It’s in this spirit that we take a microscope to one particular sequence I’ve obsessed over since I was an impressionable Hobbit-lad in 2003, bursting with anticipation in my theater seat as The Return of the King unfolded before me. Between effusive praise (nothing but respect for MY The Fellowship of the Ring prologue front-loaded with all that worldbuilding and historical lore) and head-scratching disbelief ( they did WHAT to Faramir in The Two Towers?), we can spin ourselves into knots trying to reconcile these two wolves within us - and within the films themselves, too. You can trust the most passionate (insufferable) among us, burdened with book-learned knowledge, to host annual trilogy marathons and debate ourselves in disturbingly Gollum-like fashion. So each Wednesday throughout the year, we'll go there and back again, examining how and why the films have endured as modern classics.

2021 marks The Lord of the Rings movies' 20th anniversary, and we couldn't imagine exploring the trilogy in just one story.

Lord of the rings gollum fight gif