THE HOBBIT: THE DESOLATION OF SMAUG | FIRST TIME WATCHING | MOVIE REACTION 

Not only is Gimli's dad in this: Balin is the one whose tomb the Fellowship finds in Moria and the dead Dwarf near the tomb that holds the book that Gandalf reads is Ori, the youngest of Thorin's company.

Trivia, Benedict Cumberbatch stole that acting from his dad. On an interview he revealed that his father read him the Hobbit as a kid and that he recalled the very voice and movements he made when reading him the lines and parts of Smaug lol. Kind of cute.

"If you're referring to the incident with the dragon, i was barely involved. All i did was give your uncle a little nudge out of the door." - Gandalf, LOTR: The Fellowship Of The Ring Barely involved, indeed.

"...This guy is real full of himself..." You have just described the personality of almost every dragon in existence. :)

27:40 Yes, Smaug could talk in the books. In fact, the movies _reduce_ the number of creatures that talk. The Eagles also spoke, for instance.

Yes, the dragon talks in the books. And these movies aren't just the Hobbit, they also contain a lot of the appendices from The Lord of the Rings and a couple other books that tell of the Council of White and their activities during this time and the fall of Erabor, hence the disconnect from kids movie to "holy shit this is scary" parts.

11:07 I love how Legolas say Gimli is a horrid creature and then they became best friends 60 years after lol

Smaug is literally "THE" dragon. Smaug has inspired all of the great dragons since in literature and film. This dragon terrified us all as kids and we ate it up and loved it. Full of himself, but deservedly so to a degree. Cumberbatch played him absolutely perfectly. Voice, movements, all of it.

I love how you always say "we" in reference to the action, as in "we trust Gandalf" - "we need to to get of this mountain" etc.. you're not just watching, you're IN the story, alongside the characters. That's how any good movie or book should be experienced.

At this point in the story, Bilbo has not actually had the ring for very long at all, and over the years following this, he did not have much need to use it, but he also never let it out of his sight. The reason it affected Frodo so deeply even though he had for a far shorter time than Bilbo, was that he was taking it into Mordor itself, so the ring grew more powerful and more demanding as it moved closer to its master. At least, that's my theory. :D

"Come on, it´s just a LEG." Kili: "Yea, those are kinda important, you know."

The thing to remember about the Hobbit movies is, maybe about a third of what you see is from the actual book, about a third is dredged out of Tolkien's other lore and notes, and a third is new stuff thrown in to make the movie more exciting and to shoehorn in LOTR characters the fans want to see.

I imagine Bilbo didn't get corrupted between then and now because the ring works best on those who have big ambitions or access to great power. So while it did have a hold on him, it never corrupted him like it did others. The reason why it worked on Frodo was because Frodo was willingly carrying it to its end. There's no telling what kind of horrible things the ring put Frodo's mind and body through near the end. "I can't recall the taste of food, nor the sound of water, nor the touch of grass. I'm naked in the dark. There's nothing--no veil between me and the wheel of fire. I can see him with my waking eyes." It didn't corrupt Frodo by trying to capitalize Frodo's desires, it broke him into accepting the ring instead because it was desperate. While it was with Bilbo, it was in no danger, and Bilbo had no great desire to work on. So it waited. Patiently. Thranduil is amazing in the movies, honestly. Lee Pace did an awesome job. But as far as I know, Thranduil never fought a dragon, I think this was put in to give the actor some background. There were dragons in the northern regions of Middle Earth. The rift between Dwarves and Elves go WAAAY back. Thousands of years back. An elven king, by the name Thingol, wanted to combine the best of Elven smithing (a Silmaril, which is a gem that captured the light of the Two Trees of Valinor... basically the things that acted as the sun and moon BEFORE the actual sun and moon were created), with the greatest of the Dwarves' (the Nauglamir, a necklace of gems). The dwarves wanted the finished creation, and seeing this, Thingol sent them from his kingdom without giving payment, which resulted in the dwarves retaliating and sacking the kingdom. "Dwarves are greedy", say the Elves. "Never trust an Elf" say the Dwarves. The story of the silmarils is a long one too. As they tie in with even Galadriel, as well as the first Dark Lord of Middle Earth, whom Sauron served. Yes, at one point, Sauron served a master who was greater than he. His name was Morgoth, and he was the one who created the dragons and orcs. In those times, he created dragons even greater than Smaug.

