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

I have seen the Theatrical versions of all 3 films, the extended versions of the first 2 (yet to watch my copy of BOTFA:EE), and The Spence Edit that combines all 3 movies into one. Well I have to say, above all of those, THIS is my favourite Hobbit viewing experience! The plot remains focused on Bilbo and the Dwarves throughout and this really emphasises stronger character connections. Special moments between Bilbo and Thorin or Bilbo and Bofur really shine as they're no longer lost among a ton of bloat. This actually made the ending feel way more impactful and I actually teared up a little which is something I have never done watching The Hobbit movies before. Including 1 or 2 extended edition scenes from the 3rd movie really helped with this too. I'm amazed Dustin has managed to cut so much and yet this edit still has so much heart.

There are some really positive edits made in this fanfix:

- Cutting Azog nearly entirely from the first film and he and Bolg completely from the second.
- Cutting Radagast and his woodland creatures entirely.
- Cutting the "Where is Thrain, is he alive?" plotline.
- Reducing Legolas/Tauriel, their subplot really isn't that interesting.
- Cutting out some of the ridiculous action scenes; Bombur's barrel bouncing, the erebor molten gold scene and especially some of Legolas' antics which are ludicrous (the falling stairs one!)
- The dragon sickness is mentioned plenty and it's effect on Thorin becomes very clear but no longer are you slapped in the face with it repeatedly (That awful Thorin hallucination scene)
- The bad VFX shots like in the molten gold scene are gone, he even colour corrected the GoPro shot in the barrel riding scene so that it blends in seamlessly.

There are very few drawbacks to this version but they are:

- The scene with Bilbo sat on the bench where Gandalf is introduced is a little too desaturated, this is fixed in the blu-ray but not in the MP4.

- There is a short intermission half way through the running time where they meet bard. This is fine on the blu-ray version as it is split across 2 discs but the the full length MP4 version also has it which means you may need to fast forward through it if you're watching in one sitting.

- The shot of Smaug flying from Erebor covered in gold is still present - it's been masterfully recoloured to the colour of his flesh by the editor, but it still is dripping from him and stands out like a sore thumb. I'm certain with a bit of creative editing this shot could be fully removed.

[SPOILER START]

- Towards the end two character deaths have been moved to occur at the same time, this is a great idea as it removed Legolas' action scenes with Bolg and aids in keeping the Tauriel/Kili romantic plotline out of the movie. However it's not executed flawlessly. Azog stabs one of the characters and Bolg stabs another, reaction shots are shown but when it cuts back to Azog the character he stabbed has vanished, no body is even visible. This was jarring for me and I had to accept that he'd died without any real impact. It felt quick. I would have included Azog dropping the body, cut the shot of him falling past Kili below, and had either another reaction shot to hide the cut or gone straight to the shot of the body hitting the floor, whatever worked. Aside from this their deaths were well done. Just a bit of jarring editing for me personally.

[SPOILER END]

Overall though the visual and auditory quality is fantastic. The narrative is the best I've seen for The Hobbit and really made me rank it much closer to LOTR. Enjoyment factor through the roof and all in 4 hours. Astounding work from Dustin Lee!

I've long known that there must be a good movie hiding within the mess that is The Hobbit trilogy. The Maple Films edit takes some excellent steps toward pulling that good movie out of the muck. It's an improvement, to be sure. But for me, it ultimately fell short.

In an effort to save time, the Maple Films team ended up cutting out a lot of moments and scenes that I believe were necessary for narrative cohesion. Most notable, the Battle of Azanulbizar, which establishes Thorin's history with Azog. For better or worse, Azog is the major antagonist of the trilogy, and in order to give the final fight some emotional weight the history of the two characters is essential. Without it, he's just a random orc that is, for unknown reasons, an old enemy of Thorin and their conflict falls flat for the viewer.

Stray thoughts/criticisms

-In an attempt to achieve visual consistency with The Lord of the Rings, they went overboard with the color grading. The desaturation throughout the film is far too extreme.
-A good effort at fixing Smaug the Golden, but he still appears wet while exiting Erebor. I acknowledge that this is one of the two most difficult challenges that fan editors of The Hobbit face. The other great challenge is...
-...the transition between An Unexpected Journey and The Desolation of Smaug. This cut leaves a lot to be desired. The voiceover was a creative solution, but in my opinion the flight of the eagles was cut far too short and the whole thing feels off.
-I loved the way this cut handled the deaths of Kili and Fili. I think the cut could have used a bit of polish, but the idea was fantastic.

