The Desolation of the Hobbit or The Many Reasons Why Sticking to the Book is Your Best Option

In which Hannah shockingly and blasphemously admits to hating something related to Tolkien. GASP!

Do not read this post if you haven't seen the Hobbit. It contains more spoilers than River Song's journal- and that's saying a lot. You have been warned.

Also, this is a grumpy and sometimes angry review. So if you loved the movie and don't enjoy reading long rants about things you like then you should probably ignore my no-always-so-humble opinion. It's easy to get a bit carried away when you have a passionate dislike for something.

I went into this movie a tiny bit worried but a whole lot excited. An Unexpected Journey was really, really great and to be honest I expected nothing less from Peter Jackson. Despite the nagging fear in the back of my mind about Tauriel I was confident that it would be a great movie. I have never been so wrong in all my life.

The movie began with Thorin and Gandalf meeting in Bree. It was a fine scene, nothing spectacular but definitely one of the best in comparison to what was to come. Basically at this point I was freaking out because "hey the movie I've been waiting for for a year is finally starting!" and "oh my goodness Richard's voice is beautiful." cough cough. Anyway...

Then comes the company being chased by orcs. And that's where it started going down hill. Like I said, that Bree scene was one of the only ones I particularly liked. Beorn was rushed. I was disappointed that Gandalf didn't introduce the dwarves like he had in the book. Basically the scene went like this: Oh look a bear! Run away! Here's a house where we'll be safe, by the way it belongs to the bear. Hello Beorn, we were just leaving. I don't know that we had more than 10 minutes with Beorn before we were traipsing through Mirkwood.

My chief complaint with Mirkwood was NO BOMBUR AND THE RIVER. I was looking forward to that! And there wasn't any chasing of the elves in search of food either. Although not everything about Mirkwood was bad. I was pleased with the spiders, and the scene with the butterflies in the tree was nice. But of course it didn't last very long. Soon the dwarves were captured and standing in front of Thranduil. Beorn and Mirkwood, two scenes I expected to take at least an hour, probably only took about a half an hour. I should have known they were saving screen time for later deviations.

Thranduil is a bit...odd. The way he jumps in Thorin's face was kind of weird, in my opinion. Also, what's with that weird invisible scar thing? I don't get it. Needless to say, it wasn't in the book. Oh and look who it is! The star of the movie... Tauriel. Oh wait, you say, I thought the movie was about Bilbo, heck it's even named after him! No, I'm pretty sure Tauriel gets just as much (if not more) screen time as our dear hobbit. She's the pretty, lower-class girl who enthralls the prince and kills more orcs than the rest of the elves combined. I'm sorry, but no. I was willing to over look this addition if she was used well. If she remained a minor character with some character depth who disappears after Mirkwood and doesn't come back again until the battle in the third movie. I mean of course there could have been a female elf character in Mirkwood during the Hobbit. Tolkien didn't give us the names of every elf present. But instead of a strong elven princess, we got a stereotypical "we need kick-butt women in movies or else no girls will relate to the movie- also love triangles. Chicks dig love triangles." character. Where was her character depth? I don't think she had any.

And Legolas? I was worried that he would turn into a major character and so it happened. I truly believe that Legolas and Tauriel are only in this movie because the directors/producers/writers are trying to connect to the girls in the audience. Like I said, if they remained minor characters in only a few scenes I would have been content. But of course we need to have lots of screen time for the good looking elves and their wicked-awesome moves. That's what we're here to see, right? Their fighting scenes irk me. I felt like I was watching a Marvel movie and not the Hobbit. Legolas standing on top of the dwarves in the barrels while shooting orcs? I don't think so. I love how real the battle scenes in LotR felt, despite all the fantasy creatures. The fight scenes in this movie didn't feel real to me. Which brings me to...

