Battle of the Five Armies is a soulless end to the flawed Hobbit trilogy
Found on Ars Technica on Tuesday, 23 December 2014
The Desolation of Smaug, the second of the three movies, was probably the one that strayed farthest afield from the source material. It invented several characters and showed situations that either didn't exist in the book or happened "off-screen" and were explained later.
The battles in Battle of the Five Armies are deadly boring, bereft of suspense, excessively padded, and predictable to the point of being contemptuous of the audience. Suspense is attempted mostly by a series of last-minute saves and switches.
If you make a movie based on a book, stick close to the plot and don't invent things. Or just write your own movie and put "The Hobbit" back on the shelf.