Re: The Desolation of Smaug pre-release thread [3] [SPOILERS]

[bungobaggins]

 @ all of this.

Glad I didn't watch it. Thanks, guys!  

[Sinister71]

I get to go see it for free....   even if the movie sucks I'm not out a dime      

[bungobaggins]

I gotta admit, I'm pretty jealous of you, Sin.  

[bungobaggins]

WHERE WAS LEE PACE?!?!?! And Sir Ian? And the rest of the dwarves?

Apparently he got his ass handed to him by Ass-hog!

[Radaghast]

I think I'll probably end up just reading the summary.

[bungobaggins]

There will probably be a leaked Academy review copy on the internet around February.

[Tinuviel]

WHERE WAS LEE PACE?!?!?! And Sir Ian? And the rest of the dwarves?

Apparently he got his ass handed to him by Ass-hog!

Not sure if that's how I'd say it...

But what I'm particularly pissed about is the Dwarves apparently fighting Smaug. How is that even going to come about?

[Radaghast]

But what I'm particularly pissed about is the Dwarves apparently fighting Smaug. How is that even going to come about?

That's one of the things I don't really care to know.

[David H]

Thanks for the commentary everybody!

There will probably be a leaked Academy review copy on the internet around February.

and you don't even need to suffer through that unless you want to see the horror, because I'm betting that 2 sleepless nights later Petty will have the first purist edit done!  

But what I'm particularly pissed about is the Dwarves apparently fighting Smaug. How is that even going to come about?

badly for the dwarves I'd think.

[bungobaggins]

I think the only way we'll get a purist edit of this movie is to just download the file and then delete it.

[Ringdrotten]

Kili-Tauriel-Legolas love triangle confirmed.

All the cool movie series are doing it.

I wish I hadn't read that

[Forest Shepherd]

I skipped the stupidest parts and tried to catch all the main characters.
I still find Martin Freeman particularly moody throughout all this. Perhaps that is his regular personality: not overly effusive.
I loved how Cumberbottom had to keep correcting the interviewer about his involvement in the film.

"Your voice as Smaug is just so great! The whole theatre shakes and--"
"Yes, well, as I keep saying I also did the motion-capture for the role. So a lot of his physicality comes directly out of the work I did."
 

Mr. Armitage described Smaug as a quadriped. Ho ho! Most strange. Or do wyvern Dragon-y types count as quadripeds? Whatever. The Smaug on the plan doesn't have four legs does it?

I kept hearing digestive-based humour or character development-- The Master of Lake-town has indigestion, Smaug has bad breath-- seems a bit banal surely?

Also, that's a new trailer isn't it? At the very end of the premier video. Was very short, more like a teaser than the proper trailer we got at the fan event.

Only a few actors I actually cared about were there! No Lee Pace, no Hugo Weaving, no Cate Blanchett, no Ian McKellen, no James Nesbitt, no Billy Connolly, no Brett McKenzy, no Andy Serkis, no Mikael Persbrandt!
(Well, I don't care much about Persbrandt, but it would be amusing to hear some comments concerning his film appearance.)

P.S.
I was looking through the cast to see if I was forgetting anyone, and I saw a few named orc villains in the cast. The habit among some fans, when discussing the films, to use names of orcs that we do see, but that are never named or developed beyond two-dimensional villains, is INCREDIBLY annoying to me.
It's as if using these made-up bullshit non-book names is crediting Peter Jackson and Co. with actual character-building abilities in their villains. They do not possess any such ability, and pretending they do by expecting audience members to know names they never heard before of shallow characters they don't give a crap about, beyond hoping to see their heads lopped off soon, is reckless exaggeration of their ability to present any nuance and complexity in random orcs.
The number one example of this crap is "Lurtz" from the FotR. How the hell am I supposed to know this Uruk-hai's name? I mean really. REALLY! Does Saruman say his name during his strange little Uruk-beginnings story? I sure didn't hear it.
Even MORE to the point, why do these characters have names if they are crap characters that require little or no ability to represent beyond a few inches of makeup? WHY, do they need names? Is this some kind of pat on the back on the part of PJ and Co

"Hey let's play Boggle! Ok, random name generation time! Pick the diagonals of all our tiles and shuffle those together... Here we go... "Yazneg!" Oh nice, now the tracker that is eaten by wargs on Weathertop has a name, what excellent storytelling!"  

[Pettytyrant101]

Forest gets his crabbit on. I like it!  

The whole event sounds as awful; as I had imagined, only thing worse will be having to go see the bloody film just so I can review it   Glad I passed out- I shall be trying very hard I imagine to do similar at the film.

[Lancebloke]

I think the only way we'll get a purist edit of this movie is to just download the file and then delete it.

 

I'm still refusing to go to the cinema and see it!

[Mrs Figg]

Why the heck would Sam even think about being in these films unless he were in the book end scenes, which from all accounts he is not. Why do they feel the need to shoehorn every stinking character from LOTR in to these films. Are people really that hard up to see characters they love they would rather see them in some made up nonsense than in a context they were originally intended?

I don't get it.

It doesnt matter at this stage, I am just rolling with all the sillyness, I wouldnt mind Sam being in it, its funny, its like a Petty Parody, its great fun, Kili/Tauriel/Legolas romance? Bring it ON!!!!!!  

srsly I cant be angry at all this stuff, I am going to actually enjoy the Hobbit For Dummies version

[Radaghast]

I'm still refusing to go to the cinema and see it!

Glad I'm not alone in this

[Eldorion]

You talking shit about my boy Lurtz, Forest?

[Pettytyrant101]

I cut Lurz out my edit- he's just the uruk with the bow- no big fight with Aragorn, no being Sarumans favourite pet Uruk ect.
Thats all so wrong- there should be no note of triumph anywhere around the death of Boromir, especially not for Aragorn who is distraught at this point in the book, and blaming himself as all his decision have gone wrong.
Theres a full funeral and lament in the book for Eru's sake, its not the place for a triumphant victory over a bad guy.  

[Eldorion]

I think you might be the only person I have ever talked to who watched the end of FOTR and described it as "triumphant".

[Pettytyrant101]

Not the ending, the fight between Lurtz and Araorn- Lurtz is FotR's surrogate bad guy as PJ doesnt know what do to without an onscreen baddie- he gives the main role to Saruman, but uses Lurtz as the actual protagonist.
Aragorn is the hero character in PJ's and he gets a triumphant victory over Lurz, quite literally chops him to bits.
And I dont think there should be any sense of triumph, however small in those moments around Boromirs death, its a seeming moment of hopelessness in the book, its all fallen apart.

[Bluebottle]

Is there by any chance an "Insert token bad guy" chapter in the scriptwriter textbook?

[Tinuviel]

...you know, there might be...

[Mrs Figg]

I think you might be the only person I have ever talked to who watched the end of FOTR and described it as "triumphant".

He is the only person like he's the only person to think New Zealand grass is the wrong length  

[Pettytyrant101]

and colour dont forget, and type.  And Im right about that too!  

[Radaghast]

I kind of see what PT is saying here. Aragorn's defeat of Lurtz shouldn't have been seen as a triumphant moment after the damage had already been done.

My bigger problem is with the handling of Boromir's death scene itself, but I know I'm in a very small minority there.