I think it's a shame we only see the Gondorian soldiers when they are in retreat. For example the Gondorians here, though vastly outnumbered, hold the entire Orc army till the morning of the next day. Outnumbered 100-1 and they held for such a long period of time. So they were kicking butt the whole time but we only see them in retreat, giving the illusion that they are terrible. While in reality they are much better.
Yeah I have always wondered why they fought so terrible. Your explanation makes a lot of sense. However, it is also funny how so many of the soldiers are so bad at fighting in general. Just look at 3:23 for example. I mean that soldier's attack is so sloppy and he is lleaving himself entirely exposed. Then there is also 3:26
I agree but I think they did that to generate sympathy, because we have to be scared for these guys and feel bad for them and maybe they thought if they were kicking a tone of ass then there would be no suspense.
bear in mind they were approaching from the directions the Gondorians didn't expect them to. in that case i guess it's better to risk being spotted than heard since the watchmen would probably not pay particular attention to the side of the river they thought was safe. and if they didn't have torches on their boats, they would probably keep bumping into each other all the way through, thus warning the Gondorians prematurely
I love how the humans in this battle use everything to their advantage to even the odds. When the sentry got shot, they silently got to their positions. The Orcs thought that the Gondorians were still oblivious, and fell right into the trap. Excellent strategy.
i mean, i still think it would have been more effective to just rain arrows on them while they were still in the boats, the orcs were basically traped there, if the humans were lucky some of them would even panic and knock down their boats drowning.
What always surprises me is the courage of these men; not their strength, not their training, but their courage. Facing these monsters must be terrible, especially when you know you *will* die.
Gondorian soldiers were among the best equipped and well trained fighters of Middle Earth. Here, though badly outnumbered, they held Mordor's forces until next morning. Imagine if Osgiliath was fully garrisoned!
Gondor was fighting against the home nation of orcs. hundreds of thousand orcs. Gondor offered decades of resistance. Rohan only against a base and tens thousand orcs as peak. At the film, Peter Jackson forget the introduction of the heavy cavalry of dol amroth, decisive to save faramir from his death. The forth of ramas echor with 200 men helped Faramir resisting more the Mordor the offensive until Imrahil and the cavalry arrived. At the end, Imrahil and his cavalry achieved to pressure orcs to retreat from the first level of minas tirith.
@@artisticbean4945 Another cool one I like is that John Rhys Davies (Gimli's actor), and the make-up & prosthetics team, pranked Peter Jackson into thinking that his finger had been badly cut. xD
I think it was something about that mist. Maybe it was a spell by the Witch King, as Saruman too could allegedly control weather (rain at Helms Deep), but who knows. It does seem like torches are not so bright from behind that thick mist.
What the gondor soldiers should have done is they should have left their archers on the ruins of the walls and had them shoot down into the Wrath before they even got there and it made their presence known that way it would actually give them enough time and they should have sent Riders ahead to ministereth in order to gain reinforcements want to have last long but I want to last a few more days longer than normal
That reminds me of the battle of Amon Hen where Aragorn faced off with the Uruks, the stunt men were complaining because Viggo was fucking sending his swings in every take. Fake swords still hurt pretty bad with enough force.
My only problem with the trilogy has always been how weak Jackson portrayed Gondor. The soldiers of Gondor weren't wimps, they were tired, exhausted but also veteran, elite warriors who had held the tide of Mordor for thousands of years. The only scene doing them justice is when the Rangers take out the column of Haradrim before taking Frodo captive.
@@Fatlander umm you don’t meed to see it because the time changes indicating they fought hours until they break where they were ultimately pushed back and the nazguls harrassed them
Yeah you're right and it's too bad that there weren't even short few seconds of scenes during the war of seeing skillful moments of them even as they're being overwhelmed
I think costume design should have incorporated more bandages and damage to the armor of Gondor soliders. to seel the idea that these guys were beleaguered and worn down from attrition.
I like the cut better. That scene where they kill the guy with the arrow was awkward and I would also argue the extra footage made it far less clear what was going on. In the theatrical it just seems like the orca are crossing the river to enter Osgiliath but in the extended they were going some other way or something?
