Barring a surprise release of Back to the Future 4 on new year’s eve, Pirates of the Caribbean was the best film of 2003.

Return of the King was close though! Like all big franchises, the writing let it down in the end. Good, but not good enough. Certainly couldn’t compete with the Pirates script.

I would’ve prefered fewer, or tighter, endings, less teary eyed manipulation, and a half hour slideshow of New Zealand tacked onto the end. Prepare for spoilers:

Good bits and references

• The introductory flashback.
• The lighting of the beacons. I want more NZ photography!
• Monty Python’s Black Knight’s sword-through-the-visor attack.
• Legolas downing a mumakil by flying a snowspeeder round its legs. At least that’s what I assume they were alluding to.
• Sam Raimi tribute camera movement at the entrance to the Paths of the Dead. The deadites were good all round.
• Sam’s rendition of “Get away from her you BITCH!” as “Get away from him you FILTH!” However, the power loader was more convincing than the Light of Elendil.
• The bald tattooed guy riding the mumakil.
• Minas Tirith’s suicide cliff, and the resulting flaming suicide plummet.
• “Release the prisoners!”
• Gandalf riding up and around Minas Tirith.
• Minas Morgul. Dark, and yet green at the same time!
• All the bits where the ring made the sound go funny.
• Gollum dies happy. Star Trek II is now officially retroactively a ripoff.
• People standing, sitting and even sleeping right on the edge of chasms.
• Sloth from The Goonies.
• Gimli jokes fortunately toned down.

Bad bits

• Dorset Blue Vinny dialogue.
• Endless sabre rattling and flowery speech.
• Stuck in the middle with you didn’t play as Denethor prepared himself for the pyre.
• And what was he pouring on himself? Had Gondor invented the catalytic cracker? The only flammable liquids they possessed should’ve been dark and sludgy.
• Fellowship theme > Rohan theme > Gondor theme. Howard Shore has the brain eater.
• Gandalf beating people over the head with his staff. Goddamit Jim, he’s a wizard, not a doctor soldier!
• No Saruman. No palantir development.
• Strong echoes of the more boring parts of The Two Towers.
• “Arwen’s life force is bound to the ring”? Where did that come from? Where did it go?
• Go Go Yubari applied mace-feer to The Bride more convincingly than the Witch King did to Eowyn. They both got spiked in the head in the end, too.
• Good guys: white skin, blue eyes, perfect teeth; fighting for the West. Bad guys: black skin, evil eyes, horrible teeth; savages from the South and East. Unavoidable given the source material, but don’t think we didn’t notice.
• Gimli jokes unfortunately not entirely absent.

Conclusion

Fellowship: 10, Towers: 9, King: 9.5. Arise, sir Peter, I think.