HOBBIT Part 3: The battle of the five armies

1hobbit-battle-five-armies-thorin-bilbo-banner-841x1024Think what you will about Peter Jackson and the Hobbitization of our current Middle Earth. He has Tolkeinized, making the author a current household name. His final final installment is so very…full. Mr. Jackson has been carrying the Ring for quite a while now, and all viewers, no matter how devout, can see that it’s begun to overtake him. It’s become a bit too precious to him and he…how can I say it delicately?…he Jar Jar’d the last Hobbit. It hasn’t been so terribly long since Hobbit the 2nd, and I kept wondering why Gandalf was caged like he was in Rings and how he got  there and when the eagles would show up to save him. How much did we miss that there was suddenly “real love” between the dwarf and Kate from Lost? Why is Bilbo never hungry? And why didn’t we “desolate” Smaug in the 2nd by that title rather than pick up with the grimacing dragonslaying  dad in prison and the town on fire. In the last year, I’ve had time to forgive Benedict Cumberbach. Sure, he played a mean Kahn, but he did win the 2nd world war with his math skills. Wait…

Despite the anticlimactic opener and Jackson’s forgivable faux pas(s), the wonderment and fantasy remained. The harmony of nature- it’s beasts of the realm and the dominion of Elves and Dwarves and Men. All rage and thirst and crave. All wield and sway and fight with proper swagger. All align forces to dispell and dissuade the Orc evils and their foes.hobbit-battle-5-armies-poster-ian-mckellen-cate-blanchett-411x600

One of my students recently told me he has trouble ending his stories. My mother can never wait out the suspense; she reads the endings first. All stories must come to an end. And, Peter Jackson is a man who loves endings and resolve so much that he often offers twelve or more. You will feel the need to dust off the old LOTR extended editions.

Stories like Tolkein’s Hobbit allow each of us to become a dragonslayer in our own right. I want to live a good story and write stories with worthy endings. I like to think that all endings deserve the poetic excitement that Peter Jackson is so very famous for. If you saw the others, you must finish the saga which Jackson attempted to wrap up with a bow of Elvish rope carried atop a reindeer steed…just in time for Christmas.The-Hobbit-The-Battle-of-the-Five-Armies-Wallpapers-the-hobbit-37572699-500-375

HOBBIT 2: The Desolation of Smaug (2013) movie review

Bilbo - The Hobbit 2 Movie

Peter’s pet project is a bit too precious to him, but who can complain…it’s Peter Jackson.air-new-zealand-hobbit-2

The Hobbit Desolation of Smaug Wallpaper HD He makes big movies worth every lingering glance over every centimeter of middle earth.

imageWe may presume that we would have removed those extra elfin arrow shots or that half of the dwarf scowls on the multiple could have been edited out. Jackson has built the mansion of the Hobbit trilogy, and despite it’s penchant to extended editioning, this second in the series is lovely indeed and feels more accessible than the first with the additions of human and elf characters in new locations like Laketown.

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Hobbit 2 swings out from systematic book adaptation and includes information from other Tolkien books like The Silmarilian, and it adds a new character: Taurieltauriel-kicks-ass-in-new-tv-spot-for-the-hobbit-the-desolation-of-smaug-watch-now-149430-a-1385366847HobbitTauriel2This female elf heroine, a Jackson original, raises the standards as Kate from Lost glistens and fights and alights from tree to boulder with ease  wielding weapons and sassing her companions. She asks pivotal questions of Legolas that will direct his future course and lead him, no doubt, on his road toward war between Middle Earth and Mordor.the-hobbit-2-the desolation-of smaug-2013-movie-character-gandalf-elf-legolas-wallpaper-1920x1200But nothing trumps the dragon. Bets are off. Dinosaurs no longer frighten. Monsters look like house pets in the fiendish glow of the heated snarky Smaug the magnificent and terrible.

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