My thoughts — Sneak Peak Live Event
In no particular order:
- Not enough Richard Armitage. But what we saw was fantastic!
- In contrast, clip from the next movie was meh. Whatever. If that was supposed to be a teaser for something, I admit I wasn’t moved to really care.
- Jed Brophy is surprisingly cute.
- I guess if you work at WETA you don’t have to be there at 8 a.m. on a Monday.
- Peter Jackson, I do not care what poster you had on your bedroom wall as a teenager.
- I had decided I’d update all my software, but I wasn’t going to my office (my only high-speed connection). Stuck it out with wireless in my favorite Seattle coffee chain and it was basically fine.
- I don’t know what the point is in getting fans all excited if you’re only going to take three questions from fans, and spend the rest of the time focusing on the actors. Although the kids were cute. And that was like, totally predictable.
- Also, the whole thing with Steven Colbert was stupid and took up way too much time. If you’re going to focus on the actors / roles, then give us more of that. (And I usually like Steven Colbert).
- Apropos of that, it felt once again like an insider event for a group (cricket fans, LOTR groupies) to which I don’t really belong.
- Boasting about how this could have been 3 vlogs was annoying.
- At least at the end, Peter Jackson thanked people for buying the DVD.
Me + Richard Armitage 
Well I only liked the very last scene, I wonder why… 😛
Time not well used I must say. They could have shown us more of behind the scenes and footage but I don’t complain.
“We are the Dwarfs of Erebor
we’ve come back to claim our homeland”
I’m sure I will dream this scene tonight 😉
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I agree — too much ingroup chatter, not enough info.
Mmm, Richard Armitage. And Lee Pace is cute.
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Well, my (not so) high speed connection let me down and it never buffered fast enough to capture entire event. So I missed the only thing I really cared about, Thorin and that last line. Saying ugly words under my breath now. Didn’t even get to see/hear Lee, someone i really like. Boo.
Also sounds like they mis-managed alloted time to me.
I got really tired of the scene showing MF saying his line over and over. Maybe it was due to buffering issues but it seemed to go on forever. Just didn’t care! I am like you, Serv, I don’t think I quite belong . . . and I am grumpy because of pain. But some people seem to think anything is amazing with a capital A and lots of exclamation points. 😉
OK I guess that’s enough grousing. Anyway, thanks gain for the screencaps, I really do appreciate it. XO
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I thought that scene with MF repeating his line didn’t really demonstrate Jackson’s point. He was trying to explain how he took different perspectives to shoot a scene — but the perspective was basically always the same. I think he’s probably not a great teacher.
It was fine. Just not spectacular. I wasn’t as annoyed as I was on the twitter event.
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I think you are right, Peter probably much better at doing than teaching. I had an idea of what he was trying to get across, but it got lost along the way and it seemed like a bit of a waste of a precious hour.
Part of my grievance is of course with my connection, which they don’t have any control over. Twitter, on other hand, WAS a debacle.
And Jed Brophy is a cutie, isn’t he? 😉
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You can see a brief video with the last scene here (low quality):
http://needs-no-pants.tumblr.com/post/46187168282/lq-bts-clips-from-the-end-of-the-hobbit-sneak-peek
I have a better quality video, I will upload it tomorrow if you want. A very kind guy on tumblr did a live streaming so I was able to watch the “event” even without access code (in Italy the blu-ray is out 9th April). But I’m sure someone will put it on youtube for everyone to watch 😉
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Thorin and Thranduil scene pretty intense! Never liked Lee Pace much, but he looks good in a blond wig. Last scene with Thorin yummy! Too much time with blah blah. Gandalf scene too drawn out. Oh well. Still worth seeing!
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Re: the surprising cuteness of Jed Brophy: I’ve been trying to tell you guys.
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He’s quite adorable.
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time to start a “me + jed brophy” blog 🙂 or “me + adam brown” — would be another serious winner.
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I felt like I was at work watching the “sneak peek” – only I wasn’t dragging around my massage chair to some post production office but instead was sitting at home distracted from writing my Broken fanfic and waiting and waiting for something interesting that resembled a sneak peek.
The last minute was fun, but that was it.
I guess I’m pretty jaded now with all these marketing stuff that WB throws at us and like Pavolov’s dogs, I am right there waiting for each crumb to fall. Or maybe I’m working at too many darn studios that this, which once used to be so interesting to me, has failed to totally entrance me anymore because I simply feel like I’m being baited again and again – except for that last bit, of course 🙂
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Yeah — I felt proud of myself for at least not going to my office to guarantee I’d get it in high speed — like I was resisting something — but then I just watched it all anyway including the stupid Colbert report mug jokes, which made me feel annoyed with myself.
