That's a lot of overlapping shoulder plates for mere leather armour, but I'll allow for the possibility based on the example you provided of Legolas at Helm's Deep. Still, the helms are way over the top for Wood elves. The narrow areas around the eyes severely restrict your peripheral vision which is already hampered when you are in a forest. Having said that, Thranduil's army came all the way to the edge of the wood to witness the destruction of Erebor, so one could reason that they armoured themselves more heavily for the occasion just in case their king was feeling compassionate that day. Sadly for the dwarves, he was not.

[quote=""Elysium""]Looking slightly closer it would seem that their heavy armor is more leatherish (new word, Shakespeare style). The helm, although seems metal, the colour would suggest some type of leather hide with a golden trim.

Their shoulder pads give resonance to Legolas at Helm's deep, with those large Leather Rohan originated shoulder guards.

I understand the idea of lightly armored, but I'd think that Yeomen would be of moderately unarmored and the front line elves would be more inclined to be wearing shoulder/head protection.

Then again, do we classify light armor as merely leather orientated?

Sometimes what Tolkien writes suggests somewhat that can be interpreted with perspective and subjective connotations.[/quote]
I paid close attention to the Mirkwood armor when I saw the film, as I wanted to see if the helms got much visibility. Not very clear in standard 24fps, but in HFR you can see a lot of detail. The armor itself looked more or less as light and regal as the 2nd Age Elven armor from the FOTR prologue, just slightly different styling, and not all steel. Some of the pieces have a leatherish texture, trimmed in metal. It could have even been some kind of shaped wood, but Weta were obviously trying to make it look as if it were crafted from other materials than just steel. I could also see a chain mail undercoat.

If you want heavy armor, the Dwarven armor was built like a tank. I have seen the full suits of armor built for the flashback scenes in Moria. The level of thought and detail is staggering, considering it is only briefly on screen. I hope some of that work gets into a future Weta book as well as some clearer shots of Thror's sword and shield.

But you ain't seen nothing yet!

When the dwarves were lined up at the gate, awaiting Smaug, they looked amazing in their armor. They really did look like little tanks. lol

But this scene made me think of something. I've been listening, for what must be the sixth time, the Children of Hurin, read by Christopher Lee. The scene of Erebor being overcome made me think of Glaurung, and how he was unable to defeat Azaghal and his iron mask, whereas Smaug scattered the dwarven host with ease. Thoughts?

Glaurung was more of a wingless worm. He had armies with him when he led battles. Smaug must have been much larger and more powerful, as he destroyed Dale and took Erebor himself, and they show him literally bringing the place to the ground in the film.

It was always a big contradiction to me that this Dragon, who was massive and powerful enough to accomplish those deeds, was taken down by a single arrow. I always took the Hobbit to be Bilbo's embellished account of what really happened though, not what actually happened. It will be interesting how the four writers of the films worked that out.

I think that the elves battle armor looks great. Yeah, its a little more heavy duty than what they should be wearing. But if Thranduil saw his army wiped out in the Last Alliance, wouldn't he upgrade their equipment so that doesn't happen again? Plus, I doubt they'd wear full battle gear in the forest hunting orcs and spiders. They'd probably ditch the helms and chest guards.

Interesting thoughts about Glaurung. One thing to take note of is that all the races of the "good guys" were more powerful in the first age. The elves fresh out of Valinor or had been mastering their craft under the strong leadership of Thingol for millenia. The men were at their peek height and were selfless, strong, and (mostly) fiercely loyal to the Noldorin Kings, and the dwarven kingdoms were even strong enough to take on armies out of Angband and later the elves of Thingol and Dior. Their craft was incredible, and they probably had developed more heat-resistant armor. The craftsman of Nogrod were the best. Granted, we were talking about the Broadbeams of Belegost, but they undoubtedly had similar skill and were in shared trade and knowledge with the Firebeards. Also, Glaurung wasn't as mobil as Smaug. Smaug was huge but (at least was made out by Bilbo to be) a very swift, good flyer. Glaurung was a great worm, and was not nearly as agile. What made him so devastating in later years was sheer size and the will and mental power instilled in him by Morgoth. So these are different beasts, so to speak.

