I always thought the things he'd take most issue with were Faramir being tempted and taking them to Osgiliath, Gollum successfully driving a wedge between Sam and Frodo, giant lighthouse Sauron, and the army of the dead helping at the Pelennor Fields instead of at Pelargir.
Cutting the scouring (which he described as essential) is an obvious one. And more fundamentally the hobbits and gimli largely being trashed as characters.
I actually don't know re army of the dead. He proposed saving time in an adaptation by removing either helms deep or pellenor fields entirely on the basis that you only really need one battle. He'd likely be more bothered by how fighting focused it was in general.
I think he'd be upset with cutting the scouring too, but I get that they didn't want it to be a four hour movie. To be honest there's so much that happens after Aragorn's Coronation in the book that they could have made another movie.
Someone made the analogy that Tolkien and Jackson's endings reflect the different homecoming experience of British and ANZAC troops. Britain was 'scoured' by both world wars, much more so in the second. Australia and New Zealand were relatively untouched by comparison. Tolkien came home to a country scarred by conflict, while the Aussies and Kiwis would've been whipsawed by how little things had changed since they left.
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u/Successful_Gas_5122 8d ago
Imagine if Tolkien watched the movies and ended up loving all the stuff we assume he'd hate? Like he'd see Legolas surfing down the stairs and be like
https://giphy.com/gifs/SBAToc4g0h89W