Stupid Fat Hobbitses
The real star of the show
Ever since the last Harry Potter movie was split in two, it’s become standard practice for studios to try to eke out an extra installment from their big franchises. This is intended, of course, to maximize profits, but at least in the case of Harry Potter, there was some narrative justification. Those books kept getting longer, and the movies had become little more than summaries. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was a massive book and had a lot of plot threads to tie up, so the money-grab wasn’t too annoying.
The Hobbit, on the other hand, is a 300-page novel. How could it possibly need the same amount of screen time that had been devoted to the long-winded and dense Lord of the Rings trilogy, which clocks in at over 1,200 pages? The answer, according to New Line and Peter Jackson, is that it included material from some of Tolkien’s other works, like The Silmarillion and his Unfinished Tales. And while there are elements from those works (we now see exactly what Gandalf was doing every time he disappeared), the bulk of the extra time comes from characters and story lines that were invented out of whole cloth, and from cramming in enough CGI-heavy action to make Michael Bay blush.
First, the added characters and story: A distractingly waxy-looking Legolas shows up, seemingly for no other reason than because he was a popular character from the original trilogy. Tauriel, an entirely new character, forms one corner of an extremely unconvincing love triangle with Legolas and Kili (seriously, all it takes is one cheesy line from Kili about what he’s got in his pants, and she’s smitten). Azog the orc chieftan was named in the book, but didn’t actually appear. Here, he is a major villain pursuing Thorin across Middle Earth. Bard and the Master of Laketown have much larger roles in the movie, as well as a whole subplot that adds nothing to the main story but time. And the less said about the Master’s sniveling toady Alfred the better.
Then there’s the constant, relentless action. Action sequences are added where none existed before (after Gandalf saves the dwarves from the trolls, the barrel-bound escape from the elves of Mirkwood, Smaug versus the dwarves under the Lonely Mountain) and those that were in the book are extended to the point of tediousness (escaping the goblins in the Misty Mountains, the Battle of Five Armies). Rather than being exciting, they were boring (and redundant; I lost track of how many times a defenseless character was saved at the last minute by another character appearing out of nowhere).
The problem is not simply that the book was changed. Even if I were completely unaware of the novel, these movies would be a bloated, boring mess. The plot meanders aimlessly and most of the action sequences are needlessly long. For the last half hour of each film, I found myself wondering when it would be over. They were long for the sake of being long, and action-packed for the sake of being action-packed.
And it’s a shame. What a wasted opportunity! After pulling off the impossible with The Lord of the Rings films, Peter Jackson could have pulled off The Hobbit easily. He had Ian McKellen, Hugo Weaving, and Ian Holm to reprise their roles (though I think it makes sense to use Holm only in the framing scenes, and use a younger actor for the main story, and Martin Freeman was a fine choice). He could have made a wonderful — and faithful — adaptation in under three hours. But in the end, he didn’t make an adaptation of The Hobbit. He just remade The Lord of the Rings in the guise of The Hobbit. Poor Bilbo became a secondary character in his own story.
Stray observations
Didn’t we all agree that the scene where Frodo offered Galadriel the Ring in the first movie was the worst part of the whole trilogy? Why would Jackson make us sit through one of her epic freakouts again?
This trilogy suffered from the same connect-the-dots mentality as the Star Wars prequels. When Saruman told Gandalf that he would go take care of Sauron, I half-expected him to stare meaningfully into the camera. And when Thrandruil told Legolas to seek out Strider, but that he’d have to discover his “true name” for himself, he might as well have winked at the audience and said in a stage whisper “I’m talking about Aragorn!”
The Hobbit movies, just like the LOTR movies before them, were based on J. R. R. Tolkein’s work. Not a literal retelling. (But then, is any movie version?) Do I think the story told could have been done in two rather than three? Probably. Do I think it’s a horror amongst horrors that it was done in three? Not to the point that I’m not willing to put down the money.
The Hobbit WAS a very point to point story. I first read it at age seven. It didn’t get any more complex as it and I aged.
Jackson added Tauriel under the guise of “This is a male heavy story — females should get some screen time!” so he created a female Aragorn. Then he went and ruined it with the daft lust triangle. So, one step forward, one immediately backwards. I don’t have any problem with his trying to balance the genders somewhat (Women are 50% of the population, someone should tell Hollywood.) but he could have found better ways to do it!
Sir Ian McKellen wasn’t happy with the filming. He spent a good chunk acting to pictures on sticks in front of a green screen. A paraphrase of him says “This isn’t why I became an actor.” He wanted to act with people, not sit by himself talking to sticks. I have sympathy for him.
Over all.. do I think it was a waste of time and money? No. I’d give it a 6.5 – 7 out of 10. It wasn’t as good as LOTR, but it was still enjoyable. It was nowhere near as the Star Wars prequels. Jar Jar know whats I means?
I think the weirdest point is why to do that, at all. Why not just make a single movie and then skip to Silmarillion? Silmarillion has enough material for like trilogy based on Quenta Silmarillion, plus three extra movies based on Akalabeth, Valaquenta and Ainulindale.
Though nevermind, they will probably do that too. Movie industry execs are a greedy bunch.