J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit (Maple Films Edit)

Looking for the best edit of The Hobbit Trilogy, I read through the descriptions and change lists of every edit I could find. I have watched and re-watched different versions of The Hobbit over several months and, finally, I found this edit - exactly what I was looking for!

All the slapstick and fluff that could be cut is gone, but not to the point that would create unexplained events as I had seen in other edits.

The efforts made to hide Smaug covered in liquid gold is about the best that will ever be. I watched an edit that tried skipping to him flying towards the town and that didn't flow smoothly.

If I had to nitpick... the first time I watched this edit, I thought my audio/video was out of sync during the new voice-over during the eagle rescue. Plus the great scene with Thorin accepting Bilbo as a useful member of the group after the eagles was cut, but there was no way to keep it with the cuts made to the battle with the orcs. I'd rather have the cuts than that scene, so not a big deal.

Also, subtitles. Awesome!

Watched this edit last weekend. I got to say this was an amazing edit, great quality. The colour correction was great as I disliked the way the original versions looked. I also thought the restructuring of the movies into a 4 hour cut was well done, the unnecessary sub-plots are removed quickening the pace and I didn't mind the long hour run time as I liked that it was split in two just like the Extended Editions of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Ultimately this was more in tone with The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and more structured like Jrr Tolkien's Novel and all and all I really loved this edit and for me it is definitely the definitive version.

Very well done. The effort put forth and seamless editing really make this an excellent edit, although just from the overabundance of material and plot that happens in the Hobbit, it still seems a little long at 4 hours. But really, the length can be forgiven in getting to watch all the classic moments of the Hobbit in a single movie, and I enjoy watching this single 4-hour version than having to endure meaningless sideplots that don't focus on Bilbo's journey.

Probably the highest quality editing I've seen yet from a fan edit, A/V quality was superb and I didnt notice a single cut that stood out (hold the Smaug covered in gold).

Reducing the run time to less than a half of the original and maintaining a (not just functional but IMO better) story is no small feat but was absolutely accomplished here.

Coming in a little over 4 hours this is still slightly long considering its source material, however it is (in spite of this) An Unexpected and Enjoyable Journey

My biggest thought after watching this edit was, "I thought this was supposed to be JRR Tolkein's The Hobbit?" I don't really feel that it's fair to title this edit in such a way when it's nowhere near a book cut. I still had to watch the Elven/Goblin fight during the barrel sequence, the dwarves still ran around with Smaug inside the mountain, Bard still shot the arrow off of his son's shoulder, and we watched the whole finale unfold between Thorin and Azog. It'd be one thing if there were just no good way to cut these things out, but they have all been skillfully taken care of in various other edits. This is absolutely a better film than the theatrical trilogy, but it falls short as a book cut, which is what I expected given the title.

Finally, I thought it was odd the massive amount of effort that went into all of the formats and subtitles available for this edit, yet they lazily copied and pasted the credits from The Battle of the Five Armies? Not only are there names of actors and characters who never appear in the film, there are drawings of them! I've heard time and again that the goal with fanedits is for them to feel like theatrical releases. When the end credits started rolling and a bunch of faces popped up that weren't in the film, it definitely screamed fanedit to me.

I apologize for the harsh review, but I have to disagree with the general consensus here--they put a lot of effort into this one, to be sure, but it fell short in a lot of ways for me, unfortunately.