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The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

BadOctopus

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I haven't seen it yet. I think I'm going either today or tomorrow. I'm not holding out much hopes, though. I thought the first one was pretty good, and I found the second to be quite disappointing. I predict the third will be a ridiculously over-the-top CGI extravaganza which bears very little resemblance to the book. But I have been more than happy with Martin Freeman's portrayal of Bilbo, so I'm fairly confident that he, at least, won't let me down.

Has anyone else seen it? Care to share your thoughts? I don't think we really have to worry about spoilers. Most everyone knows how the book ends. I hope.
 

Totenkindly

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I've tried to avoid specifics in the reviews. The general consensus is "solid enough to cap the trilogy" but not very spectacular otherwise. IOW, the whole sequence -- something that had the potential to be amazing, especially with Freeman as Bilbo, and he does elevate the movie immensely -- was just kind of another box-office thing to occupy a Friday night.

People are also saying the Hobbit movies work better as a prequel to The Lord of the Rings ... more of the "same" without being as good... rather than being standalone as much as they could have been. It honestly did feel that way, with Gandalf and Galadriel and especially Legolas playing so prominently, etc.

I think I saw the first Hobbit the weekend it came out, and I saw Hobbit 2 the second weekend. I'll probably see this one by early january, I guess. Or not.


-----

How does it end?

A. Martin Freeman wakes up in bed with Suzanne Pleshette and says, "Honey, I've just had the CRAZIEST dream."

B. Saruman and Gandalf and Sauron play POGs for the fate of Middle-Earth. Saruman cheats; Sauron refuses to concede; Gandalf blows smoke rings and wanders off for mushrooms.

C. Legolas shoots everything from his never-ending quiver and dings all the achievements.

D. Thorin whines about how the Arkenstone (hocked to Bard) is rightfully his. After luring the dwarf with gold, Thranduil has his elf warriors hold him down and he shaves off his beard. The orc army dies laughing.
 

Arctic Hysteria

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I just went to see it.

A big fan of the LOTR trilogy as I am and though I did not really enjoy the first and second of The Hobbit, I did like this final part. It could not measure up to any part of its first trilogy, but it was thorough, consistent, visually pleasing and, thank goodness, there was no cheesy lines or cheap humor like in the last the 2 preceding parts.

I personally think it makes some sense to me that The Hobbit was made the sequel. I can't imagine feeling intrigued enough to go to another 3 parts about The Ring fellowship and Doom after all of these wars from Bilbo's time. LOTR has built such incredible fan base that marketing for these weaker 3 parts was breeze.
 

Codex

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I liked the first two, not so much the third one. I found it a little disappointing, tbf.
 

BadOctopus

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I liked the first two, not so much the third one. I found it a little disappointing, tbf.
I saw it last night, and I would have to agree. It was all flash, and barely any substance. The battle sequences and special effects were over-blown and absurd, like Peter Jackson was obsessed with trying to one-up the original trilogy. But visual bling just couldn't make up for the fact that the plot was thin and incoherent, and the "emotional" drama was totally contrived. About halfway into the movie, I pretty much stopped caring about what happened to any of the characters. That never happened when I watched The Lord of the Rings.

And what was up with Billy Connelly's character being completely CGI, for NO REASON? What was the point of that?
 

Chthonic

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The CGI extravaganza was thankfully brief with all the excitement over and done in the first 15mins of the movie. The rest? Pretty boring, zero character development, all action and not very good action at that. Kind of glad the whole saga is now over and done.
 

Passacaglia

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Another big Tolkien fan here. :)

I got a kick out of all three Hobbits, but no, they don't compare to the LotR. Best to think of them as a totally separate continuity and experience.

I personally think it makes some sense to me that The Hobbit was made the sequel. I can't imagine feeling intrigued enough to go to another 3 parts about The Ring fellowship and Doom after all of these wars from Bilbo's time. LOTR has built such incredible fan base that marketing for these weaker 3 parts was breeze.
I've been thinking about what I would recommend if someone asked me which to watch first. The Hobbits seem like the natural choice, but as you point out this runs the risk of making a fresh viewer give up before getting to the good trilogy. (Though if they do make it to the good stuff, it'll be that much better in comparison...) So maybe I'd recommend watching the LotR first; but this isn't as chronologically satisfying, and runs the opposite risk. ("Why'd you build up my expectations with the LotR and then crush them with the Hobbits?!")