All the same, I wouldn't mind seeing some dwarves rush into battle wearing Masks of Belegost. Actually, I'd probably have a nerdgasm over it.

Found a decent pic of Bolg during the Moria battle:

Huh, I remember that scene. I was too busy paying attention to the dwarf that looked like Mr T. and wondering whether or not that was a younger Dwalin.

[quote=""Fingolfin""]Huh, I remember that scene. I was too busy paying attention to the dwarf that looked like Mr T. and wondering whether or not that was a younger Dwalin. [/quote]

Pretty sure it was...

Nobody really knows what Oscar noms The Hobbit will get, but if predictions like the following are true, it is going to fall very far from FOTR's stunning 13 noms.

http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2013/01 ... -thursday/

I think there are just too many huge films, and I mean HUGE films, for The Hobbit to really compete at the Oscars this year, unfortunately.

Ten years ago what PJ & Company did was huge; They set a standard no one had seen before.
Today the Hobbit is just an extension of that, so I don't e xp ect what we saw back then in awards.

I do e xp ect at the end of all 3 films, there will be some more awards to added to their list (hmm) Row; As in longest line up of Oscars ever seen for a single motion picture.

I allow a handful of kids to use my classroom during lunch to watch Netflix, usually Battlestar Galactica, Walking Dead or some variant thereof. Well, three days ago we started watching the 1977 animated Hobbit on VHS...yes, VHS. We were all watching this, commenting on what we thought PJ was going to be including in his version, and what started as a "God, this is bad" turned into everyone intently watching by the end.

And Gandalf was a rude tool in this film. lol

Cheers,

Guy

PJ does have someone advising him on what's out of bounds, rights-wise:

http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/ae/ ... ar-669192/

Found this on another forum. The sword on Bilbo's wall (left) in The Hobbit looks familiar.

I've seen this picture before and it does look like Aragon's sword. I'm not sure the reasoning behind it though. Maybe its more of a generic gondorian rangers sword.

Uh, that would be 'Arnorian' ranger sword...

As I recall, the one on the wall in ROTK is a bit different than this. I'll have to pop the Blue Ray in and check. makes no sense for it to be Strider's sword, but blurry as it is, it sure looks similar with the hilt ring and pommel shape. The other ranger sword props and the Gondor army swords all had different hilt shapes.

[quote=""Valkrist""]Uh, that would be 'Arnorian' ranger sword... [/quote]

My favorite pedant!

From ROTK. Neither sword is the same. Looks like they had to recreate them, which is odd, because Weta supposedly keeps everything. They did not ever get which sword was on top the same.

[quote=""Nasnandos""]They did not ever get which sword was on top the same.
[/quote]

Bilbo probably just hung them wrong after he had them down to clean and polish them.

You know, I was just thinking about that scene yesterday when I watched the film. I thought it was Glamdring, initially, but you guys are right, as usual - it does appear to be a Ranger sword.

The Digital Bits says Amazon France is reporting a street date of Apr 17 for the BD/DVD release, with the US/Canadian release presumably about the same time. That would be on track for the release schedule of most movies currently, but way earlier than the LOTR movies. It was typically August for the TE and November for the EE for them. I think some of them still have been in theatrical release in late summer! Last I heard, the Hobbit is certainly doing well at the box office, though maybe not LOTR numbers, so this is all a bit puzzling.

It has surpassed ROTK in opening weekend gross , and FOTR in the box office gross already, so they are probably confident that an April release date is fine. A huge chunk of the market have home theater setups, and simply do not go to theaters anymore (like me), so to keep the buzz about the movie strong they have to make the DVD/BR and on-demand releases closer to the films these days.

Adjusted for inflation, it has a little ways to go before it passes any of its predecessors, at least in the US. However, I think it is true that more people are opting out of going to the theater and are simply waiting to see it at home. It takes something pretty big to get me to go to the theater any more.

'Adjusted for inflation' is a load of bs as far as comparing film revenue now. The ways in which people see films are completely different, even when comparing the market to just 10-12 years ago.

Unfortunately, statistics are like that. We all can turn on two different news channels and they can read the same statistics differently. It really all depends on the perspective they use with the distribution curves. If you can't tell, I am not taking a side either way :p

I didn't realize we were getting into an area where sides were to be taken....

