We finally went to see the final Hobbit movie, as a combo Holiday Season Wrap-Up and Early Birthday Indulgence. Aaaand?
I stand by my initial tweet on leaving the theater: "Third Hobbit movie was great extended edition finale to the Second Hobbit movie."
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(Keep it secret. Keep it safe.)
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Peter Jackson (infamously, in some quarters) expanded his Hobbit adaptation from two to three movies, and this movie proves why, as we get an extended action sequence — well, for most of the movie — that pays off a lot of the stuff that was set up in the first and second films. And, frankly, pays it off pretty well. Nobody (except a fantasy wargamer) is going to watch just the third movie by itself, but matched up with the other two, it's really pretty good — arguably better than the second, which actually paid off pretty much nothing.
The Bad
– The movie is very much just an extension of the second, with memory of key elements (Tauriel/Kili, Bilbo/Arkenstone) being taken for granted. It will read fine when watched in marathon, but being watched on its own took more than a few forced recollections of What Had Gone Before.
– I'm still annoyed that some of the dwarves look dwarvish, while others (Thorin, Kili, arguably the main protags) look far too human.
– Bard's perception of Smaug's weak spot was … weak. We have talking birds elsewhere in the movies. Bard getting the secret to Smaug's vulnerability from a chatty bird is perhaps a bit to fairy-tale-ish, but conveniently spotting it seems a bit … weak. (And using the convenient cross-bow bolt mechanism from the second movie seems way too crude, too.)
– Screwing around with both the Black Arrow speech …
'Arrow! Black arrow! I have saved you to the last. You have never failed me and always I have recovered you. I had you from my father and he from of old. If ever you came from the forges of the true king under the Mountain, go now and speed well!'
… and with Thorin's farewell speech
'Child of the kindly West, I have come to know, if more of us valued your ways — food and cheer above hoarded gold — it would be a merrier world. But sad or merry, I must leave it now. Farewell.'
… was … disappointing. Elements (especially of the last) were used, but in a seriously edited form. Yes, both are stilted and/or monologuish, but, damn …
– I was vaguely irked that we got emphasis on Galadrial being a bearer of one of the Three Rings for the Elven Kings Under the Sky … but that Gandalf and Elrond, fellow bearers of same, got no call-out.
– Too many Orcs. Azog. Bolg. Lots of other CG Orcs of Various Levels of Threat. Hard to keep track of who's who, or if we should recognize one CG orc from another.
– Too many Dwarves. Kudos to the films for giving the various dwarves personalities. But it's still spread too thinly. Quick, who went off with Thorin besides Fili and Kili. What did Fili do before he went off to die in front of Kili? Who was the gray-haired one? Who was the one with the funny hairdo? Who wore the funny Radagast-style hat?
"Too many dwarves, Marty."
– Too many comic relief human bad guys, both Stephen Fry's (brief) Master of the Town and Ryan Gage's (overly-long) Alfrid. While I understand the desire to include some levity amongst the proceedings, Peter Jackson's attempts at same almost always fall flat.
– Too many kids. Bard's character is diluted by constant reference to wanting to protect his brood. Plus his inability to give Alrid the good kick in the ass he deserves from Scene 1.
– Sure, it's cool that Bard is against war. But his general pacifism felt a bit contrived.
– Thranduil's motivation went from being a PTSD nut, driven mad by wounds within and without, to being sort of a lame combo of greed and vague lameness.
– Why did we spend all that screen time on Mt. Gundabad? Did that really tell us anything, or give us some not-terribly-effective Tauriel/Legolas time?
– Did we actually see any of those Elvish archers shooting any arrows? That might have come in handy.
– Thorin's crucial character-reforming moment both goes on for way too long and is way too cliched. (A melange of voices from the rest of the movies echoing in his head? Really?)
– The bad guys have sand worms, but they somehow value an underground fastness like Erebor? Really? Why?
– War Bats? Really?
– The Charge of the 13 Dwarves was … dumb. Bold solidarity with kinfolk, sure. But the flying wedge into the face of the enemy seemed just tactically silly.
– War Rams? Really? Well, okay, they were kind of cool, but … where did they come from?
– War? What's it for? Apparently for lots of folk to get their heads cut off or else otherwise fall when sliced across the belly. Lots and lots of folk. An inordinate number of folk, for many, many, many screen minutes.
– Sting's "goblin-sensing glow" power must have gotten overloaded, because it sure doesn't show up during the battle with a zillion orcs.
– The Tauriel / Legolas / Kili triangle gets short shrift. The bits there are good, but it's never truly faced up to, and the mystery of Tauriel's final fate remains just that (I expect there will be more in the Extended Edition, most likely her decision to go into the Uttermost West). Similarly, the Legolas / Thranduil rift rushes past a bit too quickly.
– What happened to Dwalin, who was up there fighting with Bilbo and covering Thorin's tail until Bilbo got belatedly knocked out? (I'm guessing this will show up in the Extended Edition, but it was an odd plot hole.)
– Legolas with the DEX of 35 is, net, marginally less unbelievable than he was by the time Return of the King was over, but it still verged on the laughable watching him run up the falling rubble.
– Bilbo's Hobbit size plays unevenly (and awkwardly) in more than a couple of scenes — the meeting with Bard, Thranduil, and Gandalf in particular.
– Thranduil's final suggestion that Legolas go seek out Aragorn as a cool dude to hang out with felt … contrived. It was out of keeping for Thranduil, if nothing else. (It might have worked if Gandalf had done it.)
– The rhythm of Bilbo's departure from Erebor feels rushed. It's a shame we didn't get to see Thorin laid to rest with both the Arkenstone and the sword Orcrist he recovered from the troll horde. Along with Fili and Kili. Yeah, that's probably best left elided over, along with Bilbo's "and back again," but …
– This is not a movie about Bilbo Baggins. He appears in it. Arguably, he is in a supporting role. He shows up in a fair number of scenes, some of them crucial, many of them not. If you called this movie (in particular, or perhaps the series in general) The Dwarven King trilogy, or even Bard, the Dragon-Slayer, you'd have a pretty decent argument for it.
The Good
– I thought the additional speaking moments for Smaug were well-handled (for purposes of making a movie out of it_. Actually, except as noted, I thought the "introductory" Smaug wrap-up was pretty cool.
– The Cleansing of Dol Guldur was delightful. Yeah, it's all extrapolation from the appendices, and, yeah, it doesn't matter much in the overall plot of the movie, but seeing Elrond, Saruman, and Galadriel kick Nazgul/Sauron butt is … High Geekiness of the First Water of Coolness.
– The Dragon Sickness bit was (per se) non-canonical, but an effective and workable plot device. It was vague as to the extent that it was just a dwarvish ailment, or something actually mystical related to dragon hordes, but it motivated things well. And the Thorin/Bilbo plot cycle from the book was nicely fleshed out.
– While Thorin's reformation scene is hackneyed, I loved that they did it on the gold swimming pool from the previous movie.
– Thranduil's war moose was fun (even when it got silly).
– The general CGness of the armies was … pretty effective, actually. There was enough blending with reality, especially amongst the elves, to be effective. And, frankly, it played better than the Battle of Pelennor Fields in Return of the King did.
– For that matter, Azog as a CG character was pretty well portrayed, even in CG. Some good facial expressions there, worthy of Cameron's Avatar.
– Bilbo gets to do a lot more in the movie than in the book (even if he's not clearly the protagonist, title notwithstanding). In the book, he gets knocked out pretty early on, and wakes up to the aftermath. Some folk might prefer that, but (for mostly better but occasionally worse) this lets Jackson play with the actual course of the battle, as well as the deaths of the dwarves who die.
– We get some appropriate Ring-o-Vision, though fortunately Sauron is busy licking his wounds and doesn't detect it. Yet.
– Because of course high-level dwarves would, overnight, be able to craft a attractive and effective barrier in front of the gate, complete with stairs behind, parapet, speaking hole at the base, and a quick way to demolish it. Nicely done.
– The overall battle was handled fairly decently, though Vast Hordes seemed to diminish into Manageable Platoons far too quickly.
– Radagast gets a reasonable role (summoning the Eagles). Plus, Beorn.
– The wrap-up with Bilbo and his return home was nicely done, as was tying it to the intro of the LotR movies.
The Othernotely
– Jackson took a fair amount of heat for changing the final title from "There and Back Again" to "The Battle of the Five Armies," but it was in fact more appropriate for the movie was developed.
– We saw the movie in 3D. While I don't think it was required, I thought it generally worked pretty well.
– The movie, as such, doesn't stand up as a movie alone. But as an extension of the second movie, it works quite nicely (thus that tweet).
– A number of the plot holes above might get patched in the Extended Edition. Jackson was under pressure, I understand, to turn in a shorter-than-usual film, and that almost certainly led to some continuity glitches.
– Poor Balin. After being the kindly, white-bearded dwarf who seemed the voice of reason and a reasonable guy to manage Erebor post-Thorin, he heads off to Khazad-dum to reclaim it, and gets gacked by Orcs. Also, Ori and Oin, whichever ones they were.
On the other hand, he didn't have to oversee the rebuilding of the ruins of Erebor, where pretty much nothing is fully intact. Maybe he knew what he was doing.
In Sum
So, to take on the Hobbit series as a whole …
1. This was not Tolkien's Hobbit. That job is left for another movie-maker a few decades from now. Until then, the Rankin/Bass version is a better approximation.
2. This was, on the other hand, a fitting prelude to Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy. It will take a full marathon to really make that judgment, but the Hobbit trilogy used the same visual language, the same actors, and was intentionally crafted to tie into the original. As such, I think it does a pretty decent job. (http://theweek.com/article/index/273792/the-hobbit-a-disappointing-set-of-movies-but-a-worthy-set-of-prequels makes a more thorough argument in this direction, enough so to serve as the link shared with this post.)
3. Return of the King won Best Picture at the Oscars, and justifiably so. Nobody would legitimately argue that any of the Hobbit films should get so nominated. But taken on their own and as intros to LotR, they succeed pretty darned well.
4. I'm now waiting both for that Extended Edition Hobbit/LotR Marathon and that remake of The Hobbit that plays true to the original. Both should be a blast.
