The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies

I'm only going to give you a quick run-through of my thoughts on this film as I haven't had a lot of spare time to write and I am also trying to compile my top ten films of this year and most anticipated of next year lists!

So The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies. If you have kept up with my reviews of these films for the last couple years then you will remember that I enjoyed the first one, and very much disliked the second one. This one is... alright. My expectations were low but I found myself enjoying certain parts of this epic climax. The beginning was very cool and I really liked Smaug but I did feel this segment would have been better at the end of the last film, because when you come out of the cinema the opening is just a kind of an afterthought. The rest of the film has it's moments but is still bogged down by the worst aspects of the prequel trilogy; the overuse of CGI and no main character (or not enough use of Bilbo!). I mean come on, the film is called The Hobbit! And Martin Freeman is awesome, give him more to do in his own film! I did however enjoy the dynamics between Thorin and Bilbo in this film which I feel the last one kind of forgot about. Other actors I liked were Evangeline Lily, though her character was nothing more than a love interest, Lee Pace (did anyone else think it looked like he had pen marks on his face at the end of the battle?), Luke Evans and obviously Ian Mckellen who I believe may actually be Gandalf in real life... Anybody looking forward to seeing Billy Connolly in this film will be disappointed when he turns up as a cluster of pixels.

This film has good moments, a lot of the action is pretty cool looking, but never reaches the awesomeness or realisticness of Helms Deep or Minas Tirith. I'm very happy The Lord Of The Rings got made when it did, because Peter Jackson has definitely had a case of the George Lucas flu whilst making these prequels! The finale is epic in scale and Peter Jackson closes his trilogy a lot smoother than The Return Of The King. I wasn't left disappointed by this Hobbit film. The films won't hold up well over time but at least we'll still have The Lord Of The Rings to satisfy all our Middle Earth needs. I know this all sounds like negative points but I did enjoy the film I swear! It just wasn't anything special, that's all. It had the pressure of The Lord Of The Rings on it's back and was being adapted from a 300 page kids book, stretched into three really long films...

Look, I liked it, didn't love it, but it'll do. I am giving The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies a rating of 3/5.

What did you think of the final Hobbit film? Are you happy it's over or have you been left wanting more adventures in Middle Earth? Let me know in the comments below.

Thanks for reading!

Come back soon for my review of the year and what I am most looking forward to in 2015!