M4's The Hobbit Book Edit

This was my first foray into Fan Edits in general, and I'm glad it was such an excellent one to better compare with others. I think the narrative choices and colour corrections were great! It seemed like an impossible task removing the White Council, but it doesn't feel too odd that Gandalf kept leaving the party for mysterious reasons.

My only gripe is the Intermission. With the goal of meshing this edition with the Lord of the Rings Extended Editions, it shouldn't have an intermission and it feels jarring. I edited the intermission out myself for future viewings, and it doesn't feel too bad at all. Maybe adding a scene of day turning into night would make it better?

Overall this edit is great, and it's my go-to when re-watching the series.

If you're looking for a fanedit that not only fixes the flaws of the original movies but also makes it more in line with the Lord of the Rings films, has much better pacing, and most importantly, makes it closer to the original book, then look no further than this fanedit. This is BY FAR the definitive fanedit of The Hobbit trilogy, and it's everything The Hobbit films should have been in the first place.

It has always been a pet peeve of mine that they split the Hobbit into three films as it clearly reeked of ‘’we’ve gotta make money so were splitting this story into three and were going to add stuff to it that’s not even in the book just so we can pad the runtime and fill our money pool’’ so naturally when I came upon this edit I was overjoyed that someone had undertaken the task of digitally stitching the three movies together well casting most of the unnecessary fluff back into the fiery chasm from whence it came.

The Intermission is well placed and the duration of said intermission gives the audience enough time to either grab some beverages, go to the lavatory or engage in some intellectual discussion on the films events, themes and cinematography and whatever purpose the audience has chosen to fulfil and has fulfilled during said intermission they will likely be more than ready to resume the rest of there viewing of this masterful craft as it seamlessly transitions into The Desolation Of Smaug.

This edit is honestly impossible to fault and I do not say this out of blind praise in fact I literally went over it several times to see if I could find any faults weather they’d be on the narrative or technical side of things though my intention of seeking any faults was not out of the desire to look for stuff to complain about but rather so that I could give an honest and fair review of this edit as I am one of those reviewers who do not just toss out perfect 10’s lightly as such results as to why I consider an edit to be perfect are either given out of careful consideration or simply because I struggle to find any imperfection with an edit.

Other than being more faithful to the source material I loved how you altered the films picture quality to match more closely with the Lord Of The Rings as for me it not only improves consistency but makes the world I am looking at feel more natural as just looking at it made me feel as if I were there breathing in the various airs of the many locations that the company traversed during there journey, I wish I had gotten to see this version of the film at the Cinema instead of the one’s that were actually shown but noooope they had to split em because ‘’money’’

This is definitely my go to version of the films or in the case of this edit film from now on as I no longer have to experience the frustration of one film ending at a critical moment just to force me to eject the disc, place it back in it’s case, get up, reach for the next case, put that disc in and than walk all the way back to the sofa only to have to repeat these steps again when The Desolation Of Smaug ends. Or alternatively since I watched the Digital Version of your edit I no longer have to undergo the tedious task of going There and Back Again with my trackpad cursor.

Now it is just one file and one click greatly reducing the risk of Repetitive Strain Injury or simply RSI.

This edit is fantastic. My 13 year old daughter and I read the book together, and she was very excited to watch the movie. My wife loved the Lord of the Rings, but hadn't seen the Hobbit films yet. I chose to show them this edit because it was shorter and followed the book better. They both love the Book Edit and thought it was a great movie!

The cuts were very well done and the movie flows very smoothly. It was cut to follow the book, and as a bonus, a lot of the extra-silly and unbelievable scenes were cut as well. The narrative works well, and I don't think the movie suffers from anything that was cut. This is my go-to edit of the Hobbit.

Being a diehard fan of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy and J.R.R. Tolkien's books, I, like many, was heartbroken with Warner Bros. adaptation of The Hobbit. But M4 was able to make me fall in love with the story all over again. I've seen several Hobbit edits, and this is easily the best. It is an incredibly faithful adaptation of the novel while being consistent in tone with the Lord of the Rings film trilogy. It feels like the cohesive movie we should have gotten instead of the bloated trilogy we did. In my mind, this is the only version of The Hobbit that deserves the title and will be the version that I watch in tandem with the LotR trilogy. I cannot praise M4 enough for his Hollywood quality editing, his beautiful visual effects, his love of the source material, and his commitment to this project.