The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug Movie Review

The great and epic adventure continues, alongside the not so great and epic series of reviews. So today, I will be reviewing The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. Yes the second installment of Peter Jackson's prequel trilogy to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is one of those rare cases, it takes what flawed the original, removed it, took the traits of the original being amazing and amplifies it by 10.

Let me start by saying that this film is the most fun out all the Middle Earth films. This film has a much lighter tone compared to the other films other than 'Unexpected Journey.' There are also more humor integrated into the writing, most of which comes from Martin Freeman, whose performance of Bilbo is the best we've seen from him so far. The dwarves are all unique from one another, but I sometimes wish certain dwarves had more screen time and at least had one line. Since some dwarves, have nothing more than a camera shot and a grunt. But this all washes away with the action. the action is amazing, some of the best from Peter Jackson. Some of the standouts include the Lake-Town attack by the Orcs, the encounter with Smaug, voiced brilliantly by Benedict Cumberbatch, and finally the barrel sequence, which is my favorite Middle Earth moment, and is one of the best action sequences of all time.

Once again the score and visual effects are brilliant. Shore's score this time around isn't so memorable and mind blowing as Unexpected Journey and the Lord of the Rings trilogy was, but it fits the mood, and rests when the credits close as a superior soundtrack to the standard blockbuster score. Overall The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, is a sequel that improves on its original, thanks to its excellent writing, score, action, visual effects, performances, and characters; that all sum up to be one of the best cinematic experiences I have ever encountered for that reason I award The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug an amazing 9.5 out of 10.