What did you think of Fili, the protective big brother? ^^

I hear rumours Kili will die defending Tauriel...I'll throw a fit if it's true.

It should be Thorin, and he should be side-by-side with Fili!

I watched it right away on Thursday and needed some time to think about it.
The way the plot is presented is a lot better than in the first episode. Sometimes it is just better to tell less than more.
I think that can especially be said about the dwarves and their personality and background story. I always got the impression right away in the first episode that Mr Jackson wanted desperately to give each dwarf a face and story to make him identifiably and destinguishable. Tolkien didn't do that. Tolkien just gave them names and almost no special story for themselves. For a purpose. Jackson should not have tried to do better there. It's called The Hobbit and not The Dwarves and a Hobbit.
Although I understand the need to appease the actors and meet the requirements of story telling and proper characterisation 13 (thirteen) dwarves are too many to cope with. Why not distinguish them because of something related to the original story other than invent something new for each one? In my imagination when reading the book they looked almost identically like ants under the ground. Like soldiers in identical uniforms interested in building their kingdom and digging for diamonds and gold.

I didn't feel the need to have the Fili/Tauriel story. It is possibly done because audiences want or writers think they want a love story and a strong female elf is nice to look at.

I like the way the spider scene is done. Impressive to see in 3D. When Bilbo looks at his hands after the fight we get to see Mr Freeman's acting abilities. I am glad that we got some more character scenes with him. It is worth to see the movie just because of this scene. And of course Bilbo and the drangon is worth watching.
I am looking forward to buy the DVD because I want to hear the original voices.

I also like how the necromancer is presented. Something between a person and a spirit. The visualisation is great. 

I am sure you know that Thorin in the original story is supposed to be corrupted by his greed. I am not sure if Mr Jackson will do that. This character trait is still missing or at least untill now not full implemented. That is an important purpose of the story when you read it to children, IMO.
I think some hints in this direction should already be there by now. But maybe Mr Jackson ressurrects his father and gives the baddie part to him, just to save his hero Thorin.
On the other hand there is enough time in the last episode.

Last edited by Be (December 16, 2013 1:22 pm)

If everything works I will watch the original version together with Mary Me on Wednesday. Then I can compare it with the dubbed version... we will see... (any doubt which is going to be the better one???)
Going to write my opinon then.

I always thought that it was rather the point. To have too many dwarves who look similar and can't easily be identified. That is the funny thing about it. You have to count them. Which Gandalf did. I think it is impossible to care for all of them at the beginning because they are 13.
I think the additional stories Mr Jackson added are well done, but they kind of distract from the important parts.
Why humanise everyone, even dwarves with an invented love story? I liked the romantic part in front of the cell with Tauriel because it was sweet. Maybe a bit too much for my liking, but anyway. I think I read somewhere that female dwarves had beards. Is that right? I'd like to see that. Everybody can relate to a romantic relationship with a beautiful elf like Tauriel. But a bearded dwarf?
That's just me thinking up-side down and odd.
 

Be wrote:

I always thought that it was rather the point. To have too many dwarves who look similar and can't easily be identified. That is the funny thing about it. You have to count them. Which Gandalf did. I think it is impossible to care for all of them at the beginning because they are 13.
I think the additional stories Mr Jackson added are well done, but they kind of distract from the important parts.
Why humanise everyone, even dwarves with an invented love story? I liked the romantic part in front of the cell with Tauriel because it was sweet. Maybe a bit too much for my liking, but anyway. I think I read somewhere that female dwarves had beards. Is that right? I'd like to see that. Everybody can relate to a romantic relationship with a beautiful elf like Tauriel. But a bearded dwarf?
That's just me thinking up-side down and odd.
 

Tolkien's original dwarves were rather racist, tbh.  Representative of the stereotypical characteristics of Jewish people.  That's why they HAVE to humanize the dwarves...othewise, you have racist stereotypes that all look and act the same.

Last edited by sj4iy (December 16, 2013 3:26 pm)

Be wrote:

Aren't the dwarves and the elves both portrayed as peoples with racial prejudice against each other in the original story?
I think I writer can make a person unique even without the need to have a whole plotline for every character. That would be nice. To have them look alike and be unique.
 

Yes, they have racial prejudice against each other...but I was saying that Tolkien wrote the dwarves as a racial stereotype of Jewish people.  The long beards, short stature, money-coveting and cowardice were stereotypes of Jewish people (which sadly still persist today in some areas).  PJ couldn't possibly have made them like the book, or not given them personalities, without stirring up a race debate. 

sj4iy wrote:

Be wrote:

Aren't the dwarves and the elves both portrayed as peoples with racial prejudice against each other in the original story?
I think I writer can make a person unique even without the need to have a whole plotline for every character. That would be nice. To have them look alike and be unique.
 

