The Middle Earth Collection [The Lord Of The Rings / The Hobbit] [Extended Edition] [Blu-ray] [2014] [2016]

This is actually 4.5 stars, it loses half a mark for the flimsy box it comes in and the fact the Lord of the Rings trilogy extra discs are only on DVD. So, as a massive fan of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and having enjoyed the Hobbit trilogy but not loving it, I was still keen to finally get my hands on this boxset. I previously owned the original Lord of the Rings extended edition trilogy on DVD, however I had literally been waiting years for a complete boxset on Blu-ray of the extended editions of all six films once I found out the Hobbit was to be finally turned into a film(s). As for the quality of the Lord of the RIngs films, this is a rare case where the additional material improved on already amazing films. The Blu-ray transfer is excellent, and although the visual and special effects look a bit ropy in places (these films are 13-15 years old now) I think they still stand-up even with the added clarity of the Blu-ray transfer, although there is some graining in a handful of scenes. However, this did not bother me at all. Also, the big furor over the green filter on the Blu-ray editions of the trilogy is not something that bothers me in the slightest. The sound quality was excellent through my Yamaha sound bar. All of the additional extras are unfortunately not on Blu-ray, it looks like they have just repackaged the DVD discs from the DVD release (I haven't been through the extras, I've only watched the films). Another niggle is that each film is still on two discs despite the added storage capacity of Blu-ray, although it is quite nice having an enforced intermission on such long films when you have to get up to change discs. Also, having each film boxset in just a single Blu-ray case is far more preferable to the cardboard case the DVD release came in. As for the Hobbit trilogy, I had only seen the theatrical versions in IMAX 3D at 48fps. It was pretty jarring and really took me out of the films at times. This Blu-ray release (in 2D) is a vast improvement over that. The picture transfer is excellent, the standard 24fps makes it look far better, as does the 2D image! As for the additional scenes, well personally I feel they improved the films immensely. Yes, I know it's ridiculous turning such a slender volume into three films, never mind then turning those three films into 3+ hour epics. However, if you look at them as just films rather than book adaptations, I think the extra footage is a worthy addition to the theatrical releases. It improved the films for me (as did the 24fps and 2D picture). Sound quality was also excellent. The extras are all on Blu-ray, although again I haven't watched them. The Hobbit films are all on one disc each unlike the Lord of the Rings films. Overall, I'm really happy I purchased the upgrade to Blu-ray for the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and glad to have the Hobbit extended editions included in the set. This boxset certainly is epic at 30 discs, and certainly worth a punt. Recommended.

excellent produce. fast delivery

I was a little skeptical about ordering this product at first, primarily due to it's great value price. I've been wanting to get LOTR extended blu ray editions for a few years now but was always put off because of the very expensive price tag attached to this edition. Hence my doubting of purchasing this significantly cheaper edition which ALSO includes all three Hobbit extended edition blu ray movies too?! So I eventually ordered and as soon as this arrived (next day with Prime) I ripped open the packaging to inspect the box / blu rays in detail and everything looked good. Then I opened The Fellowship of the Ring and inserted the blu ray into my blu ray player and I was delighted with the picture quality and the presentation as a whole. All my doubts and worries of this product being a 'cheap copy ' were over! This is incredibly good value for all six extended edition blu rays of this amazing movie(s). The only (tiny) flaw is the quite 'flimsy' box which contains the six blu rays. This may diminish quite quickly after a few uses BUT if you wanted to, I guess you could easily resolve this by laminating the box. Anyway, for me, this is a minor problem which doesn't bother me at this value. Picture quality, audio and overall presentation (which contains all extras) is superb. An absolute must for any LOTR fan.

I have a bit of a ritual that I go through once a year, and the ritual involves me taking a few days off, slobbing in front of the telly and watching the Lord of the Rings movies - the extended editions - in their glorious entirety. When it came to the last time I was going to watch them, I'd got far too used to watching movies in Hi-Def so my lovely DVD copies looked fuzzy and frankly rather horrible on my big-screen TV, so I decided that there was really only one solution - I was going to have to purchase a Blu-Ray set of them. I was, however, rather puzzled that a nice boxed set of them was difficult to find at a sensible price, so I gritted my teeth (and possibly said a naughty word or three) and took the plunge on this set, which also includes the so-so Hobbit trilogy - which I suppose is acceptable from a completionist's point of view. Thanks to Amazon Prime, the set arrived the next day and after watching 'The Fellowship of the Ring' on DVD, the jump in quality from that to 'The Two Towers' on Blu-Ray was absolutely breathtaking in every respect. The most obvious thing was the improvement in picture quality from the paltry DVD resolution of 720x480 to the Full-HD resolution of 1920x1080, which made the images so much more sharp and defined. There was also a big jump-up in terms of the quality of how the colours looked and, of course, there was a notable difference in the audio quality, which sounded absolutely amazing coming through my soundbar. It would be wrong to write a review of the LotR saga without saying a little something about the films themselves - and I don't really know where to start. I mean, it was always going to be difficult to translate a much-loved fantasy saga (heck, THE fantasy saga) to the big screen, but Peter Jackson somehow pulled it off. The tone, the characters, the locations and everything is absolutely mind-blowing and the actors he chose to play the various roles are perfect. If you've not seen them, I would recommend that you buy this set, get yourself comfy on your sofa (mind to get some munchies and some tissues) and get yourself engrossed in these. As I said however, this set also includes the Hobbit movies, which are essentially not awful - but why they made the decision to turn a very thin book into a trilogy (thereby adding a good deal of padding) after making three very thick books also into a trilogy (thereby having to cut some bits out), so I would have much rather seen just the one Hobbit movie. It doesn't stop there, of course - once you've finished watching through the movies, you've got the absolute cornucopia of additional material to work through - this set contains (count 'em) 30 discs, including the movies themselves, which represents hours and hours of 'making of' documentaries, commentaries, concept art, special effects wizardry and the likes. It's actually quite mind-boggling and goes a long way to show how much work was put into these movies. All in all however, this is without doubt the finest boxed-set of the Middle Earth on-screen saga you're likely to get - and is definitely a worthy successor if you still only have the DVD set.

