NeverarGreat said:
Spoilers follow.
Eh, I thought the dwarves were all right. Though it seemed strange that I didn't learn who practically any of them were called, even after almost three hours, and I've read all the books! You'd think that PJ would have included more character bits to differentiate the dwarves.
I agree. Saw the film for the second time yesterday and during the dwarf introduction scene kept thinking, "I don't even remember seeing that guy, that guy, and that guy throughout the rest of the movie the last time I saw it." Of course they are there in the background, they just don't get much screen time nor are given any/many lines. Many of the dwarves in the film were more or less just props.
But in the book it was pretty much the same way. Even over multiple reads throughout the years, I could never keep straight who all the dwarves were, there are a few that stick out and are given more to do than others, and those are the ones you remember. The others are kind of just there.
That way, we would hear about the Azog vs. Thorin relationship, and later it would be a surprise even to LOTR fans that he had survived.
Wait, but that was a surprise to even LOTR fans. He doesn't survive in the books, Jackson and Co brought him back for the movies.
I liked the character of Radagast, despite being a bit too cutesy, but there was little reason to have him in the movie. Same with Sauruman, and Galadriel (apparently she can teleport?!) and the stone throwing giants. In fact, any time that the story wasn't solely about Bilbo, they should have cut it. There is something that has been called the Off-Screen-Movie, which is all of the implied events that happen while the actual scenes of the movie are playing, and these implied scenes can make a movie seem more dense, more fast paced, or more dramatic. In the Hobbit, everything about the story is shown onscreen, and this to me makes it seem like there is less story, ironically.
I feel like they really messed up the giants. In the book they are just playing around tossing rocks around during a rain storm for kicks playing some sort of game, in the movie they are violently fighting each other, ending with one decapitating the other.
I would have been cool with them cutting it. But I actually do really like the depth and detail they are going into with this film. In the end, it is still going to make loads of money and pull large audiences in, and when it is old and the masses don't care about it anymore, the fans will still have films that cater to them.
Here's an example. We see three characters that we have just met (Saruman, Elrond, and Galadriel) discuss with Gandalf at length about some place we haven't been (Dol-Guldur) and a character we know almost nothing about (the necromancer).
Through this dialogue, we get no impression about what effect it will have on Bilbo, the dwarves, or their quest to go to Erebor. In their discussion, a sword from a ghost that we haven't met yet is revealed, and used to make a subtle argument about the technical nature of magic in Middle Earth, something that we don't know much about. This scene must be absolutely bizarre for a newcomer, and for someone who has seen the LOTR movies, it is pointless collection of references for the sake of linking the two narratives together.
It is called foreshadowing. And it is for much more than connecting the two trilogies together. In one of the next two films the Necromancer will play a much greater role. What you are saying is pretty much like saying having the character of Anakin Skywalker in the prequels is a pointless reference for the sake of linking the two SW trilogies together. They are very closely connected stories and one leads right into the other.
I don't think you seem to realize that there are two stories being told in these films. It isn't just the tale of the dwarves on their quest to retrieve their gold, which is really just a short little children's story that could easily be fit into a single film. You said anything that wasn't part of Bilbo's story should have been cut, well that is all the book is. But these movies are also the story of Sauron's rise back to power and Gandalf's detective work of piecing together the puzzle of Sauron's plans, which eventually leads to the importance of the forming of the fellowship and the destruction of the ring. These films are basically an adaption of The Hobbit and major parts of The Lord of the Rings: Appendices A and B, merged together and playing out in chronological order.
It is clear you are one of the casual fans you mentioned and you aren't familiar with the books. I think you should just sit back and see how things pan out before getting too worked up. I think what's to come is going to be a lot of fun. I look forward to the stuff about the Necromancer far more than the rest of The Hobbit story, which really is quite anticlimactic. To me the peak of excitement in The Hobbit has always been the goblins in Misty Mountains and Bilbo finding the ring.
All of this, and they still don't explain the character and philosophy of the eagles, which have probably caused more casual fan confusion than any other element of the movies.
Why so?
Tolkien always used the Eagles as his last minute jump in and save the day thing. A very obvious and blatant deux ex machina. I feel they have always been more than a bit of a cop out. There is really no deep "character" and "philosophy". They aren't confusing, they are just lame.