History YMMV / TheHobbit

* WTHCastingAgency:
** The very Teutonic Otto Preminger (primarily known as a ''director'', though he played one of the versions of Mr. Freeze from the Adam West ''Series/{{Batman|1966}}'') as Thranduil. No reason in-story is given for why the elf king sounds German.
** Similarly, "Brother" Theodore Gottlieb -- whose primary occupation was as a ''comedian'' -- being cast as Gollum. This one at least made some sense, because Brother Theodore's style of humor was that of long, stream-of-consciousness rambles that often dipped into absurdism for humor. Gollum doesn't really dip into humor, per se, but once you think about it, it's at least possible to see the logic. Eventually. It also worked ''amazingly well'', with Theodore's take on the character considered a ToughActToFollow.
** Also, Orson Bean -- mainly known as a longtime panelist of ''Series/ToTellTheTruth'' and the host of the 1985 pilots of ''Series/{{Concentration}}'' (with the bizarrely-altered main game) -- as Bilbo. With this one, though, the thing is, it ''works'' (despite looking insane on the face of it), and for a long time the Bean Bilbo was very much the definitive Bilbo in much of the zeitgeist. One of the reasons Martin Freeman's casting was so hailed was because he was definitely one of the only people who could for-sure deliver an equal or better Bilbo than Bean had.

** Tolkien wasn't the first person to write about "hobbits," though it's unclear whether he unconsciously borrowed the word or thought it up independently -- see [[{{Hobbits}} the main article]] for details. The gist is that while the ''word'' “hobbit” may have existed before Tolkien, hobbits as we know them still came from him.

** Tolkien wasn't the first person to write about "hobbits," though it's unclear whether he unconsciously borrowed the word or thought it up independently -- see [[{{Hobbits}} the main article]] for details.

* AlternativeCharacterInterpretation: To some degree, supported by the author's "The Quest of Erebor" in ''Literature/UnfinishedTales'', which presents the story [[CerebusRetcon in a different light]].

*** Thorin's deathbed apology. It's widely regarded as one of the saddest moments in the book, but putting that aside for a moment, one has to wonder about Thorin's sincerity, given he's gone through the entire story being absolutely unrepentently mean and self-absorbed. When he finally swallows his pride on his deathbed, one has to wonder if Thorin truly saw the light, or if he was just apologizing to Bilbo because he didn't want one more thing to be judged for after he passed.[[note]]I go now to the halls of waiting to sit beside my fathers, until the world is renewed. Since I leave now all gold and silver, and go where it is of little worth, I wish to part in friendship from you..[[/note]] It doesn't help that again, he's done a lot of questionable things that deserve apologies, but the only thing he addresses was the one thing that happened in ''public'' and would probably have a tangible affect on his legacy. It's a beautiful speech, but because it only happens moments before Thorin's death, so we never see if Thorin truly meant what he said, or if he only made nice with Bilbo for selfish reasons. Who knows? Maybe he did try to bring the others he'd wronged in the dark to address his behavior, maybe not. Tolkien ultimately leaves a lot up to interpretation.
** Gandalf: Many readers assume Gandalf's involvement with the quest is down to his noble character and sympathy for the Dwarves, but can be alternatively seen as a pre-emptive strike, essentially manipulating the characters into forming a hit-squad to keep Smaug from joining Sauron's army. This was suggested by Tolkien in ''Literature/UnfinishedTales'' and in the live-action movie it's explicitly both. And of course Gandalf wants to establish a Dwarvish Kingdom at Erebor, hoping it will oppose Sauron's troops if they use that route (which is what happens).

* TheShipsMotor: A popular piece of fanon is that Yavanna, the wife of Aule/Mahal who created the dwarves, was the creator of the hobbit race and thus has a special fondness for them. This has no basis in book or film canon, with supplemental materials implying that hobbits originated as an offshoot of the human race, but it's very common for this fanon to be treated as widely-known fact in fanfic to legitimize a relationship between Bilbo and Thorin or have Yavanna help them reunite in the afterlife.

