My only complaint about the hobbit is that it is almost completely digital, even the concept art is digital!!

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I don't really see how that causes you a problem. 90% of what is happening on screen is impossible to capture in reality. How many trolls, orcs , wargs and oh yeh dragons do you see wandering around these days?

Hmmm dragons might be a bad example as I see one every day although that can't really be helped as I'm married to her. Lol jk but seriously what more do you want?

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DMS said:


What an epitaph... she'll burn him to a crisp

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ssssh don't draw attention to it! The great eye sees all lol

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DMS is right. A good deal has to be CGI because you just cannot go on set and film a live Smaug! Trolls, wargs, and dragons have to be digital. Also certain places and landscapes have to be at least half computer environment.

As we mentioned earlier though, The Hobbit series shares a lot in common with the second Star Wars series, among that overuse of CGI. Some times things have to be digital, but that doesn't mean everything has to be digital. There is nothing like a real set with real actors hitting each other (with real swords)! In the Hobbit, you can see actors on digital sets, waving about plastic sticks which will later be magically transformed by Weta Digital into real weapons. Whatever happened to PJ's combat approach in the LotR? The actors used to really fight with each other, (breaking arms, ankles, ribs, etc.) The idea was that they just fought and PJ shot the best action. In the Hobbit, everything is planned out and digitalised. The actors rehearse their moves with invisible enemies, (which will be added digitally later) and fight scenes end up looking more like complex dances or waltzs than brutal action. Not to say the PJ didn't sometimes have to do this with the LotR, but in the Hobbit it is now his main approach.

Best example of stupid use of CGI would be Dian. Why would you delete such a cool actor as Billy and replace him with a digital clone of himself? Maybe there were complications which didn't allow Billy to be himself, but it just shows that PJ is too willing to make everything digital. Why make Bolg digital when his old self in a costume was so much more convincing? Why do nearly all the orcs need to have digital faces?

Read this article were Viggo Mortenson himself criticises The Hobbit's CGI.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film ... r-CGI.html

Its always kinda taboo to say anything against PJ and his films, but here it is straight from one of his actors and someone who knows what he's talking about.

Elladan & Elrohir

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Have to agree regarding the digital issues - even if not paying specific attention to it, the Hobbit movies simply didn't feel as real as the LotR ones did.. and that's not least because much of what you saw was indeed not real. Orcs are the biggest issue, but various monsters (or parts thereof) were made for the LotR movies as well. It has been a good while since I watched any of the behind-the-screens stuff, but there certainly was a big Treebeard construction for Merry and Pip to sit on, and at least the howdah for the Mûmak was made as well. As it was now, Goblin Town and nearly the entire Battle of the Five Armies felt like a video game, but not being in control of one of the characters, there was no way to be immersed in the world (even on the big screen). Obligatory 3D may not have helped either, as it creates an even more artificial appearance.

NOT ENOUGH BIGATURES!!

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No amount of debating changes the fundamental fact of whether you walked out of the cinema saying "yes" or "dear god no".

If you don't like a film, instinctively, then lots of little things pop out at you and you say "I don't like this film because...".

Tauriel. Too much CGI. Not enough of my favourite character. Why is this the Legolas Show? etc.

If you do like the film some things may niggle at you a bit, but generally you'll be willing to go with it, and wonder what all the naysayers are moaning about.

The fact though, is that you like the film or dislike it based on instinct, and then try to justify why afterwards. If you don't like a film it'd be odd, in a conversation about it, to concentrate on the things you did like. You didn't like it, regardless of those things. It's not that you don't notice them. It's simply that they weren't enough to sway your opinion.

I love Lord of the Rings. There are a few bits (I'm looking at you Legolas) which make me cringe, but generally speaking I don't notice them too much because I'm "sold" on the spectacle.

I don't love the Hobbit films. Well, like most people here I thought AuJ was a good film but thought the last two sucked.

I think that by normal standards of judgement though, it's fair to say that DoS is not a very good film, and BotFA is actually a bad one. As has already been mentioned, it's a VERY bad sign when three major characters die and you feel absolutely nothing. That's an alarm bell that something has gone wrong.

We can debate the finer points of including love stories, absence of material with favourite characters, story changes and additions, and all the rest of it. But what it really comes down to is whether you have an engaging story with characters that you care about, or you don't.

