Smaug in December
I’m going to see The Desolation of Smaug in December. The trailer made it inevitable.
Tolkien made a world that actually matters to people in a way that’s almost impossible to fake. Peter Jackson knows this. He doesn’t always get the execution right, but when he does, you feel the difference between a film and something that feels real.
I know what I’m hoping for. More dragon fire. More elf women, obvious as that is. And more dwarves singing—which sounds dumb to admit, but that moment in the first film got me. All those short, hairy men sitting together drinking and belting out rough songs. It felt like actual comfort. Like home.
Will the new film deliver all of that? Probably not. But I’m going anyway.