TH: Desolation of Smaug Extended Edition Anticipation Thread

[Elentári]

Wonderful bts clip from the EE Appendices on the design for Thranduil's throne..

http://my.tv.sohu.com/us/214653578/75485932.shtml

***SPOILER ALERT - clip does contain some extended version material***

[sauronsfinger]

Great feature Elen - thanks......I loved the sketches and watching it come to life. I like the clip of PJ coming in and twisting some of the horns. Now that is power!~ WETA is selling Thror on his throne in Erebor - I hope they do this one also as it just screams out to be on my shelf. A great pair of bookends that would be!

[Smaug's voice]

And I have to wait till December to see the EE!

Hidden text.

I know that Lee Pace is the cat's meow to many, but I find much of his acting horribly hammy and stilted. Plus, it would be completely redundant to have him recite the prophecy after Bard has already done so. This isn't really a spoiler, so I'm not sure we are talking in spoiler speak, but hey, its fun!

I thought you liked Lee Pace's Thranduil.

[Elentári]

Great feature Elen - thanks......I loved the sketches and watching it come to life. I like the clip of PJ coming in and twisting some of the horns. Now that is power!~ WETA is selling Thror on his throne in Erebor - I hope they do this one also as it just screams out to be on my shelf. A great pair of bookends that would be!

Indeed! I love the idea of the two different design aesthetics contrasting yet complementing each other on the shelf!

[Voronwë the Faithful]

And I have to wait till December to see the EE!

Hidden text.

I know that Lee Pace is the cat's meow to many, but I find much of his acting horribly hammy and stilted. Plus, it would be completely redundant to have him recite the prophecy after Bard has already done so. This isn't really a spoiler, so I'm not sure we are talking in spoiler speak, but hey, its fun!

I thought you liked Lee Pace's Thranduil.

I'm hot and cold about him. I really don't like his mannerisms in the scene with Thorin, and I despise the scene where they first show him in DoS; I think that is currently my least favorite part of any M-e film, right up there with Frodo sending Sam home.

[Passdagas the Brown]

To me, Pace's Thranduil is a blend of Thingol and some of the more arrogant sons of Fëanor. So I can forgive the lack of subtlety because of the Silmarillion warm and fuzzies I get while watching him.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I would not disagree with that.

[Dave_LF]

Anyone who's seen this notice whether any of the visual rough edges in the final scenes had been polished out?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Can you be more specific?

I haven't watched the final scenes yet (there are no extended scenes during the last 45 minutes or so, from what I understand), but I can check it out at some point. However, I don't really recall noticing any visual rough edges in the final scenes in the first place, so I might not be the best person to ask.

[Dave_LF]

The wheelbarrow in the molten metal was the most obvious one, but a bunch of the shots had kind of an unfinished quality to them, I thought. But I guess it would be a difficult thing to judge objectively without doing a painstaking side-by-side frame-by-frame comparison.

[Passdagas the Brown]

Has anyone done a fan edit where the story's left intact, but it's been graded to look like film rather than digital?

[Elentári]

Two reviews of the DoS EE now published online...

http://www.filmoria.co.uk/2014/10/the-h ... ay-review/

http://www.pissedoffgeek.com/2014/10/31 ... on-review/

[Dave_LF]

I watched this last night. Two driveby observations (neither of which actually required the EE):
-Bard only speaks the first half of the prophesy in the scene, the rest is a voiceover. This makes me think my earlier conjecture about how the original idea was for Bard to recite the "positive" half of the prophesy and for Thranduil to later provide the rest was on the right track. Possibly the reason this was changed is because the late addition of the Laketown skirmish required Legolas to leave the woods long before Bard could discover Thorin's identity.
-If you look in the background as Bolg gallops across the bridge away from Laketown, you can see a stable full of horses. So I guess Legolas doesn't have mount-summoning superpowers after all.

[Alatar]

How times have changed. The first three EE's were pre-ordered and devoured on release day. The EE of AUJ was downloaded and watched, while the Bluray was saved for Christmas (and I still haven't seen the second disc of Appendices). This one I haven't even downloaded, even though I really want to see it, because I know the kids will be getting me the EE Bluray for Christmas and I don't want to spoil it for them.

[Passdagas the Brown]

Watching the DOS:EE again, it seems someone made the awful artistic decision to apply this cheap, gauzy filter to the added Azanulbizar scenes with Thrain (a filter that wasn't there for the equivalent scenes in AUJ, which look much, much better). The effect is so cheesy, that it robs those moments of any power whatsoever. This is another one of those head-scratchers from PJ and co. Why take something that looked great (IMO, the cinematography of the Azanulbizar scenes in AUJ is some of Lesnie's best) and then ruin it by applying such a cheap filter? It looks like Thorin and Thrain have been trapped in some violent, orc-laden version of Teletubby land.

[Dave_LF]

Are you certain the difference is due to the DoS EE having more done to it rather than less? I don't know that this is the case, but it seems likely that the company would devote fewer resources toward finishing and touching up the EE-only scenes than they did to the theatrical releases, especially given that they're under simultaneous pressure to finish the next film.

[Elentári]

Another review of the EE, this time from English site Moviepilot.com

[Passdagas the Brown]

Are you certain the difference is due to the DoS EE having more done to it rather than less? I don't know that this is the case, but it seems likely that the company would devote fewer resources toward finishing and touching up the EE-only scenes than they did to the theatrical releases, especially given that they're under simultaneous pressure to finish the next film.

It's very possible they simply did a cheap grade to the additional Azanulbizar footage, and covered it up with the gauze effect. But there's also old footage in there (that we already saw in AUJ) which definitely has the gauze effect added on top of it. To me, it's a completely bewildering artistic decision.

[Elentári]

Interesting comments re: DOS EE content in this threadover on TORN, which show glimpses of how the 2-film structure would have worked:

Regarding a post about footage of Mikael Persbrandt possibly referencing the "interrogation scene" the actor mentioned in early interviews, DCole4 replies:

In the original two film structure, Azog's reveal was going to come at the Frying Pan sequence. Likely this interrogation sequence would have filled us in on a bit of his backstory. As we know, the Moria flashback was originally meant to go in Beorn's house. My thought is that since the switch to three films, and the re-structuring of Azog's story, this scene was likely lost because it became obsolete, and, or, the dialogue was moved elsewhere.

It's interesting there are a couple tidbits in the EE docs that show a few moments cut since the switch to three films. We see a couple lines of Thorin's in Mirkwood where he belittles Bilbo. And we see a couple pieces of the stolen cup sequence in Smaug's lair. Also showing that Smaug's intention to go to Laketown initially happened during his conversation with Bilbo. Obviously shifted when they added the forges sequence.

It really does sound like the 2 movie version followed the book much closer...How I would love to have both versions to compare!

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Very glad to hear that they made use of John Rateliff's extensive knowledge about The Hobbit in the appendices this time!

http://sacnoths.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/ ... xtras.html

Edited to add: Also interested to learn that the fabulous golden statue of Thror (which so many hated) was Alan Lee's idea.