Audio/Video Quality: 8
The 1920x800 MP4 looks surprisingly good given the small filesize and over 4-hour length. The re-grading for the most part looks quite good, not perfect but very much an improvement. However, the de-saturation is taken a little too far overall for my tastes and in a few rare spots verges on monochrome. There is at least one spot where the grade has gone wrong. During the spider sequence a scene goes very grey, then green, then very grey again. I assume the grey was the intended look and a few shots just got forgotten about?

Visual Editing: 7
The technical visual editing was seamless for the majority of the edits (which are numerous) but there are a few spots that let the edit down. The best part is the barrel-ride. I've seen a lot of Hobbit edits and even played around with editing that scene myself and this is by far the best I've seen it handled. Another strong moment was the inspired inter-cutting of Fili and Kili's deaths, although it was right somehow in a few shots. While I'm generally of the opinion that I like these films long, the big removals of many added sub-plots was a really welcome change of pace.

The worst part is probably the removal of the were-worms. After all the other smooth edits in the preceding 3.5-hours, relatively speaking, this felt like a car crash. I'm sure it could have been handled better. The editing of the frying-pan scene was technically well handled but felt all wrong and a bit laughable when the terrifying and might "Pale Orc" is defeated by pine cones. It worked in the book (Without Azog), but this is not the book. Legolas' arrival felt quite abrupt, due to what I suspect was an over keenness to trim his non-canonical scenes down. As others have noted, the gold scene is removed but the gold covered Dragon is not. Some attempt should a have been made to fix this. A fanedit shouldn't rely on the audience to think "Ohhhh it's okay, it's only a fanedit. I'll pretend I didn't see that".

I was slightly disappointed with the "intermission" because if I wanted one unbroken 4-hour movie, it didn't give me that and if I wanted to experience the originally intended two-film structure, it didn't do that either. So close though. Hopefully someone will pull the latter off one day.

Audio Editing: 9
This was mostly seamless and impressive with only a few rare awkward music changes across the whole 4-hours.

Narrative: 6
First off, I was left unsure what the editing strategy was with this fanedit. At first you think, well this a "book cut" because it still includes truly dreadful (but canonical) early scenes like the plates song but then it later removes great material from the book like most of Beorn's scenes. Another example is with the controversial Alfrid character. He's trimmed down heavily but then reappears for no good reason (He was easily removable) right after we the audience could reasonably have assumed he was dead... then he is never seen again?

I personally think it's of paramount importance with a fanedit, that it works like a real movie, in it's own right. Sadly this edit doesn't do that in a lot of places. Characters just walk in to shot with no introduction and start saying things like everyone knows who they are. Events happen without explanation. Characters disappear for no reason. Vital exposition is missing. Legolas turns up at the battle but takes no part in it. Mighty Eleven blades that certain characters do not possess anymore... magically appear in their hands again at the end of the movie. The ultimate compliment to pay a "Fanfix" is "This REPLACES the original movie for me" but you cannot say this here, as you NEED to see the original to understand what is going on far too often.

It's a shame because the general pattern of removals is very good. With just a little more care taken over a few lines and character points, these problems could have been avoided. Or more probably, just a little less should have been removed, so coherence was maintained. Maybe the goal of hitting the 4-hour mark, meant things were removed that should have been left in for a still trim, but smooth 4.5/5-hour version?

Also just because a slim and whimsical children's book has a major character completely disappear for most of the running time, doesn't mean a movie can get away with it. You'd never release this version into cinemas and expect audiences to be okay with Gandalf's absence never being explained. Plus one of the two best things about the Hobbit is Sir Ian's Gandalf, so removing at least half of his scenes is not an improvement, to narrative, or enjoyment.

Enjoyment: 7
I didn't love the first half as I've seen it handled much better in other edits but the handling of the second-half felt very different and unique. It didn't always work 100% but it was well worth the watch to see the material slashed so heavily and still sorta work. Lastly, if you are wanting a very Bilbo-centric edit, then this achieves that very well.

Excellent stuff! video quality is not great i must say but overall very enjoyable! theres only like a couple places where it's a bit jarring and obvious of a cut like "ok yeah something used to be there" but I don't blame him for that because its better than the actual thing. This is literally the only way i will watch the hobbit from now on!