What really would've happened. Gondorian sees the torches in the water: Look! They're using boats to cross the river! Faramir: Archers, bombard them! Orcs gets pawned by archers. Gothmog, after taking an arrow to the back: Retreat! Random orc: I told you torches were gonna give away our position! Gothmog: Oh, shut up!
Sure, let's attack at midnight, in complete obscurity, with no torches whatsoever. That way, the perfectly organised strike can turn into a messy bloodshed where orc kill each other in the dark, boat can get lost in the darkness and never find the battlefield... They had to be quiet in order to cross the river before the gondolian spot the trick. No absolute stealth recquired, juste enough time to cross, via the strategy of attacking north. the torches made sense. You dont go on a boat in the middle of the night, with ennemy on the other side, and no idea where you are going exactly.
i have two excuses for that: too dark if no torches, meaning it would blind the orcs and their boats would bump into each other. 2nd in reality it was dark but the lighting had to make it clearer, we dont want Winterfell crappy lighting
I fucking love Faramir's face at 2:58 I almost want to imagine he's thinking of his brothers speech from the Two Towers extended edition or something like that. And then we he charges into the advancing orks. FFFFFUUUUUCCCCCKKKKK!!!! It get's me so energized I feel like running a marathon when he does it!
Seeing some of the comments have missed the point from Two Towers, Faramir said Gondor was weak and did not have the strength to repel another attack so Sauron would strike hard which he did. Osgilliath was vulnerable because they had taken 500 men from covering if the enemy came by the north and would not hold out for long. When Osgilliath was initially attacked in Two Towers , the Eastern shore was already taken to set a foothold for the Orcs to come through. With not enough men Faramir and his men were still covering the north thinking that was the vulnerable spot but the Orcs came by another and basically cut them off with their vast numbers
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Delicious Chicken maybe the dusk is interrupted their sights, so that they didn't able to see them. but under that circumstance or environment, sound of boats-you know, water is whipped by the boats- can be heard. but such a torchlight can be seen if the guards were concentrated on watching the river. i think, the gondor osgiliath defense army was not thought of the possibilities that orcs can cross the river during that circumstances.
I agree with people's comments about needing the torches, even though they were not stealthy - this attack was a minor distraction from the attack from the north, without torches we wouldnt be able to see them and the orca needed to stay in formation and land carefully, going almost blind would make themselves clumsy. I've liked LOTR films for ages and they're classics but like so many other films they cut so much out of the book that it makes you devalue the film, eg talent of the gondorians and how the film dramatises the battle to make it seem very one way.
@@bobman3093 maybe some of them are black uruks, but i know that its a bit mixed between black uruks, morgul orcs, and morannon orcs wich are the mordor orcs from the movies
@@shigiz yea its hard to pick them apart, I wish they made it more obvious in the movies. People think its just the normal orc/goblin band in mordors army but really it was really diverse.
The Gondorians really get shafted in Peter Jacksons adaptation. Regardless of whether the garrison was outnumbered you think they would have used some of that plentiful stone rubble lying around to seal off the exposed sections in the wall and barricade off the exposed river entrances to Osgiliath using spiked hedgehogs or cheval de frese or caltrops. That would at least prevent the orcs from being able to disembark easily on the western shore. They'd be forced to queue up to try and hack their way through the barricades (getting speared in the process) and if they tried to swim ashore from deeper waters they'd risk drowning. The Gondorians can use the high ground to their advantage and dump rubble on the orcs or deploy archers from the towers above or stab the orcs with long pikes behind the safety of their barricades. The shore would quickly get clogged up with orc barges and bodies and their attack would probably be repelled. A good example is at 2:20 - even some heavy hardwood spiked barricades wrapped in barbed metal spikes would be enough to impede the orcs from getting ashore. If the Gondorians were equipped with long pikes the orcs wouldn't stand a chance. After all in this story they had occupied the West shore since Boromir led an army in 1-2 years earlier. You think with that time available they would have made preparations for this sort of thing. Heck at least haul some of that rubble back to Minas Tirith and pile it up on the towers adjacent to the gate so when Grond was being brought up they could have dump it down and seal off the entrance to the city with rubble. That would slow the advance of Mordors army into the city and allow time for the archers to kill the trolls in the crossfire and with the trolls all dead the defenders would be able to hold the entrance quite easily and the prevent the orcs from accessing the city (The phalanx formation is more than enough to hold the entrance if the trolls are killed beforehand).