A necromancer is a sorcerer who specializes in magic revolving around death.

Funny thing about Smaug, that despite his enormous size, he's still very tiny compared to the greater dragons of the First Age. Glaurung the Father of Dragons was a wingless behemoth resembling a crocodile and a dinosaur, he served as the general of Morgoth's(the first dark lord and mentor of Sauron) armies, and aside from firebreath he had the ability to render people insane using his soul-piercing eyes. And then there's Ancalagon the Black, the greatest of the winged dragons, who was described as being as large as a mountain and his firebreath was so hot it melted the strongest metals easily.

Two of the most important events in this trilogy as far as the main events of this period in time in Middle Earth: 1. Bilbo finding the One Ring and 2. Gandalf meeting the "Necromancer" and finding out his real identity. It is the event that leads to Gandalf spending a lot of the time between The Hobbit and LotR doing research, exploration and meeting other people/creatures/beings in Middle Earth to learn about the current threat of the Dark Lord. Originally Tolkien didn't have any plans on creating a sequel to The Hobbit, a story which started as a children's story. After the release of the first edition of the book he had created so much of the lore and story line of LotR that he felt it necessary to edit and change some parts of The Hobbit to make it fit into what would become world of The Lord of the Rings (which was written as a single massive book but the publisher felt it would be very difficult to sell such a humongous book and thus it was split into three books). There are some minor inconsistencies which ultimately don't really matter. The Hobbit was basically extended with stories and a vast amount of historical and factual notes about Middle Earth, characters, events, timelines and so on that Tolkien had created which were later compiled in The Silmarillion as well as the appendixes of the LotR books, all of which explains everything from Eru Illuvatar creating the Ainur (resembling the concept of angels, spiritual entities that helped Eru Illuvatar create Eä (the universe) Arda (the planet where Middle Earth and other land masses exist) to the last words of LotR, all of which spans. The Ainur that descended on Arda to help shape it came in two variants; the Valar, the strongest and most powerful deities and the Maiar, more numerous but less powerful and more akin to angels or demi-gods. Many took corporeal forms on Arda and waited for Eru Illuvatar to wake up the first race of beings, the Elves, thousands and thousand of years before the first humans woke up on Arda. The maiar Mairon whose name meant "The Admirable" would later become corrupted by the valar Melkor (later named Morgoth) who was the true Dark Lord. Mairon came under Morgoths strong influence and his dedication to perfection and order was twisted into something evil... Thus, Mairon became Morgoths lieutenant and was henceforth known as Sauron. For thousands of years Morgoth plotted and attempted to take over Middle Earth with the help of Sauron and other weaker maiar who fell for his lure. Sauron on the other hand was the strongest among the maiar and he preferred to use manipulation, subterfuge and deceit in order to ruin the elves which he had learned to hate under Morgoth. The other Valar got tired of Morgoth ruining everything after many clashes and took him down once and for all (many thousands of years before Hobbit/LotR). Sauron hid and got away. He was still loyal to Morgoth although Morgoth was chained and put in the Timeless Void. Over the millennia Sauron grew in power, started wars and then came up with the "perfect" plan. As a deity with incredible skill and knowledge of smith-craft he changed his corporeal form into that of a handsome elf named Annatar and wormed his way into the elven society. There he showed the most skilled elven smiths secrets of putting magic into objects like rings. After having deceived men, elves and dwarves alike, giving them a total of 20 magical rings, he went to Mount Doom and forged The One Ring To Rule Them All. His first attempt at conquering Middle Earth, in the Second Age, after having forged The One ring, failed when the armies of elves and men created an alliance to bring down Sauron.. and we know how that went from the opening of Lord of the Rings. Sauron had put a majority of his spiritual being into the ring and was extremely dependent on having the ring to be the powerful being we saw in those opening scenes. After he lost the battle as well as his ring he was but a shadow, a weakened spirit with no corporeal form (he was too weak to create one) and it took him 3000 years to get to the point we saw him in The Hobbit (as the necromancer) and as The Eye in Lord of the Rings, always searching for his ring. Sorry for nerding out. ;)

