8.4/10 stinky bananas
Pretty damn enjoyable. It was a very good start to the prequel trilogy.
Martin Freeman was a great choice to play a young Bilbo. Ian McKellen runs it back as Gandalf, one of the best all time fantasy characters. You get fantastic cameos from Elijah Wood, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Lee, and Hugo Weaving. All of whom reprise their beloved characters from the original trilogy. But the best ”cameo” of them all was easily Andy Serkis as Gollum. He is just so unbelievably good at what he does. Best mocap actor ever, and it’s not even close.
There was a lot of fan service in this movie and that may rub some people the wrong way. But those people are idiots because it was great for me. Feed me that LOTR slop, I’ll eat that shit up.
The mountain fight scene was incredible. The Goblin scene was very LOTR. Best scene of the movie award has to go to the riddle scene. I loved every second of it.
Worth the watch.