Evangeline Lilly Defends Addition of Female Characters for The Hobbit With Fierce LotR Geekery

Earlier this year it was announced that Evangeline Lilly would be joining the cast of Peter Jackson‘s The Hobbit movies, and that she would be playing an elvish inhabitant of Mirkwood named Tauriel. It was one of the first signs that Jackson’s adaptations would not just be including portions of Tolkien canon that were contemporary with (but not included in) the story of The Hobbit, but would also be introducing entirely new characters to the story. This Tolkien fan is pretty much willing to watch anything Jackson puts together on principle, but I can definitely understand people who feel this sort of thing is a death knell to the movie’s “authenticity.” Okay, understand, because come on the Scouring of the Shire, but not sympathize with because look the books are always going to be there.

And so I understand that those fans might be interested to know that Evangeline Lilly is also a Tolkien purist, one who was reluctantly won over by Jackson’s films.

When the original came out in theatres, I swore up and down that I would not see them because I thought it was sacrilege that anyone would adapt Tolkien’s work. I didn’t think anyone would justify films by making them as good as they should be. Then my entire family when I was visiting went to see the movie and so I relented and went. We were all fans of the books and we were all blown away! It was a little piece of magic what Peter Jackson accomplished because it was truly a homage to the books rather than an offense

And then, given that context, she tells everybody to relax:

That said, upon reading The Hobbit again, as an adult, I can see why additional characters were needed to round out the story as an adaptation – especially female characters,” she said, “The Hobbit didn’t include female characters at all and was a very linear story, a book for children, really. What Peter, Fran (Walsh) and Philippa (Boyens) have done is all in perfect keeping with Tolkien’s world, while adding a third dimension to an otherwise very two-dimensional story.

We couldn’t agree more, and we’re also really looking forward to seeing the White Council throw down at Dol Guldur. Like… that’s going to be awesome. Come on.

(via Newsarama.)