The only remaining option I can think of is "Watch the LotR first, and if you have time to kill afterwards, here are three prequels. It's best to think of them as a different genre!"
 

Axwell

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Probably the worst of The Hobbit trilogy and the worst of the Middle-Earth trilogy. It was a fun ending to it, but it wasn't that spectacular and overall quite disappointing, although I probably went in with high hopes because of previous middle-earth movies. I really feel like they should have made it into a two parter rather than expanding it to three movies and adding in a bunch of subplots which aren't that good. It's still a good movie though, definitely worth the watch if you've seen the previous hobbits and enjoy the middle-earth movies.

I would give it a 7/10, still a good movie, not-so-good send off the trilogy and a step down in quality.

:bye:
 

Riva

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^ Agreed.

Shit movie, but even though a hundred people told me it is a shitty movie I would have still watched it.

And now that I watched it and realized it's a shitty movie I would watch it again because I am a fan of the LOTRs and the Hobbit.

I think it was obvious they were exploiting their fan base when they made three movies out of that small book but it paid off, all three were successful earners.

They could have kept the class and the money if they made only 2. But then again that would have meant $500Mn less than what they would have earned, so fuck my logic I guess.
 

Riva

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I wonder what Uber would have thought about this movie. Since I consistently disagreed with his reviews (I basically thought they sucked) I think it would be safe to assume he would like it.
 

Totenkindly

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And what was up with Billy Connelly's character being completely CGI, for NO REASON? What was the point of that?

Was he? I guess I wasn't paying attention.

---
Just watched it tonight in HD on VerizonFIOS.

I have to say, the color and detail was incredible even on streaming. I have a large-screen 3D high-end TV and I just found myself staring at the facial zooms because the detail was so exquisite. Still, it takes more than detail to make a movie.

Jackson often adds a few good touches to his movie. I like how Smaug left a straight swatch across Laketown on his first fiery pass. It gave a real sense of power of the dragon, a 5-second pass in a straight line and that part of the town is visibly gutted.

I like how Bard had to steady his arrow on his son's shoulder, which was just oddly sentimental and said something about their relationship.

I like how Thorin and Bard talked to each other through that long hole in the wall emphasizing their distance.

I like that Thranduil got a little depth at the end after being a total asshat throughout the series, by his few comments to Legolas and Tauriel that revealed that part of his coldness came from never getting over the loss of his wife.

I like they played the gate scene pretty close to the book, where Bilbo reveals what he did, and ends up having to go over the wall.

The pencil drawings in the credits were pretty cool and very lifelike.



I did NOT like how Galadriel turned all green and nasty glowing and stupid voice reverb again, for WHAT reason? She did this in LOTR and it was one of the stupidest things I'd seen. Why? Why? It doesn't even make thematic sense. And she's an elf -- she has inherent power due to the force of her spirit, but she's not a maiar like gandalf or saruman, so she and Elrond are not as powerful. It's just stupid.

I didn't like that Thorin could blame his gold lust on dragon fever. I think they should have made it less of a curse and more about Thorin's pride. Have some balls, let your characters actually struggle with the own evil within rather than being affected by some external dark magic.

I didn't like how Smaug had to give a freaking soliloquy to Bard. Would that have happened? no. I know you want to use Cumberbatch more if you get him in your movie, but really? I was also hoping the thrush would tell Bard about the dragon's weakness.

The fights themselves were okay (I thought the opening gambit with the elves coming over the shield wall, then the wall itself mobilizing and thrusting into the army was pretty cool!) but way too long and after awhile got to be a same-old same-old. And of course the endless fight with Azog and Thorin. Geez, just freaking kill each other and stay dead, okay?

I would also like to see a little more of Beorn, who only got one cool airdrop and nothing else -- I suspect he'll show up more in the Extended Edition.

And Albert. Oh albert, you're a hot mess.

Anyway, the end result: It was an okay movie. I liked some parts, I was indifferent to others. I also like Legolas, but this isn't his movie, thanks. Freeman as always was great. I like that Balin got so much spotlight, and it helps explain why Gimli was so heartbroken to find his tomb in LotR -- he was really a mentor to Thorin and the other dwarves.
 

Forever_Jung

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And what was up with Billy Connelly's character being completely CGI, for NO REASON? What was the point of that?

