I'm finding that I'm actually enjoying "The Hobbit" series more than I did the original "Lord of the Rings" trilogy. I think I can attribute that to the casting of Martin Freeman as "Bilbo". He is a much more enjoyable character than Frodo and Elijah Wood's portrayal of him. Sure,the two have different personalities and one is much more influenced by the Ring than the other, but I'm finding Freeman's Bilbo to be endlessly entertaining. Not to mention how wonderful Ian McKellen remains as Gandalf.

I do prefer Gimli and Aragorn from the "Rings" trilogy to the Dwarves of the "Hobbit", but the adventure to reclaim the Dwarve kingdom of Erebor is less dark than the quest to destroy the Ring in the previous series.

Now, I can't leave out the best thing about "The Desolation of Smaug". Yes, I'm taking about Evangeline Lilly as Tauriel. Wait...no I'm kidding. Don't get me wrong. It is great to see her getting a regular gig again after "Lost". No, the real star of the show is the amazing Smaug the Dragon. I was just in awe of how great Smaug looked. It was practically giant monster porn for me and if you've ever read any of my other comments on movies, you know I love me some monsters, kaiju, whatever you want to call them. The dragon in "Dragonslayer" was great and so were the beasts in "Reign of Fire", but none of them compare with Smaug. And then to top it off, they cover him in gold. It was just plain awesome.

There is much more CGI in these "Hobbit" films than there were in the "Rings" trilogy but that's just a sign of the times. The CGI in this film is distracting at times, but not as distracting as a movie rooted in gritty realism like "Non-Stop" and it's faked jetliner. I'm actually kind of fond of the CGI used in "The Hobbit" series because it's giving us some amazing monsters. The giant spiders, the "man-bear", the Orcs, Smaug...there's a lot for a monster-loving moviegoer to enjoy.

There were some great action scenes including a raging river chase with Dwarves in barrels and naturally, the battle with Smaug. A few scenes dragged on a bit and I was bothered by some lesser quality CGI-generated Elves. I'm also becoming more and more annoyed by absolutely zero Dwarves getting killed or even injured during all of these battles. It's almost to the point where the suspense is non-existent. Oh sure, there are thrilling sequences, but it seems none of the good guys are ever truly in danger. It's sort of like watching Superman. You know no harm can really come to him.

Regardless, "The Desolation of Smaug" exceeded my expectations and contrary to what I had anticipated, I am looking forward to seeing "The Battle of the Five Armies" as soon as I can.