The Hobbit: Epilogue

[School of Everything Else 2016] Mirroring our Lord of the Rings Prologue recorded all the way back in 2012 and leading us into the Peter Jackson and Weta Middle-earth series, this is the bookend that marks its closing. Less of a celebration of the immense achievement pulling off this second trilogy was (for that you can listen to the individual review shows), this is instead a post-mortem where myself, Sharon and Chris Eason of GameBurst (who has been with us for every one of the Tolkein shows) dissect the carcass of the lesser film adaptations of Tolkein's lesser work.  Far from jump-starting a second wave of fascination with fantasy, these three movies seem to have put a lid on the entire genre, with great success at the box office but lukewarm critical and audience response. This leaves it to other movie series' to reinvigorate public interest, a task made far harder by the existence of these films.  We adore Weta Workshop and the cast and crew of this whole saga (listening to the five hour reviews of each of the Lord of the Rings movies should make that clear), so this is deeply painful for us, but it is an investigation and a conversation that needed to happen as we account for the good, the bad and the ugly, over-designed troll with spiked maces on his amputated legs, cleavers on his amputated arms, and chained hooks through his blinded eyeballs.