Go Behind the Scenes of the Moving Cities of ‘Mortal Engines’ (VIDEO)

Peter Jackson's been laying relatively low since the completion of his Hobbit Trilogy, but he'll be back this summer with the first film in a planned series of films based on the fantasy book series The Mortal Engines. To clarify, he won't be directing the film, but rather serving as co-writer and producer, though there's no way to know yet if that was a good idea or a terrible one.

Once upon a time, Peter Jackson did epic fantasy better than anyone, but lately his films have become so mirthless and bogged down in fan service that he no longer seems interested in telling simple stories in a fantastical way. Now he's making complicated ass stories with even more complicated visuals.

It's a bummer, too, because when Jackson was on, he was on. But he hasn't been on in well over a decade. Again, I know he's not the director here, but he's obviously the name recognition in this equation, because no one cares about first time feature director Christian Rivers, outside of his mom of course.

This seems like a potentially really cool idea, like Mad Max meets Lord of the Rings, but of course there's the peril that it could be just another noisy, loud, incomprehensible mess of a fantasy film like, oh I don't know, just about every single one of them since Return of the King.

Mortal Engines opens in theaters everywhere on December 14.