There…and back again. Thus ends* the Middle-earth journey of Peter Jackson and the crew of film makers who made the worlds imagined by J.R.R. Tolkien come alive on the big screen.

It is with a degree of sadness, which will undoubtedly grow over the coming weeks, that I say ‘goodbye’** to these characters, the lovely country that is Middle-earth (er…New Zealand), and to the dedicated people, seen and unseen, who made this journey special.

On Friday evening I sat in front of a forty foot curved screen and watched The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies bring Bilbo’s unexpected journey to an end. It was a spectacle, filled with some memorable performances. It had some flaws, to be sure, but that did not stop me from enjoying the moment.

The following thoughts on The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies presumes that you have seen the previous two films and, unlike my normal Film Review process, will contain spoilers.

The Battle of the Five Armies is certainly the weakest of the three films in regards to plot. What you essentially have here is the climax of the story, without the natural arc of a beginning, middle and end, and because of this has fueled, and will continue to fuel, the criticism for The Hobbit having been stretched to three films. Incidentally, there are some interesting things revealed in the extras in the Extended Edition of The Desolation of Smaug regarding this, which tempers my criticism to some degree.

The film, of necessity, throws you right into the thick of things with Smaug descending upon Lake Town to exact his vengeance. It is an all-too-brief moment of fiery destruction for those who enjoy Benedict Cumberbatch and the digital production team’s realization of the last great fire-drake in Middle-earth. What you do see of Smaug is impressive, and Cumberbatch gets a chance to upstage all the other performers with a few meaty lines of dialogue. I have been, and remain, impressed with what Weta Digital accomplished here.

As the people of Lake Town turn to seek the promised aid of Thorin Oakenshield, the film takes us inside the heart of Erebor, where Thorin’s madness, his gold lust, is coming to affect his judgment.

The Hobbit was always an emotionally turbulent story in this regard: from the very beginning we find ourselves torn between wanting desperately to care about these characters while at the same time seeing evidence that these are people groups divided by racial prejudice, self-centered world views and questionable motives. Sure, there is a grander scheme at play that means salvation for, or damnation of, all the peoples of Middle-earth, as Gandalf reminds us with references that are cryptic to his companions and to those who have not seen nor read The Lord of the Rings. I am thankful for those moments in the story, shown in An Unexpected Journey, where Bilbo (and Bofur) articulate the plight of the dwarves being without a place of their own to call “home”. It is important to cling to that deeper motivation as you see Thorin overcome with dragon sickness, greed for both gold and power consuming him.

The first half of The Battle of Five Armies is gut-wrenching in this sense. There are fewer moments of natural humor to lighten the weight of watching a group of people suddenly bereft of home being rejected by those sho caused their grief by the reclamation of their own home. And it was always going to be this way near the end, as you could see the faults in Thorin’s character in the first film. This continues long enough to be uncomfortable, which is fortunate because it does not minimize or marginalize the trials that Thorin is facing…and failing.

Mercifully, however, the film takes its turn at the crucial moment and we begin to see the rising of one of the themes of Tolkien’s work: hope. Hope in the most desperate of circumstances. Hope…the opposite of despair. The latter half of the film is very engaging and in it Peter Jackson works to bring this trilogy to the kind of end which gives viewers satisfaction and glimmers of the aforementioned hope, while also acknowledging that the battle for Middle-earth has just begun.

I WARNED YOU BEFORE, BUT HERE BE MAJOR SPOILERS!

It has been fourteen years since the one, and only, time I have read The Hobbit. To say I barely remember anything of the story is a gross understatement. It has been a great pleasure to watch these films and experience the bulk of the story as if I had no previous knowledge. Thus it was a great surprise to see Fili die, followed by Kili, followed by Thorin. I half expected the oft-seen magical recovery moment to happen, at least for one of them. It gives me a new level of respect for J.R.R. Tolkien in that he wrote a book for children which had some very grown-up ideas for readers to confront.

I’ve read some of the complaints for the previous films of the inclusion of Azog the Defiler. While Azog only has a brief mention in Tolkien’s work, as the “goblin” who killed Thror in the Mines of Moria, it makes sense to give Thorin and company a worthy opponent in the films. I credit Peter, Fran and Philippa for using an existing character in the history of Middle-earth, and one for whom Thorin would have a legitimate enmity. Did I enjoy everything about the Azog storyline? No. But overall I did like having a central villain upon whom the heroes, flawed as they were, could focus. I found the scene in which Azog floated under the surface of the ice, while Thorin paced his body from above, to be riveting. You knew it wasn’t over, but the scene was slow enough to unfold that it made the time leading up to that moment all the more tense.

I also know there was some complaint about the inclusion of the invented character, Tauriel, but I had no problem with it. Tauriel gave the adaptation of Tolkien’s work a much needed onscreen female presence, her love story with Kili gave the story a romantic element that it otherwise would not have possessed, and she was a character who provided a bridge, and thus a level of hope, that these two disparate peoples may be able to come together. It was a calculated risk, mitigated in large part because Peter Jackson knew from the start that Kili would have to die. I admit to being curious throughout this process at how they would end that story line in a way that did not minimize the unexpected friendship of Legolas and Gimli. Kili’s death allows that to happen without devaluing the love between Tauriel and Kili. I was also impressed by the way in which that love gives Thranduil an opening to be decent near the film’s end.

Did anyone else want to stand up and cheer when Thranduil sent Legolas to the North, in hopes that he would meet a certain Ranger?

The Hobbit films may never be something I love with the same passion as I do the film adaptations of The Lord of the Rings. That is perfectly okay, I never expected them to be. The source material, absent the ability for the writers to access information from The Silmarillion, is too thin for a film trilogy. Yet I am happy that a film trilogy exists, all the same. My appreciation for each of the first two films grew exponentially after watching the behind the scenes documentaries on the Extended Editions, and I suspect that will be the case with The Battle of Five Armies.

I’m appreciative that these films were made because a decade ago I was introduced to a cast and crew in New Zealand that did something incredibly special, a group whose dedication and passion inspired me then and inspires me now. The films sparked a passion for the life and works of J.R.R. Tolkien and for that I am eternally grateful. I was happy to see the reins of The Hobbit returned to Peter Jackson. I am a fan of Guilermo del Toro, but I never wanted anyone else to be at the helm. Do I agree with everything Jackson did here? No, but I had a few (very few) issues with The Lord of the Rings as well.

I found the video-game like stone-hopping of Legolas in The Battle of Five Armies to be very stupid. Sending Legolas and Tauriel to the North, while it explained some plot points, did not really work well (though I’m holding out hope for more footage in the Extended Editions). Legolas’ bat-riding was equally silly and while I don’t expect fantasy and science fiction films to fully honor the sciences, I do think Beorn’s legs would have shattered into thousands of tiny splintered bones given the distance from which he dropped onto the battlefield. He is a shape changer, but he is not Odo.

Despite those ultimately minor issues, and the more major issue of the film taking a while to find its emotional core, I truly enjoyed The Battle of Five Armies. As I sat between my wife, Mary, and my friend Jeff, watching Alan Lee’s art accompanying the credits and listening to Billy Boyd sing, I was both satisfied and saddened that this will be the end of fresh journeys to Middle-earth…

**at least until the Extended Edition comes out in November 2015.

*and I’m still holding out hope that the Tolkien Estate will come to their financial senses and give Peter Jackson the rights to The Silmarillion.

It is a big-screen film, do yourself a favor and take in a holiday viewing at your local theater. Love it, hate it, or fall somewhere in between, it is a spectacle best suited for the big screen.