I watched all the extended Lord of the Rings again the last few days, and, well... I'm disappointed.

[Rabrrrrrr]

The more I watch it, the more it disappoints me.

I remember seeing them in the theater - the first one was so awesome, so spellbinding! I loved it! Then Two Towers came, and it was great in it's way. Then Return of the King, and I thought, "Wow - that was a lot of time spent on not much."

I gotta give Jackson kudos for his attention to detail in armor, costumes, elven language, and whatnot. It's a visual spectacle full of amazing authenticity and a HUGE geekability quotient.

But he paid not so much attention to story. It's too much visual spectacle at times at the expense of the underlying story.

And Gimli is made into a buffoon; a clown who is there for comedic relief.

And really, even in the first showing of the first movie, I thought, "Slow motion? In this day and age, he's going for slow motion like this? WTF?!"

The production levels are of a standard and a level that no other movie, let alone set of movies, has ever achieved.

But what good is that when the story gets butchered up and left on the floor?

[Brigid]

1. I have the DVD set.

Yes, they are long. But I just marvel at the amount of quality work that went into them.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

2. I was underwhelmed. The first one, I liked. The other two, not so much.

visually stunning, yes.

[rcrush]

3. The 9 hour extended Return of the King DVD is pretty cool

Even with all the extra footage they still manage to rush through the story. Still was a pretty fun viewing tho.

[la_chupa]

4. maybe I'm simple

but I love those movies

[LanternWaste]

5. You and me both, buddy...

You and me both, buddy...

I watch them as movies in and of themselves rather than as live-action versions of the books.

ed: sp

[Tommy_Carcetti]

6. I liked the second movie the best. The first and the third, take it or leave it.

The second movie was the most action packed, deepest and darkest. It had something that I couldn't find in the other two.

The first was essentially exposition.
The third was meant to be climactic but I think it went too over the top.

[Mudoria]

7. I loved the entire series

I'm never disappointed when I sit through them again. I never imagined when I was kid that it would ever be made into a movie, considering it genre, so I was just happy when I heard they were going to do it... and in three movies no less. Nerd heaven! Maybe Jackson took a few liberties but overall he made a very satisfying trilogy.

[Orsino]

8. The movies are not the books.

I forgive Jackson for making a buffoon of Gimli, I guess, and for robbing him of his greatest moments (the affair of honor with Eomer), but only because he got so much of the rest right, far exceeding the stiff, mannered text. It's for that reason I'll also allow him seven different endings to the saga, even at the cost of Tom Bombadil.

Jackson's Gollum? Win. Eowyn? Wyn. Aragorn? Win. Sam? Big win. Ents? Total win. Ditto for Denethor, Faramir and Theoden. Gandalf and Saruman? Triumphant. Hell, Sean Bean's Boromir was the best of all, and I give Jackson much love for weaving him into all three movies.

Tolkien told most of his story from the point of view of the hobbits. Jackson turned the book into an action-adventure thingy, instead, but he done good, in my opinion.

I'll agree with you, at least, on Gimli. Yeah, the heaviness of the movies demanded some comic relief, and the dwarf definitely got the short straw.

[PVnRT]

9. I'm going to be in the minority here

But I was kind of glad he left out Bombadil and battle in the Shire at the end. And, no, the scouring of the Shire is not the "point" of the book. Anyone who says that is an idiot.

[Call Me Wesley]

12. The scouring of the shire

was one chapter short - it had some comic relief, but if even Tolkien had left it out, nobody would have missed it. Bombadil was kind of a filler, but even in the books, he was never heard of afterward.

So I'm with you. :hi:

[joeybee12]

10. part 2 extended version is better than the Two Towers theatrical release...

...which really doens't make sense. The extended version is LOTS better and at least coherent.

[Call Me Wesley]

11. Always hard to turn such books into movies,

and while there's a lot of missing from the original stories, Jackson did an excellent job in creating LOTR movie-wise.

And I disagree with you about Gimli's character. He was comedic in the books; perhaps Jackson exaggerated it (since there were hardly any other characters fit for some comedic relief,) but Tolkien had some fun with Gimli himself.

And don't forget, one of the best scenes in movie history comes out of 'The Return Of The King.' This little sequence, the lighting of the beacons:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6LGJ7evrAg

[Rabrrrrrr]

13. The beacon lighting scene is awfully cool! I loved that one on the big screen.

Very moving moment.

[EastTennesseeDem]

14. I thought ROTK, which won 11 Oscars, was by far the weakest.

The first one I loved because it was exhilarating and immensely, immensely entertaining. The second one I loved because it achieved a remarkable amount of darkness, which was a perfect setup for the finale.

I liked Return of the King, but it felt for so long like I was watching a cartoon. I agree, the production values were stunning, but it kind of vanillaed the pathos of the story.