The Hobbit: The End of an Era

I was expecting to go see The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies tomorrow, the day it opens. To my surprise this morning, when I was checking show times, I saw listings for tonight. They opened it early! So we’re going to the 8PM show.

The Hobbit movies are definitely different than The Lord of the Rings movies. I appreciate the stylistic and tonal differences, while I dislike the much more over-the-top action sequences. If you watch the entire LOTR trilogy, there are only a couple of action sequences that seem, well, ridiculous. Of course I’m talking about a couple of Legolas moments, but they’re mostly for fun and don’t disrupt the tone or the story. The Hobbit movies each contain a half dozen ridiculous action sequences. I’m not a big fan of those.

The amazing thing is that despite Peter Jackson adding a ton of non-book characters and scenes, the essential story from the book, The Hobbit, is all there. Someone could (and I bet eventually will) edit all three movies down to just the stuff that’s actually in the book. And it will be great.

So tonight will be the last time I sit in the theater to watch a new Tolkien movie. (Until someone eventually remakes them). One event still remains, the release of the Extended Edition sometime in 2015, but this is the big milestone tonight.

It was a long road, movie-wise, from 2001 to here but a great and enjoyable one.