If you watched the Hobbit and wondered why all those wizard meetings, Necromancer?, do we really need a trilogy" and so forth then you might want to read a nice summary of the important moments in history of Middle-Earth that leads to the events of The Hobbit and why exactly Peter Jackson focused on the moments he did. As I said in my review, the movie was long but short of cutting action scenes, I had no clue how he could have made the movie shorter because those scenes were needed for the larger tapestry that he is putting together. Click here and you can get an idea on why I came to that conclusion. The article also serves as a nice takedown of critics who attacked the film for the wrong reasons. Below is aquick summary of the same with more added from LOTRProject's and Tolkien Gateway timelines. Spoiler warnings for article and below.
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Summary of The Hobbit to The Lord of the Rings Timeline. There are any Summary of The Hobbit to The Lord of the Rings Timeline in here.