10 Dumb Mistakes That Ruined Once Great Franchises

For the longest time the explanation for the failure of The Hobbit Trilogy was similar to The Hunger Games; in stretching a single, light-hearted kids book into three movies, padded out with contextually interesting but ultimately extraneous details from The Return Of The King's appendices, Peter Jackson had soured his Lord Of The Rings. However, a year after The Battle Of The Five Armies brought things to an end with a whimper, the real truth was unveiled.

In the in-depth making of documentaries on the film's Extended Edition (yes, Jackson found a way to somehow make them even longer), one section focuses on the overwhelming stresses on the filmmaker during the shooting of the final half of the second film, a result of a limited opportunity for planning following the departure of Guillermo del Toro from the project after a lengthy and expensive pre-production period. At one point Jackson sends the crew on an extended lunch while he tries to figure out the afternoon's shoot and confesses he has no idea what's going on.

This is why the two-parter was pushed to a trilogy - there was no other logistical way to continue - and repositions The Hobbit not as a story of greed or a case for a good editor, but as a testament to the necessity of planning. Which is something Jackson should have really known; Rings' brilliance was sealed on the meticulous world building before shooting began.