The VOICE was so much better under its previous management.

Yes, but how far can the average adult read before putting the book down because Tolkein, though a creative genius, was an awful writer.

NewWorldDan: Yes, but how far can the average adult read before putting the book down because Tolkein, though a creative genius, was an awful writer.

He was no E. L. James but he was pretty good.

But I don't like reading. My imagination was killed after years of Nintendo. I need constant visual stimulation.

So, don't go see it. Problem solved.

That's due to PJ's odd decision to include each character's bathroom break in the film.

Why did they decide to basically treat the theatrical release in the same way they treated the extended editions of the LOTR films? There's a reason you leave that extra 45 minutes or so to the version for the uber-fans...the average film-goer doesn't appreciate it and gets bored. Had they made those versions of the LOTR flicks the main releases, it would have gotten much harsher reviews from mainstream critics and audiences. And that is what appears to be happening here with The Hobbit.

I LOVE the added attention to detail and the thought that Jackson included additional lore from Tolkien material that isn't in the original book, but I'd be happy to leave that to an extended edition. There are gonna be a lot of malcontent non-geek spouses who will wonder why the f*ck the film is so damn long.

LInked pictorial on sidebar was better: Burlesque With Stoya and Friends (NSFW)

On a related note, Stephen Colbert has Peter Jackson on last night, and Colbert was schooling him on Tolkien knowledge. Anyway, supposedly Tolkien at one point was re-writing "The Hobbit" story to be more in line with the somewhat more adult tone of LOTR. After LOTR, he came to consider "The Hobbit" to be a children's book interpretation of a rather dark and complex story...a somewhat sanitized and condensed version of "the real story". So Tolkien set about re-doing it. Someone apparently convinced him that he'd just undermine his original masterpiece, and he stopped working on it.

That's Colbert's story, anyway. Very interesting if true.

I'm interested to see if Jackson maintains the lighter nature of The Hobbit, or tries to make it more consistent with the LOTR. The books definitely had different tones.

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: On a related note, Stephen Colbert has Peter Jackson on last night, and Colbert was schooling him on Tolkien knowledge. Anyway, supposedly Tolkien at one point was re-writing "The Hobbit" story to be more in line with the somewhat more adult tone of LOTR. After LOTR, he came to consider "The Hobbit" to be a children's book interpretation of a rather dark and complex story...a somewhat sanitized and condensed version of "the real story". So Tolkien set about re-doing it. Someone apparently convinced him that he'd just undermine his original masterpiece, and he stopped working on it.

That's Colbert's story, anyway. Very interesting if true.

I'm interested to see if Jackson maintains the lighter nature of The Hobbit, or tries to make it more consistent with the LOTR. The books definitely had different tones.

(All that said, he DID re-write the Gollum portion to match the tone and gravity of what it came to represent)

NewWorldDan: Yes, but how far can the average adult read before putting the book down because Tolkein, though a creative genius, was an awful writer.

Someone on Fark once put it this way: Tolkien was a master as describing setting, but couldn't handle action or interactions for sh*t.

Three pages of describing trees and armies and setting up suspense, followed by:
"There was then a fight and a bunch of people died."

I did not know that PJ cut the Hobbit into 3 movies from a 300 page book. I read slow but I know I could do roughly 100 pages in 2.5 hours.

NeoCortex42: SacriliciousBeerSwiller: On a related note, Stephen Colbert has Peter Jackson on last night, and Colbert was schooling him on Tolkien knowledge. Anyway, supposedly Tolkien at one point was re-writing "The Hobbit" story to be more in line with the somewhat more adult tone of LOTR. After LOTR, he came to consider "The Hobbit" to be a children's book interpretation of a rather dark and complex story...a somewhat sanitized and condensed version of "the real story". So Tolkien set about re-doing it. Someone apparently convinced him that he'd just undermine his original masterpiece, and he stopped working on it.

That's Colbert's story, anyway. Very interesting if true.

I'm interested to see if Jackson maintains the lighter nature of The Hobbit, or tries to make it more consistent with the LOTR. The books definitely had different tones.

The Hobbit was edited somewhat after its initial release to be more in line with LotR. I think the most major change was during Bilbo's encounter with Gollum and finding the ring. For anybody interested in learning more, check out the annotated version of the book. So much info in there, including previous drafts of some of the sections.