I actually think Legolas and his inclusion is a very good example of what went wrong in the Hobbit films generally.

1. It makes perfect sense in a film adaptation to include Legolas in the story.
2. Adding Legolas for his own sake adds absolutely nothing to the story whatsoever, so something more needs to be done to justify his screen time.
3. Jackson could have, but chose not to, weave Legolas in to the story in a more meaningful way than "oh look, here's someone you know from the other films".
4. Legolas was instead used to provide more "awesome" (actually that's spelled "aaaahhhsummmmm").

Throughout the film I think this is the issue- The inclusion of things for their own sake, and not because they serve the story in any way. In the end we're left with a bunch of visually impressive but emotionally barren scenes, glued together to make a film that we don't really care too deeply about.

I can go further, and say that I think the films begun to open up a number of interesting story elements but failed to make me care about many, or even any of them. This is due to the massive overuse of action in BotFA while they should instead be setting up the resolution of the plot points they had begun.

I did not like or care about most of the major characters. The character development was better than the book, certainly. But I still had no stake in the story of at least half of the major characters.

Lets compare that to Lord of the Rings.

What about the much vilified swapping of Arwen in place of Glorfindel?

1. Arwen does exactly the same job as Glorfindel, leaving the overall story totally unchanged.
2. The inclusion of Arwen helps us recognise and care about her character, who basically does nothing useful whatsoever in the book, but is important nonetheless (you can do that in a book- you can't do it in a film).
3. The inclusion of Arwen helps in the characterisation of another female character, of whom there are very few in LotR.
4. The inclusion of Arwen introduces us to her and Aragorn's love story in the most filmic way possible: "show the audience, don't tell them". We buy the love story because of their interaction in the forest in a way which we would not if we were simply told "they're in love".
5. It also powerfully demonstrates the tragedy of the Elves leaving Middle Earth which is an important theme in LotR.
6. Not only does it do this effectively, but it is neat and efficient, swapping out one more character who we will never be able to properly know or care about for another who is integral to the plot, our understanding of Aragorn's character, and the full implications for elves of destroying the ring.

So instead of including a change purely to justify an action scene we have an intelligent change which serves to deliver the SPIRIT of the story in many different ways. This is really good filmic storytelling and adaptation- they are trying to condense the spirit of the book down in to smaller plot elements which can be demonstrated on screen.

Or you could, you know, have a blonde elf skateboard down things for no good reason.

I find myself in a position where I don't really consider the last film a film at all. It's more of a cinema located rollercoaster ride where a whole load of visually impressive and exciting stuff that I basically don't really care about happens.

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Dain was digital because Billy Connelly got injured before filming began, so they couldn't do too much with him.

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The way I see it is that The Hobbit was considered a safe bet so PJ was just surrounded by yes men. It didn't garner the critical appeal that LOTR did, and I'll wager that it won't stand the test of time either.

Main problems I can see is that PJ was flying by the seat of his pants making them. You can see the havoc this played with the merchandise alone - last minute changes etc. There is also the lack of a pay-off in BOFA as it peaks in the first act. Characters are introduced and abandoned. There was also lots of cheap gags. Perhaps these films would have been better if PJ went back to his Bad Taste roots for another project before embarking on this. Severe amount of shark-jumping too. Too many ravines in the first one, the barrels in the second, and legolas in the third. Ultimately though, it was the lack of orientation around Bilbo Baggins that was the fatal flaw. BOFA was the only one I didn't go and see twice. Should have been two movies.

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I see the Hobbit series as flawed in multiple locations.

1) Ridiculous fight scenes where they attempted to be comical, come on yes Legolas is powerful but is he going to stand on a dwarfs head? You have to remember that there is an ancient hostility between the two races after Thingol and the battles of the Simarils.

2) Sauron was not at Dol Gudur during the battle. He fled to Mordor before and just left his Nazgul behind. Although I will admit they did do well on the Nazgul. That whole scene just gets ridiculous.

3) Much of the Lord of the Rings is panoramic shots of beautiful scenery and the Hobbits dont really do a lot of that.

4) We want a story, not just CGI, action, hodgepodge love stories and an attempt at crude or slapstick humor. I love that he included extra stuff from the unfinished Tales but he just goes overboard and it takes away from the Hobbit.