Okay, I don't have a pretty quote or source, but countless sites are reporting that Peter Jackson will be producing two "Hobbit" movies. The first one will supposedly follow the original book, while the second may bridge the gap between "Hobbit" and "Lord of the Rings".

When Lord of the Rings was announced as a movie project wayyyy back in 1998, I rolled my eyes and thought: "oh shit...geek-topia". But I was surprised by how engaging the movies were and really liked them. I'm not too big on posting movie rumors (okay... with the exception of GI Joe)..but this one might be worth following.

"The Hobbit" starts out as a fairy tale, but really picked up at the end. I can visualize a big 5-Way Dance CGI Main Event, with the dwarves, elves, eagles...and all those other guys fighting over Smog's treasure.

The proposed second movie: I have no idea what they'd include. There is that fifth book, "The Simulacrum" or whatever, that attempted to explain some of the stuff in "LOTR". Like why the super-orcs were discovered under Saruman's castle in "Two Towers", how Strider decided to exile himself, and other stuff. But I never read it and my brother-- THE biggest Tolkien and D&D geek of the 80's--- even said it was tough to follow.

The two movies are actually Jackson thinking about splitting the Hobbit into two movies.

Aww criminy... then it'd be 6.5 hours worth of movie for one story.

I dunno'...from what I remember, the final act of the Hobbit seemed a bit rushed. One Dwarf declares himself "king", then a big ol' battle erupts. Then there's that archer dude who helps 'em out. I could see maybe stretching that out a bit. But since it's Peter Jackson, we'd probably get an extra 90 minutes of Gollum screaming.

According to AICN, Jackson's just the producer. One of the rumored directors is none other than Sam Raimi