The Hobbit was originally going to be made into two films: An Unexpected Journey, and There And Back Again. But once principal photography wrapped, it was announced that it would be a trilogy instead. In my opinion, this sets up the middle film for failure. Even going into the movie with all this in mind, I was very surprised as how little I enjoyed it. The movie just drops every plot thread it was in the middle of. Gandalf is loitering around in Dol Guldur doing video game shit, the Master of Laketown was introduced and then did nothing else, and the "cliffhanger" cut to black had me leaving my seat in the theater without caring to hear even a little of the credits song.