At this rate, she’s going to change her channel’s name to “Lembas In Bed” *LOL*

“The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.” -J.R.R. Tolkien

I think the short answer as to why the ring didn't have a corrupting effect on Bilbo was simply that Tolkien hadn't thought of that part of the story yet; for The Hobbit, it was just a magic invisibility ring, and it wasn't until later that he started devising the story of Sauron and the Fellowship and wanted to tie the stories together.

The reason the orcs and their warg mounts look so different from how they did in Lord of the Rings is because they're different breeds. These orcs and wargs come from Gundabad to the North, the LotR orcs and wargs come from Mordor to the South.

Smaug is played by Benedict Cumberbatch, including motion capture.

At the time of the hobbit movies, Sauron wasn't nearly as strong and his power was still growing. Hence the corruption in the ring wasn't as strong either. Bilbo didn't have it nearly as long as Gollum did, and Bilbo was a hobbit. Smeagol was a cousin race called river folk iirc like hobbits but not hobbits.

There’s tons of comparison between Bilbo and Frodo both being the “main character” & ring bearers etc, but I always saw Bilbo in this trilogy as the company’s Sam. Retaking Erabor is Thorin’s task, not his, but the dwarves would not have even come close if it weren’t for him.

"Gimli, Son of Gorman" Imagining that epic Tolkien/Aliens crossover franchise right now.

I watched this movie in IMAX. When the dwarf in the cask rolled along the coast, knocking down the orcs like a skittles, the audience all over the hall laughed to tears. I slid somewhere under a chair in a fit of laughter.🤣

I think what you said in the opening hits the nail on the head as to why your channel is successful. Every movie reaction feels like watching with a friend - authentic and warm. Keep it up!

The respect the dwarf balin has for bilbo is so emense and heart warming 💖

"Necromancer" translates approximately to "death wizard". "Necro", like "necromancer", "necromancy", "necrosis", or "necropolis", or "necrophilia". It comes from the Greek "Nekros" meaning "corpse" They are typically wizards who meddle with the forces of death, and most archetypically are famous for raising armies of skeletons or zombies to do their bidding. "mancer" is just a suffix that denotes a magic user of the prefix's type. necromancer - death wizard cryomancer - ice wizard pyromancer - fire wizard electromancer - electricty wizard aeromancer - air wizard geomancer - earth wizard hydromancer - water wizard biomancer - life wizard etc etc etc

A lot of the Smaug lines are 100% the same as in the book, just so you know.

What makes the Bilbo Smaug interaction more awesome was that Benedict Cumberbach and Martin Freeman starred together in BBC's Sherlock series. REALLY good. You should watch it.

Yes, Gimli's dad was one of the dwarves in this, his name is Gloin. It wasn't mentioned in the Fellowship Of The Ring movie, but in the book Gloin was also one of the dwarves at the Council Of Elrond where they decided what to do with the Ring.

Fun fact: "Beorn" sounds almost like "Björn" which is Swedish for "Bear". This is no coincidence. Tolkien knew his stuff. And it's appropriate that they had Mikael Persbrandt, a Swedish actor, act his 'humanoid' part.

I read The Hobbit when I was in 8th grade for the first time. To this day, it's still one of the best books I've ever read. The conversation between Bilbo and Smaug is magnificently terrifying in the book. A treasure of 20th century western literature.

Haha, I like how she set the location as "The Shire"!

