Not the Spectacular Finale We Expected

Rating: 6/10 (16 December 2014)

December 16, 2014
Even for the past two installments of this film franchise, I have been wondering why the title is "The Hobbit", when the main story had really been more about Dwarfs. In this film, the chief Dwarf Thorin Oakenshield and his internal conflict was the central plot around which the other stories revolved. Even the Elves Legolas and Tauriel had more scenes than our solitary hobbit, Bilbo Baggins. The only scenes Bilbo totally owned for himself were those in the last five minutes.
Within the first 10 minutes, Smaug, the dragon who attacked Laketown at the end of Part 2, was already down and out of the story. For the rest of the 134 minutes running time of this film, we will be watching battle after battle among various armies trying to gain control of the massive trove of gold that Smaug left behind in his old lair in Erebor.
Because Thorin was overcome with madness from "dragon sickness", he refused to peacefully negotiate with the Humans (led by the Bard) and the Elves (led by Thranduil). This eventually leads to war -- a five-way battle along with two groups of vicious evil Orcs (led by Azog) and finally, the Great Eagles (with Radagast and Beorn). After the conclusion of the battle, Bilbo finally returns back to his home in Bag End after 11 years.
If you have seen the past two episodes, the level of acting of the cast is basically the same. Nothing so spectacular, nothing so bad. Richard Armitage does very well in the lead role of Thorin. He imbues the character with dignity and honor, despite his initial turn to the dark side. Other actors who stood out were Aidan Turner as the lovestruck dwarf Kili, and Luke Evans as the Dragonslayer Bard. Aside from seeing Ian McKellen again, it was also good to see a lot of cameos from the original LOTR series, like Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving, Christopher Lee and Ian Holm.
For a film that is basically all computer-generated effects, the quality of these effects in a lot of key scenes were rather disappointing. There was a scene of Dwarfs riding goats up a rocky mountain that really looked fake. The scene where Legolas hitched a ride on a bat in flight was snicker-inducing. The worst was the scene where Legolas was climbing up rocks as they were falling down from a crumbling bridge. The CG was so bad, it looked like Legolas was running up in thin air.
Speaking from the point of view of a non-LOTR fanatic, this whole Hobbit film franchise could have been just one big film or maybe two. Even if it was interesting and engaging, the story felt too overstretched when director Peter Jackson decided to make it into a three film series. The expectations for a truly spectacular finale in this film was not really met fully because this had been marred by some poor visual effects. Despite this lengthy storytelling, this film felt a bit incomplete. There was no scene telling us the aftermath of the battle, nor the fate of the gold, which was the main cause of the war.
I felt that the second film, "The Desolation of Smaug" was the best of the trilogy. It had the best part of the story, the best action sequences and the best special effects of the three. Anyhow, the tying- in of certain details in this film to the first LOTR film though makes me want to watch that first series all over again. 6/10.