This was the movie that I was hoping to get!

Rating: 9/10 (2 March 2014)

The Lord of the Rings trilogy is some of my favorite movies of all time. In fact, I would say that Return of the King is my favorite movie in general. When the first Hobbit movie came out, I enjoyed it, but it was nothing like the first journey to Middle Earth. Now the second Hobbit movie is out, and let me tell you, expectations were high. And let me tell you, I enjoyed this movie almost as much as the original trilogy. This movie continues the story of the Hobbit where everybody has to get to the mountain. On the way there, they meet people, have battles, and ride in barrels. I know, that synopsis was terrible. Just trust me that it's a fantastic story. Is it as epic as the original trilogy? No, but it's still well written and has an interesting premise. That's always good. What also helps escalate this movie are the characters and actors. The characters feel more relatable in this one than in the last and they're capped off by solid acting. Martin Freemen makes a fantastic Bilbo, Ian McKellan is still awesome as Gandalf, Orlando Bloom does a great job, everyone does a very well done performance. There are a few characters that feel shoe horned into the movie, like Legolas and that one chick elf I forgot the name of, but they are awesome. Not only do they have great fighting scenes, but they're just awesome as well. What I also like about this movie is that the dwarfs seem more relevant. In the first movie, the dwarfs didn't have a whole lot of material to work with and seemed forgotten in the mix. In this movie, however, they've got more dialogue, more action scenes, and more screen time. It made me pay attention more to the dwarfs, which I was glad happened. Now we move onto the fights. Holy crap. They were exciting, they were intense, they were fun, they were chaotic, they were awesome. One of my favorite action scenes in the movie was the water barrel scene. Everyone is hiding in barrels out of an Elvin prison and there's fighting and arrows and death and pure awesomeness. I hope they turn it into an amusement park ride. I would definitely attend that. And now, we get to the part that everyone's waiting for. Smaug. This guy is my favorite movie character of the year. And it's a dragon! He was big, menacing, had amazing voice work done by Cumberbatch, and he just looked so cool. During the scenes with him, I was frightened. I was literally frightened by this dragon. That is how awesome Smaug is. He is easily my favorite part of the movie. Overall, Desolation of Smaug was a breath of fresh air for the Hobbit trilogy. It had a great story, solid acting, awesome action, a freaking dragon that stole the show, and the ending. THAT ENDING! This is one of the most "holy crap, cliff hanger" endings to a movie I've ever seen. I will not spoil anything; that will need to be something you should see. This is one of my favorite movies of the year and I cannot wait to see it again.