Question: At the end of film, when the hobbits and Gandalf go to the Grey Havens, Elrond, Galadriel, and Celeborn are also there. Behind them is another person who disappears after the others board the ship (I assume he boarded also). He looks to me like one of the elves who received the three rings, shown in the prologue of the first film. Could this perhaps be Cirdan or Gil-galad?
Question: Frodo, Sam, Pippin, and Merry are all hobbits from the Shire, yet they all have different accents. Why is this?
Answer: Obviously it is because the actors are from different places. But you can explain it away by saying that the hobbits are from different families. From Bilbo's speech at his party it is clear that the Hobbits are split into a small number of large extended families - the Bagginses (Frodo, obviously), Tooks (Pippen), Brandybucks (Merry) etc. The families differ in obvious ways - the Tooks are large, the Bagginses are eccentric, the Proudfoots have large feet. Perhaps accent is another family trait?
Question: At the end, where is it that Frodo, Gandalf, Bilbo, Elrond, Galadriel and Celeborn are sailing to, and why are they all going there?
Answer: They are sailing to the Undying Lands. Elrond, Galadriel, and Celborn are leaving because the time of the elves has enden and for them to stay in Middle Earth would be pointless. Bilbo leaves because he was offered and accepted Arwen's place. Frodo because there is nothing left for him in Middle Earth and I believe that Gandalf leaves because he has fully filled his promise to help Frodo destroy the ring. An additional part of Frodo's reason for leaving Middle Earth is because his wound (from the Nazgul) will no longer pain him in Valinor, the Undying Lands. Bilbo and Frodo also earned the privilege as Ringbearers. In fact, Tolkien says that because he bore the Ring for even a short while, Sam Gamgee also was later permitted to journey to the West.
Question: Why did all the orcs kill each other in the fort?
Chosen answer: When the two Orcs were fighting in the tower where Frodo was being kept, the larger one shoved the smaller one down the stairwell to a lower level. He then yelled down that the smaller Orc tried to kill him, so they should kill the smaller Orc. From that brawl an Orc was pushed out a window down to yet, another lower level. This spurred another brawl below...a chain reaction, in other words. Also, there were two companies of orcs in the tower so there was a natural rivalry already present - much like when the orcs and uruk-hai that captured Merry and Pippin fought amongst themselves. Finally, the power of the ring had an effect.
Question: In the dream/vision sequence as Arwen is on her way to the Grey Havens, does anyone know who the little boy was that played her son? It's just that he looks so much like a little Viggo, I was wondering if they were related?
Question: I haven't read the books so I don't know if this is in them, but why did Frodo leave at the end?
Answer: For pretty much the same reason as he says in his final speech of the film "I have been deeply hurt, Sam. I tried to save the Shire, and it has been saved, but not for me. It must often be so, Sam, when things are in danger: some one has to give them up, lose them, so that others may keep them". Also, he misses the Ring, and is sick and depressed once every year with longing for it. He feels his experiences have set him aside with the rest of the world, the Shire in particular, since no one understands what he went through.
Question: When the horses of Aragorn and Legolas are spooked and run away from the entrance to the mountain cavern, Aragorn's horse gets away with the scabbard to his new shiny sword still on the saddle. Does he ever get his scabbard back for battle or just have to carry the sword unsheathed for the next scenes?
Question: In the first movie Frodo sees the sundering of Hobbiton in the mirror of Galadriel, yet in the third movie this doesn't happen. Does the mirror only show one possible version of the future and not necessarily that which will come to pass?
Answer: Galadriel says to Frodo upon him seeing the Shire burning, "It is what will happen, should you fail." Frodo didn't fail in his quest, and so the Shire was saved.
Question: What happens to Saruman? I know that he is in his tower, but we never really finds out what happens to him. We also know that the burning of the shire scenes are not in the film, so we don't see him get killed. Is this one for the Extended DVD?
Chosen answer: The extended edition may have Peter Jackson's version of what happened to Saruman but it won't have the book's version. In the book, Sarauman is defeated by Gandalf and expelled from Isengard and goes to the Shire where he takes command and enslaves the hobbits. Merry, Pippin and Sam return to the Shire and organise a rebellion. Saruman leaves, thoroughly defeated, and is killed by Grima Wormtongue. None of this was filmed for the movie. In the extended version of the movie Saruman stands on the top of the tower and has an argument with both King Theoden and Gandalf when Grima Wormtongue appears and is realizing he had been in the wrong with a few encouraging words from the group below. Saruman then belittles Grima Wormtongue hitting him to the ground. Enraged Grima Wormtongue then stabs Saruman in the back several times causing Saruman to fall and lands torso first onto a spike on a water wheel that is still continuing to turn with all the extra water from the dam burst. This is why the Ent, Treebeard, says "the filth of Saruman is washing away" also the Palantir falls out of his robes and that's why Pip finds it in the water.
Question: When both Rohan and Gondor are at the Black Gate, there is a deleted scene where Aragorn fights with Sauron. How would this be possible seeing that Sauron can only come into physical form once Mordor have taken the ring?
Answer: He fights an emissary of Sauron's who's called "The Mouth of Sauron," not Sauron himself.
Question: Can Sauron sense when the ring is near him?
Question: Why was Merry's hand burned when he stabbed the back of the witch king's leg?
That's caused by his breath and I don't think he breathes from his leg.
How was Merry even able to stab the witch king's leg anyway? It's been said that no man can kill the witch king.
Going back to the books for more explanation: First: it wasn't a protection. It was a prophecy/prediction by Glorfindel a millennium earlier. Second: the weapon Merry had in the books was a barrow-blade recovered by Tom Bombadil while saving the Hobbits from the barrow wights and had been enchanted directly against the Witch King. Since the scene (and Tom) were not in the film, they went with a more specific interpretation. The Witch King was not killed by a man, but by a Hobbit and a woman.
Answer: Because of what the Witch King is made of, his blood (or whatever) burns the skin of a mortal. Maybe even being too close will cause burns.
Answer: It would be Cirdan the Shipwright. Gil-Galad was killed in the Last Alliance.
cullothiel