Disappointing when compared to Jackson's previous efforts...

Rating: 3/10 (22 April 2015)

I questioned the decision to make 3 movies out of such a short book. It could have happily been done in one, or at the most two. I blame the studio for pushing for a repeat trilogy, but Jackson seriously mishandled this opportunity.
The Battle of Five Armies covers approximately 5 pages of The Hobbit. To drag it out into a two and a half hour movie was asking way too much of the source material. To flesh out the story, in addition to making copious use of apocryphal material, Jackson made up a completely unnecessary and ridiculous love story. A useless takeaway from the original story.
No, there are no women in The Hobbit. But that's the way the story was written. And Tolkien is a damn literary genius. This is a gorgeous story and Jackson completely screwed the pooch with it.