From what I've heard Smaug is the best part of the film, but he only appears

Spoiler	+
in a flashback for his conquering of Erebor, which doesn't leave him much time to show off his chatting skills.

An FE thread would deserve it more than anything!

Should be seeing it with some pals whenever I can find 3 hours of free time next week. I AM MORE EXCITED THAN LIFE YOU CANT BELIEVE

I liked it a lot :)

NOW THAT I'VE HAD SOME TIME (as well as a viewing of the first hour of TT last night before I went to bed), some thoughts!

The CGI was nowhere near as invasive as I'd feared. It certainly wasn't TPM-level bad. Though there is lots of it, and in places where it doesn't always seem necessary (particularly the orcs), the more cartoony nature suits this film. It is tonally separate enough from LOTR that it warrants a less grim, realistic aesthetic.

I didn't feel the 3 hours at all. Unlike LOTR, which is certainly a better, more important, more expansive series of films than this will ever be, there were no particularly SLOW bits where I just wanted it to move on. Every moment felt so LOVINGLY CRAFTED that I just couldn't help but enjoy it. Even the fanservice-y bits were fun.

Structurally, it's a bit weird. The movie stops for flashbacks and intros all the damn time, and it doesn't really build much momentum until the last hour. Like I said, it's still FUN because of how fully realized the world is, but Bilbo and Thorin's basic arcs spend a lot of time not really developing because the movie has to work in service of other plotlines (the thing that felt most timewasting in retrospect was Radagast.)

Speaking of Radagast, I liked him! I kept hearing comparisons to Jar Jar, and anticipated the worst, but I thought he was a fun character and (with the exception of the bird shit on his head), not terribly unfunny!

The action setpieces are also really good (though the copious CGI probably does affect the overall weight of them somewhat). They manage to be thrilling despite the fact that you know every character is going to survive. Especially the Warg chases and the GOBLIN ESCAPE (which is probably the most outright entertaining bits in all the movies).

The characterization was a bit odd though. Balin, Thorin, Bilbo, and LOTR characters are well-defined, but a lot of the dwarves just feel tertiary. Which is of course understandable given the source material, but I was hoping with three hours I could be more emotionally invested in the individual members of the company. The other most developed dwarves are Fili and Kili and they sucked

Overall though, it was great. I had a fantastic time being BACK IN MIDDLE EARTH or whatever and the fact that this is happening for two more movies makes me so happy

Yeah, AZOG looked really silly. But like I said, I was cool with the cartoony look/CGI-overuse generally because of the more lighthearted tone. Comparisons to SW were unwarranted imo

Yeah

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I think there's every indication they just hadn't completed it by the end of this one. Or it could be that they're just waiting till the sequel to get a MONEY SHOT

i liked the first one

the only place i really felt DRAG was Rivendell. The scenes of WIZARD CONJECTURE are dire. otherwise it's a pretty fun ride that i think is paced pretty well and has two decent character arcs in Bilbo and Thorin.

pretty good! i actually preferred the first tho

Spoiler

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thinking about it i guess this is the movie where the STORY EXPANSION really started to affect my perception of it. even though i enjoyed a lot of the additions (i was expecting tauriel to be a lot LAMER/more fanfic-y), i kept feeling like they distracted, where they enhanced in the first. I just feel like Bilbo is the HEART of the story (it is after all named after him) and the more they diverge from it the weaker it gets. in particular the Gandalf/Necromancer bits were pretty dull for me (save for the MIND BENDING scene of the eye opening.) it just feels so removed from everything that's going on and has little actual DRAMA to it. That's how I felt about some of the other action scenes too. Most of the nighttime stuff in Laketown felt like padding. I do like that they're giving the dwarves some characterization. stuff like Gloin's pictures, or Bofur's missing the boat, or Kili's disappointment at being unable to go on the mission, were nice. Thorin's OBSESSION kind of feels a bit too TYPICAL but Armitage is giving a good enough performance to make it work. Balin is my personal favorite, but I do love little old men. And the Laketown politics were fun too. It's going to make Bard's HERO stuff in the next movie much stronger, how they're setting it up. That said, did it need to be saved for the next? Would that have really made the movie too overstuffed?

also the whole movie felt kind of ugly save for the actual DESOLATION

TRUE

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on paper she totally was. but i think as played (until the godawful moment when Kili saw her haloed with light) she managed to be a somewhat independent character who was given somewhat interesting motivations, even if they all played second fiddle to her love triangle.

AND ANOTHER THING

was it quiet for anyone else? it may have just been my shitty theater or me but i could barely make out most of the dialogue. it was especially bad for smaug.

eh it's not really what the movies are going for. it's a very lighthearted subtitle that implies something more fantastical and WHIMSICAL than srs war scenes

yeah but i thought DOS was kind of short on SILLY moments (part of the reason I much preferred AUJ) and I imagine that trend is going to continue into the final entry

if that happened here i would applaud them

instead bilbo's probably gonna be DEATHLY AFRAID of getting hit and we will get a drawn out scene of him escaping peril while periodically cutting back to the battle