Just as an aside, what about this idea (for those who haven't watched the Appendices for RotK this was for a proposed 'addition' to the Battle before the Black Gates. Sauron was to appear to fight Aragorn but he first appeared in his earlier form of Annatar. The idea was that he would appear this way in an attempt to win over Aragorn & when that didn't work he was to adopt his earlier form from the Last Alliance)
http://img236.exs.cx/img236/9499/d117hn.jpg
Would this have worked? Did the writers change their minds because they wanted to stay faithful to the books or because they feared the reaction of the fans?
The reason I ask is that I think this goes to the heart of why certain things from the books were left in despite changes in the storyline which made them seem at best incoherent & at worst nonsensical. How much freedom did they feel they had in making changes to the story? If the books had had a less devoted following would they have gone further than they did? And if they had felt they had complete freedom to 'adapt' the story as they wished, how different or how faithful would it have been?
Perhaps what we've ended up with is bits of two movies awkwardly stuck together - a 'faithful' adaptation of the book & another one which just uses the book as a starting point. Could this be the reason for all the 'back & forthing' we've been going through here - they simply couldn't decide whether they wanted to make a movie of Tolkien's LotR or their own?