Tolkien is definitely not for everyone. My sister-in-law experienced that when she tried to read 'Rings, and she found it boring and just a chore to get through. It can be, since it's...well, very literary, and there's....just a mind-blowingly huge world, an entire world that Tolkien created, in there, and a lot of backstory. And characters talk about backstory things all the time, and oftentimes....it's stuff that really isn't important to what's going on in the immediate story! I  do sympathize with people who thus can't find their way through his books, but I hope people will still give it a try.

As for The Hobbit movie....I don't know about this...My main concerns for a long time have been--

1) They are making this two movies. This was pretty much the beginning of Movies-Based-on-Books-That-Are-Becoming-Two-Movies! even though it obviously wasn't released first. Well. Why have 1 movie, when you can have 2? It didn't immediately strike me as being necessary for there to be 2 movies to begin with, but then, they revealed what they intended to do was, have the first movie have all the material they wanted to do from The Hobbit itself, but the second movie would all be....'bridging' material that sets up 'Rings. That struck me as being extremely unnecessary, and made me realize, ugh....Peter Jackson just wants to make these movies again, because he loved it so much and is having a hard time letting go...That's not a good sign.

2) From where would this...'bridging' material be drawn from? Clearly not The Hobbit. Is Jackson going to look at other Tolkien works, or just....make up his own material for what he thinks should happen? But how would any of that even be related to the story, which is supposed to be all about Bilbo's adventure with Gandalf and some dwarves? So in other words, even though both movies were to be called The Hobbit, only one of them actually is. That's....really, really stupid, and again, unnecessary. If they want to make other Tolkien-based movies, okay, fine. But if it's not The Hobbit, don't call it that.

   I have become a bit more confused now because now I'm not 100% sure what they're doing. I believe they did say later that both movies would now have material from The Hobbit, but I still get the feeling they want to take the movies beyond that, and yes, still do 'bridging' material. For example, both Galadriel and Legolas will appear in the movie, or...movies, even though neither did in the book. What purpose do they serve? Why?

So, I don't know about this...I have concerns for how this will be handled, especially if Jackson is just getting carried away because he feels like making these movies again, and can't let go....

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/22/the-hobbit-dwarves-photo-_n_906...

Pretty sweet photo in the link.  I cant wait for this movie!

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/wb/thehobbit/

The first trailer is up. It looks like what you'd expect, which is nice. However....like I opined, I'm still kind of concerned about some of it. You can see the...'bridging' material that Jackson promised in action in this very trailer; Bilbo goes to Rivendell and sees the Shards of Narsil. That's....really not necessary. Galadriel is also in this movie, and seen in the trailer; also not necessary. Like I said, things like this seem to be Jackson getting excited about  making a Tolkien movie again, like he did a a bit over 10 years ago actually; this year is the 10th anniversary of 'Fellowship's release (oy, has it been that long already?? D:)!

It probably won't be a 'bad' movie; neither of them likely will be. Still though, I'm not sure I'm going to entirely appreciate everything Jackson is doing with it, in evidently trying to make the movie more like the other 'Rings movies, when Tolkien's original story, while obviously a prequel, didn't have a whole lot to do with the events that occur in 'Rings.

So, I don't know, I still feel mixed about it all.

I always thought Bilbo was the better Hobbit.   The Lord of the Rings is a great story.  But the Hobbit really showed what someone even as small as Bilbo could make a difference.  Frodo made the biggest difference but Bilbo just seemed quite brave to me while Frodo seemed a bit whiny most of the time.

The trailer got me all excited - only to see the release is about 12 months from now :/

I'm confused in how they are going to make to feature length films off the one book, especially since it's smaller than each of those in the LoTR trilogy. I'm guessing Peter Jackson will try to link it with the LoTR, trying to familiarise it for the viewers.

I'm not a huge fan of stretching out films just for the sake of it. But who knows, it is Peter Jackson's take on the book, not word-for-word match afterall. I'll reserve judgment until I've seen them both.

Well, here's the way it originally broke down; they decided to divide it into two movies, the first movie being Tolkien's original story, the second movie being...nothing but 'bridging' material that links this movie to the other 'Rings movies. This being despite the fact such information isn't in The Hobbit. Where exactly this information was also going to come from, I never heard; from other Tolkien books (most of which were unfinished to begin with), or...stuff that Jackson was just going to make up? Or both? Jackson already inserts his own version of events anyway, such as, as I pointed out from the trailer, Bilbo going to Rivendell.

I last heard that both movies will now be based (mostly) on The Hobbit; yes....both of them, but as I pointed out, you can...clearly see examples in the trailer alone of, uh, 'bridging' material that I personally really don't think is necessary. I mean, Legolas is in this movie somewhere, too. Yes, seriously. Why? Just to bring fan-girls in? Well, unfortunately for them, his part reportedly isn't very small or long, but still...why bother?

Like I also said, I think Jackson just got over-excited and nostalgic about making a Tolkien movie again, so he called up some of his friends to come back and be in it, and he just....possibly wants to re-live his experiences of making the 'Rings movies, so he's adding more material in there that relate to the movies. This doesn't mean the movies will be 'bad,' but there is such a thing as giving too much information that you really don't need. The 'Rings movies themselves do give enough backstory to go on, and that's really all you need for the movies' purposes.

Aw well....I'm sure they'll be okay.

Well they've never really made the first part of Fellowship of the Ring.  Tom Bombadil and all that.  Was the killer tree and the wright part in the movie?  Part with Bilbo's party?  Maybe that's the second movie?  Silmarillion movie I guess would work too.  I liked that even though Tolkien never would have published it.   The stuff Gandalf is doing while The Hobbit is going on and slightly after was pretty interesting too come to that.   As for the actual The Hobbit movie I'm kindof for it even though I didn't much care for parts of the Lord of the Rings movies.  Lends itself well to a movie adaptation.  The dwarves in that are kindof inept aholes so I'm not going to be upset they portray them that way.  Legolas is a Mirkwood elf.  Never mentioned by name in The Hobbit, but would have been there.

Edit:  Just watched the trailer and have to say.  While what Gandalf was doing while The Hobbit was going on was awesome and could be a cool part of say a second movie.  It would kindof ruin it to actually show it while The Hobbit was going on.  Hope they don't although seemed like they might from the trailer.  I guess it does kindof ruin the mystique anyway since they released The Lord of the Rings first so you already know Gandalf is a badass, but it was awesome listening to the dwarves constantly whine about Gandalf not helping them enough and then finding out later what he was doing during the whole thing.  When I first read The Hobbit I know I kindof related to the dwarves, like "Why does Gandalf always wander off?  They might have a point, maybe he is a jerk."  Also seems like they are making Thorin into the badass Gimli should have been which is annoying.

WTF? Did they just show Galadriel hitting on Gandalf in that thing? This is EXACTLY why I have eschewed those damn movies.

Legolas is the son of the King of the Mirkwood Elves to be exact.

I would actually like to see some of the stuff that Gandalf and Aragorn were off doing (resists spoiler postage) during the events of The Hobbit but not done by Peter Jackson. =(

I would also like to see some of the badass shiz that Galadriel did leading the Elves to Lorien. No one who hasn't read about that will ever really get what a threat she was making when she pretends to consider Frodo's  offer to take the ring. She actually COULD have held it against Sauron. Yes, she is that just much of a bamf. If Jackson wants to show more of Galadriel show THAT, don't show whatever it was that that scene of her playing with Gandalf's hair was trying to show (God I hope it isn't them hooking up) in it.