Peter Jackson has spent the last sixteen years adapting J.R.R. Tolkien’s best-selling novels to the big screen, but the release of The Hobbit: The Battle of the Armies on Dec. 17 will mark the end of the director’s epic journey into Middle-earth. Even though the global film franchise has amassed nearly $5 billion in ticket sales alone up to this point, the 53-year-old director-producer-screenwriter is ready to move on from blockbuster films and return to his low-budget roots.

Jackson has maintained tight control over the creative direction of his Middle-earth films over the years, an impressive feat considering the franchise has earned over $4.8 billion at the worldwide box office and spawned merchandise, DVDs and ancillary sales ranging from international TV to Legos worth an estimated $500 million. Jackson is, however, finally ready to say goodbye to the popular franchise and work on several true stories about his native country, New Zealand, with his longtime partner Fran Walsh.

“We really feel a bigger urge now to not continue with another Hollywood blockbuster for a while, but to go back and tell some New Zealand stories,” Jackson told Variety.

Regardless of which route the filmmaker chooses to go now that his Hobbit trilogy is over, studios are lining up for the chance to work with him again.

Carolyn Blackwood, senior exec VP of strategy and operations for New Line, stated that “No question we consider Peter part of our family,” and New Line president Toby Emmerich added that “All of us at New Line and Warners would like to continue being in business with Peter — and plan to.”

Even though Jackson is ready to start working on different projects, he admit that some of the goodbyes at the end of the shoot, which encompassed 266 days of principal photography and 10 weeks of pickups, were bittersweet.

”We’ve got a big cast, so these farewells would come upon us fairly regularly. The hardest ones were the guys who had been around for so long,” said Jackson, referring to Ian McKellen especially. “Just to say to Ian — you’re never ever going to put this beard on again, you’re never ever going to wear the robes and the hat. I did find that pretty tough.”

Ian McKellen’s bearded wizard Gandalf has been a central character in all six of Jackson’s films, and the director revealed that the final scene of The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies has Gandalf sitting quietly with Martin Freeman’s Bilbo Baggins after a massive battle. Jackson was so inspired by the moment and emotion in the scene that he cut the dialogue at the last minute and let the actors’ reactions speak for themselves.

Jackson went on to tell Variety that he’s proud of the finished product, but warns fans that the film has a different tone than its predecessors.

“I wanted to give it the pace of a thriller. I wanted to make it sharp and fast rather than the epic-quest type pace,” he said, adding that the film may also have a surprisingly high body count. “I know it’s a primitive thing to say, but you can get so much more emotional power when you have a main cast member with a death scene.”