Surprisingly Honest Hobbit Featurette Explains What Went Wrong

For a certain generation, The Lord of the Rings trilogy was their Star Wars. For that same generation, The Hobbit movies were their Star Wars prequels.

So what went wrong? In a shockingly candid behind-the-scenes feature, director Peter Jackson – the same director behind the Oscar-winning Lord of the Rings trilogy – explains that it was mostly just a matter of time.

“Because Guillermo Del Toro had to leave and I jumped in and took over, we didn’t wind the clock back a year and a half and give me a year and a half prep to design the movie, which was different to what he was doing,” reveals Jackson. “It was impossible, and as a result of it being impossible I just started shooting the movie with most of it not prepped at all.

“You’re going on to a set and you’re winging it, you’ve got these massively complicated scenes, no storyboards and you’re making it up there and then on the spot […] I spent most of The Hobbit feeling like I was not on top of it ][…] even from a script point of view Fran [Walsh], Philippa [Boyens] and I hadn’t got the entire scripts written to our satisfaction so that was a very high pressure situation.”

Compare this to the years of preparation that went into The Lord of the Rings films, and it’s no wonder the follow-up disappointed. It’s a shame that the beloved prequel to arguably the greatest fantasy films of all time were diminished on account of a tight schedule.

The Lord of the Rings: The Battle of the Five Armies is on sale now.

(via The Guardian)