Preview–Savor the final trailer from Peter Jackson’s Middle-earth saga

What a long strange, fantastical trip it’s been.

Just over 14 years ago, Peter Jackson filmed the first scenes of his The Lord of the Rings trilogy–the first live-action effort to capture J.R.R. Tolkien’s complex series of novels. Never before had anyone taken on a movie project so daunting. Just look at photos of Jackson then and now and you can see a bit of how the director’s life has changed.

The culmination of his efforts was reached in 2006 as the series approached $3 billion in gross receipts, then its last entry Return of the King tied the record for Oscar wins with Ben-Hur and Titanic taking eleven Academy Awards, and sealing its status as fantasy royalty by taking the Best Film category.

And so the success of The Lord of the Rings propelled a series for The Hobbit novel adaptation forward. And the end is only a month away. The bittersweet reality of the beckoning end permeates the last trailer we will see for this landmark series of films. With this trailer we’re left with the gloom and darkness where this story must end.

But what a fun ride we’ve had. And we now get to gather our wizard hats, staves, axes, helms, and shields and prepare for that midnight showing where we’ll all gather ’round to witness the next marvel Peter Jackson has prepared for us.

Yeah, we can’t wait.

Check out the last trailer for The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies here: