1. Once again, falling in love with the landscape here...vast rolling hills...beautiful flowers...amazing mountain ranges...New Zealand truly is Middle-earth!
2. The company of dwarves. I honestly LOVE that we're expanding more on the dwarves in this story! Dwarves are amazing and I've loved seeing their culture and who they are.
3. Wonderful CG work on both Gollum, the wargs, the orcs and now...SMAUG!!!! to this day I have not seen such life-like animations such as Gollum and especially Smaug!
4. Detail on those dwarves' clothes and their awesome weapons! Weta has done it once more! I cannot get over how amazing their attention to detail is. Everything looks so real and amazing and utterly convincing.
5. The elves. We don't see much of humans in this trilogy so we get to expand more on the dwarves and elves. Seeing Mirkwood (or Greenwood) in full was absolutely amazing and I have to say the Mirkwood elvish armor worn by the gaurds is my favorite armor in Middle-earth.
7. New Characters. Tauriel, Bard, Thranduil Thorin, we're introduced to so many new people within Middle-earth and we're able to expand on the characters we all know and love such as Gandalf, Elrond and Legolas. Each is amazing in their own way.
8. Incredible sets! I'm sure the Laketown, Trollhoard, Mirkwood and Bag end sets were a joy and pleasure to work on! It would have been much harder if there had been no set at all. Seriously there should be a Middle-earth Museum and Amusement park! Smaug roller coaster anyone?
9. SMAUG. The detail, the size, the massive weight in his voice...Benedict's portrayal of this legendary Dragon is perfect, and the corlaberation with everyone involved has made this amazing mythical creature come to life. I honestly think Tolkien would be proud...
10. BEST DIRECTOR EVER! I don't care what people say...Peter is the best person for the job for the movie adaptations for Middle-earth. People who don't think DOS isn't true to the book need to do their research. Cause its all in Tolkien's writings...Peter just expanded it! Made. it. BETTER. Thank you so much Peter and team for these amazing doors to Middle-earth!
-Rosie