There isn't anyway around these movies being bloated, self-indulgent, too long, and padded out with unnecessary material to cash grab more blood from the stones. There just isn't. But I don't think they're anywhere near as soul-crushingly terrible as the PT. There's still some good stuff-pretty much any time they're actually sticking to the book-and that's too much solid material for me to write them off. It should've been one movie which was 3 hours with an EE. There isn't any way around that. But there're still too many brilliant bits even so far-the Gollum sequence, the Spiders, Bilbo verbally sparring with Smaug, the Dol Goldur sequence, the Rivendell scene-to say it's worthless. Whether they're worth working through the padding is going to be a more individual judgment, especially given the CG overload (Remembef how good Lurtz looked when they used real makeup?) Hopefully now that all of the nonsense is out of the way, this one will turn the cards over and get to the good stuff.

Then stick to the books. Jackson is linking these to his first trilogy NOT the books. People really need to let go of that shit. You want what's in the books then stick with the books. You want something different then the movies are for you. It's really simple and I don't care if he deviates from the source material.

I don't care either. I've never read any of them so all I have as a source are the film themselves. From what I've seen though... it does seem like Jackson has issue w/ realizing that jamming as much as he can does bloat the films to be more fat than meat.

The only thing I can't disconnect (concede) from the written works and film length is that Tolkien wrote a shitload on this mythology, so Jackson putting the fat in is fine. It makes sense. The more the merrier, imo.

I don't mind going and rewatching the movies again, but from what I remember, I never had a problem with the length. The more world-building there is, the better, in my mind. But no, I haven't read the books.

Maybe for you but as a film I do feel there is a issue in pacing and structure for the narrative. If all that stuff he is putting in was good, I'd be fine. But it's not.

The non-book stuff is actually my favorite part.

The truth is, The Hobbit is a really fucking dull book. It is little more than a goofy children's tale, and if Tolkien had never written The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit and Tolkien would have been forgotten.

No offense Snake but do you read any source material before you see the movie? I don't always do it myself, but if it's something high profile I tend to do it to see if it will enhance my enjoyment. In this case, it actually detracted, but more often than not, it helps.

I for one can't get enough Middle Earth. Read the books numerous times, was overjoyed to get LOTR on film, now I'm overjoyed to get The Hobbit on film. Held out for the extended versions, will hold out for the extended version of BoFA. I'm having a blast with these...

Not for the films. Usually I've read the book before and now it's a movie or turns out there is a movie about it and i'm going to watch it at some point. Or I've never read it and the film is coming out. I keep mental note about it but rarely read them by the time the film comes out.

a film doesn't need the book to enjoy it. The source text is its own thing and the adaptation is another. I can think that they should have put this in or left that out when I'm watching the film but inherently my thoughts just lie in whether what I'm watching is good and/or entertaining.

Reading the Hobbit would never make me think anything different towards what I think of the films' quality. They are bloated. There is stuff in there that is rather needless form a narrative structure. So all I can criticize are the films from the standpoint of them being films.

And as much as I like the source material - knowing that it's also bloated and whatnot - it's forgivable that the films are, too. In a good way. Tolkien's worlds are vast and the films do a good job in conveying that even if they're not exactly like the books. If you were to read the LOTR and Hobbit novels and some of the Appendices you would get it. Maybe.

Fuck narrative structure. It's a film romp not a thesis. It's entertaining. Sometimes that shit trumps all else.

Yeah, the actual narrative is not what made the books so engrossing. It's the sense that the narrative was taking place in such a rich world replete with a vast amount of lore that we only get a glimpse of in the actual stories.

In The Hobbit, Gandalf simply kept disappearing without so much as a word. When the characters would call him on it upon his many returns, he simply stated that he was attending other matters that were far beyond them and more grave than the issue with the dragon. It's only through the Appendices that you find out about the Necromancer, the White Council, and the destruction of Dol Guldur. It's really fascinating stuff that is not in the story proper. These movies have found a way to merge them as well as include a character that was omitted in the adaptation of The Lord of the Rings (Radagast).

You want bloat. Google "Tom Bombadil" and see what we were sparred when Peter Jackson and his screenwriters wisely omitted him from LotR.

Exactly. I think the passage of time was annoying in both The Hobbit and LOTR (books), because Gandalf would leave for fucking YEARS and then return. The films got it right in that he would leave on different matters and be gone for days or a few weeks. Among other things. The one thing we won't get out of Peter Jackson's Tolkien-verse are the Blue Wizards due to rights issues. Granted, I don't think they ever did anything of significance in the books anyways.

Gandalf mentioned the blue wizards in the first Hobbit movie. They had a gag about his not remembering their names. This is due to Tolkien never naming them. Also, they didn't do much. I forget what region the left to (South, I think) but recall that they formed magic worshipping cults. That's it. I think the Necromancer was initially believed to be one of those magic practitioners but I need to re-read the Appendices.

Yeah, he mentioned them in passing but couldn't refer to their color.

No. He said "and then there are the Blue Wizards... You know, I've quite forgotten their names."

I think that Tolkien came up with names for them in The Book of Lost Tales, but they couldn't be used in the movie because they weren't specifically named in the appendices, and of course Christopher Tolkien won't sell anything else. That said, my understanding is that Tolkien never revealed much information about them, even in apocryphal tests, just that there were five. Isn't Gandalf the only one who's given any major development, and Saruman and Radaghast are only talked about sporadically? Maybe it was something that he wanted to get to before he died?

I decided to Google this and it turns out their names were Alatar and Pallando.

Yeah, something like that. I'm getting the order confused. It was a neat acknowledgment non-acknowledgement.

We snuck out to see the first Hobbit movie when my wife and I happened to both be home on an afternoon (she was home from work for some reason, I can't remember). Never got around to the second and I doubt we'll see the third in the theater, either. Finding a babysitter for two kids for extra-long movies is extra-expensive.

In one of the extras Jackson confirms they did not have the legal right to use the names of the Blue Wizards so they included that as an inside gag. Pretty clever!

The Dol Goldur stuff is not in the book--someone above said their favorite parts were from the book and included that, but it was not part of the text other than Gandalf disappearing.

It's found in the Appendices. Just not the book proper.

Also, the movie screws up the timeline (particularly the extended cut of The Desolation of Smaug) since Gandalf received the map and key from Thrain in Dol Guldur before he had Thorin, Bilbo, and the other 12 Dwarves set out to reclaim Erebor. That and Dol Guldur fell during the War of the Ring.

I should clarify--I meant that the Dol Goldur stuff is not in The Hobbit. You are correct that it is in the appendices to The Lord of the Rings, and since they own the film rights to that work they are able to use it.

Track listing for the score. It seems "The Last Goodbye", as sung by Billy Boyd, will be used in the film proper. I don't particularly like that. That song should be exclusive to RotK.

My understanding is that "The Last Goodbye" is a new composition to be performed over the final credits. The song from ROTK is apparently titled "The Edge of Night." (I had to look it up.) It was used over one of the trailers for this film, however.