The Hobbit: A disappointing set of movies, but a worthy set of prequels
Peter Jackson’s underwhelming return to Middle-earth improves significantly when you view it as part of a larger story
I do not think it should take longer to watch the movie than to read the book.
+Scott Randel If it's meant to be an adaptation of the book, perhaps. (Though the Chuck Jones "Horton Hears a Who" might be a good counter-argument.) But in terms of making something that plugs into the (narratively) later films, it's arguably justified.
From whence the rams, indeed.
And running in the air was just stupid.
A lot of the action sequences were in fact, just stupid.
Not as stupid as "lets build a golden trap", though.
I understand it started out as an adaptation of the book. That's certainly how it was touted when Jackson got the rights.
I think it went off the rails when it became The Lord of the Rings: Episode I.
I think this one might be the best of the 3 movies…. but maybe 2 movies would have been better. I thought Gandalf would use more magic when he fights.. Gandalf is so cool:)
+Heren Zu Gandalf does use magic when fights. One staff blow and foe is dead.
+Heren Zu In both books and movies, Gandalf has never been a high-power flashy mage. (Indeed, Galadriel's Nazgul-thumping is pretty unprecedented, too.) His power is more in inspiration, counsel, and presence. (High WIS and CHA.)
+Scott Randel I think that was Jackson's plan all along. It might have gotten away from him, though.
why?
+Kevin Beer Because!
(Um … why what?)
+Dave Hill True – I just never pictured Gandalf fighting like that.
I really enjoyed reading your good/bad about the hobbit.
I really agree with thorins death as well as the other dwarves. I really wanted more of a conclusion. And with bilbo leaving it did feel awkward and rushed.
..
+Jennifer Critchett The conclusions of both The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings go on for quite a ways in the books, in a fashion that would not translate well to the movies. I seem to recall Bilbo's journey taking quite some time to get home, for example.
I think missing the burial of Thorin is one of those things that, in a movie, would feel excessive. The leave-taking with the dwarves was actually a pretty good character piece for him, as portrayed.
One question… Why doesn't gandalf say anything about if he has killed any dragons? Has he ever killed One? (Sorry to switch hobbit movies)
And you guys are the same people that say The Dark Knight is the greatest movie ever! The Hobbit isn't perfect but is very good and entertaining but to rip it apart like this post is doing is doing the movie a disservice.
We are not the people who say The Dark Knight was the greatest movie ever! At least, I don't say that. I hated that movie. I can think of scores, if not hundreds, of better movies.
Also, Dave did not rip the movie apart. He noted its fine points as well as its problems. I think he did the movie, and potential viewers as well, a service by providing a thoughtful and fair critique.
When Tolkien first wrote 'Lord of the Rings', he insisted that it shouldn't be published in Amerika – now we know why.
If you are a member of the generation that grew up with media that rewards a 10-second attention span, then I imagine that is true. If you are of a generation that places emphasis on reading, then not so.
+pertent dong, Have you read The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit? They're both much longer than this discussion. I'd urge you to read them. You'll glean much more from them than you will from any cinematic adaptation.
Great work keep up the stupped story line attempted cover up cocks
like
If you took the three movies and edit out the extraneous, pedantic stuff to get them down to a single 150-minute movie, then it works.
How can anyone sit through 8 hours of … anything?
damn
Awesome trailer lvy hobbits… aj
Hey loved it to
i love this movie….
+Nivashinee Murugan you tu is awesome
The book is better for those disappointed try reading it
I watched it on Wednesday its awsome and sad because loades of people and elves #= dwarves I was sad 😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😥😨😨😨😨😨😨😨😨😰😰😰😰😰😰😩😩😩😩😩😩😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢😢 lotes
I was entertained on this movie, no complains 🙂
The films were so CGI they made by brain melt and leak out of my ears. And what was with the dwarf-elf love triangle? (Sigh)
Some things i like the most ab this prequel: 1. The Thandruil's moose with big horn, 2. Watching Galadriel ; Elrond, Saruman fight together using magic (unfortunately Gandalf can't join them, ir would be 100% perfect)
The music from The Dark Knight was awful.
. Would be very interesting to see a down-edited version of The Hobbit made from the 3 movies into one decent movie. And put in the bits from the book they left out. I suppose it leaves the door open for someone else to do a better job with The Hobbit. Main sticking point, it takes a lot of money to do it right.
. The book IS better. At least it is a good 'ad' for the book.
. What I DO like about the Jackson movies is their full-on hollywood approach, including tons of action, lots of CGI, pretty girls, dashing guys, well-respected elders, male and female, good jokes, a sense of social consciousness, and some prophetic inspiration, of a sort. The last bit depends on who is interpreting. It is fun.
. 'nuff said.
+Dave Hill That's not true. Gandalf the Grey fought Nazgul, the Balrog, and in the Hobbit, he cast that epic fire spell in the cave with the goblin king (that the director changed to white glow).
I liked the first two parts but this was horrible.
+Dave Hill fgt
ohmy gosh !!
Hill
I agree i could not get into the first two films. I havent seen the battle of the five armies and dare say i wont. Made to make MONEY
We managed to catch it yesterday as well. Also in 3D. You've summed it up pretty well. I'm not as entranced with any of The Hobbit movies as I was with the LotR movies, but I still found them enjoyable enough.
I await the next star wars trilogy with baited breath
baited breath, whew … to be that excited
i expect the next star wars movies will be as juvenile as the hobbit movies; however, that is part of their appeal; really, it was the sauron stuff that was for the older audience, what wasn't in the book,
The Hobbit, which was generally geared towards a younger audience, though a mature younger audience; also, kids back then didn't have tv, or video games, so they actually read books; i'm glad I did
My son and I thought there were a lot of things unanswered. Like…the last scene showed Bilbo and Gandolph. This scene was actually the first one from Fellowship. Ok…ao Bilbo is old. Going back to the whole 'Legolas go meet Stryder/Aragon' issue….ok…apparently it was hundreds of years that took place between The Five Armies and Fellowship. If Aragon is a man…how is it that he lived that long? Is he part elf? Also…the elf chic…did she go with Legolas? What becomes of her? AND if Gandolph knew that Bilbo had the damn ring all that time…and he suspected it was still in his possession when he dropped him off at the Shire, why the hell didn't he take the damn thing from him then?! And what happened to Legolas's father? He was never even mentioned in Lord of the Rings. We loved the movie and the series….but we need answers. We feel like the trilogy isn't over. I think a movie showing the Elf side would be helpful.
Majher hati
lol, good questions; these types of movies aren't meant to answer all your questions but to raise more; the creators of the movies would love for you to read the books they loved so much they made movies of them
the elfs are secondary characters in Tolkien's world, created to support the main characters, humans, and also hobbits, though i'm not sure about their origin, the hobbits, not having read everything Tolkien, but enough. I consider them to be a sub-race of human, like our little people. The elves had their tiffs and struggles, mainly fighting off the renegade creatures like Sauron, but also fighting amongst themselves.
It may be you get your wish, though not an elf movie following the storyline of Hobbit and Fellowship, but The Silmarillion.
+Rachel Christen Wikipedia is great source of information for you. For example, Aragorn was 87 when he met Frodo – Aragorn wasn't really a human, as far as I remember he had elf blood too.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aragorn
Regarding Bilbo, he was 50 when he went for adventure with dwarves. And it was his 110th birthday when Gandalf visited him 60 years later.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bilbo_Baggins
Regarding Ring, Gandalf never new it was The One ring Bilbo found. It took him years to track it's history and during his birthday when he finally confirms it putting this ring into fire.
You might want to actually read Tolkien's work – both Lord of the Rings and Silmarillion which explains much of the pretty complicated Tolkien's mythology. Although Silmarillion is a rather hard book to read.
This was our annual New Year's Eve movie. We saw it in 3D (by accident), but the 3D wasn't too annoying. I'm pretty much in agreement with everything you said in your review.
was great movie
Wow thats a big spiel 😂😂😂😂off to see it wednesday
Aragorn is a Dunedain, humans gifted with long life. When he tells Bormomir 'I have seen the White city, long ago.' He is referring to a time almost half a century before.
If you have questions then as others have said, you should really read the books as you will get much more from then than from any forum or wiki. Once you have read LOTR and The hobbit then give the Silmarillion a whirl to find out the answers to the even bigger questions like why Gandalf is returned to Middle Earth after his death 🙂
Aakash ne apko comand kiya
– A number of the plot holes above might get patched in the Extended Edition. Jackson was under pressure, I understand, to turn in a shorter-than-usual film, and that almost certainly led to some continuity glitches.
I don't buy this. 3 three-hour films (evolved from 2 three-hour films) to tell a story that you would read in three hours. A Extended edition is just "we are soooo dumb"
Thuggery and f2f vhvgf f2f
Poo l
it is LOTR for the kiddies, plain and simple
'nuff said
I really wasn't impressed with the Hobbit movie. It was just really blah compared to the Return of the King LOTR movie. It didn't really show a wow factor for me
Wow!
I think you could have saved a lot of time on this hit an miss article. It was all garbage .
if only they had just followed the original book, as if it were the script
if only ….
but, that leaves it open to future filmmakers, maybe even an opensource kickstarter type of project; the key being it would have to be a community based approach, not the vision of just one person; although, we don't really complain when some rich nutbag wants to make a cool hack and slash sword and sorcery type of movie, do we?
Unless it is the hobbit (or some other great story many of us cherish).
What other great stories would we be upset at nearly any movie rendition of/
I can hardly think of any, though 'Wheel of Time' comes to mind, but I've never read it. I would have to say Xanth. That would be hard to do justice to.
+Jennifer Critchett I don't believe Gandalf ever mentions it, and I can't find any mention of dragons slain by Istari.
+Rashad McQueen I don't particularly care for The Dark Knight.
Are there any specific criticisms of the movie I've made that you consider unjust or incorrect?
The bit at the very end where Thranduil tells Legolas to go seek "Strider" really annoyed me. There is no way, Numenorean or not, that Aragorn, who was 10 years old in the year of the Quest for Erebor would be roaming the wilds of the Northern lands as a leader of the Dunedain. He would have still been living in Rivendell at the time and it would take another 10 years for Elrond to reveal to him his true heritage.
But then again, this isn't Tolkien's work we're seeing on screen is it?
+Joe Blow If it's a good thing, I'd sit through it.
