The Hobbit confirmed as three movies

[Steerpike]

What do you guys think of that? I'm OK with it so long as Jackson remains true to the source material:

Five Possible Reasons that The Hobbit is Spilling Over into a Third Movie | Tor.com

 

[Sheilawisz]

I watched a trailer for The Hobbit when I went to the Mall to watch Brave yesterday, and it was so good!!

I can't wait to watch The Hobbit, and if it has been confirmed that it will be three movies then that's wonderful news for me. Now I have to read the book itself before the first movie comes out, I am sure that the films will be great =)

The Hobbit has been described as written with a children's literature style that is unlike the later Tolkien stories, is that true? Can we expect the movies to be more childish than The Lord of the Rings??

 

[Ireth]

Three movies now?? How much more are they planning to add to the story? Seriously, if they weren't going into all the White Council stuff and all else they'd be able to fit the whole thing nicely into one film and leave it at that. Three movies seems a tad bit excessive for a book that's a fraction of the size of the one that made up the LOTR trilogy.

 

[Steerpike]

@Ireth:

The assault on the Necromancer and White Council stuff could be cool. I don't know abut the creation of entirely new characters.

@Sheila:

The book itself is closer to children's fiction that LOTR, certainly. That doesn't mean they'll be filmed that way. I expect the overall tone will be consistent with the LOTR trilogy (based on what I've seen so far).

 

[Shockley]

Two things on whether its for children or adults:

1. Bombur is in it, period. No way to mature that up, and it looks like they're sticking with the traditional representation.

2. The trolls, which are comic relief in a way, are depicted as resembling the cave troll in FotR. Makes me think that might be more serious.

 

[Black Dragon]

Three movies now?? How much more are they planning to add to the story? Seriously, if they weren't going into all the White Council stuff and all else they'd be able to fit the whole thing nicely into one film and leave it at that. Three movies seems a tad bit excessive for a book that's a fraction of the size of the one that made up the LOTR trilogy.

While this new series is being labeled "The Hobbit Trilogy," and the Hobbit serves as the main story in the foreground, these films are drawing heavily on Tolkien's other writings. In fact, a significant portion of the story is coming from two major sources:

• Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth
• The Appendices of Return of the King

There's a lot of important stuff going in these writings that set up the events in Lord of the Rings.

So really, the Hobbit is only part of the story being told in this new trilogy.

 

[Ireth]

Then they should change the name, since it's kinda misleading. It's not JUST "The Hobbit" anymore, it's "The Hobbit and a bunch of other historical stuff."

 

[Black Dragon]

Three movies now?? How much more are they planning to add to the story? Seriously, if they weren't going into all the White Council stuff and all else they'd be able to fit the whole thing nicely into one film and leave it at that. Three movies seems a tad bit excessive for a book that's a fraction of the size of the one that made up the LOTR trilogy.

Hey Ireth,

Check this out:

In Defense of Peter Jackson

I wrote this just for you.

 

[Ireth]

Hey Ireth,

Check this out:

In Defense of Peter Jackson

I wrote this just for you.

D'aw, I feel special. XD

Seriously though, I like the points you brought up in that article. It would be undeniably cool to see the Necromancer, Radagast and other characters who are only alluded to in the Hobbit, or were cut out of LOTR, but I still worry about the possibility of tacked-on, superfluous romance plots just to appeal to fanboys who crush on hot elf maidens. (The Hobbit is very lacking in females, and LOTR is not much better, but at least LOTR *had* them.)

 

[Black Dragon]

I haven't seen any evidence of invented romantic subplots, although who knows.

One positive thing about Jackson's approach is that it gives female characters a role without inventing anything out of thin air.

As described in Unfinished Tales, Galadriel played a huge role in driving the Necromancer out of Mirkwood. She does some AMAZING stuff in this plot line. So now there's a major female character in the films who does important things.

Also, Tolkien has a tendency to describe groups of characters without identifying them as individuals. So for example, Bilbo and the Dwarves are captured by group of (mostly) nameless, generic wood elves.

