rotk - 2004-02-12 1:01 p.m. I was thinking of skipping this, but for the sake of closure, I won’t. There is something about Fellowship of the Rings that is magical. For three hours, it made me feel like a child as I stare at awe at the screen, in constant wonder of the new and colorful environments Peter Jackson and his crew took me. Two Towers was somewhat different in that everybody suddenly grew up, and characters become more epic and ambiguous compared to the more personal Fellowship, but I still happily gobble it all up because, among others, it contains the best battle scene ever. I liked that. But somehow, Return of the King seemed dull compared to the previous installments. It is a great achievement because it ends a great trilogy, but as a stand-alone movie, I think it failed me. Although the first two installments were quite different from the book, give or take, it retains the idea and the ‘feel’ that Tolkien conveyed. Return of the King forgets Tolkien and decided to be almost a Jerry Bruckheimer movie. Everything moved too quick and hectic. For example, Aragorn’s entrance with the Undead should be at a time when they were losing (Theoden was slain, Orcs were winning), not when the humans were winning. Except the “For Frodo” scene, which I felt is one of my best moments of movie watching ever. There are a lot of things that I can complain about, but to me it boils down to this – if PJ decided to shoot the ‘Scouring of the Shire’, can the Hobbit quartet still beat Saruman and Wormtongue? I doubt it. They would still need the help of Gandalf or Aragorn or Legolas or Gimli. However I am not the one making this movie and I doubt anybody can make a superior LOTR movie other than PJ. Thankfully, there’s the extended version DVD to wait for and hopefully, like TTT, the DVD is better than the movie.