[Galendor]

I'm a first-born or prodigal first-born. Read The Hobbit many times starting at age ten in 1980, then moved on to read LOTR as a teenager. Since then I have re-read them several times. However, I have never read any other works by Tolkien (a serious deficiency in my education, I know).

So, like many here I went to see the movies with preconcieved notions on how characters should look and act, and approached the Jackson movies with great anxiety and trepidation (and hope!) over what Hollywood might do to the story. I loved FOTR, I felt it was very close to Tolkiens books. I was less pleased with the 2nd two movies, where deviations from the books (and silly, pointless dwarf jokes, etc) became more prominent. Like several here, I did not mind omissions of characters and events (since this is necessary to fit within a movie length) but I did not appreciate the insertion of new events, and the previosuly mentioned base humor apparently inserted in attempt to get a cheap laugh (such as: "Nobody tosses a dwarf!" Gimli.