[quote=""Olorin""]I didn't realize we were getting into an area where sides were to be taken.... [/quote]

lol, well when something is a "load of bs," I am usually the one to be saying it!

What I mean is that adjusted for inflation is not a valid comparison of film revenue. That whole fad was started to knock down record breaking films by Lucas, Spielberg, and James Cameron, to show how they actually were not much more successful than Gone with the Wind when adjusting dollar for dollar tickets sales.

Today we have the initial theatrical revenue, which is in most cases still the largest source of revenue, but far below just 10 years ago because people watch films from different sources now. We now have on-demand download rentals (Netflix, iTunes, et cetera), DVD/Blue Ray rentals, and DVD/Blue Ray sales all happening within the same year the film is released. Those have taken a large chunk of the theatrical ticket sales. The one just converted to the other, but those are NOT counted as "box office" revenue, which not only makes box office useless as a factor of a films success, but makes adjusted for inflation completely useless. It's not just that it's not even close to apples to apples, or even apples to oranges. That's like apples to seeds. There is no one source to track all of those as of yet.

We also have a huge counterfeit market that is probably eating 25-30% of revenue that was nowhere near as big 10 year ago. I have several friends that never go to theaters, rent, or buy films now. They only watch bit torrent rips of screeners and demo rips. One of those friends offered me a very high quality rip of The Hobbit just one week after the film release!

I agree, box office is only one component of the success of a film. Realistically, there is probably no way to compare the financial success of a recent movie to that of past blockbusters like Gone with the Wind, Star Wars, etc. However, that doesn't stop people, particularly studios, from trying. How many times have we heard Avatar called the biggest film of all time? Or Titanic? I think it is intentionally misleading on studios' parts. Because most people equate "successful" with "good," the more "successful" a movie is hyped to be, the "better" it is, the better movies from that director are, the better movies from that studio are, etc. I guess it's just a pet peeve of mine.

Another pet peeve is people who steal. People who pirate movies, or who copy music or download it illegally, are no different from people who walk into a store and walk out with something they never paid for. And why does this matter? The more it happens, the less the moviemaker or musician can earn a living by their craft, and the more the market is reduced to lowest common denominator pablum. Phrased another way, if after losses due to piracy, only acts like Justin Bieber or Lady Gaga can make enough money to live on, then pretty much all music is going to be of that variety.

So, I hope you, as someone who's trying to make a living by creating and selling a product, give your friends a lecture when they offer you something they have in essence stolen from someone else.

[quote=""Olorin""] Another pet peeve is people who steal. People who pirate movies, or who copy music or download it illegally, are no different from people who walk into a store and walk out with something they never paid for. And why does this matter? The more it happens, the less the moviemaker or musician can earn a living by their craft, and the more the market is reduced to lowest common denominator pablum. Phrased another way, if after losses due to piracy, only acts like Justin Bieber or Lady Gaga can make enough money to live on, then pretty much all music is going to be of that variety.

[/quote]

I agree with what you have said. When I was going to buy the Prometheus Blu-ray, someone I know asked me why I pay to see films or pay for them on DVD/Blu-ray.

I don't like downloading movies from the internet. I prefer to pay to see it so that the company and producers behind the films earn their money and can continue to tell more interesting stories.

The lamest excuse I have ever heard for pirating movies is "Well they've already earned more than enough money so it won't hurt" it still doesn't make it right.

Counterfeiting exists in every industry, especially mine. It is literally a daily battle and I have seen segments of my industry destroyed by it. No matter what anyone says to the people who do it, people who do it knowingly (buying a knockoff) will continue to do so.

In the case of movie and music bit torrents, those people feel that since they are not paying for it, they are not doing anything wrong. I have actually gotten into arguments with people who justify it by saying they would never buy that album, or buy that film anyway (if bit torrents were not available), so they are not taking anything away from the owners. The same people who used to go see a flick every weekend in the theater with me 20 years ago, and who used to buy those same films when they came out on video.

This is kind of getting away from the 'Tolkien' aspect of this thread.

People think it is crazy that I don't even download music paid. I buy EVERYTHING hard copy except my college textbooks. Other than that, I own all my CDs, blu rays, ect.

My library has free rentals so I rent movies before I buy them, but if I like them I buy them. Simple.

