When director Peter Jackson decided to make a movie based on the famous novel The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien, the question for many fans was whether the movie would live up to expectations.

The movie is a prelude to Jackson’s famous movie franchise The Lord of the Rings.  The Hobbit will be a trilogy, and I am eagerly anticipating the remaining two because we were left with a major cliffhanger.

The movie keeps the audience at the edge of their seats from the beginning until the end. The movie starts off with Bilbo Baggins as an elderly man writing to his beloved nephew Frodo. This brought me joy because a cameo of Elijah Wood meant that more characters from the Rings franchise might be brought back as well. For example, Gollum/Sméagol made both his personalities known to Bilbo, as well as Gandalf, the elves and the dwarves.

The feel of this movie is unlike the one of The Lord of the Rings; it has more of a magical feel. The filmmakers brought in animated creatures and used impressive special effects to bring them to life.  The work put into the trolls and Orcs made them really stand out to me because they seemed so real, from their faces to the body structure.

I was unsure how I felt about going to see this movie in the beginning because I was never really into seeing The Lord of the Rings, but after watching The Hobbit I feel like I will want to re-watch them just so I can see the original characters in action.

The only downside to this movie for me was the lack of Frodo. He was a major character in the Rings franchise, but I would have loved to have seen more of him in this movie. I also would have liked to have seen Legolas as well. These were key characters that everyone loved, and they were hardly mentioned.  Other than that, this movie was well worth it. I would recommend it.