+Toby Giddings But with the exception of one bright shining light (against the Nazgul, early in RotK), he didn't do anything flashy. His fights against the Balrog were by presence or sword, no lightning bolts or fireballs. His battles in melee against orcs were sword/staff fighting. Impressive, but not showy. That's not what the Istari were about.
+Les Jenkins Something I realized this morning was that I didn't leave the movie feeling that Grand, Epic Sense that I had after each of the LotR movies. Granted, the tone of the books are different, but I didn't feel I'd seen something glorious or poignantly moving. I don't know if that was intentional or not on Jackson's part.
+sam green I have no doubt that making money was a part of it, but I think this was also a geek love project on Jackson's part (misguided or not).
:-):-
+Max Bailey I think the movies were also an attempt by Jackson to bring the Hobbit story to the same level and tone as the LotR, not just a "kid's story." Some of that worked, some didn't, and it's arguable that the effort stretched the material too thinly.
+Max Bailey We won't see any Silmarillion movie any time soon. Tolkien never sold the movie rights to that material, and the Tolkien estate has not been happy about the adaptations that have been made (over-critically, in my opinion).
The Silmarillion is also much broader in scope and more mythic in tone than even LotR; any adaptation of it would either be of that sort or would include a lot of padding.
+Solonor Rasreth The 3D version was actually less expensive for us to reserve seats at, so that's why we did it. The movie used the technology well but not, I think, essentially.
+Iván Estévez The third movie was 2:24, not 3 hours, which is long but not epic-long. There is certainly material that was edited out.
As to whether a single 2-3 hour movie could do just to The Hobbit … I sort of doubt it. As presented in the book, 5-6 hours would be my guess. I'm sure it will be done by someone at some point.
+dustin baldree I disagree. There were a lot of elements I liked. On its own, I'd probably give it 3 of 5 stars; taking the trilogy as a whole, I'd probably go 3.5 to 4 of 5.
I wouldn't even put them as worthy prequels. They were disappointing all round.
+Paweł Wiszniewski Thank you! We knew Aragon had to have elf blood in him. He was too fluent when speaking the language! I'm going show my son your references.
agree
+Jean-Loup Rebours-Smith Your chronology is correct — Aragorn was born in 2931, and the events of The Hobbit are in 2941-42.
I don't think (I'd need to watch again) that Thranduil actually refers to him as leading the Dunedain, just that he is among them and is the son of Arathorn. The question of how Thranduil would know about him, though, at that point, is a bit different; he had been fostered with Elrond since he was 2, and was known (by Elrond, at least) to be Isildur's heir, so word might have gotten around to the king of the Mirkwood elves.
I objected more that the exchange between the two made no sense, given their relationship.
Finally someone else posts about seeing it what'd you think?
+Rachel Christen His knowledge of elvish probably comes from being fostered by Elrond in Rivendell from the age of 2. Though he does have elvish blood; Elrond is, in fact, his (many-greats) grand-uncle. Distant enough, though, so that the whole Arwen thing isn't squicky.
(Another fun fact: Galadriel is Elrond's mother-in-law.)
I think it kinda should've had more about the ring above all others
+Rachel Christen think it has more to do with the fact that he is numenorean
+Dave Hill
Also the chronology clearly states that Aragorn doesn't "go out into the wild" until the year 2951 TA which suggests he certainly wasn't going around calling himself Strider 10 years earlier
+Dave Hill I think Tolkien's hobbit onscreen would've been dissatisfying for many: we already live in a world where jacksons lotr exists… Anything outside of that tone would've been off. Even Rankins the hobbit feels massively disjointed from his lord of the rings and rotk. They pretty much just share art styles.
I like thorin and his kin looking less dwarvish….I mean, you complained about too many dwarves, imagined if they all looked the same! This is actually kind of a strange complaint… And a great example of why jackson can't ever win, and why a closer to Tolkien adaptation would never work; you mentioned too many characters we didn't care about dying, and too many dwarves. With the exception of thorin, almost none of the dwarves in the book have any sort of character development.
We find out fili and kili die, but it has zero impact in the book. Sure you avoid an unnecessary love triangle, but at the expense of caring about anyone really, they are all just a bunch of random dwarves.
Movies have to have a more defined narrative. Even Tolkien realized how important the events were after the fact, hence their expansion in lost tales and the appendices.
I'll take a self-important hobbit trilogy over one that feels like it has no weight to the material any day.
I love the hobbit the last one is awsome
+Dain Laguna
You said: "We find out fili and kili die, but it has zero impact in the book"
Actually it has a pretty serious impact. By having both Fili and Kili die alongside Thorin, you effectively exterminate the last heirs in the line of Thror and Thrain as kings under the mountain thus allowing it to be pased on to Dain Ironfoot
+Jean-Loup Rebours-Smith I know it has repercussions in the story, but emotionally, you're not connected to it, or any of the other dwarves, in the least.
Just illustrating how the movies narrative fixes those types of problems, even if it introduces others.
They're just too long. 30 minutes could have easily been trimmed from all 3 movies.
+Dain Laguna
Well perhaps it's because the book is called The Hobbit and therefore the focus is on Bilbo and the dwarves are really just there to provide the adventure and apart from Thorin, you're not supposed to really have any deep character development, I suppose if you do it to one you have to do it to all of them and that get tedious, as unfortunately happened in the movies
The hobbit was awesome.
+Jean-Loup Rebours-Smith that's my whole point: that type of singular narrative works well for books, but movies are a different beast. No one expected 'deep' character progression for every single character (even lord of the rings doesn't manage this)..
I'm just callih out the complaint of there being too many characters people don't care about: making a movie using the books exact approach would have only further emphasized that problem.
And its unfair to give the film a hard time about something the book doesn't do well (I'd argue worse), either.
The last part was shiet.
Too many characters 7.4 IGN
A good summary, thank you!
One Adaptation to Rule them all and in the Darkness Bind them…..
kili and fili died!!! ;-;
+Jaime Hernandez 1/10 "It's pretty good" -IGN
Absolutely terrible!!! Ruined!!! I had a headache after watching it & a waste of money!! Just my opinion!;)
+Jean-Loup Rebours-Smith It seems unlikely, yes. He was also sporting a cover name at the time.
+Dain Laguna
The problem with the films following this particular line of argument is that not only does it have to deal with at least 12 characters we're not really supposed to know or care much about, but it adds a few more that are not in the original story to begin with, thus making the task all the more difficult. Granted the reason for introducing some extra characters was to attempt (unsuccessfully in my case) to have the audience care for at least those who were going to die.
I would argue the book, being originally written for children, does not need to provide further character development than for Bilbo and Thorin, and it does very well at keeping the narrative consistently around Bilbo. The way I saw these movies is basically too few good scenes where Martin Freeman does a good performance as Bilbo with lots and lots of padding, some meant as a bridging to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the rest being rather inconsequential. Yes they are two means of telling a story each with their requirements but the attempt to get the audience to care for the multiple side stories doesn't work very well.
good
+Dain Laguna I agree it was a worthy goal to do The Hobbit in the style of the LotR trilogy. Some of the decisions made in doing so were less successful than others, but it does serve as a prequel/prelude.
I also agree that Tolkien left the dwarves as even more blank slates (except that Thorin was petty and avaricious and Bombur was fat). Jackson did a lot to give them separate personalities. My complaint is that (a) two of the dwarves (the two most prominent, in many ways) look far more handsome/human than others in a way I find too inconsistent, and (b) even with the added effort, the thirteen (!) dwarves were still too many to keep track of, at least while throwing in so many action scenes. I wouldn't want to try it, myself, to be sure.
Fili and Kili's death could have been poignant and tragic without the love triangle (Kili's and Thorin's reaction demonstrate that).
I think an adaptation of The Hobbit could be made that was more faithful to the original, with the understanding that either it would need to be more of a kid's tale, and/or would need to take some amount of literary license for modern sensibilities.
Awesome movies. Not disappointing at all.
+Dave Hill agreed on the love triangle not being one necessary to making kili's passing 'matter'.
These movies are so big and loved its gonna be a long time before another version can come along and stand on its own mertis
+Dave Hill wrong. you ignored the hobbit scene I mentioned. And there is no way he was 'a swordsman', that's bs. Unless he had supernatural strength and speed, it would be extremely unrealistic, so your opinion on this is now obnoxious. You also originally said, "His power is more in inspiration, counsel, and presence' " which further indicates you are saying random bs because it contradicts your reply to me, which implies his power was being an amazing swordsman, better than any soldier of Gondor etc..don't even try it with me it's just hilarious.
Whatever peeps quit being so picky awesome movie
Geez +Dave Hill, you're such a bullshitter. Can't believe you'd try to pull one over on an obvious expert like Toby up there.
+Heren Zu
+Dain Laguna I heard J J Abrams is rebooting the series in 2018 … (ducks).
+Dave Hill lol. to be fair, i enjoyed his star treks and his wars has made some pretty amazing first impressions
Lol is this a PG well i realy like the film i waceet it
+Toby Giddings I'm honestly trying to remember the scene in the first Hobbit film. I recall that in the book he does a big flash of light and kills several goblins when the dwarves are first captured. Yes, that's flashy, but it's also The Hobbit, which had a variety of immature concepts in it; he doesn't pull any tricks like that in LotR, book or movie.
He also runs through the Goblin King with Glamdring.
Gandalf was an Istar, a lesser Maiar (angel) clothed in human flesh. I see no reason to think he could not manifest superhuman strength or speed, especially as he also bore one of the three Elven Rings. He also takes up Glamdring from the troll horde and is noted as using it on multiple occasions, such as against the Balrog in Moria.
I don't think I said anything about him being the greatest swordsman of all time, though he certainly seems to acquit himself well in battle.
I can recall one other bit of flash — his adding of horse figures in the flood at the Bruinen that wipe out the Nazgul pursuing Frodo.
But in general, the wizards were not about big, awe-inspiring magic. Indeed, their mission was not to oppose Sauron with power, but to support (and not dominate or over-awe) the peoples of Middle-Earth.