Yes, they have racial prejudice against each other...but I was saying that Tolkien wrote the dwarves as a racial stereotype of Jewish people.  The long beards, short stature, money-coveting and cowardice were stereotypes of Jewish people (which sadly still persist today in some areas).  PJ couldn't possibly have made them like the book, or not given them personalities, without stirring up a race debate. 

I didn't know that. It's silly to write against racism and prejudice and use racial stereotypes himself. Vicious circle. I always saw just dwarves without any second thoughts. It was a book written for children. In the year 2013 nobody should get this kind of connotation. I still think a writer must be free to invent a fantasy with bearded aliens without having to think about what is politically correct.
Sally Donovan is a difficult character and she is a woman of colour. Anderson isn't. Do you think we should always be aware of these problems?
I don't care if Moriarty is in fact German or if the villian is German again in a movie or has a German accent. I am used to it.

Last edited by Be (December 16, 2013 5:54 pm)

Be wrote:

sj4iy wrote:

Be wrote:

Aren't the dwarves and the elves both portrayed as peoples with racial prejudice against each other in the original story?
I think I writer can make a person unique even without the need to have a whole plotline for every character. That would be nice. To have them look alike and be unique.
 

Yes, they have racial prejudice against each other...but I was saying that Tolkien wrote the dwarves as a racial stereotype of Jewish people.  The long beards, short stature, money-coveting and cowardice were stereotypes of Jewish people (which sadly still persist today in some areas).  PJ couldn't possibly have made them like the book, or not given them personalities, without stirring up a race debate. 

I didn't know that. It's silly to write against racism and prejudice and use racial stereotypes himself. Vicious circle. I always saw just dwarves without any second thoughts. It was a book written for children. In the year 2013 nobody should get this kind of connotation. I still think a writer must be free to invent a fantasy with bearded aliens without having to think about what is politically correct.
Sally Donovan is a difficult character and she is a woman of colour. Anderson isn't. Do you think we should always be aware of these problems?
I don't care if Moriarty is in fact German or if the villian is German again in a movie or has a German accent. I am used to it.

Well, there's a difference between reading racism into something when it's not there and calling out blatant racism.  It's similar to how Native Americans are portrayed in "Peter Pan".  Yes, it was the way it was back in the day, but that doesn't mean it's acceptable today.  If they made a movie about Peter Pan today, they definitely would leave that out or change it.  That's why I didn't mind the changes made to the Dwarves and the attempts to give them personalities beyond cowardly misers.

This was what Tolkien himself said almost 30 years after writing the Hobbit:

“I didn’t intend it, but when you’ve got these people on your hands, you’ve got to make them different, haven’t you?” said Tolkien during the 1971 interview. “The dwarves of course are quite obviously, wouldn’t you say that in many ways they remind you of the Jews? Their words are Semitic, obviously, constructed to be Semitic. The hobbits are just rustic English people."

I would never, NEVER advocate censorship of any books.  At all.  I don't care if it's Mein Kampf, I will defend the right to write a book and the right to read it, because censorsing anyone's ideas is worse than letting them write it, IMO (obviously, this wouldn't include anything illegal).  I don't have to agree with the book or agree with its writer to accept that people have the right to read it.  And I would never argue for censorship or political correctness.  But that doesn't mean I can't call someone out on racism when I see it.

Last edited by sj4iy (December 16, 2013 6:30 pm)

I am probably the only person here who didn't like the movie. In fact, I found it even worse that the first one, which at least retained SOME of Tolkien atmosphere. I liked some scenes (spiders, Thranduil - Thorin confrontation) and the whole Dragon - Bilbo scene (then, sadly, Dragon began to chase the dwarves relentlessly without killing a single one of them, transforming himself from menacing into stupid), but the movie as a whole, I found it just boring. I don't mind Jackson "betraying" the spirit of original book, it is his creative licence, but the whole thing felt like a pale LOTR rip-off to me: I was catching myself thinking: yes, we saw it there... yes, it is almost identical as... only in LOTR the same things had a much deeper emotional impact. There are far too many orcs and too many action sequences in it, IMO, and not enough space for characters: Martin Freeman, for example, had been almost pushed to background and he has very few chances to show his development as a character. Thorin has been reduced to a gloomy I-want-to-reclaim-my-kingdom-and-I-am-very-serious-about-it figure. All the actors are good (may be with the exception of Orlando Bloom, but this is not a surprise), but they aren't given enough material to shine. It is no surprise, therefore, that the Dragon comes as the most nuanced personality in the whole film