You shall not pass up on the chance to consider the best to the worst-ranked of The Lord of the Rings films from the original Peter Jackson trilogy. The series began with The Fellowship of the Ring, released in cinemas in 2001, and concluded in 2003 with The Return of the King, and for those three years, the Tolkien-inspired franchise completely dominated the box offices.
For good reason, too. The Lord of the Rings films boasted cutting-edge CGI art, a serious respect for the much-loved literature, and an ensemble cast including the likes of Elijah Wood, Sean Bean, and Sir Ian McKellen. All of those original films are stand-alone masterpieces the likes of which should get you ignoring your incredibly urgent emails and sitting down with a box of popcorn to delve into the intimidating six-hour extended versions, but which one really is the best of those original, iconic three?
#1: The Fellowship of the Ring
It’s the Lord of the Rings film that brought in an entire generation of movie-goers. Beginning in the Shire with Frodo Baggins discovering that his uncle’s old ring has been bequeathed to him, Frodo is ushered into the classic hero’s journey, forced into taking that ring, the Ring of Power TM, to Mordor where it can be destroyed in the fires of Mount Doom.
This, The Lord of the Rings film has the gargantuan task of introducing a vast array of characters, a brand new world with very specific lore to take account of, and keeping the pacing and tension perfectly balanced to engage a fickle audience from beginning to end. It pulls all of this off in breathtaking style, paying homage to Tolkien’s expansive imagination and keeping the stakes relevant and heavy. It also injects light-hearted moments of fun that people still reference in memes to this day. You really can’t get more memorable than that.
#2: The Return of the King
Part of the problem with the later instalments of The Lord of the Rings trilogy films is that they had so much epic material to cover and only a two to three-hour window with which to achieve that coverage. The Return of the King does suffer for that, which is why it really can’t take the top spot. It attempts to give ample screen time to the epic battle of Minas Tirith, Frodo’s journey across Mordor to Mount Doom, including Gollum’s betrayal and Gandalf and Pippin’s adventure with the suicidal king of Gondor.
The film does an admirable job of keeping its pacing despite how much it has to cover. Pippin’s character growth in this particular instalment is particularly noteworthy and heart-wrenching. He is a far-cry from the young, naive Hobbit that left the Shire as part of the fellowship in the first movie and, in a similar vein, seeing how far Frodo has fallen, how much of a shell he is compared to the person he was when he left the Shire at the beginning of this story, is a shock and a catharsis that brings a sense of real satisfaction.
#3: The Two Towers
Okay, so The Two Towers does have Treebeard. That alone is almost enough to push this sequel higher up in the ranking, but this instalment of The Lord of the Rings takes the bottom spot for several important reasons.
For this film, the pacing is probably the messiest it is across the series, story-wise. The narrative slips between Merry and Pippin traveling with Treebeard, Frodo and Sam, and their descent into Hell with Gollum, and Aragorn’s adventures with Gimli and Legolas in Rohan. There’s an inordinate amount of time at the beginning of the film where nothing really happens to drive interest. Most of the parties are traveling, so there’s a lot of restricted banter designed as exposition for the next big scenes, and the introduction of Eowyn seems arbitrary when the audience is mostly interested in finding out what’s going on with Aragorn and Arwen.
The film suffers from the same problems as The Return of the King in that it has too much to cover in too little time and over different locations. The scale is on an entirely different level to that of The Fellowship of the Ring, and it’s clear that it’s not quite known what should be cut and kept. Covering the mid-point of a story is always hard. The hook of the initial opening passages has died down, the lore established, and the characters often need ample space to be able to grow adequately enough alongside establishing key plot points to drive the narrative on.
One Film to Rule Them All…
While The Fellowship of the Ring is arguably the best piece of cinema when comparing the three films of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, all three of these films are fantastically entertaining. A lot of love has clearly gone into each and every minute of footage. The spectacular colour palettes, the slow, sensual world-building, and the deep look into the psychological toll of the journey on each of the characters all speak to the respect the creators have for Tolkien’s original work and the fanbase as a whole.
So grab that popcorn, a blanket, and your friends and hunker down for a Lord of the Rings trilogy weekend. If you’re feeling particularly hardcore, then maybe you really can delve into the amazing six hour renditions to see how those mad geniuses change up the pacing of the story, what they add to and take away from the characters and how adding more material would change up the order of the films in this list.
