The Hobbit Trilogy: 5 Changes That Worked And 5 That Didn't
3. Smaug's Early Death
The placement of this entry into being a change that didn't work is a direct result of the Hobbit films being split into a trilogy. The issue here isn't with how Smaug died or that he died when he wasn't supposed to, it's with the baffling decision to prolong Smaug's death until the third and final Hobbit film. The film's writers may have thought that saving the dragon's fatal clash with Bard was a great cliffhanger moment to end The Desolation Of Smaug on, but The Battle Of The Five Armies more than proved otherwise. The final film in the trilogy obviously carries on directly after the climactic events of The Desolation Of Smaug, and while Smaug's destruction of Lake-Town is CGI treat for the eyes, his death only 10 minutes after the film begins just makes the transition from both films feel disjointed and unnecessary. Jackson could have just as easily included Smaug's death as the finale of the second film and made the looming threat of Sauron's forces the cliffhanger instead.
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.
