Oh yeah, the casting was literally the only good part of those movies.
I love them for the same reason I love the old rotoscoped animated movies. I wish he hadn’t been forced to pad that shit out to three movies, but I’m glad there’s more Tolkien to see.
Honestly, a skilled editor could probably chop all three movies down to a single pretty good movie. The filler is really the main thing that ruins them for me.
I think I’ve heard that a fan already did that. Apparently it’s not bad