Best Of

Compliment LotR, yes. Up to the standards of it, god no. They're not intended to be, that's what I'm saying. They tie together with expansion and future elements, sure, but they're intended to feel different. They are radically different in every way. It doesn't need to be up to the same standard. If Tolkein wrote Lord of the Rings first, and then wrote The Hobbit later, it'd be the same thing; Not gritty enough, not real enough, not living up to the same standard. You know, it's not...meant to be?
I'm honestly just grateful these films were made at all, especially with Jackson at the helm. We know from the immense success of the Lord of the Rings that he's the right guy for the job and I don't think it's a bad thing that his vision for the prequel, which is a fairy tale, is coming off this way. But that doesn't mean it has to be up to the same snuff as the Lord of the Rings. Everything in Lord of the Rings is bigger than The Hobbit, book and film. The characters, the plot, the scale. They tell a different story, and no matter how you paint it, the Lord of the Rings is the one that comes out on top. The liberties Jackson has taken on the elements of the book of The Hobbit in order to better tie it in to the Lord of the Rings are a betterment, to be honest. I don't see him has 'trying to make it an epic' to compliment LotR. I see him taking the incredibly whimsical source material and giving us something that, on screen, we might actually be interested in. Sure, these films are from the same universe, and yes, they are radically different. You're right in that The Hobbit does not suit an epic, which is exactly why it isn't gritty and real like the Lord of the Rings was, and has received the stylised visuals and the treatment it has been given by Jackson and his team.
Just my two cents.