Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy excelled at many things, but special mention should be given to the films’ action set pieces and the attention to detail. In one of the crucial scenes in the second film, The Two Towers, Saruman’s army of Uruk-hai march towards the Helm’s Deep fortress, and the army at Aragorn’s command prepares to counter the attack. As the Orc-breeds line up in front of the fortress, one of the old archers under Aragorn’s command prematurely shoots an arrow.
For years, fans believed that if this one mistake from the archer had been avoided, casualties would have been much less for the defenders before Gandalf and Éomer arrived with the Rohirrim. However, an expert archer reveals that the scene in the film was technically accurate and explains what happened in the scene.
Old Archer’s Mistake In The Lord Of The Rings Was Technically Accurate
One expert archer has finally cleared the old archer in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers of committing a grievous mistake that proved costly for the defenders of the Helm’s Deep fortress. The case in point is the scene where the Uruk-Hai lines up outside the fortress, intending to attack Théoden’s kingdom of Rohan for going against Saruman. Viggo Mortensen‘s Aragorn prepares the defense for the fortress.
However, as the two armies wait to see who attacks first, one old archer prematurely fires an arrow and kills one of the Orcs, marking the beginning of the vicious battle. While fans have been blaming the archer for 22 years now, one expert archer has come up with an explanation that relieves the archer from any responsibility for the events. According to the expert, the real culprit was Aragorn, who commanded the archers to hold still in a fully drawn position for more than a few seconds.
In his YouTube shorts, David Blumineck, an archer and pole dancer, criticized films and TV series for making their archers hold in a fully drawn position for a long time. He revealed that the modern compound bows made it easier to hold the bows fully drawn. However, with the traditional bows and the historical heavyweight bows, drawing the bow for more than a few seconds was incredibly hard.
It put an enormous amount of stress on both the bow and the archer. Blumineck revealed that the bows were designed that way to shoot the arrows quickly after drawing. According to him, even an expert toxophilite under Aragorn’s command would have let go of the arrow due to the stress. Effectively, it was Aragorn’s mistake in the scene rather than the old man’s.
Another Expert Archer Found Lord Of The Rings Archery Scenes As A Mixed Bag
In an analysis video for Insider, expert archer Jim Kent analyzed a few archery scenes from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. While he was impressed with Orlando Bloom‘s Legolas using a back quiver arrow in the woods, he found a few mistakes made in other scenes. In the dramatic scene where Lurtz is about to shoot down Boromir, Kent shared that his grip on the strip was weird. He shared that Lurtz is holding the arrow on the wrong side of the bow with such a grip. He shared with Insider:
“He’s got this weird grip on the string. He’s got the arrow on the left side of the bow, I think, and he’s holding the string like that, which isn’t what you do. If you really wanted to hold the string upside down, you’d need the arrow on the right side of the bow. I imagine that’s more of an aesthetic thing than anything.”
Kent’s final verdict on the film’s archery scene was a six out of ten. He shared that the archery in the film was “a little bit all over the shop,” before stating that he loved the movies. In the end, the archery mistakes would appear shaky only to expert archers and would not matter in the general audience’s viewing of the action sequences.
All three films in The Lord of the Rings trilogy are now available for streaming on Max.