Tolkien described Gandalf this way: 'Warm and eager was his spirit (and it was enhanced by the ring Narya), for he was the Enemy of Sauron, opposing the fire that devours and wastes with the fire that kindles, and succours in wan hope and distress; but his joy, and his swift wrath, were veiled in garments grey as ash, so that only those that knew him well glimpsed the flame that was within. … Mostly he journeyed tirelessly on foot, leaning on a staff, and so he was called among Men of the North Gandalf 'the Elf of the Wand'. For they deemed him (though in error) to be of Elven-kind, since he would at times work wonders among them, loving especially the beauty of fire; and yet such marvels he wrought mostly for mirth and delight, and desired not that any should hold him in awe or take his counsels out of fear.'
I love the current movie…I was engage though out, even got misty when a characher died
+Rachel Christen
1.Aragorn is a Dúnedain and one of the properties of that race of men is a very long life; 200 years is not unknown.
2. It was arount 50 years between the Battle of the Five Armies and the Fellowship of The Ring. (Bilbo was 50 when he went with the Dwarfs and 111 when he passed the ring to Frodo. It was 30 years after that, that Frodo when on his own adventure)
3. "The Elf Chick" was made up for the Hobbit films and did not appear in either of the books.
4. Gandalf knew that Bilbo had a magic ring but did not know, or even suspect at that time, that it was the "One Ring"
5. Thranduil is mentioned in The Lord of The Rings but does not feature; for more about the Elves see The Silmarillion or the Book of Lost Tales.
+Dave Hill the hobbit scene in the book it's like a giant pillar of flame, I believe (if you had read my first comment it mentions this and that the director changed it).
you're right about his race, but i believe they had limited capacity on middle earth, in that humanoid form and are bound to refrain from deciding fate themselves single-handedly (not suggesting he could even fight sauron either). not saying that is how it is with his race but it's a thought I believe is close to the truth on that (imo, ofc).
Ok wait but the elf chick is a very weird name
Awsome
+Dain Laguna I think you've hit the nail on the head; I also think that any adaptation of The Hobbit would have disappointed people, as you say, due to LoTR films already existing.
I actually read The Hobbit after I read LoTR and was disappointed by the book in comparison that epic.
Unfortunately The Hobbit is a children's book, written by Tolkien for his son and it reads as exactly that and nothing more, with no hint of what is to come from his pen. I think had The Hobbit films been released before LoTR it would be held in much higher regard.
i wnt to see it
I was surprised….I took my kid to see it but I got caught up…this one is really good!
I was underwhelmed by this last film. Maybe I will come to appreciate it more in the full context of all 6 films… but as a standalone it was a dud IMO.
+Trevor Marsh It's an interesting question what might have happened had Jackson chosen The Hobbit first. Assuming he made the same creative decisions on that trilogy, I suspect he would have felt more free to take additional liberties in LotR, probably not to its benefit.
Sad
Fromleati:-)
+D
will see on Netflix/Itunes probably … I m less interested by this series compared to LOR one … less mature
+Dave Hill I guess we'll never know now, but I was much more "annoyed", if that's the right word, by the expansion of the Aragorn/Arwen love story parts in the LoTR films that I was by his treatment of The Hobbit.
i second the description
+Trevor Marsh I've actually mellowed on that over the years. I certainly understood the desire to include a more prominent female role, and the romance wasn't made up in whole cloth. There were aspects of it in execution that I didn't care for, but I don't think the expansion per se was a bad idea. I thought it worked better than the similarly-motivated inclusion of Tauriel.
Such an interesting discussion, now I wish to re-read all the books, including the silmarillian, and perhaps even the other 'son of' Tolkien stuff. Why not, other than free time being at such a premium these days.
Perhaps a true rendition of The Hobbit would not sell as well as the Jackson 'action/adventure' version, but it would sell enough. A couple of years should be enough time for audiences to get cold again. So, if you start now, whoever you are, you should have it ready just in time.
Or what would be really weird, especially considering the flux the tv industry is going through, would be a Hobbit tv series. HAHA… talk about filler, they would have it be nearly ALL filler, or it could be good. Perhaps a 'mini-series'. At any rate. The budget would have to equal a high-hollywood number regardless, so might as well make it another movie. Ah well, we can dream.
Off to read the book again.
Oh, one last thing. As a movie, the extra Sauron stuff sort of symbolizes the state our world is in, with an unknown #antichrist about to take the scene, but being fought off by our valiant forces of good, such as the protest marchers, the citizen journalists, etc. We could point to parallels between Gandalf and Edward Snowden, the web-wizard of NSA. Draw your own conclusions. This is what movies are really about, and books too. What does it all really mean?
ن8
YAAAAWN!
+Toby Giddings Finally found the text.
'Just at that moment all the lights int he cavern went out, and the great fire went off poof! into a tower of blue glowing smoke, right up to the roof, that scattered piercing white sparks all among the goblins. … The sparks were burning holes in the goblins, and the smoke that now fell from the roof made the air too think for even their eyes to see through. … Suddenly a sword flashed in its own light. Bilbo saw it go right through the Great Goblin as he stood dumbfounded in the middle of his rage. He fell dead, and the goblin soldiers fled before the sword shrieking into the darkness.'
(Elisions are of goblins screaming and panicking.)
https://books.google.com/books?id=hFfhrCWiLSMC&lpg=PP1&dq=tolkien%20hobbit&pg=PA64#v=onepage&q=%22at%20that%20moment%22&f=false
I've always had the sense, esp. in The Hobbit, that a lot of Gandalf's magic were practical effects, akin to his fireworks, rather than full-blown spells.
I mean, the guy throws burning pine cones at the wargs when they are being pursued.
+Max Bailey Only question at this point is when the rights under which the movies were made revert back to the estate. By that time, they may be open to making a new version.
i look at bilbo like "why are you here watson"
+Diana Haptonstahl "Because he's here, in two roles, and he got to do one of them on Colbert!"
(A note just on the blog — really hit a nerve on this one. Somehow, as of this comment, the G+ post is at +469, shared 22 times, with 127 comments. Crikey!)
well, we can be sure that another The Hobbit will be made, even better that this one, which has a lot of good stuff in it, but is clearly made for younger audiences than LOTR
I love the Lord of the rings and the hobbit, JRR TOLKIEN, what an incredibly talented writer! Can you imagine sitting in a pub in Oxford with Tolkien and C.S LEWIS sat next to you discussing literature! F…K makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up!
+Max Bailey See, I really don't see this current Hobbit trilogy as being made for younger audiences than the LotR movies. Jackson has upped the emotional stakes and impact, as well as the violence.
Unless you mean that a future film of The Hobbit will be made for younger audiences, as it was originally written. In which case I agree.
+Dave Hill peter jackson's adaptation couldn't be more frivolous and immersion-breaking imo. there are great elements of them but overall that's my viewpoint of his 3 hobbit films. the fight scenes are extremely comical, for example. i wouldn't be surprised if he announced he tried to make it accessible for the masses much like harry potter.
The article cited is terrible for a few reasons.
He's forgiving "The Hobbit" for being bad because it sets up the "good" Lord of the Rings.
What critic justifies a crappy movie like that?
The original Hobbit book was excellent. And it sets up many events in the Lord of the Rings (which was the actual literary sequel).
The Hobbit movie(s) could have been excellent. His premise that the Hobbit movies are allowed to be shitty because LotR is "teh awesome" is the most ridiculous piece of Peter Jackson fan-boyism.
He also talks about the films as if there were no books. "But once Bilbo acquires the ring in An Unexpected Journey, Gollum disappears from the story."
YES, BECAUSE THAT'S HOW TOLKIEN WROTE THE BOOK.
He keeps talking about the Hobbit as a prequel. It's not a $%&@ing prequel. It was written first. It's not Star Wars… The Lord of the Rings didn't come before the Hobbit in the same way a New Hope was written before Phantom Menace. To make such a comparison is mischaracterizing the history of the story.
The Hobbit movies are not worthy of being "prequels". If they had been good movies, that would be another story. They could have been two fantastic movies… rather than 3 overly-CGI infested money-grab crap fests that bear little to no relation to the source material.
lol, end of discussion; it is a movie worth watching, if only because it is really cool and stuff like that, lol
and it is very similar to the book The Hobbit
+Dave Hill no, i mean it is simply less interesting and compelling and more full of 'fun' stuff like barrel riding and great big battles, and a teenage romance type of thing, etc. It is a 'christmas' movie for the kids on holiday, and a 'fun' bit of homage to Tolkien for the adults to enjoy, along with their kids.
+Dave Hill it seems possible, but flaming sparks that burn holes in goblins on contact is powerful. i'm thinking as he was a leading creator of fantasy, he drew inspiration for descriptions from the world about him at the time, like theatre stage and things like fireworks. it's the earliest fantasy literature of it's type so it might seem slightly primitive, in the same way visual effects in early films look theatrical…
hey! no spoilers. 🙂
+Max Bailey It certainly has more fun, even goofy, elements to it. I'm not sure that was so much to make it light than because that's what Peter Jackson tends to do when he's padding things out. It definitely has less of the brooding "End of the Age" vibe than LotR did — maybe a bit more of that was needed to even better tie it to the LotR films.
how mach dispoint hbit like mh
oh my, calling Tolkien primitive
*shakehead*
it is called 'magic', it doesn't have to make sense
and the interesting thing about books is they don't need special effects so anything is possible
but, i see that you mean that his visual inspirations would be gaslight, arclight, etc. grenades, wwI stuff, sort of how the animated movie 'wizards' is kind-of a throw-back, esp. to us today.
However, Tolkien had more up his sleeve than all that, including #jesus and #armageddon, etc.
lol
+Marty Walser The article writer isn't justifying the problems with the Hobbit trilogy (which he brings up repeatedly), just noting that one strength it has is setting things up for the LotR films, and that watching the entire thing as a 6-film marathon creates a stronger whole in a way that the Star Wars prequels do not (or, honestly, reading The Hobbit and then LotR does not).
i love the hobbits
Disappointing? Underwhelming? I've loved them! Far better than the book!
The Hobbits might be the cause of Global warming! All these battles,dragons,and fire in "Middle Earth"heatin' up everything….and WHERE the HECK IS "Middle Earth?!?!
nah, it is all the cellphone radiation
I still think it's the dang Hobbits…
I found hobit series very boring actual allot !
i liked it alot 🙂
i am going to watch them again when they do the 'extended' versions
Sean it its awsome!!!!!!!!
