unknownsister:

leupagus:

As much as this scene is about Thorin and his Crazy Faced Crazy Eyes of Crazy, the thing that I actually love the most is Bilbo here, and the things you know are going through his head. Because in that second-to-last panel he’s looking at fucking Smaug, and yet he still looks more frightened of Thorin.

As well he should be.

#god this scene was so fucking good for me it’s RIDICULOUS#because like Bilbo has just been listening to Smaug for however long (probably at least an hour)#telling him that Thorin doesn’t care about him#that Thorin has used him to serve a purpose and no more than that#and that if Bilbo gives Thorin the Arkenstone it will drive Thorin to further madness and greed and ambition#(and to a hobbit surely ambition is just as awful as madness and greed)#and so Bilbo’s grabbed the Arkenstone but when Thorin finds him all of Bilbo’s nascent fears are confirmed in one stroke#’you’re alive – did you find the Arkenstone’#how much does Bilbo replay that in his head and wonder if Thorin meant to put them in a different order#how much does he wonder now if Thorin will brave a cliff face to save his life again#because of course one other thing dragons are famous for is their silver tongues and cunning arguments#Smaug has planted the seed of doubt in Bilbo’s mind just as surely as the sickness has planted the seed of madness in Thorin’s#where sickness thrives bad things will follow#but where doubt festers bad decisions will seem right#Smaug is wrong in the end – Thorin will not betray Bilbo#Bilbo will betray Thorin#for his own good and for the best#but the ruins of this friendship can be laid at Bilbo’s feet just as surely as Thorin’s#and in the end perhaps this is what drives Bilbo away from his company and Erebor and back to the little rivers of the Shire#knowing he has this capacity for treachery even with the best possible intentions#martin freeman for tumblr savior#motherless darkhaired princeling asshole of my heartface#bilbo (bilbo) bilbo baggins the bravest little hobbit of them all#the hobbit motherfuckers#middle earth best earth

(x)

I’m agreeing with Smaug on this one.  In the end, everybody goes treasure-mad over Erebor’s wealth except for Bilbo.  All he wants is for his friends to get out of this mess alive.  You can only consider him to ‘betray’ Thorin if you think Thorin is right to place more value on the Arkenstone than on the lives of the people who followed him here.

Thorin’s stated mission was to take back the halls of his grandfathers.  Once the dragon’s dead, he has accomplished his quest.  HE gets sidetracked—from the promises he made his own people!—by the Arkenstone and the wealth of Erebor.  And for that matter, Bilbo is careful to make sure that the Arkenstone is never even really lost to him, but Thorin freaks out and threatens to kill him over it anyway.

In the book, as I remember, Bilbo goes down to visit the dragon twice of his own volition.  After the second time, when he’s chased topside by Smaug’s fire, he refuses to go back down…until Thorin chases him back down at sword-point to go retrieve the Arkenstone.  Absolutely right Bilbo is more afraid of Thorin than of Smaug—and how is that not a betrayal from someone you’ve come to consider a friend?