He wasn't in the first blockbuster movie, "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring," but Bernard Hill (King Theoden) is making an appearance in the next two, and he said he's excited about it.

"What's wonderful about the films is that, for all the depth -- and the books are a bit profound indeed -- I think people would get confused going that deep into books and that kind of literary area," Hill recently told Sci-Fi Wire. "What the films have done is taken the deep essences of the books and made them work and kept true to them, at the same time being true to the film process. So you go and watch a film and not a documentary about the books, which is a tricky line to follow.

"I think the second one ('The Two Towers') is better than the first one, because it deals with the world of man, so you've got a lot of emotions the public will identify with more."

Hill said getting Theoden into the established story is quite easy in "The Two Towers."

"They need him and his army to fight Saruman and Sauron, but he's under the influence of Saruman, so they have to wake him up and exoricise a spirit," he said. "That sets him off on a growth (because) he's just given up. The kingdom is in disarray, everything's falling down, so he kind of builds himself up. He's full of self-doubt and insecurities and gradually pulls himself back together and becomes the fighting king he was before."

"The Two Towers" opens in December.