Somebody got rich making them.While a lot of us fell asleep trying to watch it…
Ya true
+Joe Blow Ask anyone who watches Game Of Thrones … 8 hours? Pffft….
The hobbit is 3 hours and if you don't like it you have too sit through 3 freaking hours of torture
everybody is different
2 kinds of people, those who liked it, those who did not
Ya I a little did!!!!!!!!!!!
Yeah i was disappointed too but liked some of what they did
+Chica The Chick
J ai bcp aime mais la fin est un peu triste
my brother asked the other day, "what is a hobbit?"
Good
+Rachel Christen part of the problem is that the elf chick and some other elements were made up. So they'd have to make up some more. The history of the elves would need 5 movies on their own lol. There's so much history with that. I do agree however that the elements that were supposed to 'bridge' The Hobbit and LOTR could have been handled better. That was the point of making it 3 movies too… it's around 40 years between the two books if I'm not mistaken as Aragorn is 87 in LOTR and Bilbo is 111. You should read the Unfinished Tales.. that would help answer alot of this for you i'd imagine
i love the hobbit
The last one was good but it could have been an hour long instead of two and a half
+Dave Hill completely agree. Although I still think he could have added more 'bridge' elements… The Galadriel piece was great… she's the oldest of the remnants of the Elven Kingdom in Middle Earth save Cirdan who you only get to see at the end of Return of the King. So showing her 'power' was great.. they should make more of the comment of Saruman saying 'I'll deal with Sauron leave him to me' as in LOTR he is trapped by him already.. they should explain how or why… It was also a shame that they couldn't show the rangers as they are key to scouting Dol Guldur.. they're only mentioned in passing at the end… is rather they dealt with that kind of stuff instead some of the fluffier rubbish they added to the trilogy….
+Paweł Wiszniewski Unfinished Tales is a much easier condensed version of the Silmarillion and also adds some history around the wizards (Istari) that is not found anywhere else. Saves reading some of the crazier stuff lol
one could ask the question why the original hobbit movies were not enough ? but hollywood must find new ways to constantly show women in combat armor able to hold their own against 5 males of the enemy army….smiles..myths? go to hollywood…they also aid lying presidents of the USA.
+Mohammed Ahmad LotR starts in 3019; Aragorn was born in 2931, and is thus 10 years old in 2941 (when the Hobbit occurs). So there are 78 years in-between.
I loved the whole hobby parts, dunno why people say is disappointing, that is really a great understatement
+Mohammed Ahmad Well, the Dol Guldur bits are, unfortunately, a side show to the tale of Bilbo Baggins, so fleshing them out too much was unlikely to happen. One of my regrets from the LotR movies is that, yes, we don't see the seduction of Saruman (let alone his side plot to get the Ring, and its power, just for himself). (I regret we also don't see Denethor's madness as similarly stemming from use of the Palantir.)
Maybe I'm getting confused with the exact timelines but Aragorn at around the age of 18 or 19 leaves Rivendell and basically goes on a number of adventures.. 2 of which are fighting for Gondor against the people who attack from the Sea in ships in LOTR (can't remember their bloody names) and scouting Dol Guldur for Gandalf. That's how they become 'friends'.
Yea! Can't wait for the extended edition box set and then the 2 week marathon for the entire series in order! Zzzzzz…
who caaaaares? I can't keep track of all that shit. Prequel, sequel, how about suckuel?
+Derrufo Konepke Which "original Hobbit movies" are you referring to?
If you find Tauriel's combat prowess to be the most "fantastic"/unbelievable aspect of Hobbit movie melee, I suggest you check out Legolas. Or … pretty much the rest of the movie.
+Dave Hill yeah I see that. It's just they moved away from Bilbo anyway and given that they were supposed to bridge the films they missed a couple of tricks. In some ways I wish they'd done The Hobbit in 2 films and then added a 3rd film to deal with the connections to LOTR.. that would have compelled anyone who hasn't seen the older films to go watch them and given existing fans a real reason to go and watch the movie.. but hey ho..
The Hobbit is awesome dont say it is dissapointing
+Mohammed Ahmad Chronology of Aragon.
2931 Born
2933 (2) Father killed; fostered in Rivendell by Elrond
2941 (10) [Events of The Hobbit]
2951 (20) Learns of his heritage. Takes possession of Narsil. Falls for Arwen. Becomes chieftain of the Dunedain.
2956 (25) Meets Gandalf
2957+ (26+) Serves under Thengel of Rohan and Echtelion II of Gondor.
2980 (49) Leads raid on Umbar and defeats Corsairs. Visits Lorien, gets engaged to Arwen. Travels a lot.
3009 (78) Gandalf decides to learn more about Bilbo's ring. Aragorn hunts down Gollum, brings him to Thranduil's hall.
3018 (87) [Events of LoTR; continues into 3019] Aragorn take the scepter of the Reunited Kingdom.
3021 (90) Ringbearers depart the Grey Havens. End of the Third Age; beginning of the Fourth Age.
120 (210) Aragorn dies.
121 Arwen dies.
+Dave Hill oh i refer to the 3 whatever you call it tolkien movies done a while ago..2 towers fellowship of the whatever and the last one was…return of the king. those were more than enough of this type of gruel.
+Mohammed Ahmad As I recall, the original plan was 1 movie for The Hobbit and a 2nd movie for the "bridge" stuff.
+Dave Hill did you write this long report yourself ? impressive undertaking.
+Derrufo Konepke Ah, the Lord of the Rings movies. Given that this was a different book, and a prelude to the LotR story, and given the commercial (and arguably creative) success of that trilogy, it's not at all surprising these movies got made, warts and all.
+Derrufo Konepke I did, yes.
+Dave Hill yeah I hated that they deviated from that…
+Dave Hill haha well said.
+Dain Laguna if peter jackson did star trek movies captain kirk would end up eaten by some giant monster on an odd named moon and we would see spock teleport inside to help kirk, still alive btw,,in the giant and then when they got back to the ship we would have a 10 minute scene of men racing around the ship to show off the art work skills of the well paid movie crew.,
obviously i know very little of the new hobbit movies.saw some of the scenes of course.i failed to mention there is a giant sword maker show going to start soon on discovery channel or the history channel. he makes giant swords…really..just FYI
+Ran dy like why
+Max Bailey I said his visual description of a spell possibly was, not anything else. -.-
You say its a disappointment, I say might as well not have it at all then because you don't cherish the only movies of the hobbit in this world right now that use excellent graphics and months of peoples' live to make so screw you
I don't think it's a disappointment… just a missed opportunity. But you're right… at least the vision was great. Eragon is an example of a film utterly ruining a book… what a pile of shit that was…
IT WAS SO GOOD! CRIED WHEn…….when my baes died. Then laughed a couple of times at Bilbo!
Lol. The "drawf" appearance is to exude their age. Stupid. The movies are deeper than your expectations; clearly.
+Derrufo Konepke dude….what?
I loved it.
dave hill as the saying goes…no good deed goes unpunished…haha . : )
I'm too lazy to read it. HAHAHA!
Hahahaha.
+Ashley Smith literally me
Who think the movie was bad? Well, then change it. If you could.
I read the book in the 3 days after watching Battle of Five Armies, and Peter Jackson did a dang good job
Aw hell nah. I loved those movies! 😠
(Review added to Letterboxd: http://letterboxd.com/three_star_dave/film/the-hobbit-the-battle-of-the-five-armies/)
I've read the all the books ( Hobbit and L.O.R Pt 1- 3).
F### I hope they dont ruin "The sillmarillion"!.
Shhhh…, there hunting for new "Rabbits".
:-)M
+Michael Honeysett I actually have the silmarillion and plan to read it. 😀
+Dharmesh Mistry After having bought the first edition when it first came out, I finally made it through The Silmarillion last year. Good stuff, but not what I'd want to make a major movie from.
(For what it's worth, it took me a dozen tries to get into LotR when I was in middle school — I just found all the cutesy Shire stuff really annoying. I didn't read The Hobbit until long after I became a huge LotR fan.)
I liked it so eff you. You pretenciouse, overweight, virginal, fan boy loosers. Guess What? It's not like the book because it's not a book. It's a movie!
That said can anyone tell me the time between the five armies and fellowship of the ring?
+John Gault Ikr. Its a great book and movie.
True that Dave.
WE wouldn't "make" it a movie but its Hollywood and IT WOULD.
For those who cant read nor have their own imagination ( but enough "imagination" to try and pick a fight).
LOL , after your "rant" ,…, go Read the book John Gault. LOL
:-)M
The person who reviewed this is a total fucking tool..go and get a real job arsehole..your a waste of oxygen. Hipster wanker
+Tim Leonard
+John Gault Hey, John — research it yourself.
(Also, it's discussed more than once in the comments here.)
+SI FI, thanks for your interesting, educational, and engaging contribution.
And for calling me a "hipster," which nobody has ever done before. Does that mean I have to wear one of those goofy porkpie hats?
I think t movie was very..very..GOOD all t movies r all very GOOD….long live t HOBBIT'S….
I loved the movie. It was sad but I was happy that the dragon died
+John Gault has it been10 years or so ?
+Nathalia Bowen True. I am a huge dragon geek myself. :3
+Dave Hill I have two jobs and a flesh and blood female wife That's not inflatable. So if I get free time it's not gonna be spent researching arbitrary dork trivia. So if you don't know or wish to answer Then please say nothing..So go back to spanking it to whatever tenticle ridden pedophile transvestite alien rapist movie you and your acne ridden LARP pals enjoy.
+Dave Hill not appropriate, neither are the ways you review movies..as I said before get another job.
+John Gault LOL!
+John Gault BEST COMEBACK EVER!
+John Gault what's a LARP?…
+SI FI Live action role-play. Super fun and super nerdy. :3
+Dharmesh Mistry thanks..I don't do that but I have a huge collection of action figures.
+SI FI Np. 😀
+John Gault In the time it's taken you to ask and to consult your "Really cool insults to throw at people online" book for a comment, you could have found out yourself.
+SI FI If I was getting paid for it, I'd give it ever due consideration.
+Dave Hill then just don't do it..keep it secret keep it safe.
Lol I see santa
+Jessica Duckett I have always mistaken Bofur + Bawlin = Santa (Chubby with a white beard :D)
+Dharmesh Mistry x3
+Jessica Duckett ^__^
keren !!!
cool I love that movie
+Gavin Ramsey Ikr
who are you !!!!!
