ok this has been a popular thread on many forums that I have seen. I think its a bunch of crap and I personally will boycott the films if it happens but what is everyone elses take on it?
Personally I don't think Jackson is THIS crazy... but it seems to keep popping up in some demented fans perspectives on what should be added to the films.
Smaug shouldn't be there, the Necromancer shouldn't be there and Bilbo should spend most of it unconcious!
Noe of the above will probably be the case, Smaug will be swooping about the battlefield, the Necromancer will be controlling him and Bilbo will help Bard to slay Smaug and the WC to drive off the Necromancer- and then I will go to NZ with a specially designed pair of +10 mithril-toe-capped-infinte-bollock-kicking-boots and put them to good use!
I bet the Necromancer will ride Smaug into battle like a winged Ringwraith, I would pay good money to see Todd and Pettys faces if that happened LOL
Don't worry Julia if that happens you will see my face- on the news after being dragged away from PJ still kicking furiously!
Does that mean you won't be wanting me to order you a pair of boots then Stu?
just got me a new pair of boots myself Jason LOL yeah I think the whole idea is a big bunch of crap and who ever originally started it should be dragged from their home and beaten severely in the street in front of millions of people, while their home is burned...j/k but I personally see the Necromancer being gone at the end of film one with Smaug alone being the "MAIN" antagonist in film 2 along with the orcs/goblins in the BO5A.
I think it's a pretty cool idea.
It would make for some eye-popping cinema, particularly in 3D.
Waaaa-ha! Gotcha!
In all seriousness, though, it does present Jackson with a pretty tricky double-climax again (much like Mount Doom followed by Scouring of the Shire) and double-climaxes don't tend to lend themselves too easily to the cinematic form.
It'll be interesting to see how Jackson copes with the issue, how tightly he dares to entwine them or how densely he dares to compress the time between them...
hey I want some silvery mithril boots anyway! with pointy toes like the Ringwraiths.
Sorry Julia but they are for kicking PJ with only. Only genuine PJ kickers need apply- the dwarves are really strict about that after what PJ did to Gimli and their race.
Well Gimli is gallant and chivalrous so maybe if I tell him its my birthday?
They will send round PJ's Gimli who will arrive on horseback, comically fall off, be thrown across an inexplicable chasm to the accompaniment of a dwarf tossing joke, and then belch in your face. :)
NO he wouldnt, he would tell me that it would be his pleasure to give me the boots and then would tell me all about the Glittering Caves and ask me whether I would like to see it one day with him and Legolas, and I would say you betcha I would.
Only if they send book Gimli- which they wont.
gggrrrr! I just want boots.
I'd get you boots, Julia.
You can send them by Owl if you like.
Ignoring the last few comments and going back to Kendalf's point... maybe we will see the Smaug slaying reasonably early in the film. It would then run more like an action movie or maybe a horror where you have various peaks and troughs going on with a (very PJ-esqe) spectacular finale.
If we assume 2.5 hours of film, Smaug goes swimming at about 1:40, Armies turn up about 1:55 with various armings and jool stealings going on until about 2:10, 10 mins of battle with Thorin funeral montage and returning home with Enya singing something to end it.
"It would then run more like an action movie or maybe a horror where you have various peaks and troughs going on with a (very PJ-esqe) spectacular finale."- Lance
That sentence makes me want to strangle kittens! And I like kittens!
I would like to ignore the last but one comment about horror films.
Julia - I didn't want to suggest muchos cliche lines and Christopher Lee getting his Haribo fangs out.
What I was trying to suggest is that films do work where there are several defining moments so long as they are paced correctly with enough time for an emotional recovery.
There are a few films I would consider classics that have moments like that. Aliens... 2 big battles before the final on with the queen. Terminator, escape from cyberdyne and final showdown with the T-1000. Black Hawk Down, although shockingly amended from the true version, there were various peaks and troughs there.
I think it can be done and can be done well... remains to be seen if PJ can do it well though.
I dont think we need to force any peaks and dips in the action, the book is full of them already, its nicely paced naturally. I dont want Smaug to be killed off early on, he is the main villain and should be respected.
Lance: "maybe we will see the Smaug slaying reasonably early in the film."
I'm inclined to go the other way, actually, and suspect Jackson will put off the slaying of Smaug as long as possible and contract the amount of time between that and the start of the Bo5A.
After all, he's such an iconic figure and the (5K,48fps,3D) attack on Lake Town is going to be so face-meltingly spectacular that he won't want to squander it...
Kendalf: "I'm inclined to go the other way, actually, and suspect Jackson will put off the slaying of Smaug as long as possible..."
In that case I wonder if the liklihood that Elves will be in Laketown in force, with Tauriel leading the pursuit of the Dwarves, when Smaug arrives there and then setting off immediately to Erebor following his demise.
I wonder what the link will be to get the goblins involved in the battle. Makes me wonder if the battle will be set up as the accidental meeting of 5 armies as in the book or if it will seem more planned.
Julia - yes, the book is well paced for a reader. That doesn't always tend to work on film and we already know that there will be some significant differences already. Just trying to suggest how it could be done given the format and story will be different.
Ayup Lance...
There are OTHER Birds and Beasts not sympathetic to our Heroes, Like Crebain maybe, and given that Thorin & Co were Holed up for a few Days waiting for Dain, the News of Smaugs Demise would have been 'Everywhere' quite Quickly. And who's to say that Bolgs side of the Clan didn't have Tunnels not unlike the Great Goblin had from the West, from Mount Gundabad, the Goblin Stronghold in the East, to not far from the Lonely Mountain too ? After all, the whole Area IS 'Goblin Town'...
Lance - "Makes me wonder if the battle will be set up as the accidental meeting of 5 armies as in the book or if it will seem more planned."
I think it will be more planned, or at least the motivations of some of the armies will be more developed than simple greed. The much-postulated flashback to Azanulbizar, for example, would give Bolg an incentive to seek out Thorin and his kin if and when he somehow learnt of their location and their intentions (perhaps as Stu suggests) rather than just turn up at the Lonely Mountain, out of the blue, on the prospect of acquiring some loot when they hear Smaug's been killed.
Kendalf - I am wondering if the fact that all 5 armies are there at the same time will seem more planned than each being there for seemingly different original reasons (i.e. it will turn in to forces of good versus forces of evil from the beginning rather than the dwarves/men/elves being forced to fight together becasue of the goblin/warg army coming).
Stu - agree there are a lot of ways this could be played. With the White Council and Necro stories being in there I wonder whether the motivations for the battle will be changed.
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