Incredibly miffed about the news concerning the absence of Peter Jackson/Wingnut films, but as long as they keep Ian McKellen as Gandalf, ill be happy. He just
is Gandalf, and his performance in the LOTR trilogy was amazing. Any actor would be lesser, and I think Sir Ian was really comfortable with Gandalf and it seems Gandalf was comfortable with him!
Just hoping another director/producer/writer has the stomach to take some risks and think outside the box like PJ did. For example when he saw the visual effects departments idea of the Pellenor ROTK battle, he said 'Good, but we could add some...', which of course left the team like '

' but he just really pushed his team for amazing results and to go beyond what theyd be expected to. I think we can agree that it worked.
Personally I'd love Brian Blessed to be one of the dwarves. I can just imagine him in armour with a mace shouting 'FOR BALIN'. Though of course most of Brian Blessed's roles involve him wearing armour and shouting I suppose.
As far as Smaug's voice is concerned: if PJ was running this show then it would be a fair bet we would have Andy Serkis doing a voice as he did for a lot of the monsters (Most notably Gollum, Witch King, Lurtz too?). Im not decided on who should voice Smaug. Someone scary though.