doubleofive said:

Peter Jackson on the two-film edit:

The split was going to occur where Bard [Luke Evans] appears on the river bank as a silhouetted figure with a bow. So the whole barrel sequence was going to be the climax.

Just in case someone wants to re-create the alternate universe two-movie edit.

I find that a really weird place to split the story, it's way unbalanced in terms of story to cover between two films. If that's the case, I'd prefer the trilogy just for the more even pace, even if bloated.

But yeah, Smaug is pretty freaking awesome. Best CGI since Gollumn.