AdaptingThe Lord of the Ringspresented a million little challenges. While Peter Jackson did an incredible job with the original trilogy, the franchise continues to carry on with less impressive source material. Tolkien has a lot of appendices that offer additional details and helpful background. There are plenty of high-quality stories buried in that endless text, but most of them are a bit sparse. The upcomingWar of the Rohirrimanime film will adapt one such example. The film will adjust the original tale to upgrade the newly-named daughter Hera from a plot-relevant object to the main character.
The argument about faithfulness in adaptationremains a no-win situation. The people who believe the original work is gospel get very quiet when a new creator makes a change for the better. Those who feel artists should be allowed the freedom to alter their source material fall silent when someone ruins a classic. Ultimately, people just want the things they love to be excellent. The rules are only there to provide a convenient angle of attack. Acknowledging that reality makes any claim of heresy seem petty and inconsistent.
Jeffrey Addiss, Will Matthews, Phoebe Gittins and Arty Papageorgiou
Jeffrey Addiss, Will Matthews, and Philippa Boyens
Gaia Wise, Brian Cox, Luke Pasqualino, and Laurence Ubong Williams
Release Date
July 14, 2025
The story ofWar of the Rohirrimcomes from Appendix A ofThe Lord of the Rings. That tale mostly covers the life of Helm Hammerhand, the ninth King of Rohan. The text, subtitled “Annals of the Kings and Rulers, II: The House of Eorl,” focuses primarily on kings. The titular war is a battle between Hammerhand’s army and the forces of the Dunlendings. The basic story started when Freca, a wicked landowner who claimed ties to the Dunlendings, barged into Hammerhand’s council to demand a strategic marriage. Freca wanted to unite his son, Wulf, with Helm’s daughter. The book wasn’t so kind as to give that daughter a name, a story, or a single character trait. Freca tried to intimidate Hammerhand into agreeing to the arrangement, but his army of supporters only irritated the King of Rohan. Mighty Helm punched Freca so hard that he died from the injury. Wulf, robbed of his father and the bride he believed he was entitled to, led the Dunlendings in a brutal assault.That’s the titular war. It all started over a young lady without a name.
In a clever adaptive flair,War of the Rohirrimgives Helm’s daughter a name. Heraappears to be the central characterofWar of the Rohirrim. She appears heavily in the trailer. She rides horses, explores the woods, and fights with various weapons. Some brief flashes suggest a much deeper backstory between Wulf and Hera, deepening their connection and adding new elements to their eventual conflict. This story certainly has the framing and many of the major events of the source material, but it comes from an entirely new perspective. Hera is inexperienced and new to conflict. Hera’s presence seems heavily inspired by Hayao Miyazaki’s young heroines. Her most obvious source material is Nausicaä, from her noble role as a princess to her apparent connection with the animals of the forest. This allows the story to take on several new dimensions that could extend the story.The original tale, by the way, is a little under three pages long.
Why is Hera the main character ofThe War of the Rohirrim?
The short answer is that Hera is a character with alot of potential and no source material. She’s a completely new figure, taking nothing but the role from the source material. This gives the creators of the film a new take on the story and the freedom to experiment. They can craft a perfect main character and build their narrative around her journey. This is obvious to anyone paying attention, but most stories are about characters who have some development left to do. The trailer demonstrates that Hera is a newcomer to many disciplines. She will be forced to test her mettle and grow beyond her limits to save her people. This isn’t anything new. It’s one of the many reasons Frodo is the main character ofThe Lord of the Rings,when Aragorn is a much more traditional hero. Hera has room to grow and her status as a relative newcomer grants her a chance to surprise the audience.
Who were the other options?
A lot of people were expecting the movie to exclusively follow Helm Hammerhand.That’s an understandable assumption, as the original story keeps its focus on him for almost a page and a half. The truth of the matter is that the source material barely gives enough space to anyone. Readers get a very basic understanding of Helm as a character beyond the one or two important things he did. It’s hardly enough to base an entire film around. Any version of this movie would have had to invent a ton of stuff to fill more than 20 minutes. The new storylines have to be there. Die-hard fans might argue that veering away from Hammerhand is against the spirit of the original work. They may argue that Fréaláf, Helm’s nephew and eventual heir, would be a better central character. He gets even less exposure in the original work,barely existing beyond the momenthe takes the throne. Hera is new, but she’s only barely newer than her father and cousin.
Why wasn’t this Hera’s story?
The cleverness of creating and elevating Hera is that she’s always been a central part of the story. The books used Helm’s unnameddaughter as an object. She’s barely a plot device. She’s a gateway to power. Helm doesn’t even reject Wulf’s proposal out of love for his unnamed daughter. He just doesn’t want Freca anywhere near his family. His daughter could have just as easily been a crown or a fancy ring. But, Tolkien didn’t write a story about a fight that breaks out because one guy wanted another guy’s crown. A woman had to be the prize, and since she was the prize, she didn’t get to be a person. Taking a character who should have had some say in the most fateful event of her life and making her thelead in its big-screen retellingis an act of creative genius. Suddenly, when the creators consider the perspective of the person everyone started fighting over, the story can fill a feature.
Hera may be a spectacular character, but she could just as easily be a mess of tropes and reused ideas. This could just be a cynical excuse to doNausicaä of the Valley of the Windwith theLord of the Ringsbrand attached and guarantee a massive profit. However, the creative choice to center Hera’s story could also prove to be the best addition toThe War of the Rohirrim. Hera is something new, but that should be an opportunity, instead of a betrayal.