Tolkien pretty much treated The Hobbit the same way King worked on The Gunslinger.

What Colbert was describing though was more of a completely new work...a "re-telling" of the story.

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: Why did they decide to basically treat the theatrical release in the same way they treated the extended editions of the LOTR films?

I recently discovered if you skip numerous scenes in PJ's King Kong, e.g. some of the NY scenes at the beginning, some of the scenes on the ship, the silly Brontosaurus stampede, etc. it is a much more enjoyable film.

NeoCortex42: Tolkien pretty much treated The Hobbit the same way King worked on The Gunslinger.

Only the opposite because the revised version of The Gunslinger was farking terrible.

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: Someone on Fark once put it this way: Tolkien was a master as describing setting, but couldn't handle action or interactions for sh*t.

Three pages of describing trees and armies and setting up suspense, followed by:
"There was then a fight and a bunch of people died."

The Battle of the Five Armies was like what, two pages? And most of that was just AND THEN THERE WERE THESE OTHER DWARVES LED BY GRUMPY SON OF GOOSEY FROM THE GREY HALLS OF AEIIOUIAIOUI VAN DEN VOWEL APPROACHING UPON THE DAYBREAK AND THEN THERE WERE...

SacriliciousBeerSwiller

I'm interested to see if Jackson maintains the lighter nature of The Hobbit, or tries to make it more consistent with the LOTR. The books definitely had different tones.

You must have missed all the preview clips. Yes the books had different tones, but the bumbling and silliness the dwarves engage in make this look like something from adam sandler.

NeoCortex42


Tolkien pretty much treated The Hobbit the same way King worked on The Gunslinger.

ummm No.

JRRT made bits of the hobbit more serious to fit with the tone of the entire epic.

$K on the other hand, treated "The Gunslinger" (both the re-write and the last 3 books) like George lucas treated the Original Trilogy "special editions".

the time to beat, by The Hollywood Reporter's reckoning: 158 minutes

By the time I reached the end of chapter six, where the film stops, just over two and a half hours had passed -- I still had 20+ minutes to spare.

You don't say?

NeoCortex42: SacriliciousBeerSwiller: On a related note, Stephen Colbert has Peter Jackson on last night, and Colbert was schooling him on Tolkien knowledge. Anyway, supposedly Tolkien at one point was re-writing "The Hobbit" story to be more in line with the somewhat more adult tone of LOTR. After LOTR, he came to consider "The Hobbit" to be a children's book interpretation of a rather dark and complex story...a somewhat sanitized and condensed version of "the real story". So Tolkien set about re-doing it. Someone apparently convinced him that he'd just undermine his original masterpiece, and he stopped working on it.

That's Colbert's story, anyway. Very interesting if true.

I'm interested to see if Jackson maintains the lighter nature of The Hobbit, or tries to make it more consistent with the LOTR. The books definitely had different tones.

The Hobbit was edited somewhat after its initial release to be more in line with LotR. I think the most major change was during Bilbo's encounter with Gollum and finding the ring. For anybody interested in learning more, check out the annotated version of the book. So much info in there, including previous drafts of some of the sections.

Tolkien pretty much treated The Hobbit the same way King worked on The Gunslinger.

Great story, last book a giant steaming pile of shiat that ruined the entire thing?

I find Lotro boring as hell, and I'm a super nerd. It's just never, remotely, interested me. I've tried many a time, and I love reading (I burn through a book in a few days if I enjoy it). But Tolkien hasn't ever done anything for me.

I did however, enjoy the hobbit. Probably precisely because it was a more tightly written narrative with less 'here's a 400 page useless history' and 'here's 10 pages of song'. It was just a narrative. A well told story. I read it in HS or JH, and then tried to read lotro. Never made it past the first half of the first book.

lmdemasi: the time to beat, by The Hollywood Reporter's reckoning: 158 minutes

By the time I reached the end of chapter six, where the film stops, just over two and a half hours had passed -- I still had 20+ minutes to spare.

You don't say?

Dahfuq..


60 +60+30 = 150

150+20 = 170

158-170 = -12.

coco ebert: I'm pretty much "shut up and take my money" about the whole affair.