What really terrified me about Smaug was when he spoke you could definitely tell there was an intelligence and that he wasn't just an animal attracted to shiny things. What really drives home the terror about him is you can easily see the malice in his character and that he is a true sadist (he enjoys causing pain and suffering to those he feels are beneath him, which is just about everyone)

Hi Cassie, While it was intended as more of a Children's book, Tolkien had a tendency to write beyond his audience in the Hobbit and Jackson likes to expand further. So while there are these more whimsical elements, it becomes clear that many of the characters are more complex and layered than the mostly heroic Fellowship of the Ring. Thorin is not an altruistic hero. He is flawed. Not unlike Boromir. It also does take a while to really latch onto this many Dwarves as individuals. Remember, there were really only nine companions in the Fellowship and we would come to know Eowyn, Theodin, Eomyr, Faramir and Treebeard. The company of Thoren Oakenshield is comprised of thirteen dwarves plus a Hobbit and a Wizard, so fifteen. Plus they then add Radaghast, Legolas, Tauriel, Thranduil, Beorn, and Bard. So that is 14 characters versus twenty-one. That is a lot more to keep us focused on. I am not making excuses for it just trying to identify why Lord of the Rings is an easier watch.

I mean I like the concept that P.J kept the Hobbit like how it was written, a childrens story with wittiness and fun action. The only thing I hated was the excessive CGI that deviated from his style of movie. But his hands were tied and he was rushed into it so you can't blame him.

And to think Smaug was small even compared to Glaurung, let alone Ancalagon. Really makes me want to see a movie of the War of Wrath.

The Black Speech being “the opposite of a beautiful language” is a perfect description of it. Sauron created it as a unifying language for all the servants of Mordor, but neither he nor his underlings could create or speak anything beautiful. He and the orcs are so corrupt that speaking elvish, a ‘pure’ language, would cause them physical pain. Ironically, Sauron was forced to use elvish script (Tengwar) to inscribe the ring with its poem. The crude written form of Black speech was unable to express what he desired, so he had to use the language of his enemies.

"Why does this dwarf get to be so handsome" Studios wanting love interests and drama 🙄

This is my favourite of the trilogy (especially the extended version). I love those dark scenes in which Gandalf explores the tombs of the Nazgul and Dol Guldur... dark, mysterious, beautiful, thrilling, reminiscent of the LOTR movies. I love this whole supporting storyline throughout the trilogy, with the White Council and Sauron. I also loved the Mirkwood scenes (so suffocating, so strange, so dense), and then the fresh air above the trees... the viewer can really feel the same way as Bilbo when he manages to take a deep breath of the cold, clean air. Oh and the giant bees in Beorn's house... 🐝

1:23 'i'm not a critic in any way... i'm watching this as a normal human' LOL Yes, dragons can speak in Tolkien's world. Actually their speech is dangerous in itself, since they can hypnotise you. Bilbo gives himself mysterious titles because dragons are always intrigued by riddles ; also because it is safer for you not to give away your real name to a dragon (he would probably cast a spell on you)

When the son of actor Richard Boone found out that his father would be doing the voice of Smaug in the Rankin-Bass animated production of "The Hobbit" he took his father by the shoulders, looked him seriously in the eyes and said; "Dad, are you sure that you're up to this? Please don't screw it up!"

I love how Legolas calls Gimili a horrid creature when he saw the picture but then later they're friends.

If you want a good chuckle, check out the behind the scenes with Benedict Cumberbatch doing the movements and lines for Smaug. Him crawling around on all fours and snarling his lines is both humorous and badass at the same time

Thoroughly enjoying this entire channel. Love seeing your reactions, reminding me of the magic I felt seeing these movies the first time. Thank you Cassie

I think they have done a superb job with the dragon! His voice, his cunning and movements makes you feel he jumped out of a book!

Gimli's father is Gloin. He's the one in the first Hobbit film who asks about Elrond "Does he offer us insult?!"

These pale orcs are called Gundabad orcs they're technically not from Mordor .

Completely agree with you that these movies started to feel as long as they are, compared to LotR, where the time flew by and you were at the end before you knew it.

Bilbo is by far the greatest resistor of the Ring. He was the only person ever in the history of Middle Earth to willingly give it up. And after he had had it for 60 years.

"Bilbo saves the day again!" - Best summary of the book. xD

FYI, the man who played the city's Master is named Stephen Fry, and he is one of the funniest, and possibly the smartest, in all of entertainment. Word to the wise: keep an eye out for him in other places. Just a side note.

