10 Reasons You Should Give The Hobbit A Second Chance

6. It's Greater Than The Sum Of Its Parts

The Battle of Moria is simultaneously the point where Peter Jackson stated his game-plan for the whole Hobbit trilogy and where many of its detractors began to register their disinterest. Although the director was trying to show how this wasn't a simple children's story, to many having another exposition dump so soon after the Ian Holm-narrated prologue and the introduction of the dwarves raised the question of whether The Hobbit even has its own story to tell. It's emblematic of much of the criticism with An Unexpected Journey; it was too disjointed and unfocused. And as a film by itself it admittedly doesn't work. But as the first chapter of The Hobbit film trilogy it's rather serviceable, with the lengthy time in Hobbiton at the start, or the lack of endings being less of an issue when there's not a year-long gap between watching the films; even with The Battle Of The Five Armies months away you can still see things slotting into place. This doesn't make the film any better, but it makes The Hobbit series, like fellow unfocused fantasy series Harry Potter, greater than the sum of its parts. As for the relevance of Moria, it's an essential piece of backstory for Thorin, who could easily have fallen into a proto-Aragorn role, particularly with the arc imposed on him. The expansions here gave some context to the character, making him more amenable than his book counterpart.