Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy is a cinematic classic that defined a generation and inspired millions of new fans to embrace the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. By now, almost every fan knows the plot beats of the three LOTR films, The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King. In fact, Jackson’s films have become so rooted in pop culture that they have become the defining version of Tolkien’s work, rather than the source novel.
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With any book-to-screen adaptation, there are some parts of the text that have to be cut in order to tailor the story for a movie audience. However, Peter Jackson made some pretty big and bold cuts to The Lord of the Rings that sparked controversy with Tolkienites. And to this day, a lot of viewers who watch the films have no idea how much they’re missing out on.
Here are the 5 biggest things from The Lord of the Rings novel that Peter Jackson left out of the movies – even the Extended Editions.
5. Time & Maturation
The Fellowship of the Ring begins with the Hobbits of the Shire celebrating the 111th birthday of Bilbo Baggins, the hero of Tolkien’s LOTR prequel book, The Hobbit. Bilbo shocks his nephew Frodo by revealing that his birthday is also a farewell party, as he is leaving the Shire for a final adventure before old age steals the chance. Bilbo leaves Frodo the magic ring he stole from Gollum during The Hobbit and sets out on his way, leaving Gandalf shaken from a premonition that Bilbo’s ring is actually the One Ring of the dark lord Sauron.
In the novel, there is a massive time-jump of 17 years between the night that Bilbo leaves the Shire and the moment Gandalf returns to Bag End to visit Frodo, having confirmed through years of investigation that Bilbo’s ring is the One Ring, and that Sauron is hunting Frodo. In the movie version of Fellowship of the Ring, Peter Jackson makes it seem as though mere days have passed between Gandalf’s visits. There are literal years of growth in Frodo Baggins missing from the films, and generally speaking, the movies depict the four Hobbits as far more inexperienced and meek than they are in the book.
4. Old Forest & The Barrow-Wights
As stated, the four Hobbits are depicted as much more capable and adventurous in Tolkien’s novel. The book establishes this right from the onset, by giving the Hobbits their own adventure to survive, before they ever meet up with Aragorn or the other members of the Fellowship. That adventure sees the Hobbits trying to evade the Nazgûl “Black Riders” after leaving the Shire, by traveling East into the neighboring “Old Forest.” There, they encounter their first dangerous foe, “Old Man Willow,” the corrupted tree-spirit that tries to lure the Hobbits to sleep and swallow them into his trunk. Next, the Hobbits keep traveling East into the “Barrow-downs,” a hilly area that has become a haunted graveyard menaced by the wraith creatures known as “barrow-wights.” The Hobbits narrowly survive an encounter with one before finally making it to the village of Bree, where they meet up with “Strider” (Aragorn).
This early section of The Lord of the Rings was such a big omission from the films that Warner Bros. has greenlit a new film that will finally adapt it for the screen: The Lord of the Rings: Shadow of the Past. Former Late Night host Stephen Colbert is writing the film, which will start as a sequel set 14 years after LOTR, where the three remaining Hobbits (Sam, Pippin, and Merry) take Sam’s daughter on a nostalgic revisit of their famous quest. The film will then dip back into events from LOTR that we didn’t see in The Fellowship of the Ring, like the Barrow-downs. Many original LOTR cast members are expected to return.
3. More Middle-earth Avengers
As we said, the war for Middle-earth included many other characters than Peter Jackson could fit into his films. The tree-like beings, the Ents, and one of their elders, Treebeard, do appear in Jackson’s films and even get their grand moment laying siege to Saruman’s stronghold, Isengard, in The Two Towers. However, in the novel version, Treebeard goes right from Isengard to sending a force of Ent “huorns” to aid King Théoden and the cavalry that rode with Gandalf to Helm’s Deep and defeated Sauron’s army of Orcs.
The port city of Dol Amroth is a key piece of the human kingdom of Gondor, as is its ruler, Prince Imrahil. Imrahil has his own arc in The Return of the King, as Gondor and the remaining cities of men all unite for the final stand against Sauron. Imrahil was key in the pivotal final stands known as the “Battle of the Pelennor Fields” and the “Battle of the Morannon” in the book, but never appears in the movie.
Similarly, the novel includes “Grey Company,” a company of rangers that served Aragorn, led by his “kinsman,” Halbarad. They are called in by Galadriel, who senses Aragorn and the Fellowship need help after the Battle of Helm’s Deep. They aid Aragorn throughout the events of Return of the King, including his quest to raise an army of the dead, and the final battles at Pelennor Fields and Morannon.
In short, Middle-earth’s Avengers squad is much bigger on the book page than on the film screen.
2. Tom Bombadil & Radaghast the Brown
Middle-earth also had many noble spirits who aided the main cast of LOTR characters in the fight against Sauron. Two of those cuts were nature-based characters that may have been a bit too weird for movie audiences.
One character that Tolkienites felt Jackson robbed them of was Tom Bombadil. An enigmatic figure that Tolkien purposefully never fully defined or explained, Bombadil is implied to be some kind of entity or spirit tied to the lands of Middle-earth – perhaps even some kind of god or deity. He is a key “X factor” early on in “The Fellowship of the Ring” section of the novel, being the one who saves the Hobbits from Old Man Willow, and then getting called upon by Frodo to save them from the barrow-wight. He also arms the Hobbits with weaponry and guidance before sending them out of his forest. Tom is a character that Tolkien wrote about 20 years before he published The Lord of the Rings, in his poetic work “The Adventures of Tom Bombadil”. He’s also become a fan-favorite with an entire cult following and finally got his screen debut in Amazon’s LOTR prequel series, The Rings of Power.
Similarly, Gandalf’s fellow wizard Radagast the Brown is a character tied to nature, the woods, and animals. He appears in “The Fellowship of the Ring” section of the book as part of Gandalf’s story about how Saruman captured him in the tower of Orthanc. In the movie, Gandalf goes to meet Saruman, gets betrayed and captured, and uses his own magic to summon an eagle that helps him escape. The novel’s version of Gandalf vs. Saruman includes Radagast being manipulated by Saruman into luring Gandalf into the trap, and the “brown wizard” desperately making amends by sending the eagle to rescue his “cousin.” Radagast was given an arc in Peter Jackson’s movie trilogy of The Hobbit, as he investigates the sickness appearing in nature, signaling Sauron’s return as the “Necromancer.”
1. The Scouring of the Shire
Since Peter Jackson chose not to depict the four Hobbits as heroically as they appeared in the books, there was no reason to pay off that heroism the way the book ultimately does, with a final epilogue battle known as the “Battle of Bywater” or “The Scouring of the Shire.”
After Sauron and the One Ring are destroyed, Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin return home to the Shire, only to find that Saruman, his remaining forces, and Wormtongue have all taken over and turned the happy rustic land into a fascist work camp. The Hobbits have to escape custody and rally a small force of both Hobbits and a few men to go to war for their homeland. Because of all they’d been through during the War of the Ring, the Hobbits have become brave and battle-tested enough to fight and win the skirmish without their Fellowship companions. In the end, Wormtongue and Saruman turn on one another when cornered, with the former killing the latter, before being shot down by Hobbit archers.
While not confirmed, some fans speculate that Shadow of the Past will also feature a flashback to the Battle of Bywater, as it’s another major arc in the Hobbits’ tale that the movies left out.
You can stream The Lord of the Rings trilogy on HBO Max and Hulu.
