The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

In watching this again there were a couple things that stood out to me. We watched the extended edition so how the army of the dead join Aragorn is presented differently. In the theatrical version I remember it cutting when he yells "what say you?" It then goes to the battle and next time you see Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli, they get off a ship that setup to make you think the armies of Rohan and Gondor are being ambushed by the armies from the east but the three warrior heroes jump off the ship followed a few seconds later by the army of the dead, answering Aragorn's question. Now when it comes to screenwriting this is a far better way to show this, not just because it's showing not telling but also because of motivation because all the motivation they need which is also expressed at the end of the battle is the army of the dead want to be free of their curse which only happens by them fulfilling their oath to the king.

But in the extended edition, after Aragorn yells "what say you" the scene goes on and the dead give no answer but instead attempt to kill the three heroes by causing an avalanche of skulls and then once the heroes are outside of the caves the leader of the army of the dead walks outside the cave to basically just say okay we'll do it. This also adds a scene showing Aragorn and the heroes with their new army stealing that ship from the eastern army which nicely answers the question, where did they get that ship from? I guess when watching the movie 20 years ago I never thought of asking that question, just accepted that they were behind the scenes fighting off the eastern armies I guess especially since it's shown that they had the army of the dead with them. But this does beg the question: what's better, showing how the heroes got this means of getting to the battle or showing a more sensical motivation for the army joining the battle helping them turn the tide of the war?

As someone who studied screenwriting, we're taught that you have dilemmas like this all the time and the best thing to do would be to find a middle ground, which I feel that easy middle ground would have been to cut away from Aragorn saying "what say you" to them encountering the eastern armies and having it be where the reveal of them having the army of the dead be made there, which in the extended edition, you can honestly do this already because the army of the dead helping them take over the ship is done in a way of being a reveal like this. I feel this is a better choice because the way it's shown makes it feel like there was no real motivation for the army of the dead to join them because it makes it look like they don't care about their curse being lifted and so later when they ask Aragorn to keep his promise, it makes that feel so out of place like is this just meant to be some sort of character development showing the army of the dead either doesn't think before they act or that Aragorn did good in calling their bluff? It just seems ridiculous to me, making me prefer the theatrical version more where you only have to fill in a small logic gap of answering how did the heroes get that ship?

Another thing that stood out that I remember being a big moment, especially for the time of the initial release of this movie was Eowyn slaying the Nazgul and answering the cry of "no man can kill me" with "I am no man." It makes me miss a time when it feels everyone was more able to respect that line and her for what she did whereas I couldn't help but feel how much of an uproar would exist on social media from so many if something like that was put in a movie that released today and how it would then just be written off as being "woke." But speaking of Eowyn, I really like how the extended edition shows the development between her and Faramir more, whereas in the theatrical version, I remember thinking back then it felt pretty convenient that they just ended up together out of nowhere to avoid her being on the losing side of a love triangle once Aragorn and Arwen are reunited. So that kind of cancels out my criticism above.

Another thing that I remember was one of the complaints and memes that came from this movie from before the time of memes on social media like how we know them today, was the concept of how this movie had a million endings. It still does have some fake outs but I'd say with this being probably more fifth time or so seeing this, they didn't feel as long and continuous as it felt before, especially the first time seeing it. If anything I actually felt like the ending was short this time around which is probably because I knew what to expect but it's just funny how that critique doesn't hold up for me as well the more I see this film. Now let's just see if the Hobbit movies feel shorter after watching them again but I feel when we watch those I will be too distracted by the fact that CGI was worse than movies that were made ten years before and if I'm not mistaken on a lower budget. But that's a trilogy for another time.