I don’t know how accurate this information is and I haven’t seen it reported on any of the usual movie news sites I frequent, but IMDb is reporting it on the official Hobbit page. It seems as though James McAvoy is, at the very least, in the running for the role of Bilbo Baggins.

According to some additional reporting, it seems as though Daniel Radcliffe and Jack Black are two names that have also been tossed around as front runners, but, according to the British newspaper, The Daily Express, McAvoy is in the lead.

Each of these three guys would make very, very different Hobbit movies and I think any one of them would be completely valid and entertaining. I was still holding out hope that they could figure some way to get Ian Holm to do it, but the dude is 76. I don’t see that happening.

So far, the only confirmed cast member is Ian McKellan as Gandalf. If he didn’t come back, I think therewould be riots in the streets. I would assume Andy Serkis is back. Christopher Lee has also offered to come back if it was required of him to do so (read about that here).

So, I’d like to ask each of you robots your opinion about this and a couple of other things.

My next question is this: What role will Ron Perlman play? This is a Guillermo Del Toro movie and it would be silly to think he won’t be involved someway, especially in a film under lots of makeup.

Would he be a good Thorin Oakenshield? Or perhaps simply the voice of Smaug?

Also, I’m just throwing this out there, wouldn’t Clancy Brown make a good dwarf ?