"One Ring to rule them all ..."
Hello everyone!
Well, alright, I'm probably not saying goodbye forever, that's just not going to work out for me seeing as I spend a lot of my waking (and sleeping!) hours in that particular fantasy world.
But so far as the movies go, for the time being, this is going to be the end.
I do in fact plan on watching War of the Rohirrim, although I'll admit I'm going in very wary, mostly because it feels like they're trying to shove another girl-boss down our throats when they didn't actually need to do it, but I digress.
I'll be seeing that eventually, but for tonight, we need to see just what the Companions of the Ring are willing to sacrifice on this last leg of their journey.
How far are all of them willing to go?
There's only one way to find out: we have to dive deep into The Return of the King.
Now, we know that the Fellowship was formed to take the Ring to Mordor, but got separated along the way, after which Frodo and Sam paired up with Gollum to get them where they need to go, Merry and Pippin teamed up with the Ents to wreck Isengard, and Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli relied on Gandalf to save their butts at Helm's Deep.
The third movie opens with a little trip backwards in history as we reveal just how Sméagol became Gollum - aka, his best friend pulled the Ring out of the river muck, he immediately got possessed by its evil, throttled said bestie, and was afterwards kicked out of his community, to go wither underneath the mountains.
Happily ever after, eh?
But he's definitely leading the Hobbits further and further towards their goal, so at least we can give him that much.
Before we take a look at their journey, however, we have to catch up with our heroes, who go inspect the water-works of Isengard and finally reunite about three quarters of the Fellowship. They also manage not to get hit by a Palantír on its way down, though Pippin REALLY wants to have a look inside that shiny bowling ball.
He doesn't get the chance before they return to Meduseld, where a great feast is held for the fallen, and we all wonder how long this merry-making will last.
The answer is: not long, because Pippin nicks the orb from Gandalf, looks into it, and it turns out they just got incredibly lucky. Instead of giving the Enemy anything, Pippin actually glimpses a portion of Sauron's plan, which is that he's going to attach Minas Tirith.
Gandalf then packs the Hobbit up to ride hard for the city, so they can mount a proper defense, leaving Rohan under Aragorn's watchful eye. At least the atmosphere there is a bit cozier than the chill of the fortress Pippin walks into, however, because the current Steward, Denethor, erstwhile father of Boromir and Faramir, is on a rampage because his favourite son's dead.
Despite everyone's misgivings, Pippin offers the lord his fealty, in return for the life Boromir saved, not that it matters much in that moment as Gandalf and Denethor face off.
Viewers then get to see the old man is, well, coocoo for cocoa puffs already, clinging to a seat of power that's crumbling out from beneath him, and Gandalf says this succinctly enough with just one sentence: Authority is not given to you to deny the return of the King, Steward!
Apply ice to burned area, copiously.
But they're now playing a waiting game, because both sides are now ready, although Mordor's done waiting because the army sets out from Minas Morgul to assail Osgiliath. The Gondorians have at least one small measure of hope, however, because Gandalf previously set Pippin to light the beacon of the city, sending a distress call across the border to Rohan, where Théoden musters the Rohirrim to ride out.
And even as the Gondorians retreat, the Rohirrim reach Dunharrow, and Aragorn realizes there isn't enough time for the full force to muster; this is emphasised even more when Elrond suddenly crops up in the encampment, bringing with him a very famous, re-forged sword: Andúril. He explains that Arwen seems to be dying from the evil will that's spreading from Mordor (Arwen having returned home from her journey to the Grey Havens after seeing a vision of her son by Aragorn) and everyone needs to now stand together, or fall together.
Oh, and also, Aragorn's only hope are the Paths of the Dead.
That said and done, Aragorn finally lets Éowyn down as gently as he can, telling her he can never love her back, and heads into the night with Legolas and Gimli. They do in fact encounter the army of the dead, but we don't immediately know the decision they make, because we have slightly more important matters to attend to.
The Rohirrim are riding, it's true, but the siege of Gondor has already begun, with Osgiliath overrun, and Faramir having barely escaped. Denethor, dissatisfied as ever, sends him back with a small company of riders, absolutely not enough, and definitely a suicide mission, which everyone and their mother knows, except Denethor, who believes Boromir would have done this and won.
Idiot.
A gravely wounded Faramir is brought back by his horse, right behind which is the army that's about to start whooping ass. And as Denethor's madness officially begins, so does the siege, during which we see plenty of amazing action sequences, and a few humourous ones to top it off.
