10 Biggest Mistakes That Completely Ruined The Hobbit Trilogy

8. The Action Is Over The Top And Threatless

Some of the most lambasted moments of The Lord Of The Rings are Legolas' shows of spirit-like agility; riding a shield in Helm's Deep and bringing down a massive oliphant with a couple of arrows on Pelennor Fields. So why the decision was made for this, rather than the immeasurable moments of believable, gritty action, to be used as the template for The Hobbit's fight scenes is down-right ridiculous. The elves appear to be in an endless conflict of one-upmanship, their fighting style so flawlessly agile it's a wonder any of them ever die in combat, while the dwarves get through deadly scrapes with laughably contrived luck. Not only does it feel distinctly unreal, making the sequences feel like glorified Let's Play videos, over three films it manages to suck out any sense of awe it may have had. Legolas felling a giant Mumakil was incredible, but when every single fight has him performing increasingly unbelievable feats of "skill" there's nothing to get excited about. The series had already pushed the limits of indestructible heroes, with death fake-outs an oddly common occurrence in the originals, but in The Hobbit death is never even threatened (until it becomes narratively necessary) - it's impossible to get invested in the threat when the heroes appear to be protected from deadly falls by some invisible force field.