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The mug bit annoyed me, too. It was too much of an inside joke thing that I really couldn’t care less.
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I found a clip online with last six minutes of event and posted link on my blog along with your lovely screencap of Thorin, Velvet . . . really glad now I missed the Colbert nonsense. There’s a silver lining in the cloud of buffering I suppose. 😉
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Pavlov’s dogs is a nice simile.
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At least now, reading your comments, I don’t feel so bad about missing this whole live event. It seems to me I didn’t miss that much. I didn’t buy the BluRay, instead I’m holding out for the extended edition, even thought it’s getting harder and harder to resist.
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Thanks for the comment, thorinsgal, and welcome to blogging as well!
Probably wise to hold out. I was thinking yesterday, when I was pondering whether I was going to sign a contract for another year here, that in some sense I earn too much money if I can afford to spend it on this stuff 🙂
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A little consideration. From what I’ve seen during the sneak preview and above all what I read today on several sites (and notably TOR.Net) I deem we will see very few RA during The Desolation of Smaug’s promotion next December. They are betting on different characters/actors to appeal for the next Hobbit episode: Bard, Legolas, Thranduil, Tauriel, the Necromancer (Cumberbatch) and the Master (the mighty Stephen Fry). Some of these are heartthrobs so expect many ooofs on that side. I’m sure they won’t count on RA to promote Smaug and I feel sorry, for us but for him above all. I’m sure he is carefully managing his career but I wonder why he hasn’t done anything since Black Sky (troubled by bankruptcy of Special Effects Company and stopped in a limbo). Why nobody thought about him for Red Nose Charity alongside Vicar of Dibley? I don’t know, I’m a little curious about his choices (or lack of it, actually?). He lost his battle on Middle-earth March Madness on TOR.Net (a sort of battle among LOTR, Hobbit and Silmarillon characters) meaning he is not much loved by Tolkien super fans, maybe. I was thinking again to your great post about RA and why he stands back, about his career’s choices, so my little grey cells kept on moving and drawing scenarios… Ok, I’m an over-thinking person, I’d admit this. 😀
What your feelings about Smaug are?
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Why we don’t know what his next project is — we talked about this in another comment strand — I can’t quite make myself believe there’s really been time to do much of anything in the open windows from Hobbit promotion that he’s had since Black Sky, which have all been two months or less. As far as Comic Relief goes — we don’t know that they didn’t think of him. Maybe he was asked and said no or didn’t have time. (I have to confess I could care less about that particular opportunity, personally, and if I were him, I’d calculate that I’d already paid my dues for both the mature female audience and the spy / action hero crowd, and be looking for something else to do.) I really think being concerned about his career at this point is rushing it a bit.
Feelings about Smaug?
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Sorry for my bad English… for feelings I meant exactly what you replied to me, and what do you think it will happen during Smaug’s promotion. If he will be present in Press Conferences, interviews and so on as last year or, since there are so many new characters/actors and actor, interviews will be focused on them. I mean, Cumberbatch, Fry, Pace, Bloom and Evans are new and will have much to say. Sorry again for not being able to express muself better and thanks 🙂
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No, sorry, my misunderstanding. I thought you were asking how I felt about the dragon, as opposed to the film 🙂
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I agree Servetus. I think RA and his management team are very much in control of his next move. A lot of people in the industry are noticing him. One doesn’t have a lead in a billion dollar-generating film, backed up by generally positive critical response to one’s performance and have no work being offered. Plus he has built a reputation as someone easy to work with who gives every role his all. He is guaranteed to be in the public eye through late 2014 and what we perceive as silence may either be time spent to very selectively choose his next project and/or intentionally calculated time to catch his breath after nonstop work for 25 years. Viggo Mortenson went similarly quiet for long stretches only to do his best work in roles for David Cronenberg.
Frankly, I’m happy with the relative silence. I’d be concerned if we heard RA was just jumping on everything he could and headed toward schlock-ville. I’d rather he do nothing than do cr@p. I am already concerned that Black Sky might be a waste of his talents but remain convinced it was part of a deal with Warner Bros. for having given up so much time to make three Hobbit films rather than the originally planned two. The timing of the announced participation in the film and the speed in which it was filmed–hot on the heels of filming the principal block of The Hobbit –has my antennae up. That said, if anyone can make a disaster movie interesting, RA is the one to do it.
