Martin Scorsese
Scorsese has directed nearly every film genre under the sun: crime, thriller, sports, comedy, psychological horror, historical biography, period romance... everything, it seems, but fantasy. His next film, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, looks like it veers into science fiction, so maybe he'd be willing to take the next big leap into a full-blown fantasy epic. After all, isn't The Hobbit just one big heist film? You've got a Hobbit looking for adventure, so he signs up with a wizard and a team of dwarves to knock over a mountain full of treasure. It's basically Goodfellas in chain mail.

Francis Ford Coppola
Coppola has adapted classic fantasy novels before (Bram Stoker's Dracula), but the important thing about The Hobbit (subtitled There and Back Again) is the journey, and when it comes to books about journeys, Coppola has directed one of the most famous. In his hands, Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness became the Vietnam saga Apocalypse Now, and those same hands could make the dread and anticipation of facing the dragon Smaug every bit as palpable as the sense of foreboding we got as the patrol boat drew closer to finding the rogue Colonel Kurtz. Plus, there's got to be a licensing opportunity there for Coppola to sell Hobbit-brand wine from his vineyard.

Baz Luhrmann
Luhrmann's work is certainly "fantastic" in every sense of the word, but while his modern-day Romeo and Juliet and anachronistic Moulin Rouge were certainly imaginative, they were still rooted in reality. I say let him turn his imagination loose on The Hobbit, modernizing and inserting musical numbers wherever he sees fit. (We're picturing a chorus line of drunk dwarves dancing to Skee-Lo.) Plus, Luhrmann has recently shown that he can do sweeping historical epics with the cattle-drive-tastic Australia, and Australia, is, like, right next to New Zealand.

Spike Lee
Lee is all about underdogs, and there's nobody more underdog than the diminutive dwarves of The Hobbit, who just want to get their ancestral land and treasure back from a powerful entity who's moved in and taken over, and who now sleeps on a huge pile of gold. If that's not a metaphor for economic inequality and the corporate takeover of America, I don't know what is. Most of Lee's films take place in Brooklyn, New York, but he shot on location in Italy for Miracle at St. Anna, which was also about a squad of soldiers passing through hostile territory, so we think he's ready to go Kiwi on this one.

Wes Anderson
While the thought of Sir Ian McKellen joining the ranks of Bill Murray and Gene Hackman in Anderson's "crazy old men" pantheon makes us giggle like schoolchildren, the quirky comedy director might actually be perfect for the job. Through a liberal application of slow-motion and classic rock, Anderson manages to inject even the most mundane tasks (walking, for instance) with almost mythic importance, so we can only imagine how awesome Gandalf will look striding towards a mountain as a Kinks song kicks in. (Actually, we don't have to.) Plus, the dragon and all of the ogres in the film can be rendered using stop-motion animation, Fantastic Mr. Fox-style.

See more ideas for who should direct The Hobbit now.

Who do you want to see direct The Hobbit? Let us know below, then check out our list of comic strips that should be movies!

Want to immediately access TWoP content no matter where you are online? Download the free TWoP toolbar for your web browser. Already have a customized toolbar? Then just add our free toolbar app to get updated on our content as soon it's published.