The only thing I stream is TV. I am sorry, but these channels are making it impossible to watch 2-3 channels a week without paying for 200+ channels I'll never watch. But again, if I like the show, I'll buy the blu-rays or DVDs to show my support.

Here's an iteresting bit about the battle of the five armies from Richard Armitage:

Speaking to the excellent folks over Empire Magazine (via CBM), Richard Armitage (Thorin Oakenshield) talked about his excitement filming “The Battle Of Five Armies” sequence for the final instalment in Peter Jackson’s ‘The Hobbit’ trilogy, ‘The Hobbit: There And Back Again.’ Discussing the battle, Armitage said, “It’s been put aside until next year, thankfully,” he joked. ”It’s this big thing looming over us. I’m predicting about ten weeks for the shoot because it’s an extensive battle and each character is going to have their ‘hero’ moment on the battlefield. It’s a manic fight in the air – the eagles are fighting bats – and on the ground, and I can’t wait to see what Pete does with that.”

Bats? I don't think there were bats mentioned in the book also I never posted this but a while back, early last year, Benedict Cumberbatch said that his character, the Necromancer, turned up at the battle of the five armies. Now this didn't happen in the book of course, so I wonder what PJ and crew are gonna do. Of course Benedict may have been wrong or misquoted in the interview. I'll try and find it again and post it when I do.

EDIT: here's the interview with Benedict. http://www.tolkientalk.com/2012/01/bene ... aying.html

Bats? I know there are bats mentioned in the book. But not like giant bats. Not like Eagle sized bats... Ugh...no...please Eru...noooooooooooio!

[quote=""RevAnakin""]Bats? I know there are bats mentioned in the book. But not like giant bats. Not like Eagle sized bats... Ugh...no...please Eru...noooooooooooio![/quote]

Hahhaa I honestly feel that I am constantly the deliverer of bad news to the forum, as far as the films go that is

Maybes I should refrain from posting updates about the films

To me, its not a big change. The Necromancer turning up is though and its one thing I'm skeptical about (the one thing i've only been skeptical about). But I guess it could give the goblins more reason for being there. Also I was watching the B roll footage of the hobbit and there's a scene where Saruman mentions "the seven".

I guess that's the seven Dwarven rings, so I think they plan on tying those into the plot as well. This could go back into the extended edition, or maybe it has moved over into film 2.

Also, that list someone posted a while back from games workshop included werewolves. Now I wasn't aware werewolves featured in Middle Earth but according to the Tolkien wikia I think it was, there were werewolves at Dol Guldur. If thats true, maybes there are some things on that list that are correct after all. Can anyone confirm the existance of werewolves in Middle Earth?

Ugh... so many things being bandied about here that it's making my head spin!!!

Ok, some facts:

1- Yes, there were indeed bats at the Battle of the Five Armies. The "Five" armies were composed of, for the good side: Mirkwood Elves, Iron Hills Dwarves, and Men of Laketown (many of them descended from the Men of Dale.) For the evil side, we had Bolg's Goblins, and their Wargs. There were other allied forces in play, though they did not constitute 'armies' per se: Eagles and Beorn for the good side, and clouds of bats for the evil side.

There is no mention made that I recall about the size of the bats, though since they were evil and clearly associated with the Goblins, it is possible they were enhanced in some unnatural way by the ancient corruptions of Morgoth and thus of greater size than your average bat, just like the spiders of Mirkwood were unusually large. Certainly, if Eagles were needed in the battle as a kind of 'air force,' then the bats had to have posed some challenge to the troops on the ground other than being a mere nuisance. I just hope PJ doesn't go overboard and make them the size of Fell Beasts, though like Rev, I'm getting a bad feeling about this.

2- The Necromancer at the Battle of the Five Armies - Dear gods, no! Please let this be a horrible misquote or bad rumour. I thought PJ had learned his lesson by not having Sauron show up at the Black Gates to battle Aragorn in ROTK. This idiot move would rank right up with having Sauron now show up at the Lonely Mountain. Why would he do that? What could possibly be the stakes? He cares nothing for the Arkenstone or Smaug's treasure. So is he there because he knows Bilbo has the Ring? This would be an invention that would seriously alter many events and the history of ME until LOTR. For this to make any sense that Sauron would know about the Ring's presence, they're going to have to invent some silly scene where Azog tells the Necromancer he sensed something of great power on the hobbit that faced him down after the escape from Goblin Town. This would then have to mean that Azog or whomever else tracks the company all the way to the Lonely Mountain and causes Sauron to show up there to claim the Ring. The problem with all this, aside from the tremendous and needless overcomplication and inventions, is how anyone present at the Battle would have the power necessary to face down Sauron. We know he won't get the Ring, so how would this even get resolved???