Barrels out of bond. Martin Freeman was great. I enjoyed the way he sent the dwarves into the river and then realized he was stuck. Those are the sorts of additions to the book that I enjoy. However, I didn't care at all for the way their escape turned into a three way battle between elves, dwarves, and orcs. I didn't actually find Bombur's barrel fighting that amusing, but maybe that's because I was starting to get really annoyed with Legolas and Tauriel.

Laketown was pretty good. The look of the town was very medieval and I really enjoyed that. The master was also a good character although his side kick was annoying and too reminiscent of Grima. I enjoyed Bard's family. What was really worrying me at this point was Kili. When Thorin left behind  so many of the dwarves I couldn't stop asking myself why. Why, Peter Jackson? What do you think you're doing? And then the orcs attack and Legolas and Tauriel come to rescue everyone. No! I thought we were done with them. And then the whole Kili-Tauriel-Legolas relationship was downright silly. She saves his morgal wound with Athelas/Kingsfoil (aye that's a weed) and starts to glow. Sound familiar? Yeah, I thought so.

I think I could have overlooked and even forgiven all of these things if it hadn't been for the ending of the movie. Naively, I thought to myself that once Bilbo encountered Smaug the movie would revert to the book. They wouldn't rewrite such an iconic scene as Bilbo encountering Smaug, would they? Apparently, I'm not the brightest bulb in the box. It started off well; the dragon looked AMAZING, the lines were familiar lines from the book, and Martin Freeman proved again that he is the perfect candidate for Bilbo. But things began to go downhill the instant Bilbo removed the ring. I was a little worried (I mean in reality wouldn't Smaug just have killed him on the spot?), but that was still okay. So you want to be able to get rid of the weird, smoky ring effect. I understand. But when Thorin and the dwarves come barging in I officially lost it. So you mean to tell me that after all these years the forge still works perfectly and the dwarves manage to melt a metric ton of gold in basically five minutes? Not only was this wildly amiss from anything in the book, it was also the most unrealistic and pointless scene I have watched in a long time. The chances of the forges still working after all these years are less than 1%. The chance of Smaug, the clever, sly, and evil dragon not being able to stop them? Absolutely nonexistent. And then that part when Thorin ends up on Smaug's snout and Smaug doesn't just eat him on the spot? What, is Smaug a dog performing tricks or something? It makes me pretty furious. Yet another addition to the book which was completely unnecessary and way out in left field. I was ready for this nightmare to end, and thankfully it did shortly thereafter.

I'm not even going to talk about the Gandal/Necromancer scenes, or how much I hate Azog and Bolg,  or the way the CGI effects often made the movie feel too much like an animated movie. I don't have all day to write this review and I'm sure you've gotten the picture by now. "Hannah is certainly getting worked up over a little old movie."

Let me set this straight. I am not so obsessed with the books that I die when any little detail is changed. The Lord of the Rings movies have been my favorite movies all my life and there were plenty of changes made in them. Even the first Hobbit movie had changes made and I still loved it. But the majority of the storyline needs to remain untouched and the feel of the story needs to remain untouched. And the changes have to make sense. The Desolation of Smaug didn't feel like the Hobbit at all. I mean Bilbo was hardly in it, for goodness sake!

But I can't let you finish reading this and think that I hated every ounce of the movie. I did like bits and pieces of it: the Bree scene was nice, the spiders were done very well, and the dragon looked and sounded great. I loved the way its chest glowed before it breathed fire. The scenery was stunning as you would expect in New Zealand. And of course the soundtrack is stellar. Howard Shore does not disappoint. And the acting was quite good. It's just the story line itself that was bad. Too many bad changes. Too little character development. Too many over-the-top fighting moves and CGI effects. Tolkien was an amazing story-teller and there's a reason why the parts that stick close(ish) to the book are the best parts.

This movie has everything that audiences want: lots and lots of action, superhero moves, a love triangle, a good-looking rebel, and a woman who's just as good of a fighter as any man thank you very much. It's getting great reviews and doubtless it will make millions of dollars. But this movie isn't the Hobbit, and that's what I wanted to see. Here's to hoping a fools hope that the third one turns out better.