So much words
+Gavin Ramsey Nobody knows…mwhahahaha. :3
tell me so I know and you will stop once you tell me right.
oops got to go to bed
no how old are you
Thorin's farewell speech might have been modified, but it left audiences with a good line that even my VERY non-geeky sister repeated several times on various social networks. That's pretty cool broad appeal.
> – I was vaguely irked that we got emphasis on Galadrial being a bearer of one of the Three Rings for the Elven Kings Under the Sky … but that Gandalf and Elrond, fellow bearers of same, got no call-out.
You can actually see the rings on both Gandalf and Elrond's hands in the big showdown.
> Who was the gray-haired one?
Dori, if you mean the one with intricate little braids who liked very small glasses wine and who hung from Gandalf's staff during the fiery pinecone scene.
>Who was the one with the funny hairdo?
Nori
> Who wore the funny Radagast-style hat?
Bofur! (Love Bofur, though he gets the most love in the first movie.)
> – Too many kids. Bard's character is diluted by constant reference to wanting to protect his brood. Plus his inability to give Alrid the good kick in the ass he deserves from Scene 1.
Aww, really? Bard's such a piece of plywood in the books. The family humanizes him so wonderfully.
> _- Thranduil's motivation went from being a PTSD nut, driven mad by wounds within and without, to being sort of a lame combo of greed and vague lameness. _
You have to kind of connect the dots on what Jackson pulled in here.
* Thranduil has PTSD both from Dragonfire and from losing his wife in those same wars (in the north, fighting the forces of Angmar and Gundabad, which we get not from him but from Legolas's monologue.
* Jackson extends this by making the Elven King want to recover his property from Erebor (white gems of [name escapes me], which are fashioned as a feminine-style necklace or headpiece we are probably supposed to believe is his wife's. In the book, he's strictly in it for the loot, and settles for a set of emeralds from Dale, given to him by Bard, with no other meaning. Jackson's version has a lot of myth going on.
* The elves actually get a lot of story-love in the third movie that sort of surprised me.
I mean… Elves. Live forever and remember everything. Kinda sucks, because they pretty much amass centuries of Sad. Eventually, it just gets too much for them and they sail west.
Anyway, on top of that, they are sort of completely creatures of their own nature. They aren't like humans in some very fundamental ways, one of which being humans can move on after a loss, and elves just… can't. They don't have the wiring for it. Thranduil doesn't have the wiring for it.
The extension of this is: if they fall in love, it's for life. Period. Full stop. And they live forever, so this is pretty much a recipe for tragedy.
Your one true love dies while fighting Gundabad? That sucks, because you can't ever have another romantic relationship.
Your one true love loves someone else? That sucks, because you can't move on and love someone else who actually loves you back.
So you've got King Thranduil – he loved his wife, and his wife died in the wars against Angmar up in Gundabad (the same place his face got melted, which we saw in the 2nd movie). So he's kind of a dick to everyone because his one true love is gone forever.
He's ESPECIALLY a dick about love, because if (for example) his son falls in love, Thranduil wants it to be with someone who will never be lost the way his wife was.
Legolas marrying the Captain of the Guard who fights and goes into danger all the time? COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE.
Tauriel (who he's been said to have doted on for 600 years) loving someone who's actually mortal, like a human or a dwarf? ALSO COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE. Why would you ever do that? Utterly foolish to volunteer for that much pain for the rest of all existence.
So there's that scene at the end of the last movie where Tauriel is facing down the King and saying "don't be dick – you have to stay and help these people" and he's like "you're just saying that because you think you love a dwarf, but that would be completely idtiotic, you ridiculous child. That love isn't real, because if it is, I happen to know you're doomed to a life of sorrow." And secretly he knows she's already doomed and he's really just raging at her foolishness and the pain she's buying into.
And then. AND THEN.
And then Legolas is suddenly there with his sword, pushing the King's out of the way and saying "If you kill her, you'll have to kill me, too." And the King realizes to his horror (you can see it on his face) that NOT ONLY is Tauriel in love with a mortal, Legolas is in love with Tauriel, so Tauriel is going to suffer an immortal lifetime of loss and LEGOLAS is going to have to watch her suffer and never be able to either comfort her or in fact DO ANYTHING TO HELP, so he is going to both suffer on her behalf AND suffer the pain of "the only person I love doesn't love me, and never ever ever will, not in a thousand years."
And they race off to do their stuff and Lee Pace is left staring into space, because really they're just kids (a thousand years old already, but whatever) and they don't realize yet just exactly how screwed they both are.
They both do realize it, by the end of the movie: Tauriel now has a friend in the King (the founding member of the Loving Someone Who Died Sucks Club), and Legolas is just… leaving, because never seeing the woman he loves, ever again, is the OPTION THAT SUCKS THE LEAST. The king offers what balm he can by reminding Legolas his mother loved him, so even though romantic love is out, he's got familial love and the bonds of fellowship that can still help him get through the rough spots – it's why he sends him to find Strider – trying to help him find a good friend. The fact that Legolas's actual best friend ends up being a dwarf… well, that's just rich irony and poetic, in light of the story given us by Jackson in these prequels.
Elves are all screwed. Bilbo's saddled with the Ring. Thorin and his two heirs are dead. No one gets a completely happy ending.
Except maybe Bard, because he gets his kids and is going to be king of all the Men in that area, so good for him: family love is best.
I think that's Peter Jackson's personal message, after making millions and millions of dollars are these movies that he's been working on for about a decade:
"The gold isn't worth it, power is burden that just wears you down, and when it's all said and done, loving your family is the best choice you can make."
> – War Bats? Really?
That's actually right out of the book, I believe. "The three commanders agreed that the Goblins, Wargs, and Bats were the enemies of all, and previous grievances between them were put on hold in face of the greater threat."
Unless you were commenting about them being "bred for war", because so many things are "bred for war" in this movie, it became a running joke for me by the third time I'd seen it.
Orcs of Dol Guldor? Bred for war.
Bats of Gundabad? Bred for war.
Azog's "War Beasts"? You better believe they're bred for war.
> – The Charge of the 13 Dwarves was … dumb. Bold solidarity with kinfolk, sure. But the flying wedge into the face of the enemy seemed just tactically silly.
It's not any worse than what Tolkien had them do, and Jackson's version is cooler.
> – War Rams? Really? Well, okay, they were kind of cool, but … where did they come from?
All of Dain's platoon leaders were on them. Dain was the only one o a boar, I think, or at least they were mixed one and the other.
The LotRO player in my cheered mightily to see the rams, as they are my favorite mount in the game (thank you, Kin-level reknown with the Dwarves of the Blue Mountains.
> – Sting's "goblin-sensing glow" power must have gotten overloaded, because it sure doesn't show up during the battle with a zillion orcs.
The particular special effect is has been wildly inconsistent from the first LotR movie. I call it the "DnD Wizard's Familiar Effect" – it's only used when the player remembers to ask.
> – The Tauriel / Legolas / Kili triangle gets short shrift.
I… do not agree. 🙂
> – This is not a movie about Bilbo Baggins.
Agreed.
But it's not a book about Bilbo, either, at least not once the story gets to Laketown.
> Poor Balin. After being the kindly, white-bearded dwarf who seemed the voice of reason and a reasonable guy to manage Erebor post-Thorin, he heads off to Khazad-dum to reclaim it, and gets gacked by Orcs. Also, Ori and Oin, whichever ones they were.
Ori was the one with the intricately braided gray hair. Oin is the one with the listening horn who's also the group healer ("The healer's duty is to the injured.") He's Gloin's brother and, thus, Gimli's Uncle, so Gimli gets verklempt about him writing much of the last days in the Book of Mazarbul in Moria.
This is another place where Jackson (who I am convinced can quote and paraphrase every word in Tolkien's appendices and Unfinished Tales from memory, at this point) added some really nice stuff in the movie, extrapolated from the lore. In the second movie, Oin watches Tauriel do the healing whammy on Kili, eyes wide, and has many words of praise for the wonders of elvish healing and how he's blessed to have seen it.
Seems not-very-dwarvish, until you remember that Oin was the one who recorded everything in the Book of Mazarbul in a finely written elvish – he's a scholar, and not to proud to borrow wholesale from other peoples if it expands what he knows. Well, done, Jackson.
I've been putting off my thoughts on this movie and not blogging them, obviously. I probably should do that…
+Doyce Testerman You have won the nobel prize for Longest Typed Comment. :3
Pssh. Dave and I play handball with posts this size, just to warm up for the rest of the day. 🙂
I saw the too.
+Dave Hill Also, and not for nothing, thank you for giving me smorgasbord of names to add to my block list, just be cruising the comments.
Dear Reader, if you died today do you know if Heaven would be your home? Are you a good person?
The Bible says “Rom 3:23 for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;” Ecc 7:20 for there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not.
A lot of people say they are good people compared to others but the fact of the matter is who’s standard is it? Is it the world’s standard or Gods Standard on which we are to be judged by? Please take a few minutes and examine yourself against Gods word the Bible and see how you will stand on the Day of Judgment.
1. Have you ever stolen anything? What are you called if you have stolen? “
2. Have you ever told a lie even a small one? What are you called if you have ever told a lie?
3. Have you ever looked upon a women or a man to lust after of whom you are not married to? Jesus said if you have ever looked upon a women to lust after you have already committed adultery within your heart n.
4. Have you ever used Gods name or Jesus’s name as a cuss word? This is called blasphemy using Gods name as a word for disgust
This is only 4 of the 10 of Commandments the bible says in Rom 6:23 for the wages of sin is death;
If you were to die today in your sin where would you spend eternity heaven or hell?
A lot of people say why would a loving God send people to hell and the answer is this God is Holy and righteous let me give you an earthly example
Let’s say you robbed a bank and stole $100,000,000 took the money wasted it spent it on a luxurious lifestyle spent every penny and then finally the police caught you threw you into jail and you appear in before a judge and sentences you to a lifetime in prison or to pay the full debt of $100,000,000 plus $1, 000,000 and you turn to the judge and say judge I am sorry I broke the law and I will never do it again the judge turns to you and says well that is great and all but you still owe your life in prison or bail by fine and you turn to him and say judge I could never come up with this much money legitimately to repay this debt then steps in a man and says judge I have 101,000,000 I would like to pay this man’s fine
This is what Jesus did for each one of us he paid a fine to a Holy God that not one of us could pay righteousness was owed and paid in full by Jesus Christ.
