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So, anyway....

You've probably talked about this, because I tend to avoid this thread -- I don't really want too many spoilers.

But you can't too easily avoid the recurring and now just about confirmed rumors that Sauron appears in the ending -- and that Aragorn has a swordfight with him?

Now, when I've seen that last, I've averted my eyes, because I SO don't want it to be true!!

Can Jackson go THAT wrong? Maybe he can. For instance, the longer I've thought about it, and now re-reading that part of LOTR (just last night, in fact), I feel Jackson made a rare but really nasty misstep in his handling of Faramir, and that whole episode. That tells me that he can make really significant miscalls, though he usually doesn't.

It's one of the striking facets, and a literary study in itself, that Sauron is The Big Bad of the entire trilogy but he never personally appears! It's a study in Stephen King's Big Bug theory, that the bug you don't see is always scarier than the one you do. It allows the imagination to manufacture what IT finds scary, which is always worse than what a frontal description will do.

Now, I had a similar worry when I read, years ago now, that Jackson was going to show Sauron in the opening scenes. "Big mistake," I thought. But that was carried off in a masterful display of seen/unseen, and it worked.

But this would be SO wrong. Sauron, having a SWORD-fight with Aragorn? I just want someone either to tell me it isn't true, or to shake Jackson by the shoulders and say, "It's all so good, we'll forgive you for Faramir -- but for the love of all that's decent, don't do this!!!"

Thoughts?

Dan

Hmmm.... I don't personally have a strong emotional reaction either way on the Sauron issue, Dan.

Anyone else? I know this is a hot issue for a lot of folk.

I can admit that the enemy unseen is often scarier, but for whatever reason PJ can't get his head around that and make it fit into his vision. Can't say why.

One of the great moments in the story is the moment with Frodo at the cracks of Doom where Sauron suddenly realizes exactly what is happening.... [double-take] WHAAAAAAAAAAAAT ?????????????????

I can see it in my mind, but it looks sortof like a red lighthouse beacon, the eye looking somewhere else, searching.... and then suddenly whipping around to spotlight Frodo on the mountain. I don't know if that vision could be made to have drama in pictures without a face or not! But I can picture the Sauron from the Prologue doing what I imagine, suddenly, in the midst of battle, a sense in the back of his head, slow realization, stopping, turning, zooming in.... helpless to stop it. Crying out perhaps or a futile gesture of rage.

And Faramir, as you know, will be made right in the end, probably even made more right in the Extended Version of TTT, as there is reported to be added scenes coming that show some flashbacks to Faramir and Boromir, and show how Faramir knew that Boromir was dead. Also added will be more scenes with he and Frodo after he decides to release them. He was used a little bit to add some suspense and doubt in TTT, but I think when you look at him as a whole after the third film, he will look better. Right now he is one chapter out of the complete context he will have.