This. The Hobbit and Skyfall are the two movies I plan to see during my Christmas vacation.

DjangoStonereaver: I happen to think Jackson did a great job of
capturing the feel of Tolkien with the LOTR movies, even if he made some changes and deletions that
got some purist's panties in a bunch

Please excuse me now, I must un-bunch my panties yet again. 

Frodo, of the nine fingers....and the Ring of Doom.....

NewWorldDan: Yes, but how far can the average adult read before putting the book down because Tolkein, though a creative genius, was an awful writer.

The Hobbit, as the headline sort of indirectly points out, was concise verging on terse; even if you can't handle the writing conventions of epic literature used in Tolkein's other works your stunted attention span could likely still handle it.

oldfarthenry: PJ made King Kong long & boring! Someone give this asshole a clock - or a least a good film editor!

As one critic put it regarding King Kong, "It was bloat killed the beast". I fear the same may hold true for The Hobbit.

/keep your expectations low

"No skimming of elf songs, no matter how cutesy."

hehe, guilty...!

DjangoStonereaver: SacriliciousBeerSwiller: Why did they decide to basically treat the theatrical release in the same way they treated the extended editions of the LOTR films? There's a reason you leave that extra 45 minutes or so to the version for the uber-fans...the average film-goer doesn't appreciate it and gets bored. Had they made those versions of the LOTR flicks the main releases, it would have gotten much harsher reviews from mainstream critics and audiences. And that is what appears to be happening here with The Hobbit.

I LOVE the added attention to detail and the thought that Jackson included additional lore from Tolkien material that isn't in the original book, but I'd be happy to leave that to an extended edition. There are gonna be a lot of malcontent non-geek spouses who will wonder why the f*ck the film is so damn long.

I blame Warner Brothers for the over-inflation of this one. Jackson originally wanted to make it in 2
parts, and it was fairly well into the production process where they announced "Hey, we're doing it in
3 films not 2!"

THE HOBBIT could have been very easily and fully adapted in 2 slightly-longer than average movies,
with a natural break where Bilbo gets lost under the mountain. I don't even know what Jackson could
do to pad it out; even if he added in Tom Bombadil, that will mean an excessive amount of tinkering
and addition, and while I think the result will be great (I happen to think Jackson did a great job of
capturing the feel of Tolkien with the LOTR movies, even if he made some changes and deletions that
got some purist's panties in a bunch), the only think Warner cares about is money.

rankin-bass managed a very well-executed and faithful adaptation in ninety minutes. jackson could have done just as well in a single movie. it's a very simple story. three hours is more than enough time to tell it, unless you have 20-minute dish-throwing sequences and such.

SacriliciousBeerSwiller: NeoCortex42: SacriliciousBeerSwiller: On a related note, Stephen Colbert has Peter Jackson on last night, and Colbert was schooling him on Tolkien knowledge. Anyway, supposedly Tolkien at one point was re-writing "The Hobbit" story to be more in line with the somewhat more adult tone of LOTR. After LOTR, he came to consider "The Hobbit" to be a children's book interpretation of a rather dark and complex story...a somewhat sanitized and condensed version of "the real story". So Tolkien set about re-doing it. Someone apparently convinced him that he'd just undermine his original masterpiece, and he stopped working on it.

That's Colbert's story, anyway. Very interesting if true.

I'm interested to see if Jackson maintains the lighter nature of The Hobbit, or tries to make it more consistent with the LOTR. The books definitely had different tones.

The Hobbit was edited somewhat after its initial release to be more in line with LotR. I think the most major change was during Bilbo's encounter with Gollum and finding the ring. For anybody interested in learning more, check out the annotated version of the book. So much info in there, including previous drafts of some of the sections.

Tolkien pretty much treated The Hobbit the same way King worked on The Gunslinger.

What Colbert was describing though was more of a completely new work...a "re-telling" of the story.

Read Rateliff's HISTORY OF THE HOBBIT. In the last section of the second book it contains the re-written "version" by Tolkien of the first few chapters of The Hobbit. Tolkien gave up after chapter 4/5 because he was getting too depressed by how juvenile the version was (tho he meant it to be that way in the 30s when he wrote it) but there was so much more he wanted to add and link into LOTR. He was increasingly wanting to just re-write the entire book. But the re-written versions show all the LOTR stuff he wanted to add and link - Butterbur, the Prancing pony, Rangers patrolling the roads etc -- making Frodo's journey much more of a parallel to Bilbo. It's an interesting take on Tolkien's ideas in his later years.

