I'm making fun of you for saying "You're wrong" and then using a lot of words to say pretty much the same thing I said except with different motivations involved, as though it's only coincidence that, in your words, "They stand to make more money out of this". And it might be, maybe Jackson and his people had to work really hard to convince the company to let everyone make more money. I mean, I don't disbelieve you that there are likely plenty of other factors that led to the decision, but at the end of the day they probably wouldn't have done it if it would have lost them money. So I just found your reply kind of funny since you said pretty much what I said, just in more detail and with different motivations. Which is cool, you'll notice that I left motivations out of my response to you, just rephrased your words to sound like my original post again to show how similar they were at the heart of it. But then you say "No" again even though all I did was paraphrase you. So I'm still finding it all funny, in a nice way.

I mean, really, look at what you said here. You said:

'So to me this smells a lot like a case of "but... isn't the movie too long and isn't this risky?" or "wouldn't three be more optimal?" than "let's milk it by forcing Jackson to make three".'

So what you're saying is that they decided two long movies would be too risky and would be non-optimal ... meaning there would be a greater risk of not meeting their financial goals. So if splitting it into three movies is less risky and more optimal ... then it will make them more money. You're saying they did it because it was probably safer and better, and in the world of film safer and better means more profit. You can't tell me that didn't factor into the decision.

I'm not saying there are no valid artistic and structural reasons for making three movies. I'm not saying anyone forced Jackson to do it. I'm not saying anyone is sitting around a table cackling about how much more money they'll make of the poor movie-going suckers. I'm saying that what you're saying and what I'm saying isn't all that different at the heart of it. And now I'm sad 'cause I had to explain that in such detail, when I'd hoped that a little pithy paraphrase and a silly smiley would get the notion across.