I re-watched the entire LOTR trilogy (all extended versions) over last weekend. I think Fellowship is the only one I'd watched in full since seeing them in the theater. I expected it to be a chore, and it really wasn't. I was fully entertained the entire time.

Looking forward to catching this between last minute Christmas shopping stops.

Apparently that Beladonna Took comment was in the context of favorite scenes that were cut from the film.

And oh wow, I had no idea that Lee's stuff was filmed completely apart from the rest.

Damn, I have to pace myself with the 13 hours collectively that's in the Jackson LOTR series

^

I just got back from seeing it. The "normal" way and no 3D. I took the kids to Denny's for a Shire Sausage Skillet first just for the hell of it, and it was good. I just wanted to say...this is a great movie. We loved it. It doesn't drag, it's not too long, it follows the book well enough to be very true to the source material. If you didn't like it...well, **** you. You're a moron and I hate you.

2D showing in t-minus 30 minutes.

Having seen it in both 2D and HFR 3-D, I can honestly say, that while the 3D was very well done, I think I enjoyed it better in 2D. The movie is just a cinematic masterpiece, and 3D enhancements, while cool to see, were not necessary. I would recommend seeing it in 2D first to get engrossed in the story, and then see it again in 3D just to enjoy the 3D experience.

Of course I CAN'T see it in 2D 48FPS.

Pisses me off.

Yeah, I have not found any place that is doing that either. It is supposed to be available as 2D HFR, but it seems like every theatre that went with the HFR option wants the extra $$ the 3D ticket brings.

+1 (minus the botulism, err, Denny's)

Finally saw it today. I loved it. If you're a fan of LOTR, you'll love it. If you're not, you won't. It's really that simple.

For me, it's more time in Middle Earth, and that's a very good thing.

Can't wait going tomorrow night, IMAX 3D.

Saw it yesterday,. Pretty solid and entertaining. Seemsl like LOTR lite of course. Some over the top shit so far.

HFR is only available in 3D.

http://www.thehobbit.com/hfr3d/faq.html

I thought 2D HFR was one of the listed formats when I looked a few weeks back, but looks like I was wrong.

I disagree here. I enjoyed it, but I didn't love it. I thought I was a pretty big step down from any of the three LOTR films, and that's partly due to the complete destruction of my willing suspension of disbelief. I can get past these people falling great distances and not being completely broken, but can we get at least some scratches? It was a little overlong, and the pacing was a bit off. A lot of the toilet humor felt forced and out of place.

The casting was outstanding, though, and for the most part the effects were top notch (there's one shot of the Brown Wizard guy on the rabbit sled leading the orcs on a chase that had ridiculously bad FX).

Again, overall I enjoyed the movie, and I'll see the next ones. But it wasn't what I'd hoped, and it wasn't what I expected.

My 2 cents.

I fully agree with this one....I didn't LOVE it like LOTR movies but it was entertaining. Some of the over the top BS kinda annoyed me but I hope the next 2 are better. I understand why its getting good reviews vs excellent

I loved it. It captured the book well and goes away from the seriousness of the lotr films a bit

I saw this last Sunday. We saw it in 2D. I don't know if it was the theater we saw it or what, but there were some scenes that were just a mess of blur, particularly the opening scene with Smaug's attack. I want to see it now in 3D HFR to compare.

I loved the movie, though. The scene that everyone is complaining about didn't bother me. Anyone who follows fantasy knows that dwarves are nearly indestructible. They also had a wizard along that could have done something to soften the blow.

As others have mentioned, it sucks that I have to wait a year for the next one to come out.

Thanks! That makes sense.

It actually drifted away from the book on quite a few things...

This movie was way too long. The pacing for the next two is going to blow ass, too.

That said, I really enjoyed it.

Hahahaha. You can never make these movies long enough.

Indeed. I was extremely disappointed that it ended.

There's only so much material. They were making stuff up to put in there. I don't get it.

Not really. Other than Radagast most of that stuff they added is from the appendices.

We would have stayed for another three hours, easily.

The Appendices come "standard" at the end of any version of Return of the King that you buy. Appendix A is where all the good stuff is, by and large.

Appendix B can also be helpful, as it contains a timeline which includes some substantive stuff which answers your questions above (keeping in mind that Peter Jackson has played substantially with the timeline and even with some character motivations (Saruman, especially) in the movies versus the books, such as:

I am currently reading The Hobbit. It seems that the Gandalf in the books is not as much of a bad a$$ as the way he is portrayed in the LOTR movies. Not that he is weak or anything, but not nearly as powerful and confident. Of course, I have yet to see the movie, The Hobbit. I also haven't read TLOTR but plan to read it in the near future. So take that with a grain of salt, I guess.

