The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) - 237 questions

Directed by Peter Jackson, starring Christopher Lee, Elijah Wood, Ian Holm, Ian McKellen, John Rhys-Davies, Miranda Otto, Orlando Bloom, Sean Astin, Sean Bean, Viggo Mortensen, Andy Serkis, Billy Boyd, Cate Blanchett, Dominic Monaghan, Hugo Weaving, Karl Urban, Bernard Hill, David Wenham, John Noble, Liv Tyler (add more)

The "questions" section is for any random questions that occurred to you while watching this film, or anything you didn't entirely understand, and which Google or the IMDb can't help with. Submit them as a question, and hopefully someone will answer (the bold comments in brackets) - check back regularly. If the answer is wrong, or missing information, please use the "clarify answer" option. Don't feel limited - want to know what music played in a certain scene? Whether this was the first film to use a certain effect? Here's the place to ask!

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Entry If Gondor's royal line of succession was broken, how was it re-established from Isildur to Aragorn? [This'll be a complex answer - sorry in advance. When Elendil, Isildur and co returned to Middle-Earth after the Fall of Numenor, they set up two kingdoms, Arnor in the north, ruled directly by Elendil (as High King of both kingdoms) and Gondor in the south (ruled jointly by Isildur and his brother Anarion in their father's name). Elendil and Anarion both died in the War of the Last Alliance, and Isildur fell shortly after, leaving Isildur's youngest son Valandil (his other sons died with Isildur) ruling Arnor and Anarion's son Meneldil ruling Gondor. Valandil, as the direct heir of Elendil, should have been proclaimed High King over both kingdoms, but Meneldil refused to recognise his authority over Gondor - the two kingdoms effectively became entirely seperate at this point. Meneldil's line ruled Gondor for two thousand years before the last King, answering a challenge from the Witch-King, entered Minas Morgul, never to be seen again, leaving the Stewards in control of Gondor. Arnor, in the meantime, lasted nine hundred years before splitting into three kingdoms, each ruled by one of the three sons of the last king of Arnor. The land of Arthedain, ruled by the eldest son, lasted slightly more than one thousand years before falling to the forces of Angmar - the people vanished into the wilderness, becoming the Dunedain rangers, with the son of the last king becoming their chieftain, a role that was handed down from father to son until, another thousand years later, Aragorn was given the position. So Aragorn can trace his ancestry directly back to Elendil, the last High King of the two Kingdoms, allowing him to legitimately claim the throne of Gondor. Phew...]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry How come the Mouth of Sauron was never sent into battle? [He's not a warrior - he's Sauron's spokesman. The attacks on Gondor and Rohan are intended to wipe those societies out - Sauron's not interesting in accepting any sort of surrender, so there's no point in sending his spokesman in with the troops.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry In the "Fan Credits" section, I noticed that Sean Astin's (Samwise Gamgee) name appear on it. Are there other actors whose names appear on the fan credits? [Yes, there are quite a lot of them, but I wouldn't want to deny you the pleasure of looking for them yourself. I'll give you Dominic Monaghan, Cate Blanchett and Christopher Lee - see how many others you can spot.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry In the Extended Edition after Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli escaped from the falling skulls, they saw an outside scene of Corsair ships and two burning towns on a river. Aragorn saw this and became very sad. Is he sad because of the burning towns, or is the fact that he was unable to get the Army of Dead to fight for him? Also, what is the importance of the burning towns on the river? [Aragorn believes that he's failed - Elrond told him that he needs the Army of the Dead in order to defeat Sauron's forces, and, at that moment, he thinks that they're not going to join him. The burning towns are Gondorian settlements that the Corsairs have already attacked on their way up the river - probably intended to represent the haven of Pelargir, an important Gondorian port. In the book, the Dead helped Aragorn to defeat the Corsairs at Pelargir and were given their freedom there - they never came to Minas Tirith. The ships were then crewed by a party of Rangers (who did not appear in the films) on their run upriver to relieve the besieged Gondor forces.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry What happened to Gothmog, the orc lieutenant, at the Battle Of Pelennor? I am aware that he fights Eowyn in ROTK Extended but there is also footage of him being hacked to death by Aragorn and Gimli simultaneously. [In the extended cut we see that after Eówyn defeats the witch king she struggles away. Gothmog notices this and starts to chase her. Just before Gothmog gets to an unarmed Eówyn Aragorn, Legolas & Gimli save the day hacking Gothmog without a fight.]
