Wow, you know, you're right. I probably subconsciously was hoping for the final battle to be bigger (and oh did I think it would be when those Dune worms showed up
) but that was pretty incredible that PJ took a climax about five armies clashing and made it all about the final duels. That was one thing that was really missing in ROTK. Actually it was pretty much missing completely in LOTR after the Lurtz fight. So kudos to PJ for carefully constructing the finale to this film in a way that not only worked for this particular trilogy but that served the overall series as well.
I'm amazed at how good of a "bridge" movie this is into the next trilogy while still being satisfying in it's own right.
Aside from Theoden/Witch King/Eowyn battle, I think that's what made Helm's Deep and Minas Tirith such good battles; no two major characters were thrown together simply to have a face off. In a real battle, it would just be a random melee.
Rolling around on a cg ice field fighting a cg baddie didn't seem very satisfying to me. I think even if they had made Azog speak english if would have made us relate/hate him more.
I just didn't care about their duel at all.
I was constantly waiting for James Bond to drive across with his Vanquish.
I hated how they separated Thorin, Fili and Kili from the main battle
and Bilbo
and Tauriel
and Legolas
and the two main orcs...
It was so badly done and predictable
Aragorn versus Lurtz was fantastic because it was Aragorn attempting to save Boromir; the audience was emotionally drawn into the battle as we knew that Boromir lay dying on the floor. In addition, the battle was bloody and realistic and didn't last one second longer than it needed too.
Thorin versus George Lucas orc on the other hand, was childish and tedious. Imagine Lurtz pretending to be dead and floating underneath a river of ice beneath Aragorn.
Do you think that Peter Jackson wanted LOTR to be as CGI filled as The Hobbit but couldn't afford it at the time? And now he's trusted with big Hollywood bucks, he can use it.
It honestly feels as if two different people have directed these trilogies. When LOTR came out, it was clear that Jackson was the perfect choice for those films and he absolutely nailed but for some reason, The Hobbit just feels so...meh, I can't put my finger on it - there are so many things I think he got wrong. I still dislike how little the dwarves actually look like dwarves -
Dwarves which look good:
Gloin
Oin
Balin
Bifur
Bombur
Dwarves which don't look like dwarves:
Thorin
Bofur
Fill
Kili
Dwarves that kind of look like Dwarves:
Dwalin
Dori
Nori
And the least said about Ori the better.