The Soviets made their own version of The Hobbit. It is beyond terrible. We're talking Manos: Hands of Fate territory here.

<iframe src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/6m0l3Yr1B50" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" width="420"></iframe>

Hate to break the news, but this movie sucks.

With reports like this, you could work for Alex Jones or the Weekly World News.

You're only saying that because you intend to go back and see it again a billion times and you want the lines to be shorter.

Apparently, Tolkiens son hates these movies and what Jackson has done...



"I could write a book on the idiotic requests I have received," sighs Christopher Tolkien. He is trying to protect the literary work from the three-ring circus that has developed around it. In general, the Tolkien Estate refuses almost all requests. "Normally, the executors of the estate want to promote a work as much as they can," notes Adam Tolkien, the son of Christopher and Baillie. "But we are just the opposite. We want to put the spotlight on that which is not Lord of the Rings."

The Tolkien Estate was not able to prevent an American cartoon called Lord of the Beans, but a comic-strip version of it was halted. This policy, however, has not protected the family from the reality that the work now belongs to a gigantic audience, culturally far removed from the writer who conceived it.

Invited to meet Peter Jackson, the Tolkien family preferred not to. Why? "They eviscerated the book by making it an action movie for young people aged 15 to 25," Christopher says regretfully. "And it seems that The Hobbit will be the same kind of film."

This divorce has been systematically driven by the logic of Hollywood. "Tolkien has become a monster, devoured by his own popularity and absorbed into the absurdity of our time," Christopher Tolkien observes sadly. "The chasm between the beauty and seriousness of the work, and what it has become, has overwhelmed me. The commercialization has reduced the aesthetic and philosophical impact of the creation to nothing. There is only one solution for me: to turn my head away."



http://www.worldcrunch.com/culture-s.../#.UO34H-RQXCn

Lol eviscerated. Peter jackson made you and your family millions of dollars. You might wanna shake his hand.

I haven't seen the Hobbit yet, but I disagree with Tolkien's son. The films of the Lord of the Rings were completely appropriate, as those novels are basically the telling of a war along with a hero's quest. Those are both very appropriate for an "action" type movie.

However, I can see his criticism of the Hobbit being valid, as the hobbit is more of a coming-of-age/quest novel. I think that Jackson is trying to transform the source material into more of an action/war movie in the same vein as LOTR, and I can see that causing problems and contradicting the "feel" of the novel.

I think Jackson has flat-out said he's modifying The Hobbit a bit (three movies and using a lot of the Silmarillion) to kind of mirror the LOTR trilogy in both length and tone.

Gandalf is still a "young wizard" in the Hobbit and definitely gets better in LOTR books. At least that's the way I saw it.

I feel so sorry for those poor gazillionaires.

It's difficult to reconcile them, really. The books are written differently with different audiences in mind.

It's not really age. Gandalf is a Maia, he's waaaaaay old. The 60 years or whatever between the events of the Hobbit and the events of LoTR would be like saying a guy who is 60 years and 3 months is older than when he was 60 years and 2 months. Well, yeah, but...

I'm calling bullshit. No way that Gandalf is a member of the Missouri Association of Insurance Agents.

As you may or may not know, Tolkien's estate fought a long, hard and bitter battle over the movie rights, trying to block both LoTR and The Hobbit from being made into movies.

There's really nothing to say other than that Christopher Tolkien hates not controlling every bit of his father's literary work. I really don't care for him at all.

Would you agree he finally becomes much much more powerful though after becoming Gandalf the White? I know he's old, I was more or less just suggesting he isn't quite as powerful in the Hobbit as in LOTR.

Oh yes, of that there is no question.

It's hard to explain or understand exactly what happens when he becomes the White, but I basically think of it as his soul/spirit returns to the West where the Valar look at him and say (more or less) "you're doing great. In fact, you're the only one of the five we sent who isn't a fiasco, but since the other 4 have fallen down on the job so thoroughly, and we REALLY need you, we're going to put you back into your body and give you some extra mojo. HERE YOU GO."

Whoa -- Gandalf the White.


Now, if you read the Silmarillion and have a good understanding of the Valar and what they can/can't do and such, then the above doesn't really make that much sense (other than returning him to his body -- arguably as a Maia he didn't necessarily need a body. But it's hard to understand the serious juicing up he got when he "died".

