The Hobbit: Battle of Five Armies Review

The Hobbit: Battle of Twenty Armies plus Bilbo was a visually gorgeous film, with fantastically choreographed elves. The CGI was top notch (in both 2D and 3D - yes I watched both). The costume was superb on all accounts. Even the kiddies' acting was on form and lest we forget some Lee Pace's I'm not taking your shit any more acting. Well done Peter Jackson.

I have read many reviews on this film, and it generally comes down to this (please read in a high pitched, nasally tone):

"Trying to stretch out a just-under-300-page novel into 3 films is just as bad as trying to squeeze a just-over-500-page novel into one film (cough Harry Potter cough). It simply doesn't work. To compensate, the screenwriters have to add in extra storylines to justify the length of the films blah blah blah."

This sums up my feelings entirely to such articles.

Yes, the film was a tad long. Yes, I had to visit the loo twice to stretch my legs. But it was an effing fantastic way of bringing in female characters in Tolkien's literature: something of which we are dismally in need.

Having a female brings new layers to the storyline that previously didn't exist in The Hobbit. 

Although Peter did stretch out the films to a point of almost collapsing, he did do a bloody good job in representation. The women of Dale town fought alongside their male counterparts in the battle to defend their lives. Tauriel fights in battle. Galadriel's dark side was echoed from her first encounter with The Ring in The Fellowship of the Ring as she fights Sauron back into the East.

Peter Jackson empowered female characters to that equal of their male peers, and that alone deserves a tap on the back. Too many reviews comment on the gratuitous length of the films and solely mark down them for doing so, to them I simply offer this:

The films may not have been true to Tolkien, and I am sure die-hard Tolkien fans will complain. But to me, there are more important things than just keeping to the books.