Peter Jackson Confirms Next Movie Is a Sequel to ‘The Adventures of Tintin’
It has been over a decade since Peter Jackson last directed a narrative feature film, with his focus shifting primarily to producing and documentary projects. However, that hiatus is finally coming to an end, and the film that will mark his return is not a new venture into Middle-earth, but a long-awaited sequel in a different realm of pop culture.
Jackson’s last narrative directing credit was 2014’s ‘The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies’. Since then, he has concentrated on producing films like ‘Mortal Engines’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim’, as well as documentary projects such as ‘They Shall Not Grow Old’ and ‘The Beatles: Get Back’. Fans have been eagerly anticipating whether he would return to the director’s chair for a narrative feature.
That wait is now officially over. In an exclusive interview with Gold Derby, Jackson confirmed that his next directing project will be a sequel to ‘The Adventures of Tintin’. “Probably the next film that I’d actually direct is a ‘Tintin’ movie,” Jackson shared with Gold Derby, noting that he and his longtime writing partner Fran Walsh have just completed a script for the follow-up to Steven Spielberg’s 2011 original.
This project stems from a promise made over a decade ago. When Spielberg directed the first ‘Tintin’ film, ‘The Secret of the Unicorn’, in 2011, the plan was for the two filmmakers to switch roles for the sequel, with Jackson directing and Spielberg producing. “The idea was that then I was supposed to go straight onto a second one, and we’d swap the roles, so I’d direct the second one, and he’d produce it. It’s just taken 15 years to get there, unfortunately, a bit late,” Jackson remarked.
The delay has been longer than anyone expected, with the project remaining dormant for over a decade, despite Spielberg confirming Jackson’s intent to direct back in 2018. Earlier this year, during an appearance at the Cannes Film Festival, Jackson revealed that he was actively writing the script from his hotel room while attending the festival to receive an honorary Palme d’Or.
According to Jackson’s comments at Cannes, the new film will pick up directly where Spielberg’s original left off, starting exactly where ‘The Secret of the Unicorn’ concluded instead of jumping ahead in the timeline. He also mentioned that the completed script would be sent to Spielberg for approval, expressing confidence that his longtime collaborator would support the direction they have taken.
However, Jackson is not diving into the ‘Tintin’ sequel just yet. He is currently busy as a producer on Andy Serkis’s upcoming film ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum’, which began production in New Zealand this summer and serves as a bridge between his Hobbit trilogy and the original ‘Lord of the Rings’ films. Jackson noted that he and Serkis have drawn inspiration from Todd Phillips’s ‘Joker’ in shaping the story’s approach to Gollum’s psychology.
The original ‘Adventures of Tintin’ performed exceptionally well internationally upon its release, grossing $374 million globally against a domestic total of $77.5 million, and won the Golden Globe for Best Animated Feature while receiving two BAFTA nominations. This international success, combined with the enduring audience interest in Hergé’s century-old source material, provides a solid commercial foundation for the long-gestating sequel as it heads into production.
With ‘The Hunt for Gollum’ currently scheduled for a December 2027 release and no set timeline for when Jackson’s ‘Tintin’ script will go into production, fans will need to wait a bit longer before Jackson’s narrative directing comeback hits theaters. Given the lengthy journey this sequel has already taken to come to fruition, simply having a completed script is a significant step forward.
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