Time
Entry In the Extended Edition of "The Two Towers," it obvious that Denethor has a liking of his now-deceased older son Boromir and a disliking of his younger son Faramir. This is more evident when Denethor boldly said to Faramir in the throne room that he wished that Faramir and Boromir had switched places so that the former dies and the latter live. Is there a reason in the original novel why Denethor has an unfavorable opinion towards Faramir, his younger son? [No, no really. Denethor's wife, Finduilas died early, and the grief turned him into a grim and humourless man - one suggestion is that Faramir takes heavily after his mother, and Denethor dislikes him for that reminder; another suggestion is that it's actually Boromir who takes after the mother, and that Denethor favours him for that reason. Whatever the issue is, it seems likely that it started early on - Boromir translates to "Faithful Jewel", whereas Faramir seems to translate to something like "Adequate Jewel". As even their names appear to reflect the prejudice against Faramir, whatever the problem is, it goes back a long way. Maybe, once Boromir was born, giving Denethor an heir, he really wanted a daughter and was disappointed by the arrival of another son. Compounded by the death of his beloved wife (making a daughter impossible), that disappointment could easily grow into the dislike that he shows in the film. There's also the point that, although unseen in the film (unless the Extended Cut touches on it), Denethor has been using a palantir, which has allowed Sauron to affect his mind - it's not unreasonable to think that Sauron could have determined that Faramir was actually the stronger-willed of the brothers, and had deliberately influenced Denethor's mind against him to hamper the younger man's efforts against Mordor.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry This may be a stupid question, but is it just me that thinks the Gondorian soldiers are poorly-trained to fight or in poorly defensive formation against the Orcs and trolls? Also, are the soldiers of Gondor conscripts, as it seems that there is no able-bodied male civilian in Minas Tirith, and those who are able-bodied are soldiers? [That's because they were under the rule of Denethor who was very foolish and didn't care about the consequences.]
Time
Entry In the next few months, the Extended Edition version will be released. Why did Peter Jackson remove about fifty minutes of footage (which will appear in the Extended Edition) for the theatrical release? [The movie was already 3 hours long and he removed footage not strictly necessary to make it that length. Movies are shown to test audiences for things like length, proper ending etc. His said that while good, it was just too long.]
Answered by Grumpy Scot Time
Entry Why does Sam refer to his old gaffer while killing the orcs guarding Frodo? [Sam's fighting to protect those that he loves - Frodo (directly, through his rescue attempt) and the Shire in general and his father (indirectly, through their whole quest to destroy the Ring). The whole "that's for so-and-so" thing seems quite in keeping with his mood at the time.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry Why aren't the four hobbits given a hero's welcome when they return to the Shire? The fellow who greets them seems less than impressed that they just saved Middle-Earth. Do the Shire folk not know about what went on? Do they ever learn of it? [Few hobbits have ever ventured outside of the Shire and tend to regard Bilbo and Frodo with a certain amount of suspicion for having left for so long. In the novel, the Shire is attacked and therefore they would know about it, but since it is apparently unharmed in the movie they wouldn't care very much about what was going on in the rest of Middle Earth.]
Time
Entry This may be a bit stupid, but when Pippin is singing to Denethor while he's eating, is him eating supposed to mean anything symbolically? [Well, the fact that Denethor IS eating in the first place during such a highly emotionally charged dire moment, coupled with the fact that he actually asks Pippin to sing serves to demonstrate his heartlessness. As we hear Pippin's stirring voice, the spurting red tomato is used to add a shocking visual as it represents the blood of the many men who are riding to Osgiliath to their death.]