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Although I love the possibility that I could see him almost constantly at work, that’s about my needs, not his. And yeah — the thing that’s really unusual is that he *isn’t* just jumping on the next thing in order to stay in work.
(I also find this sympathetic because of my own situation. AFter years of knocking myself out, I am now trying to find the *right* work as opposed to any work, which is a great deal harder.)
You and I are on the same page re: Black Sky.
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Not everyone’s career takes off after being in a big franchise. Some strike gold like BC, others are constantly working but mostly on not very good movies. When I look at Luke Evan’s CV I think RA could easily be offered stuff like that. Or stuff like Gerard Butler did since 300. And surely he won’t have a problem doing guest appearances on TV or audio work if it really was only about working. I hope he was well paid for BS and that may allow him to take time now. BS isn’t a cheap movie and the second movie often is much better paid then the “breakthrough movie”.
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I agree that they will use all those hot new actors to promote DOS, I think RA will still do his bit, but he may not do as much or not appear at Comic Con. I even think one of the reasons to split the movie in three parts was not to have too many characters in the first part. On the other hand, I’m looking forward to see Thorin interacting with them. Having other screen-partners apart from Bilbo, Gandalf and the dwarves and other adversaries apart from a CGI orc can only be a good thing.
As to VoD – I couldn’t care less either. That was six years ago and he has moved on since. I also keep wondering if he has personal reasons for moving to the US without apparently working there. If that is the case, good for him. He probably has put work before personal relationships for a very long time. Or he just enjoys living in a city of his choice for a change. Or is doing a directing course or something in that vein.
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I know he was sick, but it in that Lorraine interview it looked to me like he almost winced when she said, “loved you in Vicar of Dibley.” I wonder, now, if he thinks of that as a role that typecast him for offers in roles that appealed to a certain demographic.
And yeah — I am sure he has reasons for whatever he’s doing. I was wondering if living in the US was supposed to help him improve his US accent(s), or if he were trying to make contacts in the NYC theater world (since he never really broke out on the London stage). And if he has a person in NYC, good for him. He deserves to be happy.
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The recent VOD piece was awful and I’m glad RA was not a participant. I felt sorry for Damien Lewis.
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I admit that I haven’t watched it yet 🙂
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oh, and honestly, if Lee Pace were in my production, I’d use him to promote the hell out of it. I didn’t get what all the excitement was until yesterday. He is kind of intensity on wheels: sweet and flirty all at the same time. Mmmmm.
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I think they will use Lee Pace and the other guys from Smaug, but I think they will use RA too. I didn’t take it too hard that they used the LOTR folks for the sneak peek. Their careers need exposure too. LOTR is their claim to fame.
I think RA will be amazing in Smaug and will get a lot of acclaim for it, so I don’t think we have to worry about those new boys.
And I’m not worried about his career either. It all takes time. And is he really living in NYC now, or just spending more time there? You can certainly stay incognito in NYC, which seems to be what he likes to do!
Lee Pace not my cup of tea at all! But def seems intense in Smaug!
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I have no idea how much time he spends there, and how much in London or LA or Machu Picchu but there has been a connection at least since filming BS. He was in NY during hurricane Sandy and only someone who lives there or has a very good reason to stay would do that.
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Hi, Jane. I’d be surprised if you did know how much time he spends anywhere, unless you’re holding out on us! 🙂 It’s just that people say all the time that he lives in NYC, and I just wondered why they are saying that. I thought maybe there was an interview or something. It was hard to get out of the City during the hurricane, even if you wanted to! LOL! Of course, I’m hoping he DOES live in NYC because I live right near there! : D
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He said in an interview (I think it was GQ) that he is based around NYC. Because it is halfway between LA and London and because of the theatres. Now I expected him to move to the US for professional reasons and some of us always thought that NY would suit him better then LA, but given that he’s not working, I wonder if he has other reasons. He also visited friends in NY during filming of BS. It is certainly good for him that he already has friends there.
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Hope I get a chance to see that clip someday. But I’m already pleased with the few screencaps I saw!
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[…] event was the first time I really took a good look at Jed Brophy and liked what I saw — so charming — but more importantly, it was the point at which I finally got hit with […]
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me + Richard Armitage + Lee Pace, or: The ship that dare not speak its name, part 1 | Me + Richard Armitage said this on November 21, 2013 at 8:24 am |