The Hobbit Trilogy: 5 Changes That Worked And 5 That Didn't
The 5 That Worked
5. Gandalf's Journey To Dol Guldur
It's one of the biggest changes that Peter Jackson made with the overall narrative of the Hobbit films, and one that had to be made for the transition from book to film. Unlike Tolkien's book, which told the story through Bilbo's eyes, Jackson's films placed as much emphasis on Gandalf, the overarching narrative of Middle Earth's fate and Sauron's future return. There are moments within the book where Gandalf leaves Bilbo and the band of dwarves to embark on a separate investigation scarcely explained i.e. the Necromancer. While Sauron's alias is mentioned in Tolkien's book, his identity is never explicitly revealed, nor does the character actually appear in the book. Jackson decided to give substance to Gandalf's various departures from the dwarven company by 'filling in the blanks', so to speak. Many criticisms aimed at the films concern how Jackson has created events out of thin air that Tolkien never actually wrote or implied. And while there are certainly examples of Jackson being perhaps too overzealous with his changes, this certainly isn't one of them. The White Council's discovery of Sauron's revival established a continuity with the Ring's films absent from Tolkien's book and resolved the problem of Gandalf just randomly disappearing throughout the films.
Joe is a freelance games journalist who, while not spending every waking minute selling himself to websites around the world, spends his free time writing. Most of it makes no sense, but when it does, he treats each article as if it were his Magnum Opus - with varying results.