Cumberbatch, insofar as I know, is providing the voice of Smaug, and he will be dead by the time the Battle occurs. I can't fathom what he is talking about, but I hope it is a mistake as sometimes actors don't seem to know what they're talking about, or the media misquotes them. He is also playing the Necromancer, but he has no business being at the Battle whatsoever. If he is, this will be a horrible alteration. Whatever the case, this change would be one hundred times worse than Nazgul tombs and zombie Thrain. :p uker: :p uker: :p uker:

3- Werewolves in Middle-earth: the short answer is yes. The long answer is that The Silmarillion introduces us to Draugluin, the greatest werewolf that ever lived, spawned by Sauron, and the sire of werewolves to follow. The book also mentions that this was a form favoured by Sauron himself when he comes to devour Finrod's companions whom he had imprisoned in Tol Sirion after it became Tol-in-Gaurhoth, the Isle of Werewolves. They were spirits of fallen lesser Maiar made to inhabit the bodies of wolves, and it is possible that the Wargs, who had the power of speech, were descended from these werewolves, just like Carcharoth was descended from Draugluin. An important note here is that these werewolves were not shapeshifters, as is the common lore, but always retain the form of human-like wolves. They were not the same as the Beornings, whose leaders, like Beorn and Grimbeorn, were able to change form into great bears.

Lastly, there is no mention ever made of werewolves being present in Dol Guldur, so if they are there now and show up later at the Battle, this will be another PJ invention. Werewolves in Tolkien are not mentioned beyond the First Age. Any that survived the War of the Wrath likely went into hiding. Sauron is never said to assume that form again either as he lost the power to alter his shape after the Downfall of Numenor.

I hope this clear some things up.

Go Val! Tell it like it is!

Thanks for the post!

I don't think Cumberbatch had even done any of his work on the film yet when he said that, and when he says "Five Legions War or something which I'm meant to understand", take that to mean he was not familiar with the script yet and didn't understand. I don't e xp ect Sauron in the BOFA.

As far as bats, they are described in the book as swarming overhead in the battle. Tolkien also says they fastened vampire-like on the stricken. He calls them 'great bats', so they are larger than normal. Since the eagles are called Great Eagles, and this is a Peter Jackson film, I e xp ect the great bats to be much more than what is in Tolkien's book.

[quote=""Valkrist""]There is no mention made that I recall about the size of the bats, though since they were evil and clearly associated with the Goblins, it is possible they were enhanced in some unnatural way by the ancient corruptions of Morgoth and thus of greater size than your average bat, just like the spiders of Mirkwood were unusually large.[/quote]

B.O.U.S.? Sorry, Princess Bride reference!

[quote=""Valkrist""]2- The Necromancer at the Battle of the Five Armies - Dear gods, no! Please let this be a horrible misquote or bad rumour. I thought PJ had learned his lesson by not having Sauron show up at the Black Gates to battle Aragorn in ROTK. This idiot move would rank right up with having Sauron now show up at the Lonely Mountain. Why would he do that? What could possibly be the stakes? He cares nothing for the Arkenstone or Smaug's treasure. So is he there because he knows Bilbo has the Ring? This would be an invention that would seriously alter many events and the history of ME until LOTR. For this to make any sense that Sauron would know about the Ring's presence, they're going to have to invent some silly scene where Azog tells the Necromancer he sensed something of great power on the hobbit that faced him down after the escape from Goblin Town. This would then have to mean that Azog or whomever else tracks the company all the way to the Lonely Mountain and causes Sauron to show up there to claim the Ring. The problem with all this, aside from the tremendous and needless overcomplication and inventions, is how anyone present at the Battle would have the power necessary to face down Sauron. We know he won't get the Ring, so how would this even get resolved???[/quote]

He could be arriving too late to save his hoped-for ally Smaug (only half-serious). The biggest problem with this is that PJ established (wrongly, yet established) in his FOTR movie that Sauron was too weak to assume physical shape. So what would we get at the Battle? A ghost?

