Why is The Hobbit trilogy a disappointment?

Introduction

When somewhere around 1999-2000 it was announced that they were making a new movie adaptation of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, people were in general quite skeptical about how good it could be made. When they announced that the director would be Peter Jackson, of Bad Taste fame, people were even more skeptical. Peter Jackson was not exactly known for making epic larger-than-life movies. He was known for comedy splatter movies. Many people were understandably predicting an utter failure.

It turned out, however, that not only was the choice of director almost perfect, but the movie trilogy turned out to be one of the best pieces of cinematography ever made, gaining accolades, sweeping the Oscars, and gaining copious amounts of praise and adulation both from film critics and the public. Most critics agree that the movie trilogy is up there with the best of the best of film history. It's most certainly the best movie (trilogy) of the fantasy genre.

After the amazing success of the movie trilogy, almost immediately talks began about adapting Tolkien's The Hobbit.

The skepticism of the public arose once again when it was announced that the adaptation would not be directed by Peter Jackson (the reasons for which were complicated, full with executive meddling, rights to the work, and all kinds of corporate-political drama). It was also unclear whether this would be one single movie, perhaps two movies, or an entire trilogy. When at some point it was confirmed that it would be an entire trilogy, just like the LotR adaptation, this only raised skepticism. (The Lord of the Rings was itself a book trilogy, so it made sense to also make it a movie trilogy. The Hobbit, however, is one single book, shorter than any of the three books of the LotR. Expanding it to an entire trilogy felt completely artificial, and probably going well beyond the source material.)

Many years later, quite late in the production of the film trilogy, it was announced that Peter Jackson had been taken to direct the project after all. People rejoiced, although only with very cautious optimism.

It turned out that the caution in the optimism was somewhat warranted. The new movie trilogy turned out to be... ok. Not bad by any measure. But just... ok. There was clearly a ton of effort put into the movies, and lots of things were better than in the first trilogy (such as computer graphics), but otherwise it was... just ok.

Needless to say, being just ok was quite a disappointment for many. Expectations were high due to the previous trilogy, and the new one did not fulfill those expectations, which caused disappointment. Even Peter Jackson himself admitted that the trilogy turned out to be a disappointment (blaming primarily the fact that he was brought in very late in the pre-production process, which didn't give him even nearly as much time to polish the work as he did with the LotR trilogy.)

I am a huge fan of the LotR trilogy. I own the extended edition DVDs (and have actually been thinking about getting the BluRays for better quality), and have watched the entire trilogy like a dozen of times.

When I saw the Hobbit movies in the movie theatre, I liked them (I even went to see the first one twice). I had to admit, however, that they didn't leave me such a good impression as the LotR movies did, although I really couldn't put my finger on the reason. The movies looked a lot like LotR, and felt a lot like LotR... but there was something that made them not as good as LotR, although I couldn't figure out what.

I recently purchased the trilogy in BluRay and watched it again. I think I figured out one of the major reasons why The Hobbit just doesn't feel as good as The Lord of the Rings.

The Lord of the Rings

In The Lord of the Rings, most of the main characters are very memorable and with good characterization. In fact, many of the actors were launched to international fame by their role in this trilogy.

Prior to the trilogy, Viggo Mortensen was a relatively unknown actor. He had many major roles in previous films, but he wasn't exactly world-famous. However, his portrayal of Aragorn launched him to world-fame, and he became an immediate celebrity.

During the early stages of pre-production of LotR it was announced that Sean Connery had been offered the role of Gandalf, but he had refused it (or otherwise couldn't take it). This was a disappointment to many, since most people thought he would have been the absolutely perfect choice for the role. Most people were highly skeptical of Ian McKellen being chosen, given that not many people knew him, nor was he especially renowned as an actor among the general public (unlike Connery). But, once again, the movie trilogy launched him to absolute stardom, and today Gandalf is pretty much seen in the public eye as looking like McKellen. Ian McKellen is Gandalf, period.

And who can forget the absolutely brilliant role of Gollum. In the books Gollum was somewhat of a main character, but he was just... some more or less minor semi-antagonist. The movie trilogy launched the character to fame. Everybody was repeating the expression "my precious" in Gollum's (well, Andy Serkis's) voice. Definitely one of the most memorable characters in the trilogy.

While Gollum was very prominent in the books, Legolas certainly wasn't. He was mostly a minor secondary character in the books, without much influence. But, once again, the movies launched both the character and his actor (Orlando Bloom) to world fame. Legolas became quite a badass, and adulated by many fans.

The same can be said to be true, to some extent, for many of the other main characters, such as Frodo, Sam, Saruman, Elrond, Gimli, and so on. Even the Eye of Sauron gets a memorable role in the trilogy, even though it doesn't do much.

If there is one singular main character to the entire trilogy, one central character throughout the entire saga, it's of course Frodo Baggins. Regardless of what you thought of Frodo's characterization (personally I thought it was great), it can't be denied that it was memorable: He was vulnerable, he was flawed, and he was more and more in pain as the trilogy progressed. It helps a lot that his actor, Elijah Wood, has such expressive eyes and facial features, that convey emotion and pain so vividly.

The Hobbit

The Hobbit, however, seems to conspicuously lack this kind of memorable characterization for any of its characters, and I think this is one of the major reasons why the movie trilogy overall is so meh.

How many dwarves are there in the main cast? Was it something like 12 or 13? How many of their names do you remember? How many of their personalities, or other characteristics do you remember? Did any of them stand out as especially badass, or vulnerable, or wise, or otherwise memorable?

Perhaps the only one of them that barely qualifies is their leader, Thorin Oakenshield, due to his role. (Then there was that one dwarf who got injured by an arrow and fell in love with that Elf... What were their names again?)

The trilogy introduced some characters simply because they were so famous from the previous trilogy. Most prominently Legolas appears in the movies, even though he doesn't in the original book. Gollum of course appears in the book (and is one of the most memorable characters in it), and his appearance is stretched in the first movie as much as it reasonably could be. Gandalf's role is greatly extended in the movies.

But even these established characters felt a bit flat in The Hobbit. They had to live in the shadow of their appearance in the first trilogy. Ironically, they didn't really stand out, because they were quite clearly trying to capitalize on their previous fame. Legolas's antics didn't feel as much badass as they felt artificially shoved in. Gandalf didn't feel as empathetic as he did in the first trilogy.

Like Frodo was the main character of the LotR, Bilbo is the main character here. But Bilbo doesn't feel even nearly as deep and relatable as Frodo did. Bilbo acts more like a court jester of sorts, rather than a person forced to endure a burden tasked onto him due to circumstances, which causes him enormous amounts of suffering.

I'm not saying that Bilbo should have been a clone of Frodo. Of course not. He isn't in the book either. However, my point is that the movie trilogy fails to make him especially memorable, fails to give him deep characterization, like the original trilogy did with so many of its characters.

Perhaps the only memorable character in the entire trilogy is Azog the Defiler. Curiously, and perhaps ironically, he doesn't actually appear in the source material (he is mentioned once by name, but does not appear). If the most memorable character in the entire trilogy is one that doesn't even make an appearance in the source material, what does this tell us?

The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy did a great job at character development, giving depth to its main (and even many secondary) characters. The Hobbit movie trilogy fails in this to a very large extent. I think this is one of the main reasons why the latter does not stand up to its predecessor, and why it just doesn't feel as good and memorable.