You really should read the books, beginning with the Hobbit and then the LOTR, including the Appendices. If you want more after that (and you probably will by then) there’s the Silmarillion, which tells the story of the histories that are referred to by the characters you’ve come to know and love. Once you have gotten that far, you will understand MUCH more about the reasons why and have answers to many of the questions you have, like how can Aragorn be nearly 90 years old and look so young and how old is Galadriel, who is Gandalf really? (and Saruman for that matter?) Who was Sauron? One thing that the movies don’t do well (because of time constraints) is to explain many things that are laid out much more plainly in the books. Also, as I’m sure you’ve heard from other comments, MANY of the characters in the movies are presented in a very different light than they deserve. The books give us a much deeper look into how and why they have become the people they are now. In some we see them change as the weight of what is happening around them crushes their resilience. In the book of the Hobbit, this happens to Thorin in much the same way as it does to Denethor (father of Boromir and Faramir) in the book of The Return of The King. The confrontation between Bilbo in the book version is much more entertaining, as Bilbo engages in a battle of wits with Smaug, whose pride eventually gives Bilbo a look at Smaug’s only weak spot in his armor of scales. This information is given to Bard the bowman by someone else, but it is Bilbo that discovered it and passes it on. All this to say that you REALLY SHOULD READ THE BOOKS! You won’t regret it, I promise.

The music you play in the background of your intro is amazing. How it builds and builds with this positive energy, it's really well done.

Imagine you were me and you had to wait for another year to watch the next part. I watched it in theatre and I was so drawn in, I didn't realize the movie was ending right there! I was so upset, even though i knew what was going to happen overall to Laketown(having read the book).

Fun fact: for the scary black fog monster thing, Benedict Cumberbatch recorded the lines in reverse, to give them an extra weird and unnatural sound. It worked.

Yes, Bilbo survives his quest. It's interesting what happens to some of the members of Thorin's company after the quest: Gloin's son Gimli becomes a member of the Fellowship, Balin leads an expedition to reclaim Moria and establish a dwarf colony and is briefly successful but it is eventually overrun by orcs and he is killed there. Oin and Ori join Balin on his quest but Oin gets killed by the Watcher in the Water at the gates of Moria when trying to escape when the colony is overrun and Ori dies next to Balin's tomb when making a final stand against orcs. Ori's body is found by Gandalf and the Fellowship in Lord of the Rings when Gandalf reads the journal that Ori was holding in Balin's tomb.

That close up of Smaug saying "Death! gives me goosebumps

Your reactions are so wonderfully charming and enjoyable simply because you are not a critic or expert! Love them!

Gandalf knew that he had found a magic ring, but he didn't know it was "the one ring" so it wouldn't have changed anything if he had told him anyway. He still doesn't know this beginning of LOTR. He found out in the scene in Gondor, Denethor allows him into Gondors library and he researches it there. There's a scene where he reads a scroll from Aragorns ancestor Isildur in the movies.

The funny thing about the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings is how the events are relatively small scale compared to the ridiculous insanity of what happened in the past of Middle Earth. Smaug is tiny compared to the dragon Ancalagon the Black, Shelob the Spider who attacks Frodo and Sam is a descendent of a primal spider called Ungoliant who is vastly more powerful and there were many Balrogs including the most powerful, Gothmog. Durin’s Bane who we see in Moria isn’t a particularly strong or remarkable Balrog and there used to be thousands of them. Even Sauron is effectively a henchman and servant of the true evil in Middle Earth, a being called Morgoth. The events of Lord of the Rings are effectively a minor skirmish at the end of a far bigger and more dramatic war lasting thousands of years.

you are so genuine! i love rewatching movies with you!!

Loved your reaction at seeing the shadow of the Necromancer turn into the pupil of the Eye of Sauron. Even knowing the connection, it still got me the same way when I saw it for the first time - one of the better moments in the movie.

