As good as the first, and oh so dark

Rating: 10/10 (18 December 2002)

Having seen the second part of my favorite epic novel, it once again blew me away. A word of warning: this one is dark. The book, like the movie, takes a very dark and violent turn in this second part. I love that sort of thing, so I was very happy, but be wary if you're taking kids to see this one.

Spoiler Warning
Rather than seperate the journey of Frodo and Sam from the rest of the story, they interlaced them together, and a lot of changes were made. Many of them for the better, but like before there were a few changes I did not like. First the bad stuff.
Most of the changes I did not like were simply the things left out of the story. The Ents, for instance, could have been more developed on. We didn't get to hear much of their philosophy and lifestyle, which was a very enjoyable part of the book (no meantion of Entwives). And they made the Ents seem less intelligent then they are portrayed in the books. Also, there didn't seem to be enough Gandalf in this one. In the book, he had a much larger role. It would have been nice to see the events leading up to Gandalf's Battle on the Peak, and I think more explanation was needed as to Gandalf's return as Gandalf the White. Those that didn't read the book wouldn't know how he wound up in Fangorn forest. Then again, I really didn't fully understand what happened to him until I read the Silmarillion so I guess a little mystery was Tolkien's intention. But I think they just left a little too much unexplained here. I could have done without the whole Aragorn being thought dead part. Not really a bad part as we get to see more of the story of Arwen and Aragorn, but kind of unnecessary. The Siege of Isengard was just as cool as I had hoped, but was a bit short. In fact, this movie actually was too short. It ends quite a bit early in comparison to the book, probably a good choice pacing-wise since you can't top that climax. But, I hope they make up for those lost chapters in the next movie.
Still, I had simliar feelings about the stuff they left out of the Fellowship, and they made up for it perfectly in the Extended Edition, which is definitely the most flawless movie I have ever seen. Hopefully it will be the same when the EE comes out for this one. Pretty much everything else in this movie was perfect.
The battle of helms deep (a favorite chapter of mine) is every bit I could have hoped for and more. This was the mother of all battles in the book (second only to the battle of the Pelennor Fields in Return of the King), and they really hit the nail on the head for this one. They didn't change the course of the battle too much from the book, but the additions they made to it were great. I especially love the addition of the lothlorien elves to the battle. The look, special effects, score, fight scenes and acting were wonderful. The performance of Gollum/Smeagol was right on. Another great addition was the story of Arwen and Aragorn, an appendix to the book I was afraid they were going to leave out. Although they leave out most of their history, we do get to know enough about their past, and in the process learn a little more about the elves. Another cool addition was the whole fight with the Warg riders. We get introduced to Wargs in the hobbit but don't see much of them in The Lord of the Rings novel. Definitely a cool fight scene (gotta love Gimli). Gimli was probably my favorite character for this movie. In the book, Gimli and Legolas were very well developed characters. Two warriors who start off hating each other, then wind up best friends. Peter Jackson, thankfully, managed to develop them well. Gimli kind of takes a back seat to Legolas in the first one, but in this one he really shines. He is the comic releif in this one, as he is in the book, and Peter Jackson nailed it. We definitely needed the comic relief among all this doom. My favorite bits of Tolkien dialog are the ones between Legolas and Gimli during the battle of helms deep. They're both pretty much doomed to die, but all they can do in between cleaving orcs is joke around and place bets on the number of kills they can get. I was very happy to see that this is one of the few bits of Tolkien dialog PJ left unchanged.
This was definitely a wonderful film, go see it, and see the extended edition as well. 10/10