“And they gave it a B minus because it had too many battle scenes. Can you believe it?”

The wonder of Tolkien is that he is believable in a fantastic sort of way. How would you say it? I guess the word is “everyday.” Yes, that’s it! Tolkien is fantasy that is everyday and believable in a child-like way.

“The Hobbit,” the book, is just that.

Years ago in Middle Earth, there was an Englishman by the name of J. R. R. Tolkien, a very odd name, who himself had some very odd ideas. In 1937, he published some of those in a small book, entitled “The Hobbit.” Hobbits are themselves small, resourceful and fond of food, but not seeking of travel or adventure, unless prompted by a Wizard, which his exactly what happened.

At the time, the folks in New York considered the story “juvenile fiction.”

It was hardly that, never has been.

“The Hobbit” is the most modern of adventures with little of the modern trappings to weigh it down.

Always a thoughtful sigh and quiet sit to be found on the well-traveled pages, it never was the action than kept things going, it was and always will be the little people.

A shame, we lost those in the most recent cinematic presentation. We lost the small friends. They slipped away in the action of Hollywood. A shame, really, that was the whole purpose of the book and the true stuff of the story.

For years, no one really knew what it was all about. The book was always successful, but it took years for the book to actually be read. Passed hand-to-hand in schools and offices, ordinary folk, businessmen and school kids, looked up from its pages across at each other and dreamed dreams that brought them together.

I read “The Hobbit” and the following three volumes of “The Lord of the Ring,” every single word of them, to my children at night as their eyes closed and they marched off to adventure.

They are books with words that walk.

I love the movies. I’ve seen all the films of “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings.” They are fantastic, great, wonderful – in their ways and appreciated for what they are.

The last installment, “The Hobbit, Part 3 – The Battle of Five Armies,” is an action thriller that should make Tinsel Town glow with pride. For battles battling, armies armying and fighters fighting, the picture deserves an A plus.

“Can you believe it got just a B minus?”

For the GI Joes among us, “The Battle of Five Armies” is a winner.

For the silent ones of us not so much seeking adventure as being found by it and wishing all along to be back in the Shire propped before a fire with a good book, the last installment of the film maker’s art is a great leap-crash-bang with few of the well recognized words that drew us back again and again to the pages of the little book.

In that little book near its end, the battle of five armies is a matter of only a few carefully chosen words. Early in that epic conflict, Bilbo himself is knocked quite cold. He rests on the ground, eyes closed, while the action swirls, ebbs and passes from view. When the hobbit wakes, it is to the sad scenes at war’s end. Bilbo stands with the other survivors beside the litter of Thorin, King under the Mountain. Thorin is dying from the wounds of his own greed. On death’s door, he is a wiser and gentler king. Thorin recognizes the value and gift of his burglar, and, with the simple parting of friends, the King under the Mountain wishes Bilbo well. It is the last of the small kindnesses that make “The Hobbit” the book it is.

Tolkien is fantastic, everyday, believable and child-like.

With that, he has earned his grade.

Grandpa Jim