I purchased the extended editions of The Lord of the Rings on DVD when they were first released. With an HD TV and a new generation of LotR fans in the household, upscaling to Blu-ray was definitely worth the money. The power of the story-telling is second-to-none and the transfer to the upgraded medium does the films justice, especially given the commitment to a lot of practical effects, which arguably stand the test of time better than heavy reliance on CGI. It’s rare that all of the elements of image and sound come together in a way that makes its mark so perfectly and indelibly. The Hobbit trilogy is a worthy companion from a visual perspective, but lacks the richness and depth of narrative of the LotR trilogy. It’s always a pleasure to return to Middle Earth. This Blu-ray edition made it seem as though a window to that world had manifested in the corner of the room. I would recommend this box set to all Middle Earth fans, but I’m sure that to anyone that struggles with the fantasy genre, the combined running time will feel like an ordeal. To those who find themselves drawn in to the journeys and character arcs, the end of the adventure retains an emotional punch that doesn’t diminish with time or repeated viewing. This is some of the most impressive story-telling ever committed to film... or digital equivalent.

Great quality DVDs. Has so many discs with all the bonus features and other bits and bobs. Even has a little booklet of photos from the movie and some of the actors. My all time fave trilogy and the best box set of it I could’ve possibly of bought.

As others has mentioned there has been problems with sound and image and this is true - occasionally the speakers will only output white noise and the picutre will stutter and glitch with it displaying the wrong colour - however, i find that this happens rarely and will normally fix itself if you just open the cd tray then close it again. It is only a minor nussance and if you get it for the £35.20 like I did, is well worth the hassle when normally it should Only get this on sale. If you dont want to wait for a sale and need it straight away I would recommend the £70 middle earth collection, it has Dolby Atmos (and Dolby TrueHD 7.1) with a remastered picture - I havent seen it but I would assume has better picture and should fix the problem I mentioned above. The audio is DTS HD Master, lossless - always great - and is my favourite audio codex other than Atmos and DTS:X. The audio track on these are less bassy than other Dolby tracks which is nice because the Dolby tracks for this film are too bassy to start with (credit to the audio engineers on the films) DTS HD Master also enables you to pinpoint where sounds are coming from, better than they Dolby Surround and Dolby TrueHD mixes - not sure about how it compares to Atmos mixes which should be a lot better. Most of the ability to pinpoint the sound I've found is what you listen to it on, watched it on a 20 year old panasonic 'Home Theater' system with the sound being less than impressive and where all you hear is sound coming from speakers and rather sounds being placed all around you and coming from places without any speakers nearby. When I switched over to my Nad T758 V3i and some low quality diy speakers the soundstage developed infinitely and felt like there was a circle of speakers all around, not just 5 with it sounding like I had front wides and surround backs - maybe now is the time you've been waiting for and upgrade your sound system. There is nothing particular to say about the picture, ive tried it on a small 32 inch 1080p TV (sat about 7.6 feet away) and it looks good enough and also on a 65 inch 4k TV if anything i prefered the 32 inch, even with my Panasonic DP UB820 upscaling to 4k on the 65 inch it didn't look like true 4k like it does with most over upscaling - great blu ray player highly recommended - this lead to a more pixelated, less pleasing picture. I would highly recommend the 4k disks if youre viewing on a TV greater than 55 inches. The mediocre picture can easliy be redeemed by changing settings on your TV. With LG TV's (which are the only TV's you should be buying) if you raise the amount of red to 15, green to 10 and blue to 5 and then change the luminance of red to 17, green to 11, blue to 7, cyan to 8, magenta to 9 and yellow to 14 (my personal favourite settings, you can alter them to what you prefer) then you should have a great looking picture with colour that pops out at you and doesnt make it too unrealistic whilst being almost alluring to the eye - thats if you have all the other picture setting right before hand. If you do it right Smaugs flames looks and almost feel warm and gold looks more realistic and less whitewashed like how most TVs make it look - this is due 60-70% of the brightness from the TV is from and additional white pixel added into the RGB which makes most things look too pale and white, blacks looking grey etc. This is impossible to completely fix as you cannot take the white pixel out but it helps to compensate for the increased white. Overall, I recommend for the price, unless you have a large TV or is not on sale.

Ok... So i read a number of reviews before buying this. If you read them they have stated that it is just 6 normal blu ray cases in flimsey cardboard. To sum up yes this is true. If you want incredibly limited edition with beautifully hand crafted cases with photos of the cast and crew (which im pretty sure would be more than £65) then this isnt for you However if you want to view the full extended edition journey in beautiful blu ray definition from beginning to end additionally packed with hours of behind the scenes footage and additional content then this set is perfect definitely delivers. To address the reviews saying "do not buy this is the original theatrical version not the extended edition" if you are looking at a photo of the dark sleeved box with the hobbit trilogy (underneath it the lord of the rings trilogy) with the words at the top on a blue band 6 film extended editions then dont worry thats what you will get. Hope this helps but i think this is well worth it.