Anya Taylor-Joy Cast as New Elf 'Seren' in The Hunt for Gollum

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Anya Taylor-Joy says she’s about to read the Lord of the Rings books as she embarks upon her own journey through Middle-earth, having been cast in The Hunt for Gollum.

The Furiosa and Super Mario Galaxy Movie star plays an elf named Seren, a new character created for the upcoming prequel from Gollum actor Andy Serkis. Seren is described as "a Sindar Elf of the Woodland Realm" and "a trusted and lethal agent of King Thranduil (Lee Pace),” and it’s the word “lethal” that Taylor-Joy is particularly fond of.

Speaking to Variety , Taylor-Joy said that in her youth she had decided that she could be either a Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter fan, not both, so only came to watch the Peter Jackson movies during the COVID-19 pandemic. She now plans to read J. R. R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings books, though, which is probably a decent shout given she’s set to star in a Lord of the Rings movie.

“I’m about to read the books now, actually,” Taylor-Joy said. “So as a child, I had a misguided idea that you could only be a Harry Potter fan or a Lord of the Rings fan. Nobody told me that. I just came up with that on my own. Luckily, throughout COVID, I then watched all of ‘Lord of the Rings,’ and… turns out you can love both, and you should.”

Without giving anything away about her role in The Hunt for Gollum, Taylor-Joy added: “It’s so fun. I mean, if my tombstone can say ‘Lethal Elf,’ I feel like I did a good job on this planet. So yeah, I’m excited.”

The creation of Seren for The Hunt for Gollum has certainly got Lord of the Rings aficionados talking . Reacting to the news, many fans have commented that Seren's role sounds similar to Tauriel — the character played by Lost and Ant-Man star Evangeline Lilly in Peter Jackson's Hobbit movies — who was also an elven aide for Thranduil, as well as being one of that trilogy's most controversial additions.

The Hunt for Gollum is based on a period only mentioned briefly in The Lord of the Ring, and depicts Gollum's whereabouts prior to the events of The Fellowship of the Ring. At this time, Gandalf, Aragorn, and Sauron's forces all seek the Ring of Power, and we’ll get to see more of Gollum’s origin story.

This week it emerged that The Hunt for Gollum will digitally de-age some of its characters using machine learning and AI . Elijah Wood and Ian McKellen reprise their iconic roles of Frodo and Gandalf over 25 years after The Fellowship of the Ring came out, so the tech will be used to make them look younger even than they appeared in the 2001 classic.

The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum hits theaters on December 17, 2027. The Lord of the Rings: Shadows of the Past, co-written by Stephen Colbert, is also in the works.

Photo by Maya Dehlin/WireImage.

Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.