'The Hobbit 3: Battle of the Five Armies' Release Date, Cast News: Film Premiere December 2014

The Hobbit: the Battle of the Five Armies has been announced to arrive theaters December 17, 2014 for the United States and December 12 for the United Kingdom. The trailer was first released on July 26 at the San Diego Comic Con. The film will premiere in Wellington, New Zealand.

Synopsis for the film reads, "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies" brings to an epic conclusion the adventures of Bilbo Baggins, Thorin Oakenshield and his Company of Dwarves. Having reclaimed their homeland from the Dragon Smaug, the Company has unwittingly unleashed a deadly force into the world. Enraged, Smaug rains his fiery wrath down upon the defenseless men, women and children of Lake-town."

The movie is written by Philippa Boyens, Fran Walsh and Guillermo del Toro. It is directed by Peter Jackson, who also served as one of the writers. This will be the third and final installment of J.R.R. Tolkien's book, The Hobbit. The two previous films were entitled An Unexpected Journey (2012) and The Desolation of Smaug (2013).

The cast will include Martin Freeman as Bilbo Baggins, Ian Holm as old Bilbo Baggins, Ian McKellen as Gandalf, Elijah Wood as Frodo Baggins, Richard Armitage as Thorin Oakenshield, Benedict Cumberbatch as Smaug/Sauron, Orlando Bloom as Legolas, Evangeline Lilly as Tauriel, Luke Evans as Bard, Lee Pace as Thranduil and Graham McTavish as Dwalin, among many other actors.

Jackson changed the title of the movie to The Battle of the Five Armies after realizing that it better suits the movie. On his social media account, he said, "There and Back Again felt like the right name for the second of a two film telling of the quest to reclaim Erebor, when Bilbo's arrival there, and departure, were both contained within the second film. But with three movies, it suddenly felt misplaced—after all, Bilbo has already arrived "there" in the Desolation of Smaug."

"The Battle of the Five Armies' much better captures the focus of the film but also more accurately channels the essence of the story", he added.