A wild guess but I know he sometimes struggles with his face freezing up, what with the Parkinson's and all that. Maybe he was having a rough time with his condition during the shooting?
 

highlander

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I haven't seen it yet. I think I'm going either today or tomorrow. I'm not holding out much hopes, though. I thought the first one was pretty good, and I found the second to be quite disappointing. I predict the third will be a ridiculously over-the-top CGI extravaganza which bears very little resemblance to the book. But I have been more than happy with Martin Freeman's portrayal of Bilbo, so I'm fairly confident that he, at least, won't let me down.

Has anyone else seen it? Care to share your thoughts? I don't think we really have to worry about spoilers. Most everyone knows how the book ends. I hope.

i saw it a few weeks ago and loved it.
 

Totenkindly

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A wild guess but I know he sometimes struggles with his face freezing up, what with the Parkinson's and all that. Maybe he was having a rough time with his condition during the shooting?

I didn't realize he had Parkinson's. That sounds like a pretty valid reason, if it were the case.
 

INTP

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Thanks for reminding me that this trilogy existed. Watched the second and third part today and they were pretty good(as was the first part, which i saw back in the days when it came out).
 

Totenkindly

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Looks like, as I thought, the Extended Edition release will have more Beorn. He was pretty terrifying in the ten seconds he got in the theatrical release. (Of course, not sure what they'll do with him exactly, since his role in the book version of the battle has already been supplanted...)

‘Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies’ Extended Cut Features 30 Extra Minutes

The Hobbit Extended Edition - Lord of the Rings Wiki (at the bottom of the page)

If all those scenes are true as rumored, it should flesh out things nicely.

--

Jackson's version of Saruman had him working for Sauron (in LotR) so one of the scenes here follows up on his face zoom where he says, "Leave Sauron to me" after they cast the Necromancer from Dol Guldor... and apparently Saruman finds him and a bargain is struck.

In Tolkien's version, of course, Saruman was a free agent -- he was breeding his own orcs, and was seeking the Ring for himself and thus thinking he could supplant Sauron. But I guess that would have been too confusing in the movie to somehow separate two "types" of orcs visually so that the audience could keep track of who was who and understand the dynamics properly; Tolkien could pull that off easier in the book. It was one of the intricacies that was sadly lost in the adaptation, as really Saruman/Curunír was too proud to serve Sauron (they were both Maiar of the west) and didn't want to serve, he wanted to lead; so the thing about orcs in LotR is that they were at odds with each other at some points in the plot, Saruman's orcs (marked with the White Hand, the "Uruk-Hai" bred to soldier) trying to take the hobbits to the White Tower while Sauron's orcs were trying to grab them himself.

[In fact, the interaction between various orc tribes were so contentious even on the same "side" that Frodo and Sam escape Cirith Ungol after the two groups of orcs slaughter each other to see who gets them. If the orcs had gotten along, Sauron would have likely won.]

It suggests here that Saruman was bitter over Círdan giving Narya (the elven ring of fire) to Gandalf when they arrived at the Grey Havens from the West. The rings were all closely guarded by the greatest elves remaining in Middle Earth, and it's easy to guess who had two of them because they ruled realms of great beauty: Elrond bore one (Vilya, the ring of air), and Galadriel bore another, which we see a lot of in Jackson's movies (Nenya, the ring of water). According to one source, Círdan (the lieutenant of the great elf lord Gil-Galad who perished alongside Elendil in the battle where Sauron was originally overthrown and the One Ring taken from him) was entrusted with Narya (the ring of fire) by Gil-Galad.

When the Istari arrived to guide and advise the Middle Earth denizens in the Third Age against the rising evil, Círdan recognized Olórin's need and gave him Narya, because it possessed the power to kindle the flame of their hope against the darkness and he knew that the wizard (who we know as Gandalf) would have need of its strength and sustenance.

Apparently Saruman was aware of this, in Jackson's version, which leads to him betraying the White Council and Middle Earth.

Since I knew backstory, the fight in Dol Guldor was interesting because I was aware that -- theoretically -- all three Elf Rings were present in that small square where they were facing off against the preincarnate ringwraiths and the Necromancer AKA Sauron (although maybe Jackson didn't do that? Because wouldn't they have taken the ring from Gandalf if he had had it? Or maybe that was a plot blip?) But yes, if the story runs true, Gandalf and Galadriel and Elrond were all present. But Jackson really only highlighted the presence of Nenya, the ring of water.
 

