XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien   
   From: mr@sandman.net   
      
   In article , Paul S. Person  wrote:   
      
   > This is a short note because there is a very good discussion on aft.   
      
   > This statement, IMHO, is /almost/ true:   
      
   > If you liked the first Hobbit movie, you will like the second. And   
   > vice-versa. For the same reasons.   
      
   > The exception is if you based your like or dislike of the first film   
   > on Radigast's zany antics. In the second film, these antics are   
   > gone. He may not be as serious as Gandalf, but he isn't silly.   
      
   True. And he has less screen time as well.   
      
   > Otherwise it's pretty much the same as the first film: 1) The story   
   > of the book continues on through the middle chapters, or so, leaving   
   > the Death of Smaug and the Battle of Five Armies for the third film.   
   > 2) The other stuff continues on pretty much as might be expected:   
   > the better you remember the details of JRRT's sub-creation, the more   
   > puzzled and dismayed you will be. The actual assault on Dol Guldur,   
   > assuming it occurs at all, will occur in the third film, since there   
   > will only be three films. 3) The recycling of patterns from the   
   > /LOTR/ films continues; in this case, the Arwen-Aragorn-Eowyn   
   > triangle, such as it was, is reincarnated in the tale of a female   
   > Elf torn between a much higher-ranking Elf and a Dwarf. Hey, if   
   > interspecies romance worked in /LOTR/ it should work here too,   
   > right?   
      
   Let me stop you there. While the third movie may go down this route - there   
   was nothing in DOS that made me think that Tauriel had any such emotions   
   for Kili. She certainly cared for him due to their conversations in the   
   caves, but it's a lot like Aragorn, Eowyn and Arwen in the way that   
   Laurel/Aragorn had nothing but a friendship feelings towards Eowyn/Kili.   
      
   And whether or not Kili felt something akin to "love" for Tauriel, we don't   
   have much to go on there either. He sees her in this Frodo/Arwen elf-light   
   sort of thing, and that's all. He looks upon her the same way Frodo looked   
   upon Arwen, yet Frodo didn't go around a yearn for Arwen.   
      
   Again, the third movie might go down that route, but this installement   
   didn't really show this as firmly as some seem to interprete it, if you ask   
   me.   
      
   > 4) Speaking of that female Elf, she makes me wish Arwen had   
   > been so spunky. Here we have a completely non-JRRT character ... and   
   > it works! IMHO, of course. 5) Expect to here the same music you   
   > heard before. Not necessarily organized into the same pieces, but   
   > the same themes. Including one that should be /very/ familiar. 6)   
   > If, as I did, you thought the one-armed Orc baddie was dead at the   
   > end of the first film, you are in for a /big/ surprise. At least   
   > this time I noticed that he was using a tree branch for a lower arm.   
      
   Wait what? I'm assuming you speak of Azog here? Why would you think he was   
   dead after AUJ? He's standing there watching them fly off on eagles after   
   all.   
      
   And he hasn't got a "tree branch", it's a metal arm that is somehow infused   
   with his body, it even extrudes above his elbow.   
      
   > So that leaves an action-packed third film: the Assault on Dol   
   > Guldur, the Death of Smaug, and the Battle of Five Armies. With very   
   > little of that pesky filler stuff (otherwise known as "story")   
   > between them.   
      
   To be fair - most of the "story" in TH was about Bombur sleeping and   
   dreaming of food :)   
      
      
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