The RotK: Scouring of the Shire
Not there. 
I intentionally didn't read anything about the extended edition. I even sort of hate trailers. But as soon as I saw Saruman die I knew it wasn't happening. OK first of all Wormtongue doesn't try to kill Saruman, he throws the palantir as a way of sucking up to him. The Scouring of the Shire would've taken 5 or 10 minutes and I just wanted to see the goblins' jaws drop when 4 hobbits came back and kicked their asses. I mean....how can you not have the VERY END of a story!!! Sure other than that it was perfect. Just rocked. Things they invented that weren't in the book were brilliant. Does anyone think they will do yet another cut, like Director's Extended Cut with the Scouring of the Shire? Will Chris Lee still be alive!? Sigh.
As someone said in another thread: "Maybe at some later time, they will add that in, the way new stuff was added to the remastered Star Wars trilogy?"
I hope so! Tom Bombadil, Faramir, the Downs, the whole she-bang.
</rant>
Anyway I can't wait for the Hobbit!
I intentionally didn't read anything about the extended edition. I even sort of hate trailers. But as soon as I saw Saruman die I knew it wasn't happening. OK first of all Wormtongue doesn't try to kill Saruman, he throws the palantir as a way of sucking up to him. The Scouring of the Shire would've taken 5 or 10 minutes and I just wanted to see the goblins' jaws drop when 4 hobbits came back and kicked their asses. I mean....how can you not have the VERY END of a story!!! Sure other than that it was perfect. Just rocked. Things they invented that weren't in the book were brilliant. Does anyone think they will do yet another cut, like Director's Extended Cut with the Scouring of the Shire? Will Chris Lee still be alive!? Sigh.
As someone said in another thread: "Maybe at some later time, they will add that in, the way new stuff was added to the remastered Star Wars trilogy?"
I hope so! Tom Bombadil, Faramir, the Downs, the whole she-bang.
</rant>
Anyway I can't wait for the Hobbit!
Comments
In the House of Tom Bombadil, too to a lesser extent.
J
Now, Return of the King, I'm pretty stubborn on despising it because it wasn't really that great, and the deviation from the book was just so great that I just cannot like that movie.
Authors know how to tell stories, script-writers do not. That's what it boils down to. There is a reason that The Lord Of The Rings is the 2nd most read book in history, and it's not because of Fran Walsh, Peter Jackson, or [other guy]. Tolkien wrote a good story, a great story even.
[Begin Extended Edition Tidbits]
The victory on the Pelenor was nothing, because of the Dead; it went completely against the solitary human victory that really happened. Aragorn winning the Palantir and causing Sauron to move was misplaced. Saruman's death was wrong, the finding of the Palantir was wrong. In the extended, Aragorn & Co appear on the other side of the mountains at the mouth of Anduin which is some distance south. Denethor's suicide was wrong. There were countless other things that I know were wrong, and other stuff I'm not certain about since I haven't read the books in some time.
[End Extended Edition Tidbits]
The Scouring of the Shire should have been there, plain and simple. I do agree it seemed tacked on but it was most definitely a surprise. And even if Jackson was trying to get something across that the people at home cannot understand; he also didn't show that people at home are still affected and that they can do something still.
As for saruman's new death, well, the scene was pretty cool regardless of it's inaccuracy to the book, so I'm not complaining, granted I did think it was a little cheesy when the water wheel turns over to hide him(for the theatrical release)
The mouth monster at the gate(name slips my mind) was a nice addition for the extended, despite his corpse disappearing on the first wide shot.
All in all, I enjoyed the extended RotK quite a bit, though, I think the extended Two towers was superior in terms of what they added.
The mouth monster at the gate(name slips my mind) was a nice addition for the extended, despite his corpse disappearing on the first wide shot.
That was the creepiest creature in the whole movie. Still gives me the heebie jeebies.
Overall, I think ROTK was well done, the whole thing was excellent, however I'll always be dissappointed with the omitting of the Scouring of the Shire. It was just so fun to see the differences in our four friends at the end.
I know, sometimes parts of a book may not translate well to the screen, but you do sometimes have to cater to the original fans also. C'mon, Peter Jackson you already made the thing 4 hours long, the ones that couldn't sit through an extra 15 -30 minutes would have left the movie in hour 2.
Now, in the books, merry and pippin drink from the fanghorn drought and they grow quite a bit(relative to hobbits) Obviously, this was omitted from the theatrical release of the two towers. but it was included in the extended edition. Likewise, it would have been nice if they had thrown that in there for the extended RotK. I don't think it would have been necessary to change *every* merry/pippin scene to their new heights, but just the scenes where they are compared to the other hobbits. Ah, it was probably more trouble than it was worth. But I would have liked to have seen that.
The scouring works in the books because as written it is a story about People and what they have to go because of the ring. The movies are about the ring and what people have to go through to destory it. Not a huge difference there, but it's enough to make the scouring work for one and not the other IMO.
Originally posted by rageous
The scouring works in the books because as written it is a story about People and what they have to go because of the ring. The movies are about the ring and what people have to go through to destory it.
I agree with that. The problem is that the script writers decided with the ending to make the movie about the characters - the havens, the long goodbyes, the slomo bouncing hobbits on the bed, sam's marriage, etc. etc. They either needed to get rid of at least half of that, so that the end really was the destruction of the ring, or they could have added a little bit of time to the ending by showing Saruman pop up and get dealt with in the shire by the hobbits. I think they actually could have included a mini-scouring and still cut the total time of the ending down.