Hell, Tolkien would never have finished LOTR in the first place without a legal deadline to finish it. He kind of got around that my adding additions and edits in later years. He was obsessed with re-writing everything forever.

devilEther: oldfarthenry: PJ made King Kong long & boring! Someone give this asshole a clock - or a least a good film editor!

As one critic put it regarding King Kong, "It was bloat killed the beast". I fear the same may hold true for The Hobbit.

/keep your expectations low

My expectations are incredibly low. Every trailer makes it look worse. Yes I'm still going to see it so don't get your nerd undies in a bunch. It was the only Tolkien book I liked.

Saiga410: I did not know that PJ cut the Hobbit into 3 movies from a 300 page book. I read slow but I know I could do roughly 100 pages in 2.5 hours.

The Hobbit is only 300 pages? Then why the fark do they need 3 movies that run nearly 3 hours apiece to tell the story? I understand why Lord of the Rings needed it, because that book was freakin enormous.

buttery_shame_cave: rankin-bass managed a very well-executed and faithful adaptation in ninety minutes.

Panties now officially UN-BUNCHED. Thank you and I'll gladly birth your Hobbiatchild.

Of course, I'll need a Lopitoffme first, but after 10yrs of marriage it's not as if I use it that much anyways, other than running a little water through it on occasion.

I get it already. But you still won't kill the film's box office performance or fan reaction.

should've been Hobbiatchild, but the auto correct is somewhat amusing nonetheless.

stoli n coke: Saiga410: I did not know that PJ cut the Hobbit into 3 movies from a 300 page book. I read slow but I know I could do roughly 100 pages in 2.5 hours.

The Hobbit is only 300 pages? Then why the fark do they need 3 movies that run nearly 3 hours apiece to tell the story? I understand why Lord of the Rings needed it, because that book was freakin enormous.

They're going to show a "side story" that happened at the same time of the Hobbit, which is expanded upon in other books. Basically, it's about what Gandalf is running off to do, whenever he runs off from the Bilbo and the Dwarves. And from what I've read, it leads to a huge moment of awesome.

My goodness, but this auto-correct thingy owns me.

Strider1002: So, don't go see it. Problem solved.

Done.

There's also Silmarillion stuff in the movie, so that's also a factor.

Keizer_Ghidorah: There's also Silmarillion stuff in the movie, so that's also a factor.

ClintonKun: stoli n coke: Saiga410: I did not know that PJ cut the Hobbit into 3 movies from a 300 page book. I read slow but I know I could do roughly 100 pages in 2.5 hours.

The Hobbit is only 300 pages? Then why the fark do they need 3 movies that run nearly 3 hours apiece to tell the story? I understand why Lord of the Rings needed it, because that book was freakin enormous.

They're going to show a "side story" that happened at the same time of the Hobbit, which is expanded upon in other books. Basically, it's about what Gandalf is running off to do, whenever he runs off from the Bilbo and the Dwarves. And from what I've read, it leads to a huge moment of awesome.

I was wondering why it was broken into three movies.

This information relieves some of my concerns about how they could possibly drag out such a short novel into a trilogy.

DubyaHater: But I don't like reading. My imagination was killed after years of Nintendo. I need constant visual stimulation.

May I recommend that modern day miracle called, "Internet Pornography"?

/Done wonders for me.
//Except that my hand is always sore.
///And steadily growing more hirsute.

talkertopc: LInked pictorial on sidebar was better: Burlesque With Stoya and Friends (NSFW)

Stoya rly!

In grade school or Jr. High a lot of my friends were reading Tolkien so I gave it a go with The Hobbit.
I couldn't stay interested and never got past a few pages.

The Jackson films have really opened up the Tolkien world for me and I've enjoyed them and reading various wikipedia tid-bits about them. Still not convinced I could manage reading that stuff, though.
I always preferred spaceships and laser beams to fairy-land and trolls.

/Will see the film sometime, not concerned when. Haven't seen any trailers yet, not concerned about that, either.
//slashie-meh!