The ring actually didnt effect bilbo as much as it did Frodo because Sauron and wasnt as powerful yet

The movies suffered a lot from studio interference: - Peter Jackson did not have enough time to do preproduction. - The studios demanded to focus the movies on Bilbo and Thorin instead of all the dwarves. - The studios demanded a love triangle. - The studios demanded mid-production to split the 2 movies project into 3 movies. And for some reason, Gandalf was a lot more stupid in the movies than in the book. For example, book-Gandalf was totally in control of the meeting with Beorn, while movie-Gandalf was a mess.

"It's Just a Leg!" 😃😃😃😃

6:49 These “What If” questions are the best. There are so many hypothetical situations that could’ve led to.

Cassie, the reason Thorin is this way is because of two things: The experiences he has lived through and the mental illness that his grandfather developed: Dragon sickness. His home was literally ripped away from him, struggled to protect his people and lost his grandfather and father to Azog. These events hardened Thorin and made him feel like he couldn't trust anyone but his own people. As for Dragon sickness it is a form of madness his grandfather developed from his ever growing desire for gold. It got to a point where it could be passed down through his family. In the last film we saw Thorin worry if he had also inherited his grandfather's madness and how it is now starting to manifest. Thorin has had it real rough but Bilbo has become a source of light in his life, giving him back hope where there was none before.

The reason the One Ring didn’t affect Bilbo the way it affected Sméagol is because Gollum had it a lot longer bilbo only had it for 60 years while Smeagol/Gollum had it for over 500 years and it did keep him alive and extend his life a whole lot but it still put him in so much pain and caused him to develop a second personality (Gollum) and it made his appearance really ugly it’s like a what meth or heroin does to somebody after awhile you end up looking like a zombie which what I think Tolkien was going for when he wrote the story

The Orcs are from Gundabad, basically a different breed of Orc, more warlike. They are usually larger, and Azog was noted as being larger than normal even among his own kind.

When you asked who's the master, I said Sho' Nuff! Last Dragon instincts lol. 🤪

Yes, Smaug did indeed speak in the book. And his ego was just as lofty...lol.

Lee Pace plays the lead character in the movie The Fall (2006). Def one of the most underrated movies, a cinematic masterpeice and def one you should react to.

STOP I'M DYING LMAO. the way he just stuck his arms out from the barrel with his axes and just started spinning around. murder frisbee

If I were running an RPG campaign, as soon as they open the hidden door, the dragon would be getting rolls to smell the change in air. As soon as a dwarf steps inside or lingers near the open door, the dragon would be getting plus to that sense roll. Smaug was the model for the avaricious dragon. Paranoid and obsessively protective. The question I had from the beginning, reading it years ago is what was Gandalf's plan? An army of dwarves couldn't do anything. Seven armies of dwarves would give him entertainment and some snacks. 13 dwarves and a hobbit had no chance , so the only factor that made for any confidence at all for the quest was Gandalf vs the Dragon. One hobbit burglar made no difference, the only thing that made any sense was the wizard, and he might as well have walked in the front door alone.

Fun fact: Smaug is the smallest of all dragons in Tolkiens stories of middle earth. Sauron had a master called Morgoth who was the first dark lord during the first age, who is also the one who created Orcs as a race. Morgoth created 6 dragons as his weapons of war, one of those dragons was Smaug but the biggest of them all was Ancalagon the black, who by Tolkien is described bigger than a mountain.

I'll be hoenst, they did Thranduil dirty in these movies. He is not quite the villainous person they make him out to be. He is certainly flawed, but he comes off waaay more callous than he is.

"he's so smooth, his skin and skills" 😂😂😂👍

if anything, they didnt include enough of Smaugs talking in the movie. quite the elegant wordsmith

The One Ring did poison Bilbo just like it did Gollum, the only difference is that Gollum had it for hundreds of years and Bilbo only had it for less than one hundred. Frodo got wrecked by the Ring way faster because by the time he had it Sauron had regained a lot of strength and had grown more powerful and active and the Ring was also more active in trying to get back to him, plus probably other stuff came into play, like Frodo actually having the Ring on him 24/7 for like a year while going through really stressful situations while Bilbo probably didn't actually carry it on him or used it that much during the following decades while he lived his simple life in the Shire. Also, Tolkien wrote "The Hobbit" first and hadn't decided to connect it with the other more grown-up stories he was creating until later on, so he originally hadn't meant the ring Bilbo finds to be anything more than a regular magic ring, instead of THE Magic Ring of Evil (tm) like he decided later, so maybe that's part of why it originally didn't have such a big negative impact on Bilbo.

