device that opens An Unexpected Journey alongside the late Ian Holm, once again portraying the older Bilbo, as the two hobbits discuss Bilbo writing the story of his adventures. Hunt for Gollum could very easily, say, flash back from Frodo writing his own adventures down in Return of the King‘s epilogue to him wondering what Gandalf did after he left the Shire again.
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