* FranchiseOriginalSin: Though a common point of critique for the later films in the Jackson trilogy was how little character focus the dwarves got, the original book was also rather uninvested in their stories beyond that of Thorin, with the other twelve (barring perhaps Bombur, Dori, Fili, Kili, Oin, Gloin) being fairly flat and almost [[TheDividual a collective character]] more than anything. The book doesn't tend to get critiqued for it as much, though, given that it never really makes any pretense that the dwarves are the focus, keeping things squarely on Bilbo. The films, meanwhile, spent a lot of time fleshing out the dwarves and their character dynamics, making things far more deleterious when they started being pushed into the background--and it didn't help matters that it was usually not in favor of Bilbo.

** After the success of ''The Lord of the Rings'' Tolkien considered re-writing ''The Hobbit'' to match the more serious tone of its sequel, along with fixing a few of the inconsistencies between the two. After completing a few chapters he asked a friend (we don't know who) to read it. Her response was "this is wonderful, but it's not ''The Hobbit''". Tolkien decided to leave the NarmCharm intact and never completed the revision. The re-written chapters and notes can be read in ''The History of the Hobbit''.

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%% This example was proposed and approved in the Complete Monster thread don't remove it without consulting the thread first.

%% Link: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=6vic3f9h1cy5qivsenw8llok&page=13035#comment-325874
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* FranchiseOriginalSin: Though a common point of critique for the later films in the Jackson trilogy was how little character focus the dwarves got, the original book was also rather uninvested in their stories beyond that of Thorin, with the other twelve (barring perhaps Bombur) being fairly flat and almost [[TheDividual a collective character]] more than anything. The book doesn't tend to get critiqued for it as much, though, given that it never really makes any pretense that the dwarves are the focus, keeping things squarely on Bilbo. The films, meanwhile, spent a lot of time fleshing out the dwarves and their character dynamics, making things far more deleterious when they started being pushed into the background--and it didn't help matters that it was usually not in favor of Bilbo.

*** Thorin's deathbed apology. It's widely regarded as one of the saddest moments in the book, but putting that aside for a moment, one has to wonder about Thorin's sincerity, given he's gone through the entire story being absolutely unrepentently mean and self-absorbed. When he finally swallows his pride on his deathbed, one has to wonder if Thorin truly saw the light, or if he was just apologizing to Bilbo because he didn't want one more thing to be judged for after he passed.[[note]]I go now to the halls of waiting to sit beside my fathers, until the world is renewed. Since I leave now all gold and silver, and go where it is of little worth, I wish to part in friendship from you..[[/note]] It doesn't help that again, he's done a lot of questionable things that deserve apologies, but the only thing he addresses was the one thing that happened in ''public'' and would probably have a tangible affect on his legacy. It's a beautiful speech, but because it only happens moments before Thorin's death, so we never see if Thorin truly meant what he said, or if he only made nice with Bilbo for selfish reasons.

** So much of the soundtrack, with "Misty Mountains Cold" and "Rollin' Down the Hole" being standouts. And they even used Tolkien's lyrics from the book with many of the songs!

* UnfortunateImplications: As discussed [[https://dc.swosu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1172&context=mythlore here]], Tolkien's statements about how he saw dwarves as a FantasyCounterpartCulture to Jewish people makes much of their portrayal here seem rather off: the dwarves are [[JewishComplaining constantly whining]], largely ineffectual, lose a lot of fights, and their primary flaw is shown to be [[GreedyJew excessive greed]], with the narrative going so far as to claim that dwarves cannot be truly heroic. It's rather notable that in future works (being written during and after the 1940s), Tolkien seemingly took pains to undo these earlier ideas, with ''Lord of the Rings'' showing that dwarves boast many great warriors who are brave and heroic on the battlefield, and Gimli claiming that dwarves only prize gold and jewels for their aesthetic beauty, not their monetary value.

* NightmareRetardant: On paper, the spiders of Mirkwood sound like they ''should'' be this, since the animators saw fit to give them ''puppy dog eyes and '''rabbit ears,''''' which even sounds like a ''joke'' when one says it out loud. [[SubvertedTrope However]], they actually look ''so'' weird and un-spider like that they loop back around to NightmareFuel. Quite the 4D chess move there, animators.

* NightmareRetardant: On paper, the spiders of Mirkwood sound like they ''should'' be this, since the animators saw fit to give them ''puppy dog eyes and '''rabbit ears,''''' which even sounds like a ''joke'' when one says it out loud. [[SubvertedTrope However]], they actually look ''so'' [[UncannyValley weird and un-spider like]] that they loop back around to NightmareFuel. Quite the 4D chess move there, animators.