Summary

• The Hobbit trilogy relied heavily on green screen technology and poorly-rendered CGI, resulting in less authentic performances and a fake, manufactured look.
• The decision to turn The Hobbit, originally a slender children's book, into a sprawling trilogy led to pacing problems and an overstuffed storyline.
• The inclusion of unnecessary characters and changes to the original book detracted from the cohesiveness of the trilogy and weakened the relationships between characters.

After everything Peter Jackson accomplished adapting J.R.R. Tolkien's work, fans couldn't wait to return to Middle-earth with The Hobbit trilogy, only to discover that it was worse than The Lord of the Rings movies. From the time The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey was released in 2012 as part of a planned trilogy, fans wondered why Jackson was taking Tolkien's slim novel and splitting it into three films, but since it reignited the winter appointment viewing that The Lord of the Rings had been a decade before they dutifully ed it. Unfortunately, with each year a sequel was released, the problems with the trilogy got progressively worse.

The Lord of the Rings had not only been an extraordinary cinematic achievement, but it also held a special place in fans' hearts who revered its homage to Tolkien's world-building. Nostalgia alone couldn't buoy The Hobbit trilogy's transgressions, which became numerous and unwieldy as the movies boasted longer and longer running times. By the time The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies was released in 2014, fan expectations had been utterly dashed, and any sense of a hero's journey ending in triumph and celebration had been replaced with a gratified feeling that a long slog was finally over.

10 The Hobbit Trilogy Relied More On Green Screen Than Lord Of The Rings

The Hobbit trilogy relied more on green screen technology than The Lord of the Rings, which either filmed on location in the abundant verdure of New Zealand or tried to incorporate as many sets as possible with its actors so that they felt like they were really traipsing around in Middle-earth. By using more green screen in The Hobbit movies, as well as copious amounts of poorly-rendered CGI (particularly for antagonists), the cast didn't have anything corporeal to react to. Not only did this lead to slightly less authentic performances, but it also made The Hobbit films look fake and manufactured rather than fantastical and otherworldly.

9 The Entire Hobbit Trilogy Is Based On One Book - And It Shows

J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit is a slender volume intended as a children's story, and hardly enough to make a trilogy out of, and yet Peter Jackson decided to make many changes to The Hobbit book and turn it into a sprawling trilogy. What should have been epic ended up feeling overstuffed with filler, and each film suffered from pacing problems as a result as Jackson added material to pad out the story beats, including a series of crazy chases, such as through Goblin Town and the rivers of Mirkwood. The trilogy feels unwieldy and cumbersome as opposed to smooth with a clear beginning, middle, and end.

8 The Hobbit Trilogy Changed Directors During Development

Unfortunately for its development, The Hobbit changed directors during its lengthy development. Initially, Jackson wasn't going to be involved as anything other than an executive producer and a creative consultant, but eventually, his involvement at the ground level was necessitated by other creatives stepping aside. Fans have long wondered what it would have been like if the original director Guillermo del Toro had ever realized his vision for Middle-earth, but instead, Jackson tried to turn The Hobbit into The Lord of the Rings rather than taking any new risks that might have made it seem different from its predecessor for the right reasons.

7 Peter Jackson's Hobbit Book Changes Were Worse Than Lord Of The Rings

Not only did Peter Jackson make changes to Tolkien's Hobbit book that added content and stretched out the story into three films, but he also made a series of changes that greatly impacted their cohesiveness. In The Lord of the Rings he removed filler such as the Tom Bombadill sequence, but in The Hobbit he added scenes involving new characters, like Tauriel, and crafted a love story between her and Kili the dwarf. These changes might have been fine had they felt like they were part of the same movies, but they simply distracted from the main storyline of Bilbo accompanying Thorin and his cohort to free Lonely Mountain from Smaug's grip.

6 The Hobbit's Frame Rate Controversy Explained

Peter Jackson released The Hobbit in a few versions, including regular 2D, 24 fps, and 3D HFR (High Frame Rate). Most films are shot at 24 fps because it's just a little faster than what the brain can process and what the naked eye can take in, but shooting at 48fps meant that the "magical" cinematic quality of the films was often robbed by an emphasis on realism versus an emphasis on emersion. Not only did the 3D HFR have the effect of giving fans' motion sickness as their brains attempted to keep up with what their eyes were seeing, but it also made what should have been incredibly detailed movies look fake and artificial.

5 The Hobbit's Characters Were Less Developed Than Lord Of The Rings

The Hobbit featured a lot of extraneous characters, like the Mayor of Laketown, or the White Orc, who took up valuable space that could have been used to develop other characters. Bilbo and Thorin's relationship was a very special one in the novel but felt forced in the movies, to the point where it didn't make as much sense that Bilbo would be so broken up about his death. The Lord of the Rings movies took their time between battles to show why each relationship was important, mostly because it broke the Fellowship off into pairings that brought out the strength in each character.

4 The Hobbit's Ultimate Villain Wasn't As Compelling As LOTR's Sauron Stakes

The Lord of the Rings focused on Frodo taking the One Ring to Mordor and casting it into the fiery depths to save Middle-earth because if he didn't, Sauron the Dark Lord would march across the land and consume it in chaos and darkness. The Hobbit trilogy didn't have this sort of uber-villain, but instead focused on Smaug, a dragon concealing a treasure that only really mattered to dwarves, and an Orc with personal beef with Thorin and his kin. After the threat of Sauron, fans just couldn't feel compelled to care about villains that they had no personal connection with or didn't really see as a threat until awoken.

3 The Hobbit's De-Aging Technology Was Distracting

Today de-aging technology is somewhat commonplace, being used in movies like The Irishmen and The Mandalorian, but back in 2014, the de-aging used in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug wasn't so refined. It was primarily used to make Legolas look as young as he did when filming The Lord of the Rings trilogy, but it did nothing for the fact that Orlando Bloom's body was different, that he sounded older, or that he moved more slowly than a nimble man in his early 20s. It became distracting whenever he appeared on the screen as fans searched for signs of the uncanny valley.

2 The Hobbit Unnecessarily Included Original Trilogy LOTR Characters

Peter Jackson chose to provide some connective tissue to The Hobbit by including some original trilogy characters from The Lord of the Rings like Legolas. While the Prince of Mirkwood was alive and well patrolling his father's kingdom when Bilbo made his unexpected journey, he didn't have anything to do with it, and plunking him down into the story only served to undermine its own merit. The choice made it seem like the movies couldn't stand on their own without an original character to save the plot, and besides that, his storylines including Tauriel and Thranduil added nothing to his character development during the War of the Ring.

1 The Hobbit's Fellowship Couldn't Live Up To LOTR's Iconic & Diverse Group

The introductory scene involving dinner with Thorin and his dwarves before Bilbo's unexpected journey promised great camaraderie, but that was the last time all of their personalities truly shined. As the movies went on, only a handful of them were ever distinguishable from the others, whereas in The Lord of the Rings, every member was identifiable due to being an Elf, a Dwarf, a Man, or a Hobbit. Had more attention been paid to the new Fellowship of The Hobbit movies, they might have been heroes to cheer for rather than feel sorry for.