Unfortunately, we also get to see Denethor nearly burn Faramir alive, but at least Gandalf gets there in time to save the younger man. The older one ... I'd say something about crispiness but, well, it might not be a politically correct term.
And just when it seems that Gondor's about to kneel, Rohan arrives, in the most spectacular scene that's been laid out in cinema in the last twenty years. Théoden's speech is one for the ages, never to be forgotten, and the cavalry charge the Orc ranks, flattening anything and anyone in its path.
Until they hit the wall of giant elephants from Harad.
At this point things take a turn for the worse when the Witchking of Angmar enters the battle to take out Rohan's leader, but he isn't counting on Éowyn being there.
See, she disguised herself as a man to ride with the army, and brought Merry along with her; together, they defeat the evil sorcerer, of whom it was said that no man could kill - and luckily, neither one of them falls under that category.
Around the same time, Aragorn and his dead army arrive to mop up the rest of the enemy forces, and Gondor lives to see another day - while the dead can finally rest (no, Gimli, you can't just keep them around, they're not toys).
Our heroes have won the battle, but not the war, and Gandalf knows that there's still plenty of obstacles (and armies!) between Frodo and Mount Doom, which he won't be able to reach if they remain there. So Aragorn proposes a desperate scheme: they'll ride out and challenge Sauron head-on. It's the only way, and, because their previous death-certified escapades have always worked out, everyone else agrees it's as good a chance as any.
So they go and do just that.
Meanwhile, Frodo and Sam have been having (mis)adventures of their own. Nearly discovered at Minas Morgul, they climbed up the stairs, Gollum managed to convince Frodo Sam's false, so Frodo sent him back, and then he recognized his mistake after freeing himself from Shelob's lair and getting attacked by Gollum.
Of course he also then gets stabbed by the giant spider, because obviously, and while Sam fights her off (nobody's more loyal than Sam, nobody), he despairs thinking Frodo's actually dead this time. The Orcs who come to take the body reveal otherwise, however, so Sam rescues his master from Cirith Ungol, and they start their desperate trek to the volcano they need to reach.
Aragorn & Co's last stand comes in handy because Sauron's attention is fixed on these new intruders, so the Hobbits can actually get to their destination, only, there's a catch.
Frodo succumbs to the Ring.
Sauron realizes his folly even as he almost wins against the Captains of the West, calling his remaining Nazgúl to Mount Doom, but inside the chamber the day is saved by the most unlikely character: Gollum.
Incensed that someone else has "his" Ring, he battles Frodo, bites his finger off, and stumbles over the edge down into the lava river.
Thus Sauron is destroyed, this time for good, and Gandalf rescues our Hobbits out of the disaster with some friendly help from the Great Eagles.
The Company now finally reunited in full, they attend Aragorn's coronation and subsequent wedding to Arwen (fully cured and gorgeous as ever), before dispersing to their own homelands. Unfortunately for Frodo, however, his hurts and all the wounds he picked up along the journey never fully heal, so eventually he joins Gandalf and Bilbo on one last journey: to the Grey Havens.
There, to Sam's despair, it's revealed Bilbo and Frodo are both sailing West with the last remaining Elf lords, to heal their lasting hurt.
And as the ship disappears into the sunset, Sam returns to the Shire, his home, and his family, as the door closes on this chapter of the story.
I swear I'm sniffling like an idiot just writing this last sentence LOL!
Poignant, emotional, action-packed, and filled with both hope and despair, The Return of the King absolutely deserves all the Academy Awards it received and all other laurels that were heaped upon it once it was released. I don't think there's been a movie quite like it before or since, at least not in the specific genre it dominates.
It concludes our characters' journeys, neatly wrapping a bow over this entire story, allowing for Men to take dominion while everyone else quietly fades into obscurity. The great evil of their time's been defeated, and that's the most important thing.
Equally important is the note that Jackson and his team kept up their continuity with the story they were writing, so that even though they might not have followed Tolkien 100% of the time, or word for word, they followed their own trajectories and brought Tolkien's spirit full-circle by the time Frodo's ready to sail the horizon.
It's a master class in storytelling that delivers in both action and emotion, and honestly, if you haven't watched it yet, I really do have to wonder what you're waiting for. It's right at your fingertips, and absolutely worth your time.
10000000000/10 recommend!
xx
*images and video not mine
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