{"id":67129,"date":"2012-12-12T20:53:09","date_gmt":"2012-12-13T01:53:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/?p=67129"},"modified":"2012-12-12T20:53:11","modified_gmt":"2012-12-13T01:53:11","slug":"12-things-youll-love-about-the-hobbit-and-12-things-you-might-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theonering.net\/torwp\/2012\/12\/12\/67129-12-things-youll-love-about-the-hobbit-and-12-things-you-might-not\/","title":{"rendered":"12 Things You’ll Love about ‘The Hobbit’ (and 12 Things You Might Not)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\u00a0I had the pleasure of seeing an advanced screening last night of ‘The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey’-\u00a0in 3D but not in 48fps.\u00a0\u00a0In honour of todays date (12\/12\/12) I thought I would share the 12 things I loved most about the film, and 12 things I didn’t.\u00a0 I will say that overall I loved the movie, and plan to see it in all formats at least a few times each.\u00a0 And it was\u00a0a lot harder to\u00a0come up with 12 things I didn’t like about the film than 12 things I did like.\u00a0 Spoilers ahead!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

***********<\/p>\n

Things to love:<\/p>\n

1)\u00a0 The prologue – \u00a0Seeing Erebor\u00a0in its glory!\u00a0 Young Thorin!\u00a0 Thranduil!\u00a0 A fleeting glimpse of Smaug!\u00a0 And, most surprisingly (I was actually a little worried about this), seeing old Bilbo and Frodo as they get ready for Bilbo’s birthday party.\u00a0\u00a0 A nice way of seeing how Bilbo begins the Red Book as well as a nice segue into the beginning of ‘Fellowship of the Ring’.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

2)\u00a0 Martin Freeman as Bilbo – \u00a0Perfect casting.\u00a0\u00a0 I have long been a fan of his, and he absolutely nails this performance.<\/p>\n

3)\u00a0 Richard Armitage as Thorin – See\u00a0above.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

4)\u00a0 The dwarves singing at Bag End – I laughed during ‘Blunt the Knives’ and almost cried during ‘Misty Mountains’.\u00a0<\/p>\n

5)\u00a0 The returning cast (Sir Ian McKellen, Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett) and familiar settings (Hobbiton, Rivendell) from the ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy.\u00a0\u00a0 It was like being back with old friends after a long absence.<\/p>\n

6)\u00a0 Bret McKenzie as Figwit <\/del>Lindir.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

7)\u00a0 The Stone Trolls – \u00a0 Bert, William, and Tom.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 They look and sound just as Tolkien described, except… (see # 8 on my 2nd list).<\/p>\n

8)\u00a0 ‘Riddles in the Dark’ – My favorite scene in the film and from the book.\u00a0\u00a0 Both Martin and Andy Serkis were brilliant together.\u00a0\u00a0 Can we just give them both an Oscar now?<\/p>\n

9)\u00a0 Bad Ass Dwarven fighting.\u00a0\u00a0 Those goblins never stood a chance.<\/p>\n

10)\u00a0 The soundtrack – a Middle-earth film without Howard Shore’s score is like a Hobbit\u00a0without food and pipeweed.<\/p>\n

11)\u00a0 Here come the eagles!<\/p>\n

12)\u00a0 One\u00a0last glimpse of Smaug\u00a0opening his eye as the film ends.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I can’t wait to hear Benedict Cumberbatch give voice to one of my favorite literary characters next year.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Things You Might Not Love:\u00a0<\/p>\n

1)\u00a0 I would have liked to have seen a bit more done with Radagast\u00a0the Brown.\u00a0\u00a0 Don’t get me wrong – I love Sylvester McCoy,\u00a0 and he does warn Gandalf\u00a0about the goings-on in Dol Guldur.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But otherwise he just seemed to be there for the sake of being there.\u00a0\u00a0 Perhaps the Extended Editions and films 2 & 3 will fix that.\u00a0<\/p>\n

2)\u00a0 Bilbo seemed a little too excited to leave the Shire, and he left on\u00a0his own. \u00a0\u00a0 I wanted to\u00a0see Gandalf come and get him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

3)\u00a0 Speaking of Bilbo heading out on his adventure, why did he have a backpack?\u00a0\u00a0 I would have rather he left as he did in the book, without so much as a pocket hankerchief.<\/p>\n

4)\u00a0 Azog\u00a0 – In my opinion, he was too cartoonish and too obviously CGI.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 A little disappointing given how amazing Weta’s CGI characters usually are.\u00a0<\/p>\n

5)\u00a0 The Wargs – See above.<\/p>\n

6)\u00a0 The Goblin King – See above.<\/p>\n

7)\u00a0 No talking wallet during the Stone Trolls scene – I understand it may have been\u00a0a bit too cartoonish, but I was\u00a0disappointed not\u00a0to hear “Ere, ‘oo are you?”<\/p>\n

8)\u00a0 Bilbo covered in troll snot – I would have been okay without seeing that.\u00a0<\/p>\n

9)\u00a0 The scene with the Company in the middle of a fight between stone giants seemed almost completely lifted from the scene in ‘The Fellowship of the Ring’ on the Pass of Caradhras.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

10)\u00a0 No talking eagles, either –\u00a0 I wanted to hear at least a little something between Gandalf\u00a0and Gwahir.\u00a0<\/p>\n

11)\u00a0 I know the eagles aren’t a taxi service, but couldn’t they have dropped the Company off just a *bit* closer to Erebor instead of at the top of a mountain very far away?<\/p>\n

12)\u00a0 That\u00a0it will be another year before we all see\u00a0‘The Desolation of Smaug’.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0I had the pleasure of seeing an advanced screening last night of ‘The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey’-\u00a0in 3D…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,148],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hobbit-movie","category-hobbit"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t