9. Give Martin Freeman The Forefront
Martin Freeman has, most critics agree, done a bang-up job playing the young version of Ian Holm's Bilbo Baggins, at once capturing the initial vulnerability of the character before the adventure sets off and the courage he slowly acquires over the course of the story. Still, there's an awful lot of the film where Bilbo sort of blends into the background, either because of the sheer enormity of the set-pieces, or because there's just so many other supporting characters in the shot; a lot of the time, we have to sift through the various other characters just to locate him, despite the fact he's wearing different clothes to the dwarves. Though of course he's forever the hero of the piece, his screen presence is not as pronounced as it could have been. Now that Jackson's got through the tough stage of introducing us to the new protagonist, hopefully The Desolation of Smaug can proceed in a more confident and assured manner, whereby Freeman can proudly stand at the center of the frame and continue to forge his heroic stature. Given how much Jackson appears to want The Hobbit to stand level with The Lord of the Rings, he needs to ensure that he has a strong, developed, abundant protagonist at the helm.