What if the Arkenstone was something different than we were told?

I love the novel version of “The Hobbit” as the charming, fast-paced adventure for children that it is, and I like large portions of the movie trilogy, but I really feel that the last movie dropped the ball, failing to tie the many plot threads together in a satisfying way. I’m actually planning on creating a fan edit of the movies to trim the fat and make them better (once I figure out how).

One of the oddest choices Peter Jackson and Co. made in Film Three was to claim that the treasure hoard was now cursed by Smaug having lain on it all these years. Yes yes, I know that’s perfectly Tolkienian, and I’m fine with that . . . were it not for the fact that in Film One we were told that it was the greed of Thorin’s grandfather Thror, the King under the Mountain, that tainted the hoard and drew Smaug. So the hoard is now twice-cursed. Which is just silly and nonsensical and poor storytelling.

But what if the two “taints” were related? Well, I’ve got a new (fan) theory (that is totally not canon) that attempts to resolve this problem. You see, what if the Arkenstone was in fact the heart of a fell dragon that had died deep in the mountain many years ago? That is what the dwarves found, and it was the evil of that ancient worm that poisoned Thror’s mind and thus the hoard, and ultimately drew Smaug in?

Then Smaug’s evil just deepened and strengthened that corruption, in particular the corruption of the Arkenstone, the heart of the ancient fell dragon, making it all the more difficult for Thorin to overcome? To me this resolves the “twice-cursed hoard” problem, making the Hobbit movies richer and more interesting and the storytelling that much better.

What do you think?

 

 

 

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