The Hobbit's

'The Desolation of Smaug' is coming to DVD/Blu-Ray this week. These Hobbit movies are really frustrating, and in the smallest ways. There's just so much fat in each of them, if you removed the Gandalf/Sauron subplot, cut down the extended fight scenes, and removed some tracking bridge shots, you would have some reasonably lengthed movies. In fact you'd probably end up with a duology instead of a trilogy. I read that 'An Unexpected Journey' was originally going to end with the barrel scene and that the second movie was going to be Smaug and the massive battle. That would've worked for me. You could've done that and had the Gandalf material as its own standalone movie. Some have come close to saying the Hobbit trilogy is Peter Jackson's equivelent to the Star Wars prequels. I wouldn't go that far, but I can certainly see where that's coming from. Really hoping the payoff of part three will bring it all together somehow and make this a series worth revisiting.