Why The Hobbit was Disappointing and How I Hope It Will Get Better

Last week when The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey came out on DVD, I was eager to watch it again. I had been less than thrilled when I saw the movie in the theatre, and this time, I tried to approach with lowered expectations, hoping that it wasn't as bad as I remembered. Unfortunately, after watching it again I have to admit that The Hobbit just isn't the movie I wanted it to be. However, it's only the first in the trilogy and I have hopes that Peter Jackson will really shine in the next two.

All of that being said, I'd like to present to you the three big reasons why I'm forced to admit that The Hobbit is not a good movie, and a few thoughts on why I hope the next two will get better:

1. Peter Jackson fell in love with his special effects.

I'm going to call this the George Lucas syndrome. It's like Peter Jackson decided that just because he can do something with computer animation, then it must be included in the film. This resulted in the special effects being used to in a jarring, awkward way. The battle scene in the goblin cave looked like a video game. CG characters (the Goblin King, Azog) made me think of Jar Jar Binks. Entire mountains came to life, just so the animation department could show off. And don't even get me started on the heavy handed way some actors' faces were airbrushed to try and make them look a decade younger.

In The Lord of the Rings trilogy, the special effects were used subtly, and helped immerse the audience further in the world that was being created. In The Hobbit, the opposite happens. The special effects jump off the screen, demanding notice, and jarring the audience out of the story. And speaking of the Lord of the Rings, that brings me to my second point...

2. Reminders of the other trilogy were too frequent and kind of awkward.

When I say reminders, it usually was a moment recreated in too faithful detail, awkwardly shoehorned into the narrative of this new movie. There's the scene where Gandalf gets all scary and deep-voiced in Bag End for no reason. Ian Holme and Elijah Wood were brought back just to remind us that the other movies existed. There's the time Azog and his goblin crew are hanging out at Weathertop. In fact, the entire subplot with Azog was invented, with the only reason I can see being that it resulted in our band of protagonists being chased by a baddy for the second half of the movie in the same way it happened in The Fellowship of the Ring. And don't even get me started on the super fakey way the ring falls on to Bilbo's finger, in exactly the same fakey way it fell on Frodo's finger.

And the one moment that should have been recreated just as it was shown in the original trilogy was altered in this movie. In the Fellowship of the Ring, there is a flashback of Bilbo finding the ring. When Bilbo finds the ring in The Hobbit, the situation is completely different. I'm not looking for perfect repetition, I would have been fine with the same general idea. Instead, the moment happens under completely different circumstances. Anyone who has seen The Fellowship of the Ring -- a group also know as the entire audience of The Hobbit -- will notice the discrepancy and be pulled out of the story by it.

3. The movie is too long and moves too slowly.

This isn't an uncommon problem for Peter Jackson. King Kong, anyone? In The Hobbit he was given room to do whatever he wanted with the movie, and what he did was pad out the run time with unnecessary scenes and action sequences that were basically just CG love fests. As much as I love the songs from Tolkien's books, I don't think they really add that much to a cinematic experience; we don't need twenty minutes of various dwarven choruses in the first half-hour of the movie.

I think the problem is that The Hobbit should not be three movies. The story is not that long or complex, even with extra material from Tolkien's appendices. Three movies are too much, and three three-hour movies verges on the ridiculous. The Lord of the Rings was excellent despite its run-time because there was so much material in the original source. Peter Jackson was forced to make cuts and not include things and as a result every scene was in the movie because it helped the story move forward. With The Hobbit, the opposite is true. There simply isn't enough source material to keep the film going when you have so much time to fill. What you end up with is a movie that feels bogged down in parts, and bloated action sequences that exist just to show off the special effects.

All of this being said, I am keeping a small hope alive that the next two movies will be better. There are some really excellent performances in the movie. Martin Freemen, in particular, is the perfect Bilbo. The best parts of the movie are the times when he is given room to shine; his scene with Gollum, for example, could not be improved upon. Ian McKellan is, as always, excellent, and the actors playing the dwarves do a great job of conveying each character's individuality instead of just coming across as a mass of indistinguishable beards. With such a strong cast, even a movie with significant problems is enjoyable.

We all know that Peter Jackson can make excellent movies. Even his less stellar efforts are still good, it's just that we've come to expect gold from him every time. I know I'm about the millionth person to raise these points about The Hobbit, and I just hope that he listens to some of the feedback and uses it constructively. The Hobbit tells a great story, and we haven't even gotten to the good parts yet. I'm still going to let myself hope that the rest of the trilogy will bring the awesomeness of Middle Earth that we all love.

I finally want to read The Walking Dead

I've really enjoyed watching The Walking Dead. Normally I don't get into blood and guts stuff -- the storyline often ends up being secondary to the violence. This show, though, is more about character development than squeezing as many blood soaked moments as possible into an hour.

As much as I've liked the show, I haven't really felt the urge to read the comic books upon which the show was based. The first season was compelling, but I didn't have the desire to dig deeper, and the second season was kind of boring for long parts. Definitely not the kind of thing to entice me to further reading.

The third season, though, has been different. The story arc that juxtaposed Rick and the Governor is the best thing that ever happened to this show. First, you are wondering if the Governor is really all that bad. After all, he's not doing anything Rick isn't doing. However, we get a slow reveal throughout the season and each week the writers let us peer deeper and deeper into the Governor's twisted psyche. Meanwhile, Rick is losing control of his mental state, all because he is trying to act like the kind of man the Governor really is. A man that Rick definitely is not.

I know that the season's not over -- we still have to fight the "war" between the prison and Waterbury -- but it feels like Rick's character journey, at least, has reached its destination. His call to arms in the last episode was the polar opposite to the ultimatum he delivered at the end of season two. It was an admission that the path he'd been trying to follow since he killed Shane was not right. He is a completely different person than he was at the beginning of the season, but he is much closer now to being the person he was at the beginning of the show.

It's this kind of interplay between characters, as well as a bad guy who is both believable and scary, that makes me want to delve into the story behind the show. If this kind of thing can be developed within the limitations of the TV format, then I'm dying to find out about what the writers of the comic book got into.

Plus, I hear there's more Michonne in the comics. And Michonne is my favorite badass zombie killer. I would love to see more of her.