Lord Of The Rings: War Of The Rohirrim New Character Images And Info Revealed

With the reveal of 20 minutes of footage from The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim, we got our first look at Brian Cox's Helm Hammerhand, an ancient King of Rohan. The movie takes place about 200 years before Bilbo first came to find the One Ring and the events of The Hobbit.

The animated film is directed by anime legend Kenji Kamiyama, and tells the story of the conflict between Rohan, a kingdom featured in the original movie trilogy, and the Dunleding. The war forces Helm and his kingdom to take refuge in a fortress that will eventually bear his name, Helm's Deep.

Talking to People, producer Philippa Boyens--who also co-wrote the screenplays for each of the three Lord of the Rings movies and The Hobbit trilogy, talked about translating the world of Middle-earth to an anime style. "There are certain things I don't think we could have necessarily done--or they would have made it extremely expensive--elements to the storytelling that you could do in anime in a way that was kind of breathtaking, actually."

The film also introduces Princess Hera (Gaia Wise) with Miranda Otto, who played Eowyn in the live-action Lord of the Rings series, returning to voice that character acting as the narrator. Joining Cox, Wise, and Otto will be new additions Luke Pasqualino, Lorraine Ashbourne, Benjamin Wainwright, Laurence Ubong Williams, Shaun Dooley, Michael Wildman, Jude Akuwudike, Bilal Hasna and Janine Duvitski. Boyens also praised Cox's voicework for Helm, who will be on screen for the first time.

"I have to say, [Cox] being the father of a daughter also was really interesting given the dynamic at the heart of this film," Boyens adds. "That was really great."

The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim releases in theaters Dec. 13.