It's a trap! Ah, whatever, you will watch it.

Rating: 7/10 (19 March 2014)

Well, the title says it all. You will watch it, because it's meant to be watched. Not read. Not given a thought. Watched, period. CGI candy. While I believe there are plenty of reviews of visual fans, stating how gorgeous the pixels moved, I'd rather present a cynical\critical approach to the various CGI scenes.
*Warning - SPOILERS* >Spiders. Yet another extremely dangerous fight that leaves all dwarfs alive. Dwarfs lived through goblins, giants, orcs, spiders... Only to have hardscripted arrow hit one dwarf with a boner.
>Treasure of Erebor. At least in Harry Potter there was Gemini Curse and magic. Do you expect me to believe that dwarfs just let these kilotons of gold lay around? That's below even hoarding, that's clinical, absurd and not even impressive.
>Witch King's tomb. Probably one of the stupidest sequences in the whole movie. Gandalf goes in. "Summons Radaghast". Talks some scare. Alright, cut! Seriously, this tomb was mentioned in the previous movie - why the hell not show it? With all the stupid CGI scenes and Bilbo\Dragon flirting, why not show Gandalf actually explore the tomb, not look at the broken wall and realize: "Welp, we're screwed".
>Bard. Faramir, yet another copycat from the original. Archer, douche, handsome.
>Legolas and Tauriel. Damn, all they need is a pair of lightsabers and some Force to kick it. And introducing this elf just to mate her with dwarf for very obscure reason - right... Screen time! >Dol Guldur. It's a trap meme. Ah, screw it, once again there has to be screen time filler with no sense or purpose. And that will still keep the main character alive against all sense. Who, like, literally, WHO could not guess that Necromancer is Sauron? >Barrel Chase. Me: I thought the cow... I mean, the "goblin level" of the first movie was the most clinically stupid, unrealistic and ridiculous scene(well, together with stone giants), but this is something else. When you go mental, you go all the way down - I am afraid to watch 3rd part.
>Smaug. I thought Transformers 3's "stupid wench tricking Megatron" was something that proved that Michael Bay is biased. No, Jackson has just redeemed Bay. Seriously, this silly CGI talking lizard hasn't fried Bilbo on sight, was flirting with him all along... and then hasn't killed a single dwarf before flying away in ragequit. Worst movie ending nominee. At least first movie's Bilbo-Gollum scene was a funny filler. This is just inexcusable CGI mashup with no sense or point at all, just to take screen time and show the dragon's moves.
>Forge battle. Right, haven't any of them watched Alien Resurrection? You've gotta freeze the gold... Like, seriously, if this molten gold could not melt or simply incinerate Thorin swimming right on top of it... What was the point of bathing a whole "impenetrable" extra strong lizard in it? They expected him to melt? But, yeah, looks cool. Worst ending ever already achieved, so what gives, cheers for the looks.
Copied and edit-censored from my post on another site.
So why give 7 stars to this? At least it's a Tolkien movie. And it has more action and plot escalation than the previous one. Render onto Ceasar that which is Ceasar's, so to say.