And in addition to the increase in just power, there is certainly an additional level of seriousness, a new resolve, renewed focus.

Of course he is. Just like Jesus post resurrection.

Been playing the **** out of LOTRO. Don't act like you aren't jealous of my level 40 Champion.

http://i.imgur.com/Dj7nWh.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/uOKvEh.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/7qH8hh.jpg

And that's why Gandalf the Grey > Gandalf the White.

When Gandalf died he came back as a shitty character.

I'm not. Can't get the screen cap to work, but I've got a level 60 Guardian that I 'm working on...just finished Moria for the most part.

You're playing this but you didn't play SWTOR? How comes?

I have a SWTOR character. Forget how far I got but didn't have time to play it anymore.

Might pick it up again at some point. Story was interesting.

LOTRO holds my interest better because of the lore and setting. Turbine just did an incredible job making a huge, interesting world.

Finally saw this last night. I thought it was good overall, but I don't really get why they decided to make so much stuff up that wasn't in the books. I would have preferred they just make one movie out of the book rather than add a bunch of bullshit and turn it into three. Oh well.

$$$$$$$$

And hardcore LOTR nerds want to see it anyway. Most of that stuff is referenced in the appendices.

So true. ROFL


<iframe id="nbc-video-widget" width="560" height="315" src="http://www.nbc.com/assets/video/widget/widget.html?vid=1429006" frameborder="0"></iframe>

My then level 60 Guardian (hit level 63 tonight) posing for a picture in the Dovlen-View in Moria

I'm on a goat mother****er

http://i.imgur.com/ja3p16l.jpg

Can't wait for the next one! When's the first Hobbit come out on Blu-ray?

That's the slow goat! Get your butt to Sarnur and grind rep with Thorin's Hall and buy the fast goat! :D (I've got both...lol) I just hit level 72 the other day.

Decent flick. I enjoyed it. Only thing I don't like is Jacksons overindulgent action scenes. Characters fall 100 or a 1000 feet and never get a scratch. Yea right.....

I might have liked this better than LoTR. Seemed to have a better pace.

Anyone know if 48 fps version is being sold?

From what I can tell - no.

I didn't like the falling scene with the whole party on the bridge-type thing. Suspension of disbelief only goes so far...

Dwarves, who are almost indestructible, who also had a wizard along that could have softened the blow with a quick spell? :shrug:

To be honest, I had more of an issue with the Goblin King's scene right after that. :rolleyes:

I don't think so. I'm admittedly clueless when it comes to this....but will any TV currently support that look?

One thing I noticed even in standard DVD, I thought many scenes had a more digitized fakey look to them than the original LoTR trilogy did. Just my opinion.
Posted via Mobile Device

They have 120 Hz TVs, of course you can watch something that's shot at 48 FPS on them.

Most sports are shown in 60 FPS.

I had to read the book in HS and I wanted to shoot myself. There were only 150 different midget characters that you had to keep up with. :#

Any word if they are doing extended versions?

I read that the Extend Edition will come out in the fall. It's unsure if it will be available in 3D at this time.

There is no reason you can't put a 48 fps version on an extended edition release. Even if someone's TV doesn't support it (I can't imagine why though), you can watch any digital video file on your computer.

F them if they don't release this in HFR.

Watched it over the weekend. Really wasn't impressed at all. It was amazing to me how poorly done the CGI was. Things just looked so fake in this. Even some of the landscapes looked obviously fake. The dwarfs characters were just not interesting at all.

its funny how different peoples reactions are to this. I went in not expecting much, but really ended up enjoying it quite a bit. Admittedly, i was never the biggest LoTRs fan, so i thought this was better.

I do agree some of the CGI work( mainly the backgrounds) looked fake. It felt like they used more real locations in the original trilogy. I need to sit down and watch the original trilogy again sometime.

LotR blew this crap away.

First off, let me state I've never read the books.
Second, I know this is fantasy world.


But I just don't understand the powers of Gandolf.

One minute he can hold up his staff and blast hundreds of bad guys away in one shot of light, and the next minute he is running like a pussy from some goblins. Did his mana pool need to regenerate? Is there downtime on certain spells?

In the hobbit, he calls in a bunch of birds to come lift them off away from danger....

Why didn't Gandalf call the birds from get go, so they could've made their way to the dwarf mountain a shit load faster while avoiding all of that danger?
Why did the birds drop them off on a cliff that was still miles away from their destination instead of taking them closer?

I suppose with my logic, there wouldn't be a gazillion books.... but that kind of stuff bothers me.

Your applying too much logic. : )