Alfrid Lickspittle is a minor antagonist in The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug, and The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies.
He was played by Ryan Gage.
What Makes him a Scrappy?[]
- Alfrid, while intended as comic relief, he is too unlikable and hateable to enjoy. He's simply a greedy coward with no redeeming qualities other than liking his boss before being betrayed by him. He's a weird mix between a Comic Relief and a Hate Sink that simply doesn't clash well.
- He gets FAR too much screen time, taking away scenes from characters that are considered more awesome and enjoyable.
- He doesn't exist in the book yet has as much screentime as the characters that do or don't exist in the book either but aren't as annoying.
- He's exactly the same character as his previous Master who unlike him was played by Stephen Fry and was a much more amusing character.
- He never gets any character development or even gets his comeuppance in the third movie's theatrical release.
- His scenes have also been criticized of being repetitive: pretty much all of them would involve Bard putting him in place of a task, him doing it wrong and trying to take advantage of the situation, Bard discovering and him promising not to do it again.
- While his character is to show that greed is a bad thing, we already have Smaug (A dragon voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch that is considered epic) and the Master of Laketown (Played by Stephen Fry and is actually funny at times) to show that. To make it more ironic, the Hobbit was originally just one novel stretched into three movies just to make money and his character didn't exist in the original book. Therefore, his existence is ironic.
- Some fans also wondered why they didn't use their screentime to give more to do to Beorn or Dain (who play major roles in the Battle in the book but have a limited role in the movie) or all of the other dwarves that don't appear too much in this movie.
- Some also see it as a poor attempt to make a Gríma Wormtongue-equivalent for the Hobbit trilogy. Except Grima was an effective and creepy villain besides being pathetic and had more redeemable moments.
- His last scene in the movie has him possibly getting away with everything and escaping the battle with lots of gold.
- Only an issue in the theatrical version as in the extended version he gets his desserts (during the battle of Gandalf and troll, Alfrid accidentally drops a coin on catapult lever, causing to him to be thrown in troll's mouth, killing both) (one of the reasons some fans consider the extended version to be better that the theatrical cut).
Trivia[]
- He is one of three Middle-earth Scrappies, along with Tauriel and Galadriel. However, he is the only male.
- Ironically, Peter Jackson commented after The Desolation of Smaug that he was sure audiences would love Alfrid's expanded role in the third film.
- It is being rumored but not confirmed that a screening of the Extended Edition of The Battle of The Five Armies had audiences give big applauses to the scene of Alfrid dying.
[]
 Scrappies
| ||
|
Animated Films Live-Action Films Animated Television Other Live-Action Television Arrowverse Other Video Games HITMAN Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League Other Shorts Comics Fanon See Also | ||