Retmeishka

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I've never really enjoyed war scenes that much. I can't really follow what's going on fast enough to understand it and care about it. I went to this movie with my boyfriend, and he was saying things like, 'Wow, that was really cool how he impaled himself on the other guy's sword so he could get close enough to stab him,' and I was like, 'Wait, when did that happen? I didn't even see that!' I just see people moving around in a blur waving weapons around. I would not be a very good fighter. So, this entire movie was basically just incomprehensible and uninteresting for me.

Not only that, but I forgot about various characters dying, because it had been so long since I read the book, and so I was all looking forward to a happy ending where nobody died. Oops.

A lot of times, when I see people fighting in a big melee, I can't tell who's who, or which side they're on. So I have no sense of the importance of this moment. It is totally insignificant and meaningless to me. I can't say, 'Wow, Big Huge Important Character X, with all of his motivations and his history, is, right this very moment, having an epic battle against Big Huge Important Character Y! This is awesome!' Instead I'm like, 'Okay, some guy who might be one of the good guys, I guess, I can't really see who that is - oh, he's dead now, okay, moving on.'

This has ALWAYS been a problem for me when I watched any kind of war-battle movie. It was horrible when I was required to watch those sorts of historical movies back when I was in school. I had absolutely not the foggiest clue who was who and what was going on and why it mattered, and I could never answer any questions about the movie afterwards. 'A bunch of people fighting' is my summary.

Even though my boyfriend was able to understand what was going on a bit better than I could, he still didn't really love the movie that much, but then, he hadn't read any of the books and didn't have all the backstory and all that, so it wouldn't have been as meaningful. It was kind of funny and awful when a friend of the family came to visit at his parents' house and invited him out to see this movie again, only a couple days after he and I had seen it together. Both of us were suppressing the urge to tell him that he had already seen the movie, and so he ended up going and seeing it again. I guess he would have had to pretend to be surprised by everything that was happening. So neither he, nor I, felt that it was the type of movie we would want to see over and over and over again - and yes, I do in fact go to see movies multiple times if I like them, sometimes a shocking number of times (that is, when I have money and can afford to waste it on going out to the movies).

About me not being able to watch a fight and understand it: I don't have any problems with my eyesight or anything, but for some reason, I just can't pay attention to hundreds of moving objects in a big mess of chaos, and be able to tell which objects are threatening to me so that I can dodge them, and which objects are a vulnerability so that I can stab them. My brain just can't process that.

In that respect, I am a typical girly female. When they study the differences between the *average* men's and women's brains (I emphasize 'average,' because there are many exceptions to this general rule), they find it really is true that women aren't as good at the things associated with fighting battles.

On the other hand, there is something I can do which I think is an amazing ability of the brain and the visual processing center: I can recognize particular growing plants that are edible or useful, amongst a mess of weeds, if I am moving past this mess of weeds really quickly - the familiar edible/useful plant shapes just jump right out at me, no matter what kind of chaos is in the background. They're not moving in a three-dimensional field and attacking me.

Well, and another thing about the fighting. I'm always thinking to myself, like the sneaky evil terrorist that I am, that there must be some other way to get in and fight the battle, without doing it in a big mass on this open field. I'd rather see somebody sneak in and sabotage something without warning them. So I was much more fascinated with the plot of Frodo and Sam going - wait, wrong movie, well, you get the idea, Frodo and Sam going in to destroy the One Ring. Or Luke Skywalker and all of them shooting a bomb through the little ventilation shaft thingy and destroying the Death Star (seriously? what kind of idiot would design a Death Star like that?). I like that kind of fighting. The melee on the open field just seems so horribly wasteful to me. You can't just throw people away like that.
 

Totenkindly

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It does seem kind of crazy. From a general's perspective, it's all just numbers and troops and forces; but each one of those soldiers has had a long, unique life, and for some of them their story will end needlessly on the battlefield. So depending on your view, you either look at broad troops and outcome and winning is what spells success; but from another view, it's always a destruction of irreplaceable lives.

Typically watching a war movie, you just learn to recognize a few key people in the story and ignore the rest (because it's too hard to focus on the swirling detail) or you use an eagle-eye view to watch people move as units versus individuals. And strategic placement of the units, all things being equal, can give you a clue as to how the overall battle is going. For example, here I really only paid attention to Thorin, Dain, Bard, Thranduil, and a few of the dwarves I recognized from the company, but many of the individual soldiers are just things in the battle that either fall or stand. It goes by too quick to focus on everything.

Anyway, that is what Thorin was trying to do, taking a few dwarves up to Ravenhill. And it kind of worked.
 
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