The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug…and desolation of the fans?

I saw The Hobbit this past Saturday. I had high hopes going in. The trailer was promising. I had mixed feelings. If you do not know the plot of The Hobbit, I encourage you to go pick up the book. It’s short and you’ll get the gist of the three movies. Then go read the Appendices and you’ll get the extra bits they’ve been adding in. This movie begins with the dwarves meeting Beorn and ends with Smaug heading off to lay waste to Laketown.

This is Bard. He was great. I loved him.

What I Hated:

Okay, one of my favorite parts of the book was Beorn and the way that they gain his help. Gandalf is tricky and super sly. It is magnificent. However, in the movie, they are running from the orcs and just barge into his house with no explanation at all. It was possibly the second biggest disappointment that Jackson has ever given me, the first being the complete lack of Tom Bombadil in the LOTR movies. It was especially disappointing given the fact that a lot of time was given to plot lines not in the book, like Tauriel.

I was unsure of the presence of Legolas and the She-Elf, Tauriel. I actually liked both of them being in the movie, but I hated her weird love story with Kili. She saves his life from the spiders and then from the orcs and then from the poisonous Morgul wound. That’s not to say that Kili doesn’t hold his own in these fights, but she does save him in the end. When they exchanged war stories, I hoped that their relationship would be mere friendship. Tauriel is a lowly Silvan Elf and Legolas is fond of her, but she could never be with him. I thought that she liked him because she could sympathize with the way that they were treated. When she runs to save him after learning he was poisoned, I again put it down to her liking him as a person. But after he is healing he says, “Can she ever love me?” and all hope was lost. I’m a little bit more than upset over what they’re setting up. A romance triangle is heading our way in the last installment of The Hobbit. Prepare yourself for angst. It will come to nothing, though. I have a feeling that dear Tauriel will die alongside Kili in the last battle.

What I loved:

I know several people that disliked the fact that Jackson decided to make three movies, shortening the bits that we love (aka BEORN) and adding in stuff from the Appendices. I actually loved the extension of Gandalf’s story. We get to see how they route Sauron from taking form and pushing back his return a bit. Gandalf’s battle with the darkness was one of my favorite parts of the movie.

Right before the epic battle between Gandalf and Sauron.

I also liked Tauriel’s character. It was important that a female character be introduced to an otherwise male dominated story. I think that her position and character were all well-done. And I liked her sympathy to the dwarves until it became a point of love, as mentioned above. I think that Tauriel would have fit right into to Tolkien’s world.

Thorin’s slow decline into greed is excellently portrayed. The minute he sees all the gold, I almost screamed, “NO!” because you could see it all over his face. Greed was in his heart and was spreading all throughout him.

The best part of the movie, however, was Smaug. He gave me chills. I thought I would have nightmares. The graphics were excellent and Benedict Cumberbatch was phenomenal as his voice. When I was a kid I was frightened of the dragon, but childish fears fade away as we grow older. This brought them back with a vengeance. Smaug was cunning and evil. He was all that he should have been. I have to say, the thing that got me was the way he moved. He was so fast and swiveled a lot. It creeped me out. He definitely stole the show.

Overall:

The last line of the movie outraged everyone in the theater, because it ends with Smaug going to destroy Laketown, which is a fairly climactic event. However, I liked the cliffhanger. I won’t when the movie comes out on DVD and we can’t see the end, but it made me excited for the next installment. I liked the movie overall. I didn’t touch on this earlier, but Lee Pace was an AMAZING Thranduil. The minute he appeared on screen, I freaked because he was all I could have hoped for. He was completely ethereal. The good outweighed the bad, and I think that Jackson truly is doing a terrific job. I wasn’t entirely desolated.

Have you seen The Hobbit? Were you desolated?