The Hobbit was a MASSIVE letdown for me. Three big gripes..
Overuse of CGI- What happened to all the orcs/goblins being real people in makeup? That added to the realistic feeling of the movie. That's now gone, replaced by ####ty looking characters like the Goblin King (Gollum looks amazing though). As soon as they went into the mountains and were surrounded by these crappy CGI characters I knew I had had it with this movie.
Shift in tone- I wasn't really feeling the lighter tone of the movie, I think it would have flowed better with the LOTR trilogy if they kept it the same as those movies. Kids still enjoy those movies. I don't care if the book was more family friendly. It feels off when you go from a goofy guy like Radaghast to seeing someone get their head chopped off. The Trolls were somewhat cheesy but forgiveable. The mountain scene was pure cheese (the goblin kings death scene was infuriating).
Bloated- I'm a fan of the extended editions of the Lord of the Rings. They're all I'll watch now. This movie could use a retracted version. Chop out some of the long dinner scene, the singing, everything involving Radaghast the brown and you have a much better movie IMO. (I loved the intro and enjoyed the stop in Rivendell personally). I'm guessing they could have made two fantastic two hour movies if they didn't get greedy for trilogy money.
All that said, there was still enough for me to like in this movie that I will probably still buy it and will be seeing the other two for sure. It wasn't a disaster like the Star Wars prequels, but it could have and should have been much better. I have a professional editor buddy who I will be begging to make me a better cut of The Hobbit once it hits blu ray.
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