I read a PJ interview about making The Hobbit 3 movies and he went on about how much material there was and how he could make 3 good movies out of it. Now, it was clear that the studio was pushing him and it's entirely possible that he felt compelled to lie.
The Hobbit Part I: An Unexpected Journey
Wasn't the original title for the second film There And Back Again before the split was made?
An Oscar winner for Best Picture right there.A four hour movie about the Entmoot. Most action-packed movie ever.
Could be a good alternative option too. I want the games to continue if possible, not sure what the rights situation is right now.
There is no rule that says everyone has to like everything. My friend keeps recommending these B horror movies to me that she thinks are just amazing and I think are awful. Movies are art so it's simply a matter of taste. I really do try not to tell someone they are stupid for hating something I love because it's also going to be true the other way round.I completely understand. I gave him that I enjoyed the first trilogy and think he had something going, but made some just silly, unnecessary moves along the way. All of this is from someone who loves the books with a passion and I try to keep that in mind. That being said:
Arwen replacing Glorfindel
Completely writing out Farmer Maggot, Bombadil, and Fog on the Barrow-downs
The death of Saruman
Aragorn seeming to fall during his battle with the Orcs in Rohan.....lord help me...
The Paths of the Dead
Gandalf's confrontation with the Witch King at the gates of Minas Tirith.....SMH
I could go on, but there's no need. I've had the Bombadil discussion more than once and I know PJ "SAID" he thought it wouldn't fit, but I see it as more of a failing of creativity on his part or perhaps the studio got involved. The pacing could have been easily handled. My take was (and I could be wrong) that he didn't feel like he had the time, but he sure as hell had time to add extraneous stuff that wasn't in the book and did nothing to advance the story. The trickiest part would be the ending and not have it drag on too long. I think probably 5 slightly shorter movies spread out over 3 years (2 for the fellowship, 2 for the two towers, and one for the return of the king) with an epilogue of the story of Aragorn and Arwen would have easily allowed him a full telling of the story. The last part can be debated, but IMO he clearly was pandering to Arwen (did the same thing with whatever the hell that female elf's name was that never existed in the hobbit) and just took some liberties that were ill conceived and added nothing....in fact detracted.
And this is coming from someone who confesses to rather liking the movies. Like I said PJ was on to something and kind of muffed it.....still made some good "movies" though.
I thought The Hobbit, after a reasonable start, turned into a steaming pile.
On thing I will say is that the disagreements on this site are a hell of a lot more polite than when I've posted on reddit. LOL. I was getting blasted for even saying I liked the movies, but thought PJ screwed up. You have to hate him or you're in the crosshairs.
I completely understand. I gave him that I enjoyed the first trilogy and think he had something going, but made some just silly, unnecessary moves along the way. All of this is from someone who loves the books with a passion and I try to keep that in mind. That being said:
Arwen replacing Glorfindel
Completely writing out Farmer Maggot, Bombadil, and Fog on the Barrow-downs
The death of Saruman
Aragorn seeming to fall during his battle with the Orcs in Rohan.....lord help me...
The Paths of the Dead
Gandalf's confrontation with the Witch King at the gates of Minas Tirith.....SMH
I could go on, but there's no need. I've had the Bombadil discussion more than once and I know PJ "SAID" he thought it wouldn't fit, but I see it as more of a failing of creativity on his part or perhaps the studio got involved. The pacing could have been easily handled. My take was (and I could be wrong) that he didn't feel like he had the time, but he sure as hell had time to add extraneous stuff that wasn't in the book and did nothing to advance the story. The trickiest part would be the ending and not have it drag on too long. I think probably 5 slightly shorter movies spread out over 3 years (2 for the fellowship, 2 for the two towers, and one for the return of the king) with an epilogue of the story of Aragorn and Arwen would have easily allowed him a full telling of the story. The last part can be debated, but IMO he clearly was pandering to Arwen (did the same thing with whatever the hell that female elf's name was that never existed in the hobbit) and just took some liberties that were ill conceived and added nothing....in fact detracted.
And this is coming from someone who confesses to rather liking the movies. Like I said PJ was on to something and kind of muffed it.....still made some good "movies" though.
I thought The Hobbit, after a reasonable start, turned into a steaming pile.
On thing I will say is that the disagreements on this site are a hell of a lot more polite than when I've posted on reddit. LOL. I was getting blasted for even saying I liked the movies, but thought PJ screwed up. You have to hate him or you're in the crosshairs.
The Tolkien Estate controls the rights to it. The 1st Age, starting with the Ainulindale (The Music of the Ainur), could be awesome. Just keep Peter Jackson away from it. He'd probably add a piano and guitar to make it relevant for today.
I highly doubt he'd even want to revisit the franchise considering how much of a clusterf*** of a production the Hobbit was and how miserable he looked in the BTS footage.
It's fun seeing your list of extra bad alterations and realize that I, as someone that also loves the novel, think some (certainly not all) of those were quite smart for the adaptation, and one I see as a clear homage to how the novel dealt with it.
But to rather touch on changes in general there is one theme of changes, which includes a couple of often maligned ones, that I think PJ was very smart to make and that was changing some of the instances where the power of the Ring is undercut. As said, I love the novel, but I think the films probably has a more consistent presentation of the Ring's danger and I think that was even more important when the story is told much more quickly (which is funny to say for a trilogy that's almost 11.5 hours).
It's amusing to hear that the purists are still going on Reddit. The LotR adaptation were the first films that I ever followed the production for and I followed online discussions from the announcement all the way through the discussions of the released films. I vividly remember how many fans that just couldn't accept a single change, no matter how small, and that actually helped me learn to deal with adaptations in a more constructive way than I had before. That part of the fanbase just felt so unreasonable to me that it was easier to want to look at things from more than one viewpoint, so I do owe them that.
