Huge Improvement over the First film.

Rating: 10/10 (11 January 2014)

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug Spoiler free review
The second film in the The Hobbit Trilogy is a HUGE Improvement over the first film, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The pacing is fast and exciting with some huge action set pieces. There is this Barrel sequence that is just plain awesome.
The characters are more fleshed out in this movie though some are still not developed properly. New additions to the trilogy are Legolas and Tauriel. Both were Bad-Ass. Though I know they were shoe Horned into the movie but they made some of the action scenes awesome. There is a love triangle in the movie. That could bother some people.
The Best part in this film is Smaug the Dragon voiced and motion- captured by Benedict Cumberbatch. Smaug was menacing. The CGI of Smaug was Amazing. The performances are still good especially Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Orlando Bloom, Evangeline Lily, Lee Pace, Luke Evans and Sir Ian McKellen..
There are a few problems. The movie has a lot of differences from the book but it does expand the universe. There are a few CGI shots that could have been polished.
The soundtrack by Howard Shore is good but no the best. The credits song "I see Fire" is pretty good, too.
Overall rating 10/10 Fantastic thrill ride.