10 Movie Characters Killed Early In The Sequel

3. Smaug - The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies

Loki Death
Warner Bros.

Smaug the Tremendous. Smaug the Mighty. Smaug the Unassessably Wealthy. For two long movies, the anticipation for The Dragon of Erebor is built and when finally Benedict Cumberbatch's beast makes his entrance he does not disappoint.

But there is a reason the dragon appears at the end of the second movie, only to be killed off at the start of the third, and it is right there in the title. These movies are not about Smaug, despite the years of anticipation.

The Hobbit is about Bilbo. It is about Bard, and it is about the Dwarves getting home. Killing the big bad dragon is just one obstacle, granted a large obstacle, in getting the Dwarves back into Erebor.

It is a shame that Smaug doesn't get more screen time over the course of the trilogy, as the dragon is easily the best part of the series. Cumberbatch's voice work is genuinely unsettling yet charismatic, and the fiery desolation left by the dragon in Lake Town is nothing short of stunning to look at.

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