We came all this way
But now comes the day
To bid you farewell
— Billy Boyd, “The Last Goodbye”
Peter Jackson takes us, for one last time, on his Middle-Earth adventure and brings an end to the amazing journey that began in 2001.
The Battle Of The Five Armies (BOTFA) covers the events of the last six chapters of the book. It immediately begins where The Desolation Of Smaug (DOS) left off. BOTFA can be subdivided into three main parts: the destruction of Lake-Town, the rescue of Gandalf by the White Council and the Battle of Five Armies and the front gates of Erebor.
The Destruction of Lake-Town
The destruction of Lake-Town is a quick sequence that shows how a dragon like Smaug can be a deadly weapon. With just three passes, Lake-Town is left in ruins and death. Bard tried shooting normal arrows at the dragon but to no avail. This earned him the title of Bowman bestowed upon him by Smaug himself. Bard didn’t need the thrush to tell him about the weak spot in Smaug’s armour. With the help of his son, Bard improvised a bow capable of shooting the black arrow and thus cause the demise of Smaug. The dwarves didn’t need the services of Róac the raven to learn the death of Smaug, they saw what happened with their own eyes. These changes from the book are welcome since they prevent any distraction from the main event which is the fall of Smaug.
I believe that this part should have been added to DOS: It would have provided a stupendous ending to DOS and made BOTFA more focussed.
The White Council Rescues Gandalf
This is perhaps the most thrilling sequence of the entire movie. We see all the members in action: Elrond putting his frown to good use, Saruman being very agile at fighting Ringwraiths and Galadriel literally carrying Gandalf into safety and using her phial to drive Sauron out of Dol Guldur into Mordor. We are to believe that this is the same phial she later gives to Frodo.
The Battle of Five Armies
The battle is grandiose and involves elves, dwarves, men, eagles, wizards and Beorn against orcs, wargs, goblins, bats and trolls. I leave it to you to decide which five groups gave the battle its name. The prelude to the battle is very well staged: Thorin becomes greedy and nearly brought the downfall of Erebor because of the dragon sickness. Thranduil is also struck by a variant of the same disease: he’s eager to go to war just for the sake of white gems.
The fight sequences are amazing and surpass everything we have seen so far in The Hobbit and Lord Of The Rings combined.
Unanswered Questions
After watching the theatrical version of the movie, I felt that it was incomplete. Mainly because of the missing scenes that everybody saw in the trailers. Also, the hints made by Peter Jackson in the comments of the Blu Rays of the previous movies did not materialize: we didn’t see how Gandalf got a new staff, nor did we see what happened to the morgul blade recovered by Radagast. The contribution of Beorn is very minimal. Book readers already knew (and accepted?) that he will not kill Bolg, but his screen time should have been more that just a few seconds. I suspect that all the above will be covered in the Extended Edition.
Overall Thoughts
I am impressed by the respect of the filmmakers to the book material. Many scenes from the book are in the movies, although sometimes not in the right order. For example: Bilbo is knocked on his head and passes out. When he wakes up, he sees the eagles and says: The eagles are coming. In the book, Bilbo is knocked on the head after seeing the eagles.
By adding material from the LOTR appendices, bringing Azog back to life and creating the Tauriel character, the filmmakers succeeded in bringing The Hobbit to the same age group audience of The Lord Of The Rings and thus constitute a solid prequel.
The movie provides a good reason to Legolas to leave his duties as heir of the Woodland Realm and go wander off and later join the Fellowship: when he realized that Tauriel’s true love is a dwarf, he couldn’t stay in the same place as her. I didn’t find this reason convincing. Maybe if Tauriel died in the battle, it would have constituted a stronger motivation to Legolas. I hope the extended edition will make me change my opinion.
Overall, The Hobbit trilogy was a welcome invitation to relive Middle-Earth. But now comes the time to bid farewell to this amazing experience.
A very fond farewell and thank you to Peter Jackson and his team.
IT professional. Apple addict. Self-proclaimed Tolkien scholar. Opinionated moviegoer. Aspiring coffee and tea connoisseur. Always thinking different.
Long-Time Geek 
The trilogy as a whole has been okay. But this one thankfully ended on a good note. Nice review Georges.
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