Answered by Rikki Time
Entry With the Eomer crying question, the answer says that he could be grieving for Gamling. Why would Eomer be so emotional of his uncle's right-hand man? [After the deaths of their parents when they were very young, Eomer and Eowyn were taken in by Theoden, and grew up in his house. As such, it's quite likely that Eomer has known Gamling for many years and regards him as a close friend, possibly even a brother.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry Where in the movie is the song called " Use Well the Days" sung by Annie Lennox? [It's not in the movie at all and is only included on the deluxe edition of the soundtrack as an extra.]
Answered by Myridon Time
Entry Is it true that Cirdan the Shipwright can be seen near the end of the movie? If so, which actor plays Cirdan? [It's true, yes, you can see him, standing on the dock at the Grey Havens, behind Galadriel, Elrond and Celeborn. He's also seen in the prologue to the Fellowship of the Ring - he's the elder of the two male elves who possess Rings (the other being Gil-galad). Cirdan was played by Michael Elsworth.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry In the theatrical trailer, we see a scene of Eomer grieving for a dead person, presumably during or after the battle for Minas Tirith. This scene is not in the theatrical version of the movie. Will it be in the extended version? And who is the dead person? Theoden (Eomer's uncle)? Or some other fallen warrior that Eomer was very fond of? Thanks. [The two most likely candidates would be his sister Eowyn (not dead, but certainly in a bad way after slaying the Witch King) or Gamling, Theoden's right-hand man, whose death we will apparently see in the Extended Cut. It could conceivably be Theoden, but we've already seen Eowyn grieving for him - having Eomer doing the same would probably be overdoing it.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry Who is the guy that plays one of the Gondorian Soldiers by the Black Gate? I forgot the timecode, but there's a close-up of him right before Aragorn begins his speech. [Who knows - he's just an extra.]
Answered by Tailkinker Time
Entry In the trivia section, it is said that the movie editors made a video clip of Elijah Wood and Sean Astin to the song "I Got You". Can anyone please tell me where I could find this? [The song on the video montage is "I got you babe." Just as the rest of the main cast received personal gifts, this was a personal meaningful gift to Sean and Elijah, at the wrap of the films and it is not for the general public.]
Answered by Rikki Time
Entry Tolkien never gave any age for Legolas but Peter Jackson did (I think it's 2100 years or so). Where did he get the idea for Legolas' age? Was it just arbitrary or was it based on other evidence (like that Legolas is obviously a younger elf- younger than, say, Elrond or Arwen)? [We know he must be older than Arwen as she is the last elf born in Middle Earth. She is around 1657 at the beginning of the War of the Rings.]
Answered by Myridon Time
Entry After the Ring has been destroyed we see the reactions from the Fellowship members. Pippin is kneeling on the ground, sobbing Frodo's name. Is he crying out of joy because Frodo succeeded or is he crying because he thinks Frodo died in the process? [Probably both. It's something he would have very mixed emotions about.]
Time
Entry I would really like to know - is this picture of Saruman definitely his final fate?(http://www.councilofelrond.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=My_eGallery&file=index&do=showpic&pid=5639&orderby=hitsD). I thought that Wormtongue was going to stab Saruman on Orthanc in the extended ROTK and does it not seem a bit graphic for a LOTR film? [A bit graphic? We've had heads and limbs lopped off and fingers bitten off - doesn't seem like this is significantly worse. Until the Extended Edition comes out, there's no way to tell (unless you're on here, Mr Jackson) whether this is the real deal or not - that being said, what we see here doesn't actually preclude Grima doing his bit. As I understand it, during the final confrontation between Gandalf and Saruman, Saruman is standing on the peak of Orthanc - and presumably, in order to converse with Gandalf down below, Saruman will be standing pretty much at the edge. It's not an implausible sequence of events that Grima stabs Saruman, leading to the wizard falling from the tower, to be ultimately impaled on his own devices (as we see in the image).]
Answered by Tailkinker Time

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