Review Detail

This was an excellent edit! It felt like a super fun mini series version of The Hobbit, highlighting what worked in the original films: the excellent cast, costumes, music, effects, and sets; and cutting out the gratuitous elements: Legolas running up falling bricks, the Tauriel love triangle, and most importantly Azog--I really appreciated how cleanly this edit removed Azog as a named and backstoried villain without compromising the final fight between Azog and Thorin. The episodic structure worked well too, emphasizing the different structure of The Hobbit as compared with The Lord of the Rings. What I was especially looking out for was the Battle of Five Armies, since this was something that various edits I've seen have handled with the widest degree of variance. What I appreciated here was how Fili's death gave Thorin's final fight with the now unnamed lead orc (previously Azog) impact despite the two of them having no other backstory together, and too I appreciated that in this edit Kili got to go on a little revenge killing spree before he too was brought down.

I would certainly recommend this edit and will be watching it during my LotR marathons!