I watched the extended edition of AUJ last night, and I think it's the most I've enjoyed a Hobbit movie.
Sure the CGI looks fake fairly often, Azog especially. But I think AUJ is a real step above the others mainly because it's the only film in the trilogy that's Bilbo-centric. Martin Freeman is the best thing about this trilogy without a doubt for me.
All through watching it, I enjoyed a few of the extra scenes (mainly character moments for Bilbo). Especially the scene where Bilbo is walking around Rivendell... why wasn't that in the theatrical cut?
It fits in a lot better than some of the overlong action scenes.
That said, this one does have the most plot of the three, and as a result the action scenes weren't as interminable-feeling as the ones in Desolation of Smaug. DOS is a chase movie and BOTFA is a war movie, and they don't have a huge amount of plot - mostly subplots and distractions and bloat. This is the only Hobbit film where Bilbo has a real character arc, the others are too busy being focused on Gandalf, the other dwarfs, Tauriel and borin' Thorin.
AUJ was always my favourite of the three movies, and the EE has affirmed this for me. All this movie needs is a haircut, maybe down into a 80-90 minute segment of a 3 hour film. I hope there's a good fan edit out there, because there's a genuinely great movie (in AUJ at least) in there among the bloat and fluff.
