Peter Jackson is a genius...

Rating: 3/10 (5 January 2015)

...at milking money out of gullible fans of J.R.R. Tolkien's work, myself included. And that's about it. This final part of The Hobbit "trilogy" shows no sign of him having any storytelling talent left. What little redeeming qualities this movie has, I'll go through in the end. Now, a long list of faults and failures:

Smaug. He was the main villain in the book. Now we get five minutes of him in the beginning. Unforgivable.

The way Bard kills Smaug. Being an archer myself, this scene made me cringe in physical pain. What in the world were you thinking, Jackson? Why didn't you just give him a ballista or at least a very large crossbow? If you know anything about archery at all, you know that you would never be able to shoot an arrow like that with a broken bow at all, let alone that distance at that speed and so accurately.

Alfrid. OK, we get it, he's a selfish, greedy, egocentric, cowardly vermin. You don't need to rub it in at every turn. It's obvious that Alfrid was supposed to be some sort of Gríma Wormtongue part two, but whereas Gríma had a motivation to be "evil", Alfrid just is all out evil and no good with no humane features whatsoever. Unforgivable.

Dwarf - Elf love story. Against the lore, no depth, no plausible reason for the characters to be in love, no chemistry between the two actors, no purpose in the greater story. Why?

Bilbo's role in the movie. At times I forgot he even existed, and he is supposed to be the main character.

The giant worms. So, you have these massive worms that can eat their way straight through a mountain and you use them to...drill a few tunnels for the orcs to walk? Why not have them surface directly below the enemy formation to send them into disarray? Why not send them to weaken the enemy fortifications and bring them down?

Dáin riding a pig. Yes, a mighty dwarven king is riding a pig in this movie.

The battle of the five armies begins with the dwarfs forming a solid shield wall across the valley floor. The orcs have no missile troops to mention, whereas the elves, now protected by the dwarven shield wall, have rank upon rank of deadly archers, and what do the elves do? Whittle the enemy down with their arrows, as any sensible commander would have them do in such a situation? No. They ninja jump over the dwarfs into close combat with the orcs, throwing the major tactical advantage of the shield wall straight out of the window. It's as if Jackson paid the medieval warfare experts that he used in LOTR trilogy to not take part in the making of this "trilogy".

Where in Tolkien's lore does it state that dwarfs ride goats? I know that it happens in World of Warcraft, but Middle Earth? And where did the goats suddenly come from?

Wait. Azog's supposed plan was to lure Thorin, Fili, Kili and Dwalin into a trap, which they would have been unable to walk into without the goats, so maybe Azog sent them to the dwarfs. Yeah, it suddenly makes sense. Or not.

Bard riding a wagon into a troll, Trolls used as battering rams, Legolas riding a bat, Legolas using his sword as a joystick to crash a troll into a tower, the ensuing duel on top of that crumbling tower, Azog's choice of weapon (a huge slab of stone on a long chain) for a duel on a frozen lake, go ahead and have your pick for the silliest moment of the movie from these.

The Eagles. Yeah, I know the Eagles were originally used in The Hobbit. Yeah, I know they were supposed to be present in the battle. Then why for the love of all the gods of all possible pantheons do they have the smallest role of any six Tolkien movies that Jackson made in this particular one? We get about 15 seconds of them. And Beorn? Five seconds. I'm not kidding you. Five seconds.

Thranduil tells Legolas to go and search for Aragorn. What? Why? They don't know each other when they first meet in LOTR trilogy, and at the time of Battle of the Five Armies Aragorn is in fact a 10 year old boy being raised and guarded in Rivendell, not a ranger known as Strider, so what the hell Jackson?

No closure whatsoever. Seriously. We're not told that Dáin became the King under the Mountain, we're not told that the lake people will begin to rebuild Dale, we're not told what happens to the gold, we're not told what happens to the remaining dwarfs, we're not shown the funeral of Thorin, Fili and Kili, NOTHING. The movie just ends without answering the usual questions raised by a trilogy of movies.

The only good thing about this movie was the cast. Richard Armitage and Martin Freeman were both brilliant and others did a fine job as well, but with material and directing so weak, they simply can't do much to prevent the movie being a piece of turd. 3/10, and all the points go to the actors and their work.