+Anti- Illuminati In the books, they did do something like that. However Jackson decided to make the Gondorians weak little babies for some reason, It really pisses me off.
Not enough time to organise such a strategy, given the fact that it was a SURPRISE NIGHT ATTACK, and that the mordor army had been attacking the place constantly for 20 fucking year
Strategy and motivation was all they needed. All available spearmen in two lines: 1st line kneeling, 2nd line standing, archers behind firing. Other swordsmen hiding behind the pilars. Faramir could've fought more bravely
well, this is Middle Age fantasy after all. people really didn't care much about tactics back then, it slowly started to change during the Renaissance. i mean, for so long they would actually put their freaking _king_ to lead the attack, now that was a bright idea, wasn't it?
They sent scouts out to Cair Andros North of Osgiliath. Meanwhile the Orcs come from nearer by, straight across the river. Seems like a tactical error. However...! This was an understandable and certainly not unwise move. Cair Andros was a fortress on an island, fought over about as much as Osgiliath. And, if I recall correctly, it was not as fortified as Osgiliath (which had 500+ men) and Mordor could have overrun there and gone around Osgiliath straight to Minas Tirith. If that were the case, and they had no scouts to report on time, the garrison at Osgiliath would have been cut off from Minas Tirith and would have been completely annihilated by Mordor forces and the Haradrim from the South. Gondor knew that very well, so sending out scouts to Cair Andros (seemingly instead of East Osgiliath) was not an unwise move.
You know Faramir was the strongest of the sons. He could have taken the ring but never did. Yet his father didn't show him favor. It's such a tragic family dynamic but so relatable.
that actually looks like an error of sorts. i don't know if Tolkien ever specified the qualities of Man but i'm pretty sure he never once mentioned there being any other races than white. plus, Middle Earth being located in an area closely resembling Europe would have you doubt there were any non-white races there. so sorry to everybody out there: apparently there are no non-white Men in the Tolkien universe. send your complaints to the guy himself
This was the only LOTR battle scene of the last two movies of the trilogy I cared about, because: A) It was short and compact B) Didn't rely massively on CGI C) Relatively small scale (at least shown) D) No cliche pre battle speeches E) Baddies achieved something Fellowship was always my favorite film (and book) partly because of those reasons, the focus was not really on the action.
Well of course the larger scale battles relied on CGI. How else would you expect to have thousand of soldiers and orcs on-screen at once? Should they have gotten real Oliphaunts? Real fell beasts for the Nazgul? You're just looking for reasons to complain.
I agree this battle is very underrated when it comes to people talking about the trilogy, but I still feel that the other battles are very well done and I don't feel the speeches were cliche I think they were pretty impactful, and emotional
ლαДкФS 1560 Thank Hollywood for that. In cinema, as a general rule, any fighters that aren't the heroes and don't have names exist solely to be cut down by the hundreds by the villain's minions with ease. Stupid rule, I know. In the Hobbit BOTFA, the Iron Hills Dwarves fell victim to it as well
+Dave Egan The Lorien Elves didn't fare any better at Helms Deep either. The Uruk-Hai butchered alot of them. And the elvish swords they had, they were easy pickings.
@@wiseguy01 Colonial Europe conquered but they set up military bases, laws, trade-posts and used the local populist as labor whether they were slaves or not. "Immigration" now is a different sort of invasion. They're conquering through population, interbreeding, having like 3-4 kids a family, and having like 300k annually people arrive legally and illegally in the west.
@@ethanragbir8311 Lol, you fools so desperately want to be the victims that you are comparing immigration to a time period that caused the destruction of nations, cultures and killed or enslaved millions? leading to generational poverty and unfair distribution of wealth across the globe? This is just delusion on your part. Just stop.
@@wiseguy01 Wrong. It's all the same colonialism. Rich used people to conquer native non industrialized peoples back then for resources and riches. Rich use third worlders as cheap labor and a source of blood to replace what they view isn't a cheap and plentiful (aging) enough population for their global economies in today's age. Your racism is showing as well as your ignorance. (hatred of Europeans simply because they were manipulated and used in the same sense by the rich as other races are now used as weapons in a different fashion today)
not a military tactician by any means but wouldn't it have made more sense for the guy that got shot to yell "HEY THEY'RE COMMING ACROSS THE RIVER IN BOATS" and then get some archers up on those buildings to do some damage before the orcs can do anything?
