General Electric Company's (NYSE: GE) NBC Universal needs all the help it can get if it wants to remain part of the famous Dow component. After all, how many times have we heard in the last several years that the huge industrial conglomerate should get rid of the media asset? Well, maybe a little glitzy dose of DreamWorks will increase the perceived value of the movie/TV division in the eyes of a management in the midst of financial-crisis turmoil.

After wondering whether it would be Universal, The Walt Disney Company (NYSE: DIS), News Corp. (NYSE: NWS), or Time Warner, Inc. (NYSE: TWX), the new DreamWorks has decided to strike a distribution deal with Universal after it became a free agent following its split from Viacom (NYSE: VIA). This is according to The Hollywood Reporter. The transaction reportedly means that Universal will be releasing six films per year from DreamWorks starting sometime in '09.

Of course, we don't know all the details yet, but since DreamWorks is being funded by Indian media-investment entity Reliance Big Entertainment, Universal will probably only end up with a modest distribution fee. Still, any studio would have loved to have had bragging rights in terms of the famous director. It was never meant to be a fair competition, though, since the move to Universal was pretty much set in stone. Spielberg has had a special relationship with the company for a long time, and it was considered a given that DreamWorks would end up with a pact at the classic studio.

After years of squabbling between the creators of The Lord of the Rings film trilogy and New Line Cinema (Time Warner, NYSE: TWX), today comes wonderful news that Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh have agreed to create not one, but TWO new hobbit movies! The prequels will be produced and distributed by New Line Cinema and MGM, and are slated for release in 2010 and 2011.

The first will be based on J.R.R. Tolkien's earlier work, The Hobbit, which follows Bilbo Baggins as he discovers the ring that becomes the macguffin of the record-breaking trilogy. Along the way, we will again encounter Gandalf, as well as a dozen dwarves, two trolls and one very angry dragon.

The plot of the second film, meant to bridge the narrative gap between The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, will be stitched together from the volumunous notes Tolkien made for his history of Middle Earth. I'm pleased that Jackson and Walsh are heading this effort, since they have shown that they respect Tolkien's vision.

I can't wait to follow them there and back again, again.

Thanks to Matt Betts for the tip.

Lord of the Xbox -- that's what this partnership will be called. Microsoft has joined up with Lord of the Rings movie trilogy creator Peter Jackson to help develop video game content for the Xbox 360 console. This partnership, if handled correctly, will allow Microsoft to recruit more everyday people to its Xbox 360 console instead of the regular, dedicated gaming crews the Xbox universe mostly contains.

Instead of creating "games" though, Microsoft wants to ensure customers of the Xbox 360 enjoy interactive entertainment that goes beyond the gaming experience, according to Shane Kim, who leads Microsoft Game Studios.

In a move that should make "Halo" players scream with delight, Jackson said that it would first work with Bungie Studios, the game developer that published both Halo and Halo 2 and was actually purchased by Microsoft, to develop a Halo-like video game.

The Halo games, which are all-time bestsellers on the Xbox gaming console front, commanded hundreds of millions for Microsoft and injecting the same type of game with Peter Jackson at the helm surely will be a feast for Xbox 360 fans when a product is finally released.

Master Chief is....Peter Jackson?

At the X06 conference in Barcelona, Spain the Xbox team showed many developments, all of which are going to be good for gamers as well as items which should turn Microsoft's Xbox franchise into a net-net profit center for Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ: MSFT). To date, the Xbox unit has been a net money-loser for the company. I have said that the street acronym of Microsoft as "Mister Softie" should be changed to "Master Chief," and that is even more true after looking over today's news and reviews for the Xbox franchise at the X06 conference.

"Lord of the Rings" mega-film series creator Peter Jackson has teamed with Microsoft to launch a development studio and collaborate on a new "Halo" game (Halo is a popular series of science fiction first-person shooter video games).

Jackson is also producing a big screen "Halo" movie. He and Microsoft are set to create Wingnut Interactive to focus exclusively on video games, and its first untitled game will be set in the "Halo" universe. Wingnut will work with Bungie Studios, which created the franchise and is currently working on "Halo 3." Halo 3 is set for release next year, and as a big personal fan of the game franchise hopefully this one won't be delayed like the company's Vista operating system.

Besides Halo 3, Wingnut is supposed to create another game that will focus on attracting non-gamers to gaming. Microsoft-owned Ensemble Studios also revealed it has been working on a game set in that universe, "Halo Wars," which is said to be a real-time strategy game for the Xbox 360.