Elijah Wood Reveals 'Hobbit' Details

Elijah Wood Reveals Hobbit Details Image (CNN) — Now that production has started on Peter Jackson's highly anticipated "Lord of the Rings" prequels, star Elijah Wood is giving E! News some info on "The Hobbit.""They're gonna be big," Elijah said Sunday of the two upcoming flicks, titled "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey," and "The Hobbit: There and Back Again." "The audience is huge. The anticipation for 'The Hobbit' has been so massive for so long."Just how massive? The three "Lord of the Rings" movies grossed almost $3 billion worldwide, but Wood, 30, says he doesn't see it as a competition. "I don't even know if they're meaning to outdo them," the actor says of the prequels.According to "Gollum" (Andy Serkis) via IGN, a trailer for the first "Hobbit" movie will be released "around Christmas."Wood's character Frodo Baggins is the star of the "LOTR" trilogy, and has controversially been added to the "Hobbit" prequels, as has Cate Blanchett's character Galadriel and Orlando Bloom's elf Legolas.The idea may have its detractors, but Elijah explains how the "LOTR" characters can appear in Jackson's "Hobbit" movies when they weren't in J.R.R. Tolkien's book."The idea is that there are things actually happening historically at the same time the story of 'The Hobbit' is taking place, they just weren't written in 'The Hobbit,'" he said. "They were written in appendices and external pieces…that's kind of where a lot of that is coming from."As the film's star, Wood may be biased, but he thinks the additions are going to work. "It's going to feel like a nice transitional piece," he said. "I think it's going to be a great amalgam of a fresh new approach with places we've never been before in Middle earth mixed with things that are very familiar to us. It will be a beautiful transition. I'm excited about it. I can't wait.""The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" will open December 14, 2012. "The Hobbit: There and Back Again" will follow on December 13, 2013.Copyright CNN 2011