Normally you want a long period of building tension and then a very quick resolution after the climax. The way they did it was to have a really long resolution after the climax, which just didn't work. But one way to have a more extended resolution is to have an additional mini-peak or two after the main climax. Uh yeah I'm talking about films.
The scouring works in the books because as written it is a story about People and what they have to go because of the ring. The movies are about the ring and what people have to go through to destory it. Not a huge difference there, but it's enough to make the scouring work for one and not the other IMO.
True about the audience. What about the ones that purchase the extended DVD over the theatrical DVD? I would think that those would be the fans of the books. Jackson and Company could have included the scouring in the extended edition and left it out of the theatrical edition. But due their decisions on pacing and translation from book to screen they omitted it and have left the original fans disappointed.
They never intended to shoot the scouring scenes though, so there was never any of that type of content to add into this DVD.
Originally posted by LiquidR
If I remember correctly, they did shoot additional footage for the extended edition of Fellowship and Two Towers, they just chose not to for ROTK.
I sincerely doubt it. They definitely did extra work editing and such, but I don't think they actually shot additional footage specifically for the extended DVDs. I bet all of the additional footage they shot was for last-minute changes to the theatrical releases.
My overall impression is that the extended DVDs for the first two movies were really fantastic, but the extended/additional scenes for RotK weren't that great. They didn't really add that much to the movie. I did like the extra Eowyn-Faramir footage, and Mouth of Sauron was kind of funny, but that's about it.
I guess they basically included all the good footage they had in the theatrical release, it was so damned long.
Originally posted by BRussell
I sincerely doubt it. They definitely did extra work editing and such, but I don't think they actually shot additional footage specifically for the extended DVDs. I bet all of the additional footage they shot was for last-minute changes to the theatrical releases.
My overall impression is that the extended DVDs for the first two movies were really fantastic, but the extended/additional scenes for RotK weren't that great. They didn't really add that much to the movie. I did like the extra Eowyn-Faramir footage, and Mouth of Sauron was kind of funny, but that's about it.
I guess they basically included all the good footage they had in the theatrical release, it was so damned long.
From the FotR Extended Edition liner notes:
From FotR Liner Notes
But rather than simply inserting deleted scenes, Jackson approached this Extended Edition as if he were creating a whole new version of the film. He and the editor, John Gilbert, carefully evaluated material to be integrated into the film, and then worked to bring each scene up to the same polish as the rest of the feature - visual effects were completed, dialogue was recorded, and sound effects were created.
To make sure all of the scenes flowed, Howard Shore composed and recorded new score with the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
So while they didn't shoot any new video, they did new everything else to enhance the previously shot video.
[on topic]
I too wished they covered the Scouring. They alluded to it in one of the visions Frodo had, but that's it. I'll admit it, about halfway through RotK, I was yawning, what with all the back-slapping and self congratulating. Like earlier posters' have said, the resolution phase of RotK was too long.
Supposedly there's about 10-12 more hours of video footage that Jackson has said he's contemplating making into its own DVD release.
the Movies were amazing, but if you start throwing bits of the book in and saying " look, this isn't in the movie," you are unfairly criticizing the movie.
I think yes, the resolution freakin backslapping phase in RotK was a waste of 30 minutes or even an hour. So yea they could have squeezed the Scouring in. I just love it. This idea that there is still more footage is interesting! Can you tell us more PBG4 dude?
And yea that mouth of sauron guy was funny! Poor guy. What ever happene to don't shoot the messenger?
Originally posted by Scott
I'm still unhappy with some of the unnecessary changes between the books and movies. I think some of the changes are significant. Like the elves showing up at helms deep and the ents not showing up. Also how Gandafl finds his way out the mountain. Plus many more.
You know what I really want to know? How in the world did Gandalf get his staff back? I mean, he's trapped on the top of Saruman's tower, then he jumps and flees on that huge bird. But at no point did he ever get his staff back from Saruman.
Originally posted by Aquatic
nebakid, great point. good to see you around again!
I think yes, the resolution freakin backslapping phase in RotK was a waste of 30 minutes or even an hour. So yea they could have squeezed the Scouring in. I just love it. This idea that there is still more footage is interesting! Can you tell us more PBG4 dude?
And yea that mouth of sauron guy was funny! Poor guy. What ever happene to don't shoot the messenger?
I will try to find where I read about the extra footage.
Originally posted by PBG4 Dude
You know what I really want to know? How in the world did Gandalf get his staff back? I mean, he's trapped on the top of Saruman's tower, then he jumps and flees on that huge bird. But at no point did he ever get his staff back from Saruman.
From the books I don't remember the staff being that important. I guess the movie needed a prop.
They shouldn't have replaced slo-mo hobbit-bed-bouncing with Shire scouring, they should have just cut it out and gave us that time to empty our bladders. Elijah no-neck Woods smiled at the camera for about 28 hours before that damned boat sailed off. Cut some of that time down.
Who the hell was that deformed ork? That's bugged me since the theatrical release.
[Extended Edition Spoiler]
When the Witch king broke Gandalf's staff... that was awesome. He and the Mouth of Sauron were great characters.
If they could have founds some way to incorporate the "beautiful" Sauron I would have been very happy. That concept video looked great until he turned into Fellowship-prologue Sauron and had that ridiculous sword fight. Just have him disappear and the Mouth of Sauron come out or something. But definitely work in the idea that Sauron was one of those old-school elvy-goddy-wizardy types before he turned evil and black (racist!).
[/Extended Edition Spoiler]