Hobbit: Into the Fire, The

Thank you for this edit =) I expected much from this sequel but it was boring, and full of things that just didn't exist in the book just to fill a movie with 3h bahhh. I only wished that you've changed that end music, it is so not LOTR/Hobbit bahhh. Enya, Emiliana Torrini, Annie Lennox etc super cool but this one???? well, overall I praise you. =)

This edit is much better than the original version. Technically I did not notice any issues, the video quality is high and the audio is only 2 channel but also a high quality. The best part is how much of the movie has been cut but how little you notice the missing pieces.

I loved the LOTR trilogy but could never quite get into the books. However, The Hobbit is one of my favorite books of all time and I have been nothing but disappointed with the Hobbit films. They are overly long, filled with constant unnecessary reminders that these movies are prequels to the LOTR trilogy, and the films seem to forget that Bilbo is suppose to be the main character. Unfortunately some of those things still remain in this edit, which is why I had to take a few points off of enjoyability and narrative.

Nevertheless, this edit will be my official go to version for Desolation until someone creates a literary cut of all three Hobbit films. I highly recommend anyone who likes fantasy to check out this edit and to skip the theatrical cut all together.

Dear Peter Jackson:

Please hire the 613th incarnation of Ranger Kris. He'll make a fine addition to your editing team and just might save you 15% on car insur. . . wait, fuck, wrong script. If you'd hired Ranger Kris earlier, he could have saved you scores of millions on unnecessary CGI, but at this point in the game, he can at least pare your last installment of The Lord of the Hobbits to half of whatever length you think the audience should endure. In other words, Ranger Kris can halfling-ize your halfling movie. Thank you.

Wearing a flaming Sauron disco suit,
ssj

First, my apologies for the tardiness of this review. It's been a busy summer moving my family halfway across the country. I was a screener for the first incarnation of this edit, Fire of the Dragon (http://www.fanedit.org/ifdb/component/content/article/79-fanedit-listings/fanfix/1033-hobbit-fire-of-the-dragon-the), and while I thought it was a vast improvement, I (and others) still felt like a more seriious take on the film would be preferable. Ranger613 decided to take this on and this edit is the result. And, for me, it is indeed preferable to the Fire of the Dragon edit. Ranger calls this a "book purists" cut and while that may be true, it isn't the reason I enjoy it more. I never read The Hobbit. But I did feel like Jackson was trying to straddle a line with these movies that just doesn't work. He's trying to keep them in line with the original LotR trilogy, while also trying to make them lighter fare more in keeping with the source material. It just hasn't worked for me and I prefer edits that aim to remove the silliness and video game like action to reveal something much closer to LotR. For the first chapter, I now go to kerr's Arkenstone Edition. And now, for the chapter two, I will go to this. A word of warning though, this definitely does not play as a standalone film, not that the original did either. While we all have yet to see the third and final chapter, it feel entirely possible to me that the best edit will be a four-ish hour film (or two two hour films). One final note, there has been much discussion of the final scene of Smaug shaking off the molten gold (recolored here). I provided feedback during the editing process on this and, to me, it is still not right in my mind. But I have to say that my wife, who had never seen the original movie, didn't even notice. In fact, I didn't tell her this was a fan edit. She simply said it was much better than she expected after the first one (which we saw together in the theatre). To me, that's high praise! Good work, ranger613!

I've fallen way behind on reviewing edits that I have watched, and I have watched this one twice. I will keep this short. It is perfect. I had never watched any of the Lord of the Rings movies, nor the first Hobbit movie---neither had I read the books. But reading some of the summaries and reviews here for the different edits, I decided to try, since my main reason for keeping away had been the length. I am currently reading The Hobbit and loving it. So for me, this edit is the sequel to Kerr's Hobbit, the Arkenstone Edition, since that is the only version of the 1st movie I had seen. And it works perfectly. There is no hint that anything at all has been cut, re-ordered or fan-edited in any way. It simply plays like an excellent movie. I have every intention of watching this a third time, along with a 3rd re-watch of Kerr's Arkenstone cut of the 1st Hobbit, before I may actually venture to the theater in December to see the unedited 3rd and final movie. I am really a big fan of this edit, and reading the book concurrently with it, it makes it even more impressive to me. If there were going to be big flaws, I would definitely notice them since Tolkien's words are so fresh to me now (I have only just read beyond the point where this edit ends). I suppose I owe it to myself to see the original Jackson version now, but I know there is no way it could be better than what you have presented here. I give out a lot of pretty positive reviews around here, but this is one I wish I could give an "11" instead of just a 10. Just excellent and highly recommended to everyone! It also got my vote for edit of the month.