Iconic 'Lord of the Rings' Actor Will Be Replaced By 'White Lotus' Star
If you've been living inside a mountain in the dark, making up riddles with random strangers, you may not have heard there's a new Lord of the Rings movie coming. This film, directed and starring Andy Serkis, is coming in 2027 and is called The Hunt for Gollum. It will see the return of various characters from The Fellowship of the Ring, including the wizard Gandalf, the Hobbit Frodo, the heroic Aragorn, and the titular Gollum himself, as voiced by Serkis since 2001. But the return of so many iconic characters from the novels of J.R.R. Tolkien doesn't necessarily mean we're getting the same actors playing those folks. In fact, according to Serkis and Elijah Wood, at least one major character from The Lord of the Rings trilogy, specifically Aragorn, has already been recast. Viggo Mortensen, who originated the role in 2001, will not return.
"I don't know what's out there at the moment, but I know there's a lot of speculation," Serkis told Screenrant. "But let's just say we are recasting the role [of Aragorn] and we are on the way to finding someone."
Who is playing the new Aragorn in The Hunt for Gollum?
Although Serkis did not confirm a specific actor who will play Aragorn in The Hunt for Gollum, Wood apparently has. Speaking to the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Wood seemingly confirmed that actor Leo Woodall will take on the role of Aragorn in The Hunt for Gollum, noting that the actor has "tough boots to fill."
Elijah Wood talking about Leo Woodall as Aragorn and Kate Winslet in The Hunt for Gollum pic.twitter.com/9UzmgXKqHd
— The Mellon Heads - LOTR Podcast (@mellon_heads) April 2, 2026
If Wood's information is correct, Woodall, who starred as Jack in the 2022 season of The White Lotus, will be the first person to take on the role of Aragorn/Strider in over two decades.
Is The Hunt for Gollum a Prequel to The Lord of the Rings?
While some sources will tell you that the upcoming film The Hunt for Gollum takes place between the events of The Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring, that's only partially correct. The film will explore the life of Gollum, which, presumably, would mean that aspects of it take place prior to The Hobbit, in all versions of the story. And, because Aragorn is central to the story, the events of the film actually come from unseen action within The Fellowship of the Ring.
In the chapter titled "The Shadow of the Past," Gandalf explains to Frodo the history of the One Ring, and specifically talks about how he got intel about the Ring from Gollum. These details, which last about four pages in the novel, are, in essence, the basis for The Hunt for Gollum, at least when it comes to the Gollum-hunting business. As Gandalf says: "And my search would have been in vain, but for the help that I had from a friend: Aragorn, the greatest traveller and huntsman of this age of the world. Together we sought Gollum down the whole length of Wilderland, without hope and without success."
This is the relevant detail about why Aragorn has to be in this movie if this story is to be told. Interestingly, in the book, Gandalf reveals this to Frodo well before Frodo meets Aragorn in the Prancing Pony, and at that later point, Frodo only knows him as "Strider." The 2001 movie version of The Fellowship of the Ring does not include Gandalf telling Frodo any of this, making some of the details about Gollum's wanderings post-Hobbit a bit vaguer.
In a way, when you re-read this chapter of The Fellowship, you can see why Serkis wants to turn this into a movie. There are a bunch of details that Gandalf breezes over, presumably to get to the point as quickly as possible with Frodo. The reader also gets the sense that Tolkien is doing a bit of authorial housekeeping to explain why Gollum never came to the Shire to steal the Ring back from Bilbo.
But the crucial detail, again, is that The Hunt for Gollum needs a version of Aragorn hunting Gollum, and it looks like there will be no attempt made to de-age Viggo Mortensen. Instead, a newer, younger face of Strider will lead this movie, along with the same old face of Gollum.