Controversial sequels and prequels are pretty common today, but none are more controversial than “The Hobbit,” prequel trilogy to the “The Lord of the Rings” movie trilogy, especially now, with the third and final movie in the series, “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies,” which comes out 17 Dec 2014.

“Those movies (Hobbit Trilogy) are such a cash grab! They made three movies about one book!” said senior Chris Dennis.

It is true that “The Hobbit” trilogy is based off of one three-hundred page book, “The Hobbit, or There and Back Again” by legendary fantasy author J.R.R Tolkien while the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy was based on three separate books (“The Fellowship of the Ring,” “The Two Towers,” and “The Return of the King”.)

Although “The Hobbit” series is quite controversial, the movies have performed quite well in the box office, with the first movie of the series, “An Unexpected Journey”, as it currently holds the record for the eighteenth highest grossing film of all time. The second movie of “The Hobbit” series, “The Desolation of Smaug” is currently the twenty fifth highest grossing film of all time.

Even with the success of the movies financially, both “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” and “The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug” movies currently hold have a sixty four percent and a seventy four respectively, while all the all of which earned rotten tomatoes ratings in the ninety percent range.

Even though the Hobbit movies are not as consistently well received with critics, old fans of the series are enjoying them just as much as the original trilogy.

“‘The Hobbit’ movies are so good! They are just as good as ‘The Lord of the Rings’ trilogy.” said senior Eric Richter.

What I see from the whole “Hobbit” controversy are two very legitimate sides to the argument. The anti-hobbit side believes that Peter Jackson went way overboard with the decision of making “The Hobbit” movies a full trilogy while the pro-hobbit side believes that they are just as well made and exciting as the original.

My final word on this issue is that it was wrong of Peter Jackson to separate the smallest novel in the entire series into three movies, but he has done a good job making them be as thrilling as they can be.