Since this is full of conjecture for the next film, consider it wall to wall spoilers!!!
Here is a list of all the things we are looking forward to seeing in ‘The Hobbit: There and Back Again’ next December. Since there are so many changes, additions and enhancements in the films, we can only know the broad strokes of what is to come with the details up for grabs. That means this list will mostly be based on events that occur in ‘The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug’ and the questions and actions they leave open heading into ‘The Hobbit: There and Back Again’
And now we begin the Spoiler filled guesswork portion of this article.
1) Legolas catching up to Bolg. Nobody, but nobody gives Leggy a bloody nose and lives.
2) Smaug’s attack on Lake-town will be epic! Bard’s response will be equally epic!
3) What exactly does it take to pry Thranduil out of Mirkwood and enter the fray? Could it be a true desire to assist the Men of Lake-town in their hour of need? Or will it be his desire to recover the missing elven gems? Or will it be a more personal desire to find and bring back Legolas and Tauriel who are missing and presumed to be in the middle of the fight already?
4) How will an injured Kili and the rest of the dwarves get out of the way of an approaching Dragon? And what about Bard’s kids?
5) Who springs Bard out of prison? Will it be Tauriel, Bofur and Fili, or might it be his son, Bain?
6) What becomes of Tauriel? Does she stay with the Dwarves and Bard’s kids or does she try to catch up to Legolas?
7) How does Gandalf get out of his pickle?
8) Radagast went to inform Galadriel of what was happening at Dol Guldur, will she go to War? Who else might come with her? Will Saruman join in or drag his feet?
9) Does Bilbo have the Arkenstone already? If not, how will things play out in Erebor while Smaug is away? And how does the Company find out about Smaug’s fate and how long does that take?
10) Is that big Orc army we see marching through Dol Guldur going to be present when the White Council shows up? Or is the army headed towards Erebor, leaving Dol Guldur rather defenseless when the White Council does show up to spring Gandalf?
11) When will Beorn decide to jump into the fray and how many dead orcs does he leave in his wake?
12) Will we see an auction beginning at Bag End with Lobelia stashing silverware into her bodice?
The same company that publishes the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, obviously including “The Hobbit,” and “The Lord of the Rings” announced an app companion to the latest Peter Jackson Middle-earth film, “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.” From the looks of things, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt means for this to be an immerse and interactive version of the film books. Jude Fisher provides text and many of the images are 3D and interactive. We will include a gallery of images from the app below the official press release.
The app is produced by the United Kingdom publisher of Tolkien’s work, Harper Collins UK in conjunction with Warner Bros. and developed by Ardman Digital.
Below is the full press release with images of the product:
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN HARCOURT ANNOUNCES THE HOBBIT: OFFICIAL VISUAL COMPANION APP
December 20, 2013
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, official U.S. publisher of J.R.R. Tolkien’s work, is thrilled to announce THE HOBBIT: OFFICIAL VISUAL COMPANION APP, an app designed to accompany the film experience of The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, directed by Peter Jackson. A production of New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures (MGM), The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug opened worldwide on December 13.
The app, produced by HarperCollins UK in association with Warner Bros., was developed by Aardman Digital. The app aims to engage with book and film fans on a digital and interactive platform, and is packed with content from the The Hobbit Trilogy, including text by Jude Fisher, details and images of the characters and a beautifully rendered 3D map.
Nick Perrett, Group Director of Strategy ＆ Digital at HarperCollins said, “This is the first step toward HarperCollins’ vision for persistent storytelling worlds that will act as a hub for fans of The Hobbit worldwide. This exciting new experience brings The Hobbit universe alive and, will over time, develop as a platform for discovering the world of Middle-earth.”Sanj Kharbanda, VP of Digital Strategy at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt said, “At Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, our strategy is to create great experiences across many touch points including books, ebooks, apps, and the web. We are thrilled to partner with HarperCollins UK to bring this to life for The Hobbit and celebrate the magic of Middle-earth with a new generation of readers with this app.”
Created using the Unity engine – more typically used by game developers than book publishers – THE HOBBIT: OFFICIAL VISUAL COMPANION APP is designed to enrich users’ experience of the films, enabling them to navigate a map of Middle-earth in its entirety, while discovering facts about the characters, locations and artifacts recognizable from the films and book. The app also features interactive trivia, allowing users to unlock additional app features.
THE HOBBIT: OFFICIAL VISUAL COMPANION APP will be updated with a rolling schedule of content for the next two years, including cast interviews, content for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is the official U.S. publisher of film tie-in books for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, directed by Peter Jackson.
THE HOBBIT: OFFICIAL VISUAL COMPANION APP is available from Samsung’s Apps Hub (Samsung Web, Samsung Mobile) and Apple’s App Store (Premium, Lite).