Sorry, it's been many years since I watched that movie so I don't get the reference or how it relates to what you quoted me saying.

What Kit said seems right as whatever Cumberbatch is trying to say seems non-sensical as he can't even get the name of the battle right. If the interview is that old, why is it only coming to light now? Sauron at the BotFA makes zero sense. He wouldn't be able to do anything, and we know he only learns of "Baggins" much later from Gollum. PJ himself showed us this, so I shudder at what shennanigans he's going to come up with to contradict himself and Tolkien if any of this is true.

[quote=""Valkrist""]I shudder at what shennanigans he's going to come up with to contradict himself and Tolkien if any of this is true. [/quote]

Time travel.

I'm waiting to see a walking, shadowy, slenderman-like Sauron like we caught a glimpse of in An Une xp ected Journey running around the Battlefield scaring people to death. Don't worry, Arwen can always save the day.





Ok, I'm bad.

[quote=""Valkrist""]Sorry, it's been many years since I watched that movie so I don't get the reference or how it relates to what you quoted me saying. [/quote]

The Princess Bride reference was to Rats Of Unusual Size, or R.O.U.S. You said some to the effect of bats of unusual size, so B.O.U.S. was absolutely the first thing that popped into my mind.

[quote=""Fingolfin""]Ok, I'm bad.[/quote]

Very much so!

[quote=""Valkrist""]Sorry, it's been many years since I watched that movie so I don't get the reference or how it relates to what you quoted me saying.

Sauron at the BotFA makes zero sense. He wouldn't be able to do anything, and we know he only learns of "Baggins" much later from Gollum. PJ himself showed us this, so I shudder at what shennanigans he's going to come up with to contradict himself and Tolkien if any of this is true. [/quote]

Sauron has Alzheimer's

[quote=""BladeCollector""]Sauron has Alzheimer's[/quote]

BC, that's so bad that PJ might actually use it.

Fin, twenty lashes with a wet noodle for you.

Azog was originally an actor in make up. PJ wanted him to stand out from the crowd though and changed him into a CGI character. This is the original Azog:



I must admit, after seeing the film the second time round I liked Azog more. I'm looking forward to seeing Bolg in the new film.

Problem is, he made him stand out waaaaay too much in the process.

Lurtz in FOTR and Gothmog in ROTK were very distinctive and I'm pretty sure they weren't CGI. Directors these days just want to take shortcuts with everything and CGI just leads to laziness. Then you slap 48fps on us and e xp ect the CGI to be convincing? Not gonna happen.

[quote=""Valkrist""]Problem is, he made him stand out waaaaay too much in the process.

Lurtz in FOTR and Gothmog in ROTK were very distinctive and I'm pretty sure they weren't CGI. Directors these days just want to take shortcuts with everything and CGI just leads to laziness. Then you slap 48fps on us and e xp ect the CGI to be convincing? Not gonna happen. [/quote]

I don't think Azog is that much of a problem, he still seemed to fit in with the prosthethic orcs seen in the film. I don't personally consider CGI to be a shortcut or lazy because there is still a lot of time involved in creating these characters and of course its more e xp ensive to do. I think we're at a point now where CGI is amazing, and can be used well in big productions such as this. I really thought the new Wargs were amazing, and Azog was quite impressive.

Sorry, I'll just have to respectfully disagree.

The movie was full of CGI, too full in fact, and it was painfully obvious to anyone with an eye for it, which should be just about anyone with a pair of eyes on their head. One's love of the subject matter should never blind us to imperfections, no pun intended. Azog was obviously and painfully fake-looking by comparison to the few orcs around him that were guys in latex masks. I can understand the process being used for the mass battles and large crowd scenes in Goblin Town, but for closeups and dialogue, it wouldn't have killed them to come up with a convincing-looking yet real Azog that would have stood out just as much as the one we got, which to me stood out for all the wrong reasons. I get the wargs, that was necessary, but I call it laziness and a shortcut when you apply it to things that could have been done perfectly by an actor, and Azog is the example.