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David Mumpower: My thought process is that the events of Aurora are at least marginally connected to this in terms of impact. While we can say that this situation is different, the reality is that six months ago, going to a movie theater had tragic results. When the news broke on Friday, I have to believe that a lot of consumers were at least subconsciously reminded of what transpired at a screening of The Dark Knight Rises. This would discourage them from going to see The Hobbit. There is no way to quantify this but the question is not one that can be argued numerically. As of this moment, I believe it is the most logical explanation for the disappointment of The Hobbit's opening weekend.

What do you think of nasty Hobbitses?

Kim Hollis: Did you see The Hobbit this weekend? What are your thoughts on the movie?

Jason Barney: We did not go this weekend due to other family commitments. I will probably see it sometime this week or during the holidays.

Edwin Davies: I wasn't able to see it due to work and/or holiday preparations, but I fully intend to see it next weekend as a way of marking the start of my Christmas break.

Matthew Huntley: I did, and it's a worthy fantasy adventure that retains the light-hearted spirit of Tolkien's book (not that it has to, but in this case it's an asset). The film looks magnificent in parts, while in others it looks a little too video gamey and digital. I wasn't a huge fan of the 48 frames per second presentation, either, but I'm willing to accept it's just my eyes and brain aren't used to it. It's too long for its own good, but all around it was a fun and exciting.

Max Braden: I did not. I thought about seeing it twice. And each time I thought, "that is going to be one long, dreary, long lot of nothing for lot of IMAX ticket money." I did feel almost compelled to see it because it might get nominated for something. In hindsight, some of the complaints I've heard about the highest quality picture image makes me feel even better about not going. I can watch this movie in less than three hours when I watch it on DVD at 1.5x speed.

Kim Hollis: I did see it on Friday morning, and while I didn’t enjoy it as much as the Lord of the Rings films, I did mostly think it was a lot of fun. Some of the magic that the first three films had for me seems to be missing. The high points are that it is absolutely wonderfully acted. Martin Freeman is a terrific Bilbo Baggins, and Ian McKellen is fantastic as always. The scene between Bilbo and Gollum is everything I would have hoped for, and I believe that the Gollum animation is better than ever – his face is extremely expressive. I also enjoyed the diversity of the dwarves, even if a few of them seemed overly cartoonish compared to the others.

Criticisms that the film is too long are absolutely justified, because it’s true. I do think that it moved along briskly enough, but it still felt like “a long movie.” There were certainly scenes that could have lifted right out without damaging the story in the least. I remain disappointed that Peter Jackson didn’t do just a single film, because I maintain that the book would have been better served in that format. It’s not a long book, and I don’t really see the need to add the extraneous stuff even if Tolkien did write it down at some point in an appendix or wherever. I will say that the movie did make me interested in reading that extra stuff, though. I’ve been trying to sprinkle a lot of fantasy books in my reading list (I’m working through the Oz series now) and while I’ve read both LOTR and The Hobbit a number of times, I think I’m enticed to read Tolkien’s additional work, even including The Simarillion.

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