Bible Says we must repent (turn away from sin) and place are faith and trust in Jesus in his righteousness not ours.
Bible also says Rom 10:13 for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. The Gift of God is eternal life thru Jesus Christ our Lord. That means if it’s a gift it’s not something you can earn it is given freely so you cannot earn it but in order to get the gift you must receive it.
Part of you may of felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit pleading you to ask God for your forgiveness another part of you says this guy is crazy I am not going to hell this is your spirit and your flesh warring against each other your flesh is full of pride and your spirit knows you have sinned against a holy God today is the day of salvation not tomorrow today could be your last day on earth don’t put off your eternity cry out to Jesus ask him today to reveal himself ask him to forgive you and give you a new heart
God Bless
+Doyce Testerman Jeez, man, you're gentrifying the neighborhood here …
(And here I was about to go to bed …)
+Doyce Testerman:
You can actually see the rings on both Gandalf and Elrond's hands in the big showdown.
I think I spotted the one on Elrond, not so much Gandalf as he's dragged off the field (one wonders if Saruman felt left out), but they didn't get the zoom-in that Galadriel's Nenya did.
Aww, really? Bard's such a piece of plywood in the books. The family humanizes him so wonderfully.
I like the family. It was a note played too frequently, IMO (at least half the scenes Bard was in during the movie).
You have to kind of connect the dots on what Jackson pulled in here.
I don't question we get a more fleshed out Thranduil than in the book (we get more fleshed out everything than in the book). It's just the fleshing out is kind of uneven.
Your connected dots make sense (tons of sense, as I read further; well said), but I would have liked a few more of them on screen. (I know. Probably something in the Extended Edition.)
Jackson extends this by making the Elven King want to recover his property from Erebor (white gems of [name escapes me], which are fashioned as a feminine-style necklace or headpiece we are probably supposed to believe is his wife's. In the book, he's strictly in it for the loot, and settles for a set of emeralds from Dale, given to him by Bard, with no other meaning. Jackson's version has a lot of myth going on.
"The White Gems of Lasgalen" — apparently made up by Jackson.
I mean… Elves. Live forever and remember everything. Kinda sucks, because they pretty much amass centuries of Sad. Eventually, it just gets too much for them and they sail west.
Which is what I expect to happen with Tauriel.
They both do realize it, by the end of the movie: Tauriel now has a friend in the King (the founding member of the Loving Someone Who Died Sucks Club), and Legolas is just… leaving, because never seeing the woman he loves, ever again, is the OPTION THAT SUCKS THE LEAST. The king offers what balm he can by reminding Legolas his mother loved him, so even though romantic love is out, he's got familial love and the bonds of fellowship that can still help him get through the rough spots – it's why he sends him to find Strider – trying to help him find a good friend. The fact that Legolas's actual best friend ends up being a dwarf… well, that's just rich irony and poetic, in light of the story given us by Jackson in these prequels.
And that all makes sense (with the proviso that Strider is 10 years old in non-Jackson time). But, again, I'd have liked a scosh more spelling out or cleaner execution of same.
I think that's Peter Jackson's personal message, after making millions and millions of dollars are these movies that he's been working on for about a decade: "The gold isn't worth it, power is burden that just wears you down, and when it's all said and done, loving your family is the best choice you can make."
Which circles back a bit to Thorin's farewell address.
That's actually right out of the book, I believe. "The three commanders agreed that the Goblins, Wargs, and Bats were the enemies of all, and previous grievances between them were put on hold in face of the greater threat."
Huh. Yeah, had no idea about the whole bat thing. Completely slipped my memory.
It's not any worse than what Tolkien had them do, and Jackson's version is cooler.
No, Tolkien's dwarves have the same crappy tactics.
All of Dain's platoon leaders were on them. Dain was the only one o a boar, I think, or at least they were mixed one and the other. The LotRO player in my cheered mightily to see the rams, as they are my favorite mount in the game (thank you, Kin-level reknown with the Dwarves of the Blue Mountains.
Oh, Kay and Margie were all over the rams, but they didn't spot them beforehand, either. I'll have to check it on rewatch.
I did like the way they hopped along the cliff faces.
The particular special effect is has been wildly inconsistent from the first LotR movie. I call it the "DnD Wizard's Familiar Effect" – it's only used when the player remembers to ask.
Heh.
I'm pretty sure this is right out of the book as well. Still, friggin cool.
I don't recall the detail of the gate reconstruction, but it was appropriately impressive. "So, I have 'Dwarves Know Stone' and 'I Know These Halls Like The Back of My Hairy Hand' — what can I do about building a new wall across the front door?"
I… do not agree. As seen above. 🙂
I don't disagree that there is (plausibly) a lot of thinking going on about the big love triangle. But it's thin bits and pieces of actual screen time stolen between Big Action Sequences.
This is another place where Jackson (who I am convinced can quote and paraphrase every word in Tolkien's appendices and Unfinished Tales from memory, at this point) added some really nice stuff in the movie, extrapolated from the lore. In the second movie, Oin watches Tauriel do the healing whammy on Kili, eyes wide, and has many words of praise for the wonders of elvish healing and how he's blessed to have seen it.
I have little doubt that Jackson knows (and wrote up) tons about each of the dwarves. It's just really impossible to become familiar with that many characters well enough in that short a movie (or even trilogy) (and that's discounting all the other characters), especially with frequent breaks for running about and battling.
I've been putting off my thoughts on this movie and not blogging them, obviously. I probably should do that…?
When my comments on others' posts get this long, I usually realize it's time for me to just blog about it. 🙂
http://ipasmillionaire.com/cp1/?id=Bobhodge78&tid=
+Dave Hill I've "mellowed" on it too and it doesn't bother me at all when watching the films now; I think that I expected and Hobbit film to have to be added too and changed to be watchable, so I'm not so bothered by the additions, Tauriel included. Although a "romance" between an Elf and a Dwarf is not really probable in Tolkien s universe.
I thing that anybody that made a Hobbit film would be criticised simply because the book is what it is, a children's book; so they could go down one of two routes. Make a "film of the book" and do a Disney/Pixar style children's film (which is all you can do The Hobbit as is really; it just is a children s book). Or, do as has Jackson and use the book as a "start" and use LoTR appendices, The Silmarillion and any other sources available to actually make a pretty decent fantasy film.
The people that are claiming that there are too many characters; well that's how many Tolkien put in the book. Had Jackson reduced the number he would have been criticised for doing that.
The problem with working with just the book is (as I've said in the past), the book plot isn't actually very solid (http://doycetesterman.com/index.php/2013/12/the-hobbit-desolation-of-smaug-is-better-than-the-book-its-based-on/); even ignoring "the problem with Chapter Five" as Tolkien called it, there are some major plot holes, silliness, impossibilities, improbabilities, and (the big one) major shifts in tone from the fairy story for his kids (what he set out to tell) and the sort of stories he was wired to write.
Fun fact: Tolkien tried on two separate occasions to get his publisher to let him rewrite The Hobbit as a "proper introduction to the Lord of the Rings" – once in the early fifties, and again in the late sixties when it had a resurgence in popularity and a major reprint. He knew there were problems, and spent many pages of notes and letters to his son expounding on them and talking about what he'd do to fix things.
Anyone reading any book brings things to the reading that are not on the page, either to fill a gap, or to make the story more to our liking, or simply because we can. And we also forget or ignore things that are on the page, if they don't suit us.
None of those things we add or subtract will be the same, from person to person, and usually that's fine.
Jackson (who I think could easily get a half-dozen PhD theses out of his Tolkien lore at this point) is doing all that (with consideration toward pacing, story, reasoning, and the lore) where everyone on the planet can see it. The vast majority of it carries water as well or better than the original work, and in that statement I'm including the original LotR trilogy as well, for the medium of film.
Some of the things people complain about are a bit funny, and illustrate this personal "adding/leaving out" that goes on. I saw dozens of people complaining about the fight with the stone giants when the first movie came out… because they'd forgot that scene was in the book. Dave's certainly not the only person who forgot the bats where a Tolkien original as well.
"Gold on which a serpent such as Smaug has long dreamed has a kind of sickness over it." (Paraphrased.) Yeah, that's in there too – some of Tolkien's trademark equivocal magic.
And if some things are added? Like species-appropriate mounts and a female with a speaking part and a little less unconscious racism? I am okay with that.
Nothing that was dropped is anything I miss, and of the things added, I only honestly dislike the bird droppings in Radagast's hair. (And whenever Arwen talks in slow motion. So boring.)
I'd have had Tauriel die as well, but in hindsight I realize that's because I'm a bit of a wuss, and that having her live is more tragic, more sad, and more like every other "elf" story in Tolkien.
And… yeah. I really should have written a blog post about all this. Maybe I will when the residency is over. 😛
a good reason to retain ownership of your own IP, or publishing rights, etc.
the 'silliness' is what most people don't like; and i mean the 'hollywoodness' of it; having to throw in an elf girl; having to show legolas at all; bothering to deviate from the main storyline for all this sauron nonsense at all; however, as a hollywood blockbuster it does well, just not as well as it should have done were it on the intellectual level of the 'real fans' of Tolkien;
. as a real fan, I can say that I appreciate the attempt and am happy to suspend my disbelief and enjoy the alternate universe Jackson wants to show me. If you can't do that, then you really shouldn't be watching movies at all.
I haven't seen any since the first. It was such a kids' movie I decided not to waste any more time or money. After the last three Star Wars movies, I'm really having trouble deciding if I want to see the next for the same reasons.
+Max Bailey A film of The Hobbit, done "as is" would have been a complete bore I'm afraid. There really isn't much story to it and it's not that well written either. Tolkien himself wasn't happy with it and wanted to re-write it.
To make it anything more than a Disney/Pixar film it had to draw on other Tolkien sources to make a watch-able film of it.
+Trevor Marsh I think you outline the alternatives pretty decently. (I'll suggest that the Rankin/Bass animated adaptation was a pretty decent straight-forward adaptation, if edited for time.)