I like Beorn too! My favorite part of the book was when Tolkien described all the food he gave to the party on the journey. A bunch of honey cakes and honey-based foods because he was a beekeeper/farmer.

Both Martin Freeman (Bilbo) and Andy Serkis (Gollum) were members of the cast of Black Panther. As they were the only caucasian actors in the main cast they got the nickname on set as the “Tolkien white guys.”

"The movie did... DRAG ON... just a little bit." Love it.

"shes like an angel!". talk about the pot calling the kettle! :D

Even before this book, there are two others. Children of Hurin, and before that The Silmarillion. There is a wealth of lore in this universe that literally spans thousands of years.

Cassie: "It did DRAG ON." (bah-dum-dum) No pun intended!

10:38 So I imagine that someone else already answered this question, but on the off chance: the big differences between Bilbo and Smeagol in terms of the effect the ring had on them was firstly: time Bilbo had the ring for many decades by the time LoTR starts, but Gollum had had the ring for centuries, it simply had more time to warp Smeagol into Gollum. But also in the books Gandalf suggests that the circumstances in which Bilbo came to possess the ring were different enough from Smeagol to protect Bilbo from the worst of it. Smeagol stole the ring from Deagol and murdered him for it, so he started off his ownership of the ring with an act of evil that made it easier for the ring to corrupt him. Bilbo, however, didn't hurt anyone to gain the ring, he just found it, and when he had to escape from Gollum, he took pity on Gollum and spared his life rather than kill him. By starting off his ownership of the ring with an act of mercy, Bilbo was protected from the worst of the ring's evil.

Mordor was already filled with Orcs, and tangentally ruled by Sauron. But he was currently in Mirkwood, in Dol Guldur. And Gandalf actually in the books had an idea by the time he came out from the tunnels, because he did not miss the invisibility trick like the others. And in the there, he actually informs Gandalf here, but does not tell him everything. He tells him everything after the journey ends, and Gandalf questions him about information that was missing in his story. And the fact that he tries to hide it worries Gandalf, because it is not like Bilbo to do so.

30:20 tbh i think the ring gets more powerful as it got closer to mt doom and that's why frodo felt its effects more.

I saw this at a theatre that was showing it in 3-D, it was amazing, especially those butterflies, you felt as if you could reach out and touch them.

I enjoy your honest and fair take on these films.

Stephen Colbert, who is a total LOTR nut, has a cameo in this film along with his family. He's the guy with the eye patch who knocks on a door.

If there's one thing that's not bad it's the CGI. Smaug is proof of that.

She actually said, "it's just the leg", hahahaha!

The river barrel scene was filmed near near Nelson in NZ. I grew up there and even though it was in 76, I remember it clearly. Nelson is so beautiful. I miss it

The ring didn't poison Bilbo's mind as much and as fast as Frodo because as Frodo got closer to Mordor, and Sauron, the ring's power grew stronger. Hence, it affected Frodo much faster.

You have the greatest reactions, I just finished binge watching all of your uploads. If you haven’t seen Forrest Gump please consider adding it to your list. Greatest movie of all time in my humble opinion.

Random fact, Thranduil and legolas are sindarian that's why they look so different from the wood elves in mirkwood, mirkwood is Silvan elves. (Ignore my spelling lol). Also thranduil's father died in the battle of the last alliance. Another random fact: the reason why thranduil wants the gems so bad was because they were supposed to be for his wife (Legolas's mother) but she never got to wear them. The cement of the girl in the forest is the wife (queen of mirkwood). Also to why thranduil is so cold is because he lost his wife and the only way elves can die is of a broken heart or slain in battle. It's not really told to why thranduil didn't fade after his wife's passing. The hobbit is supposed to come before lord of the rings.

I love watching my favourite movies with someone so out of my league..Thanks for cheering me up