"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" comes across precisely as it means to.

Rating: 8/10 (20 December 2012)

The Hobbit is a bit of a chimera. It's a little bit Lord of the Rings, as it should be as it covers events leading up to that story, and its a little bit light-hearted adventure through middle-earth. Now, no one can criticize a chimera for not being a lion or for being a dragon, when it is made up of parts of each by nature. It's identity is found in the diverse mixture of themes and events. The book is very similar in this regard, and the movie is quite close to the book. It should also be noted that unlike other movie trilogies, The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey isn't a self-contained story; we really need to see all three movies to understand all the events from An Unexpected Journey.
The main flaw I found in this film was the preference for action over character development. It would have been nice to see Bilbo be more of a burden and complainer than was shown in the movie. Those wide-view aerial shots sometimes came across as a cheap way to move characters from A to B.
The Hobbit isn't the perfect book, and it doesn't make for a ground- breaking movie either. It is not another "Lord of the Rings" movie. The Hobbit is a movie about Bilbo Baggins and Middle-Earth. And that's what people love about it. If you go in expecting to see any other movie than The Hobbit, you'll be disappointed.