Adaptation challenge two: the dragon dilemma
If the three installments of LOTR are any guide, An Unexpected Journey will begin with a historical prologue, probably narrated by Galadriel. And it has to be about Dragons, as central to this tale as Rings of Power are to the one that follows — and, for future viewers who will begin with The Hobbit, a much more familiar fantasy element to hang a tale upon. The most important fact about Dragons is that they lust after treasure, and the most important fact about treasure is that Dwarves have more of it than anyone else does. And that brings us right into the essential back-story: Erebor, The King Under the Mountain, and the coming of Smaug.
I don’t think there’s any question that you need to show Smaug in this opening sequence. You’re looking for something visually spectacular that will grab viewers as strongly as possible, like the Battle of the Last Alliance on the slopes of Mt. Doom (moved there by Jackson from outside the gates of Mordor in large part to goose up the visuals). Smaug’s attack on Erebor and Dale not only fits that bill perfectly, but is essential to the story. You’re not going to communicate the key fact that Erebor was sacked and Dale destroyed by a dragon, without showing the dragon. That’s just cheating the audience.
But this creates a huge problem. The first sight of Smaug the Magnificent in the second film should be a great, dramatic moment, one we’ve been looking forward to. In fact, this seems even more obvious than the last point — I’ve even heard it opined that Smaug will be saved for the second film. (In the sense of Smaug as a character, played by Benedict Cumberbatch via motion capture, this is of course true; what we’re talking about here is the first film’s need for CGI Smaug, from a distance.)
[Editor’s note: we’re aware of Jackson’s statement at Comic-con that the audience would only see “a glimpse” of Smaug.]
The solution is simple, and the key is in that appellation, The Magnificent. The Smaug we see sacking Erebor and destroying Dale could be a young Smaug, not yet Magnificent at all. The Smaug the Magnificent we meet a movie-and-a-half later has not only unexpectedly acquired his diamond waistcoat, but has grown considerably larger and, as he’s aged, changed in other credible and really cool ways. Young Smaug is lean and sleek and feral and ripped; old Smaug is vast and crusty and brute but retains enough of young Smaug’s musculature to be even more terrifying. It’s one character, but two great character designs, and if done right it would make the first appearance of Smaug in the second movie just as thrilling as if we hadn’t already seen him. You want this sight of Smaug to take the audience’s breath away by exceeding all expectations, and the easiest way to do that is to give us a set of reasonable but false ones. In other words, I expect AUJ to open with the second-best dragon in the history of SFX. Then just you wait.
The third installment coming soon: Reconciling the Worlds of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings
About the author: Eric M. Van is well-known in the literary science fiction and fantasy community as the founding and longtime Program Chair of Readercon; in 2010 he and three colleagues became the only people ever to be nominated for the World Fantasy Award (Special Award—Non-Professional) for running an sf convention. He moderated the Tolkien panel at the only World Fantasy Convention he’s been to and has been on many Tolkien / Jackson panels at cons in the Boston area, including the Third Conference on Middle-Earth. He’s also a fanatic film buff who has seen 111 movies released in 2011 (so far), and a writer who has been working for fifteen years on a big, intricately plotted fantasy novel—so he’s thought a lot about how narratives are constructed. Like everyone else, he has a blog.
The views in this post are his own, and do not necessarily represent those of TheOneRing.net or its staff.