+Derrick Ranshaw Yes, along with firing fire arrows into the barges to set them ablaze. If you can't do that then line up the Rangers with their bows to pick off the orcs as they disembark, with the armored soldiers engaging the orcs as they come forward.
Took like 30 seconds for the orcs to arrive, they used the element of surprise to ambush the enemy vanguard and fire arrows are useless, unless is against a target full of oil and something flammable.
I love this scene because it makes the orcs look like an actual threat. Unlike any scene with Legolas in it where they fall over if someone as much as bleeds on them. Although I do have to question the tactical reasoning in letting several orcs run past your position so they can potentially turn around and attack you in the back when you launch your own assault.
Never understood that, from a tactical defensive standpoint the first orcs wouldn't made it more than 5 steps off their landing crafts. Although it did make the orcs look funny and stupid, running past a bunch of guys with swords and not noticing they're there.
@@reminiscer15 I think the idea was to catch them from behind and the sides, cause even if they jumped out in front of em there's a weapon there. But if you have several scores of men behind you to ambush the orcs, stretching them out gives your boys more orcs to kill
Who the fuck said orcs can't shoot, that orc just sniped the gondorian from at least 30 feet through a window, pierced his armor and hit him right in the chest.
everything here is hilarious to me. 1. orc commander says "Quiet" so as to not warn the humans about the orc invasion. Except every orc boat has a torch on it so they're perfectly visible and any gondorian watcher will spot them (which exactly what happens in a couple of seconds). What's the point? 2. they kill the watcher so he wouldn't warn his comrades. Except they're still warned right away. 3. the gondorians are heavily outnumbered but they can still form the line to deny the enemy an easy landing and inflict as much casualties as possible. Instead of doing that, the gondorians come up with the most moronic ambush that doesn't even achieve anything. What did they try to do there by letting some orcs inside the city? Encircling them? That's impossible: the orcs outnumber the humans. On the contrary, now that the orcs have some people BEHIND the main gondorian force, it's easier for them to encircle gondorians and cut them off from Minas Tirith. PJ made great LOTR movies but even back then it was clear that he can't follow up on the internal logic of some scenes and just puts some scenes together that just don't make sense. People have been criticizing him for his Hobbit trilogy and some dumb scenes from there (like the elves jumping in front of the dwarven spear line like idiots) but the roots of that stupidity can be seen even in the LOTR trilogy.
+Marko Il Piccolodivano except that the orcs are crossing the river to kill but the migrants are crossing the Mediterranean to not be killed. Very much definitely a tiny difference of course
Despite the fact that the close up shots make Gondor soldiers look bad, they actually are doing well considering they're massively outnumbered. They held out for the whole night against those odds. Plus the big shots or in the background it seems like they are actually doing fine. That all goes for Minas Tirith too, they fought for days there.
At he battle of Agincourt, the English longbowmen slaughtered French knights in full armor. Armors are meant to stop direct blows from swords, not arrows.
I remember my Northern Dunedain Campaign at DaC Gondor got wrecked by Mordor so after fighting Angmar, Moria Goblins, Dunland and Enedwaith I invaded the furthest reach of Gondor that was held by Sauron using a full army of rangers, and Aragorn's beacon of Hope army until we finally reach Osgiliath which was a hard siege since it was held by Black Uruks and Khandish Hunters, I sent Aragorn's son Eldarion to hold it which he did with the help of Araphor, Halbarad retook Ithilien and Minas Morgul and I was able to lead Aragorn towards Morannon (with the ring of course) there we destroyed the ring and Sauron forever.