What Jackson does is take some of those elves and give them names and personalities. One of them is a female wood elf named Tamriel. The other is Legolas who, according to Tolkien's timeline, was living there at that time (he was the prince of the Mirkwood Wood Elves). These characters aren't radical new inventions by Jackson. Rather, it's him taking the nameless group of elves and making them seem more real by having individuals peppered among them. And of course, this also adds another female character to the films.

Personally, I think that having female characters in the films make them seem more realistic. Plus, a world without women would kind of suck. Don't you agree?

 

[Ireth]

One positive thing about Jackson's approach is that it gives female characters a role without inventing anything out of thin air.

Well no, but he did give Arwen stuff to do in the first LOTR movie that she never did in the book -- taking Frodo to Rivendell was what Glorfindel did, and summoning the river was Elrond's doing, with some pizzazz added by Gandalf. I can kinda forgive the first, since Glorfindel wasn't an actual character in the movies and Arwen needed to do something other than snog Aragorn and cry about the thought of losing him, but they should have let Elrond and Gandalf take credit for the river thing, IMO. Having Arwen do it just comes a bit out of nowhere, whereas Elrond and Gandalf had actual powers to allow them to do such a thing.

As for original female characters in The Hobbit, from what I know about one of them, she's basically Legolas with boobs. She uses dual knives and a bow like he does, on top of being Captain of the Guard. Definitely some Mary Sue potential there.

 

[gavintonks]

I trust Jackson but I hope it is not to make 3x the money like the horrible harry potter last book and 2 rubbish films

 

[Ireth]

I trust Jackson but I hope it is not to make 3x the money like the horrible harry potter last book and 2 rubbish films

The seventh book is one of my favorites. What did you find horrible about it?

 

[Steerpike]

The seventh book is one of my favorites. What did you find horrible about it?

I liked the seventh one as well, and it would have been impossible to do it as one film, unless it was a very long one.

Even with The Hobbit, I suspect you could make three films just covering the material from that book. As was noted, above, the unabridged audiobook of The Hobbit is eleven hours long. You'd shave some of that off by doing it in motion picture form, but I don't think six hours would be unrealistic to cover the entire book, even without adding material from other sources.

 

[LOCOFOOL]

I think it's necessary; my film major friend said they're using some new filming techniques which should be pretty cool. Also it'll cover a lot of material which i'm pretty excited about.

 

[gavintonks]

I did not enjoy the running around the countryside and it fif not have the same intensity and feel of the others

 

[Mindfire]

The only thing that bothers me about the Hobbit adaptation is this new Tauriel character they made up for the films. It's one thing to re-cut certain scenes or slightly alter the role of established characters, but creating an entirely new named character out of the nothing? This makes me nervous. Couldn't this "Tauriel" part have just been assigned to Legolas instead, since he's a legit character and was (IIRC) there at the time?

 

[Steerpike]

The only thing that bothers me about the Hobbit adaptation is this new Tauriel character they made up for the films. It's one thing to re-cut certain scenes or slightly alter the role of established characters, but creating an entirely new named character out of the nothing? This makes me nervous. Couldn't this "Tauriel" part have just been assigned to Legolas instead, since he's a legit character and was (IIRC) there at the time?

Legolas is in there as well. I suspect Tauriel is there with the idea that you need her to generate more interest among female moviegoers. I don't think that's actually true, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's the thinking.

 

[Ireth]

Legolas is in there as well. I suspect Tauriel is there with the idea that you need her to generate more interest among female moviegoers. I don't think that's actually true, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's the thinking.

Pfff. I'm female, and I wouldn't go to a movie just because of a female character or three. The attractive dwarf men are appealing enough on their own. XDDD

 

[Steerpike]

Pfff. I'm female, and I wouldn't go to a movie just because of a female character or three. The attractive dwarf men are appealing enough on their own. XDDD

I bet you wouldn't throw Gimli out of bed, eh?