Jackson thinks he can write scenes better than Tolkien - and proves once and for all that he can't

Rating: 3/10 (1 February 2015)

If you keep your expectations low the film is OK for the first 60 - 70% (other than the woefully bad lines in the cleansing of Dol Guldur, like "you should've stayed dead"), then, where the battle with the orcs and goblins and warg riders and wolves in a horde under storm clouds and swarms of bats and lightning, swarming around mountainsides desperately defended by dwarfs, men and elves should have been, and where there should have been a giant bear fighting trolls and giant eagles, instead Jackson decided he could do it better. And produced a tedious and bizarre series of dull, predictable one-one-one duels, with ridiculous video editing that removed all possibility of suspending disbelief. Combining impossible to believe with tedious takes some doing, but Jackson manages it.
Oh and such great alterations to the book as Fili (or was it Kili) saying "I've got this", which really fitted in perfectly.
Some of the scenes that stick close to the book dialogue are well acted and good, but they are few and far between.
If i wasn't opposed to the death penalty i'd say that Jackson should be dressed as Bolg son of Azog and torn apart live on film by a giant bear as part of a book-accurate remake, to pay for his crimes against Tolkien.
It's not just that he changed the story from the book, but that he replaced it with such awful scenes rather than even half-decent ones.