[Fíriel of Ao Tea Roa]

Well, I am back again.<P>And my heart is heavy. Having seen "Return of the King" for the second time now, I think its editing is unusually sloppy. I was never much of a nitpicker; I loved "Fellowship" from the first screening, and the same happened with the extended version of "Two Towers". But the theater release of "Return of the King" has so many mistakes! <P>For the first time, one can clearly see when scale double have been used. <P>When Gandalf talks to Pippin about death as another journey, one can see that his sword is fake: it shows the air bubbles of a plastic sword, not the battle scars of a steel sword. <P>And Aragorn´s speech when he has been made king is really weak, and his speech before the battle does not stand out enough. Missing music support (for me this speech has always been the strongest moment of the trailer) probably?<P>The beacon on our highest peak Aoraki/Mount Cook was too much, everyone loved and we were ripped out of Middle-Earth, back into a National Geographic documentation. Darn, I was just so enchanted..<P>And then the storyline alterations: what about Sam not just crying after Frodo´s speech but actually TURNING BACK! What about Aragorn´s healing hands? What about Sam´s family living in Bag-Ends?<P>I have enormous hope for the extended version, where sidestories can be included. Merry pledging his service to Theoden.The grievance of the journey into Mordor- why not showing the shedding of Frodo´s and Sam´s orc armour? A grieving son (Eomer). More elvish. And what about a narrative about the later adventures of the main characters ..<P>As some of these scenes were in the trailer, I live with hope. And re-live the better moments of the cinematic version. Pippin heartbreaking singing. Frodo´s "one cannot simply go back in time". <P>---------------<P>Faenaduial, you are not alone.