i mean, i still think it would have been more effective to just rain arrows on them while they were still in the boats, the orcs were basically traped there, if the humans were lucky some of them would even panic and knock down their boats drowning. Still i love this fight
The reason for portraying Gondor as weak here is simply thats movies; Denethor ruled the lands, without Eddard Stark(Oops Boromir) Gondor looked weak, defeated after; I think what P.J wanted to show in these movies is how decayed and weak Gondorians soldiers looked vs Orcs, where as in the Books, they barely needed savings from the Rohirim, it was actually a Prince from the Gondor South that saved them, not the ghosts... P.J wanted to show how without a King, the people of Gondor had no willed to fight for, neither for the shit they were faced to; also you have to remember, in this, they show em, out-numbered 10-1, fighting off, yes, they do not show much Gondor soldiers fighting them off, but in the movies back in the Elrond council, you see Boromir saying that Gondor had fought off the orcs for years of Mordor, and in Two towers extended edition even after their victory in osgiliath, Denethor tells Boromir the bigger attack has yet to come and they will fail; TLDR; p.J wanted to show how with Aragorn now as King Gondor soldiers fought as badass at the black gate because they now had a badass King and portrayd Denethor as some sort of a madman who failed, wanted to burn his son alive, and did nothing to try to defend his city, when in the books he did evertything til the his last day to defend Minas Tirith and even used the palantir because he was that strong mentally to offend Sauron to see what was his plans, once he saw Frodo captured he lost all hoped; whereas in the movies, we see him as this failing,weeping, steward, weak,fragile; yet challenging Gandalf on whos riding with him with Theoden(ARAGORN)! as he says that he falls back to his throne; thats movies
In LOTR it seems any contact with a sword or arrow is immediately fatal for secondary characters or bit parts. That solider just grunted and dropped dead from that single arrow.
its crazy how outnumbered the gondorians are but they still massacre many orcs, if they had time to prepare for the attack, there would be even more casualties on the side of the orcs
Faramir should have placed rangers up top to fire arrows while they were still paddling and had a shield spear wall formation below. I’m pretty sure that’s what borromir would have done.
Everyone are saying how the Gondorians are terrible this is the problem with the movie. These men are the main Veterans in the war with sauron and they're outnumbered 100 to 1 and in Minas Tirith it's only the tower guard garrison who have never fought
Wooden spikes barricading the shoreline, archers raining arrows from above, and a store of oil to throw down and set the barges on fire would have gone a long way to holding out the garrison. That way they could torch the entire shoreline while they retreated and make the advance on Minas Tirith that much slower
Instead of hiding behind corners it would have been better to form shield walls between the rubbles to stop the orcs from landing (with archers on the roofs to shoot at them)
I prefer the theatrical version where they cut out killing the sentry. The idea that it's a double sneak attack feels more suspenseful than just "oh we totally blew our cover killing the sentry standing next to everyone else"
I play Dragon Age: Origins--this is like a whole movie of the cut scene from the battle between the Dark horde and the good guys right before you wake up in the witch's mother's house in the Wild.
thing to think about is the similarity between the Saxon invasion of England or Albion as the Celts called it and the ork invasion of the forts of gondor is that gondor and Albion were both distracted by something. in albions case it was the threat of the picts and Irish as well as being completed shattered after the Romans and distracted by religion and gonor was distracted by the whole history to legend to myth thing just to think about
Hey guys this is just a scenario, how long would take for Stannis Baratheon to take Osgiliath and Minas Tirith? And he has 80 thousand man army what do you guys think?
This is why i think the theatrical versions are much better in loads of different ways. In this extended version ...scout gets shot by an arrow they all react ..like that's their warning the orcs are coming but in the theatrical .. its you don't know how they know just they're getting prepared like they are smart they are wise to the orcs attack and they are going to surprise them when they come off the boats..like they are on the ball and always ready...in the extended its stupid because it's like we shot a guard and we know that they know were coming now but were all still going to bundle onto land like we have the element of surprise...this also makes the humans look stupid like they had no idea this attack was happening till the last second in the theatrical this scene is so much better makes them so much smarter and slicker... you get a sense the soldiers are ready because they have been defending this river for weeks now. in the extended its oh the orcs are gone ..oh shit wait no they're not! I love this scene but extended ruins it for me! Also in the extended versions Aragorn comes across as way more of an asshole and they ruin his character!
Robert Fryar 3D Art what makes Aragorn come of as an asshole in the extended. And no the extended cuts are better. Every scene with Boromir, Faramir and Denethor just turns the movies from a 10 to an 11. And Saruman’s death is essential
