Today was another minor fandom meltdown as Richard Armitage, best known as Thorin Oakenshield in the movie adaptation of JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit, launched his Twitter account. While there are a lot of fan dedicated and copy accounts, this one has been verified by Twitter.

And in a beautiful bit of timing, it’s on his 43rd birthday as well. So welcome to the madness that is Twitter Mr Armitage and a very happy birthday!

Guess what day it is today? pic.twitter.com/GpzqGyOZTM — Richard Armitage (@RCArmitage) August 21, 2014

I know, I know he is SO much more than Thorin, but if I were to list EVERY wonderful thing he has done, we’ll be here till his next birthday…..

Armitage is notoriously, and to my mind wonderfully, media shy; in fact has quite often expressed his near bewilderment of the ‘machine’ that is fame and popularity. His humble approach to the fact he is adored by a legion of fans is part of the charm. He often cites he just loves what he does, and is grateful that other people seem to as well. I hear ya Rich!

In his interview with Chris Harvey of The Telegraph in June this year, Armitage was quoted as saying “I’m so backwards with all that. I know what Twitter is, I don’t use it, I don’t use Facebook, so luckily it does zero to my ego.”

This morning there is, as expected, much speculation about why now – although in terms of timing; you have to applaud doing it on your birthday….

Here’s hoping we see some interesting tweets and not the clinical ‘advertising style’ that some celebs adopt. I mean there’s no harm in promoting your work via social media (heck I do that myself!) but it would be nice to see what else he favours or has an interest in – perhaps his love of environmental causes and some small insight into how he views the world. I don’t think we’ll be seeing him in the current trend of Ice Bucket Challenge, it just doesn’t seem to be his thing… although I for one would be happy to proven so very, very wrong on that front Sir!

In a complete torment, earlier this week in an interview with Digital Spy, when Armitage was asked what projects where coming up for him he teased “I’m doing another movie after I’ve finished on stage,” Armitage told us. “But I can’t tell you what it is. But you’ll know!”

Ohhhh will we see him make a cameo in Avengers: Age of Ultron? or will he return to our screens as Lucas North in Spooks???? That’s a whole other story. . . . .

Armitage can currently be seen in cinemas in Into The Storm, which opened on August 7 and continues to roll out across the globe. And in its final installment, Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies will premier in December 2014.

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