Anyone who saw The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring in the cinema remembers that first viewing – the scope, the scale, the sense that against all the odds, Peter Jackson somehow pulled it off. Then the next year he did it all over again in The Two Towers, pulling off one of the all-time great screen battles. One year later, and The Return of the King finished off the trilogy with grace and bombast – proving that even the Academy couldn’t resist a fantasy film with that much emotion and technical wizardry. Jackson’s Middle-earth saga was a genuine cinematic groundbreaker – and Empire went there (and back again) every step of the way to report on the making of the trilogies as they were released.
Now that entire collection of articles – set reports, interviews, production reports – is all collected in one magazine to rule them all, forged in the fires of Mount Doom: the new issue of Empire Classics, Return to Middle-earth. The collectors' mag tells the complete story of Jackson’s saga, including access from all six films, the original Empire reviews, and cast reunions.
The Return to Middle-earth issue of Empire Classics goes on sale on Tuesday 31 July from all good and evil newsagents, across Mordor, The Shire, and beyond. Pick up a copy online here with free p&p (delivery may, or may not, be via giant eagle).
Keep up to date with all the latest movie news, click here to subscribe to Empire on Great Magazines and have the latest issue delivered to your door every month.