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN HARCOURT TRADE PUBLISHING
For nearly two centuries, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s Trade division has published some of the world’s most renowned novels, non-fiction, children’s books and reference works in hardcover, trade paperback, and eBook formats. Its distinguished author list includes eight Nobel Prize winners, forty-seven Pulitzer Prize winners, thirteen National Book Award winners, and more than one hundred Caldecott, Newbery, Printz, and Sibert Medal and Honor recipients. HMH publishes such distinguished authors as Philip Roth, Temple Grandin, Tim O’Brien, and Umberto Eco, and a celebrated roster of children’s authors and illustrators including Lois Lowry, Chris Van Allsburg and David Wiesner. HMH is also home to The Best American
series®; The American Heritage® and Webster’s New World™ dictionaries; Betty Crocker®, Better Homes and Gardens®, How to Cook Everything®, The Gourmet Cookbook, and other leading culinary properties; the Peterson Field Guides®; CliffsNotes; books by J.R.R. Tolkien; and many iconic children’s books and characters including Curious George®, The Little Prince and The Polar Express. For more information, visit www.hmhco.com.
THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG
From Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson comes “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug,” the second in a trilogy of films adapting the enduringly popular masterpiece The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien. The screenplay for “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug” is by Fran Walsh & Philippa Boyens & Peter Jackson & Guillermo del Toro, based on the novel by J.R.R. Tolkien. Jackson also produced the film, together with Carolynne Cunningham, Zane Weiner and Fran Walsh. The executive producers are Alan Horn, Toby Emmerich, Ken Kamins and Carolyn Blackwood, with Philippa Boyens and Eileen Moran serving as co-
producers.
New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Present a WingNut Films Production, “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.” “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug” is a production of New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures (MGM), with New Line managing production. Warner Bros. Pictures is handling worldwide theatrical distribution, with select international territories as well as all international television distribution being handled by MGM.
Just a couple of hours ago, the Hobbit Production Video #14 popped up on Peter Jackson’s Facebook page. This final video blog covers the recording of Howard Shore’s magnificent musical score for The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. The score was recorded by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, and conducted by renowned orchestrator/composer Conrad Pope. We’ve got the video for you just below in HD, courtesy of Peter Jackson’s YouTube page. Enjoy! Continue reading “Peter Jackson releases final Production Video of 2013!”
Additional characters aside, as they were all known before going in so they can’t be a surprise anyhow, here is a list of things that have surprised audiences in ‘The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug’ this past week since the film’s release.
1) Legolas got a bloody nose, which seemed to surprise him almost as much as it surprised the audience. He’s never been wobbly in a battle before, not sure if that is going to make him more cautious or not as he chases after Bolg, the one who inflicted the injury.
2) Smaug seems surprisingly well informed. He knew that Thorin had earned the nickname of Oakenshield while out in Middle-earth after the fall of Erebor. Smaug also seems fully aware that a Dark Power is rising and that there is an impending war coming. Now if we can just figure out who is feeding him this intel.
3) A Wind Lance, really? Not a standard Long Bow? How disappointing, although it is wicked cool looking and realistically makes more sense, it is not the image most fans were expecting from Bard the Bowman.
4) So Kili gets injured and is left behind in Lake-town, along with 3 other Dwarves. Wow! the Breaking of the Company. The fact he was injured by a Morgul bladed arrow was also a surprise.
5) The Orcs were chasing the Dwarves down the river and fighting the Elves in full sunlight? What’s up with that?
6) The other surprising bit with Smaug is that he could sense the Ring’s presence and by force of will convince Bilbo to take the Ring off. Yipes! It’s a power similar to that of the Nazgul.
7) Back to Bree we go, and this time the guy sitting in the corner is actually dangerous, and that dude munching on a carrot is back.
8) The Spiders did speak, but only Bilbo can hear them when he wears the Ring. Well, except for when he took the Ring off and stabbed that one spider, who then says “it stings” before dying, giving Sting it’s name. So the Spider’s speaking was a surprise, and the way it was handled was a surprise, but there is at least one inconsistency to this plot device. Does anyone care about that? Probably not, cause the spiders were creepy as all heck.
9) Gandalf entering Dol Guldur alone, first facing Azog and having to resort to trickery to get away, and then the big face off with the Necromancer, who reveals himself fully to Gandalf. The endless emptiness that is Sauron is epic.
10) While not surprised that the molten hot gold did not seem to injure Smaug, the most surprising bit in that whole sequence was just how transfixed Smaug was when the Golden Dwarf statue was revealed. He looked like an animal caught in a Cobra’s stare, which is probably the reverse of what Smaug normally encounters.
Thranduil, King of the Wood-elves. This is more of a nerdy observation list, than a full-on exploration of textual fidelity (or lack thereof) but if you want to go hunting Tolkien easter eggs in The Desolation of smaug, this article from The Smithsonian provides a few via the insights of Tolkien scholars Michael Drout and John Rateliffe. Enjoy!
If you have a Tolkien/Middle-earth inspired poem you’d like to share, then send it to poetry@theonering.net. One poem per person may be submitted each month. Please make sure to proofread your work before sending it in. TheOneRing.net is not responsible for poems posting with spelling or grammatical errors.
Rhett Allain from Wired examines the physics of the dwarves in barrels as they escape down the Forest River. If you like numbers, this will be right up your alley.
Surely you have read The Hobbit (the book). It’s a classic novel and the basis of the upcoming movie The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. The book is old enough that I don’t think I need to give any spoiler warnings. I want to consider the part where the dwarves escape from the elves by floating down a river in barrels. Continue reading “Should Dwarves stand up in floating barrels?”
Rhett Allain from Wired examines the physics of the dwarves in barrels as they escape down the Forest River. If you like numbers, this will be right up your alley.