A Guide to Enjoying The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

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Before seeing the movie…

  1. Do not read The Hobbit. Skip the rest of this list and enjoy the movie for the escapism that it is.
  2. If you have already read The Hobbit, get brain surgery to remove all memories of The Hobbit. Skip the rest of this list and enjoy the movie for the escapism that it is.
  3. If brain surgery is not an option, forget as much as you can about The Hobbit.
  4. Consider renaming the movie to prepare yourself for the dissimilarities to the novel. My friend Grace and I suggest Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: The Desolation of Expectations.
  5. Buy a chess set. On the board, carefully mark the moves for a 7-move game. Set up the chess board. Add pieces to it from at least three other games. Attempt to play the 7-move game. Stop playing halfway through.

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During the movie…

  1. Bring a pad of paper and a pencil to the movie. Draw two columns. Label one column “Number of orc decapitations.” Label the second “Number of orc decapitations during same period in book.” Keep a tally.
  2. Create two more columns. Label one “Events that took place in the book.” Label the second “Events that took place in the same way in the movie.” Keep a tally.
  3. Keep a tally of things that foreshadow events in the Lord of the Rings movies.
  4. Keep a tally of absurd Legolas moves.
  5. Keep a tally of off-screen deus-ex-machinas.
  6. Pretend you are an elf maiden. Contemplate whether you prefer your love interest to be blonde and pretty-boy or brunette and brawny. Realize that either way, you are doomed to be a proverbial star-crossed lover. Contemplate joining a nunnery.

After the movie…

  1. Review your tally lists. Weep.
  2. Return to your chess board. Realize that the movie was setting up people to be in specific places for part three. Glue down the pieces and name the board Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: The Desolation of Expectations. Sell it to a museum.
  3. Use your newly acquired funds to learn neurosurgery. Develop a new technique to excise precise memories from brains.
  4. Spend the remainder of your life inventing a time machine. Time travel to early December 2013. Perform neurosurgery on your younger self to remove all memories of The Hobbit.
  5. Return to Step 2 of the first list. Enjoy the movie for the escapism that it is.

2 Comments on “A Guide to Enjoying The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

  1. Pretty much the only thing it followed was the order of events. I literally can’t think of a single event that happened in the movie in the same way (or for the same reasons) that it happened in the book.