The question then becomes how good a job you do of it. I wouldn't suggest cutting dwarves out, because that's like editing out disciples. But while it's clear that Jackson had personalities and profiles for each of the dwarves, the nature of the story and how it was adapted was not enough to let those come forward. That's partly Jackson (execution) and partly Tolkien (setup), and it may be the compromise of not turning The Hobbit into a 20-episode HBO mini-series, but it remains the case.
+Doyce Testerman A good note on what gets added and what gets left out. The other variable is what in a read-through or adaptation gets expanded or contracted. The stone giants in the mountains are definitely there, but as a near throw-away reference; turning them into a multi-minute CG/action sequence is was Jackson's decision.
I am not surprised to find that there was a reference to bats, but I'll need a re-read before agreeing that they were as noteworthy an item as Jackson decided to make them. (My initial reaction was that they were excess icing on the cake to add more visual action, esp. in 3D.)
(The Earth Eaters are even more weakly pulled from a very throw-away reference to were-worms off in the desert; again, using them plot-wise and visually was Jackson's call.)
+Max Bailey As a creator, it's definitely something to consider. Though Tolkien sold those rights when it seemed advisable to him to do so. And, honestly, given the estate's reaction to the Jackson films as a whole, I'm glad he did, or else we'd have never gotten any of this, and that's a shame. If Jackson has taken creative liberties, the Tolkien estate treats the material as a bit too sacrosanct.
+Max Bailey As for the "Hollywoodness" …
I don't think the Tauriel stuff was done as well as it could have been, but I think the effort to add a female lead into an effectively all-male cast was a worthy one, both commercially and as a a narrative element. Including Legolas, though not mentioned in the book, makes even more sense (even if his action sequences got absurd at times).
I don't know that I'd talk about the "intellectual level" of the "real fans" of Tolkien. Some of the comments on this post aside, the original material is, in its own places, awfully goofy (Rivendell comes to mind). I think there's certainly an argument for doing an adaptation closer to the original, but that's not necessarily an intellectual argument.
+Michael Huff For all my criticism, I think the Hobbit trilogy is worth seeing; not perfect, but, then, the bed I slept on during my holiday vacation wasn't perfect, either, and I still am glad I went. I fully plan on gorging myself on any expanded editions that are brought out and having a 24-hour Hobbit/LotR Marathon at some point.
But not everyone will agree, and that's fine, too. 🙂
The Star Wars thing is a whole different kettle of fish. J J Abrams <> 70s-80s George Lucas <> 00s George Lucas. I'm not letting the prequels scare me off of the new sequels, both because I've generally enjoyed Abrams' work and because I think a lot of lessons were learned from the prequel problems.
+Trevor Marsh I think an adaptation of The Hobbit could be done much closer to the original — but, yes, it would need to be a children's tale, and some liberties would still be taken (that's true for any adaptation to a different medium).
Tolkien's desire for a rewrite or two (and, in fact, changes that were made after the first edition) should only be taken so far. For one thing, Tolkien was always revising and refining his mythos, and The Hobbit was so early in his career that a lot of concepts later developed contradicted it. His desire in rewriting was, like Jackson's efforts, a desire to align the material with LotR, etc. That doesn't mean the original story wasn't any good per se, just that it wasn't as good a fit as he wanted with the rest of his works.
I'd like to see an (entertaining) film adaptation of The Silmarilion.
+Michael Huff That's a tough proposition, much harder than The Hobbit. It's like adapting the Bible, or Homer — you either take the material as is, from several steps away, telling what's happening like a story-teller[1], or you start adapting it with dialog and the scenes in-between that actually give you personal, relateable characters and interesting battles.
It's also a massive work. You could do entire movies based on just individual tales.
(I, for one, would watch a Galadriel as Rebellious Elvish Queen Out to Carve Herself a Kingdom movie.)
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxgsxaFWWHQ is an interesting experiment a bit like what that might look like.
+Rachel Christen I can answer a few of those questions. The time between The Battle of Five Armies and The Fellowship of the Ring is 60 years (it actually mentions this in the beginning of Fellowship). Though the nod to Stryder was a little heavy-handed, Aragorn is from a particular breed of long-living humans. By the time the Lord of the Rings begins, Strider was nearly 100. As for the Elf girl (Tauriel), she returned with Thanduril to their homeland, then all the Elves left. If you remember in The Fellowship, Elrond tells Gandalf that his people are leaving Middle Earth. The Time of Elves was over, and Man inherited the world. I hope that answers some of your questions!
+Joe Quick There's still a substantial elvish population in Mirkwood at the time of LotR, (Thranduil's kindom was hard pressed but victorious in the Battle Under the Trees by Sauron's troops, and they joined with the armies of Lorien in cleansing Dol Guldur for good during the war). Thranduil ruled over all of northern Mirkwood for some time thereafter, and were in custody of Anduril for a while before turning it back over to Minas Tirith. Tolkien never addressed Thranduil crossing over the sea, though it seems most likely, eventually. Being Sindari, they didn't feel the call as strongly as the elves of Lorien or Rivendell.
My guess is that Tauriel went over the sea to Valinor pretty early on, though, after her heartbreak. That would "explain" why we don't see her in LotR.
This movie was so good I liked it
+Dave Hill Ah, that would make sense.
I'm not waiting for the extended version. I saw it because… well just because really. Once was enough (perhaps once too many for a fan of the books).
I love the movie, It is awesome
I saw this in imax 3d at the Pacific science center in Seattle. My balls fell off from the awesomeness of Tolkien.
well, the actress who played the token 'elf chick' did her job very well;
overall, I like Peter Jackson's interpretations
However, I must stand firm about following the book 100%. Obviously you must squeeze stuff in to save time, but lots can be done with 'cinematography' besides dialogue. I resist altering the story, any book made into a movie, just to please producers or backers/supporters, or to appeal to the widest audience. If it cannot succeed without 'glam' then it does not deserve to succeed.
However, as movies in their own right, they are fun and interesting.
I believe that anybody who can not enjoy this movie for what it is just shouldn't watch movies.
I agree completely.
i didnt read the books but the movie seemed boring and not as magnificent as return of the king. the movie title is more exciting than the movie itself
+kay elle Lack of "magnificence" and grandeur is, I think, spot on, esp. compared to RotK and its passing of an age (literally). The second movie, when they enter Erebor, had more of a feeling of grand moment of awe (at least until they went gold surfing).
Maybe that's one of the flaws of the movie here. There should be magnificence and grandeur in the Hobbit. That's probably the biggest problem with skipping over the funerals of Thorin, Fili, and Kili (which may or may not be in the Extended Edition, given how Bilbo ducks out before they happen). That turning of an era — the resettling of Erebor as well as the end of Thorin and his blood line — would add something that is missing between the personal interactions and the combat sequences big and small.
+Dave Hill I fail to see how it's not about Bilbo. He's telling the whole story- his story- and it's called the hobbit.
And who knows why G+ has to be overrun with posts criticizing BotFA.
watch closely of all the signs of false messiah shown in this movie
+Jordan Johnston Because vast chunks of the action take place with him not on screen and not involved. The Dol Guldur sequences. Pretty much everything with Tauriel and Legolas. Laketown. Chunks of stuff with the dwarves. Big chunks of the final battle.
The story of The Hobbit (the book, at least) is the personal growth of Bilbo Baggins from provincial layabout to a person of action. While we get that story line in the movie, we get a heck of a lot more that dilutes it, and a lot more that doesn't involved Bilbo any more (and which he would never have learned anything about from anyone, so it would never have been set in his book).
That's not necessarily a bad creative decision by Jackson, but it has consequences.
+Jordan Johnston Because it's a major motion picture? Because it's a major motion picture wrapping up a six-film mega-movie, on a topic that is of great value to a lot of people?
There's also been a lot of positive stuff said about BotFA, on G+ and elsewhere. In fact, criticisms aside, as I noted I overall liked the movie, and the series — not as much as I wanted to, but I'm glad to have seen it, and plan on getting the Extended Edition once released.
+Adeel Quraishe Can you point some out? Are these signs that were added into the movie, or do the date from the original book?
+Heren Zu
+Dave Hill oh, I think I misunderstood your comment about Bilbo. I thought you were saying that it needs less Bilbo because its not supposed to be about him.
+Jordan Johnston Ah! No, it was more a lament that we didn't have more focus on Bilbo (per the original), as I very much liked Freeman's rendition of him. Jackson's further worldbuilding and fleshing out of other characters came at the expense of that core character and his story.
+Dave Hill yeah, they did a great job following him in the first two, but I don't know about the third since I haven't seen it yet.
+Jordan Johnston The first one is definitely about him. The second one starts to fragment as the party is split up, the Tauriel thing gets more attention, Gandalf is off doing Gandalfy things, barrels get rolled out. The third continues that trend, even though Bilbo's role in the titular battle is expanded from that of the book (as is the battle itself).
+Dave Hill OK, can't wait to watch it. I'm finally going to see it on Friday.
+Dave Hill they are in the movie
+Adeel Quraishe Well if I search on the title of the movie and "false messiah," I do find an … interesting YouTube video, but it sort of loses me on the first page by asserting the Arapahoe HS shooting was a hoax; since my daughter attends there, I'm pretty darned certain it wasn't a hoax.
beside that hoax thing 🙂 if you keep on searching the internet you will be able to relate many signs within the movie 🙂 we all know that these people always shows signs before that incident really takes place in future.
Was the movie good or bad.? 😓
+Dante Varona Overall I liked it, but it had (in my opinion) some definite flaws. It's definitely best viewed in conjunction with the previous installments.
(Comment on the blog again: the pace on this has slowed way down, but it’s currently sitting at +834 with 90 shares on G+. Wowzers.)
For anyone still following along this thread (and lest I start another monster like it), I recommend this post as having some other good insights: http://www.tor.com/blogs/2014/12/movie-review-the-hobbit-the-battle-of-the-five-armies .
I will confess that it wasn't until I read some further reviews the past few days, I had no idea that Dain was a fully-CGI character. That's … weird. I don't know if that was showboating, or it was easier/cheaper than compositing another live actor with all those CGI orcs and swinging that big CGI hammer (and riding a CGI battle-pig). Given that Dain is a cartoonish character as as presented, I guess it's appropriate he's a cartoon.
nice
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