[The Saucepan Man]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR> I was under the impression that everything they built was environmentally friendly, and removed afterwards, leaving no impression on the landscape. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>That's certainly the case with Edoras. It was on National Trust property (or whatever the New Zealand equivalent is), and they were obliged to return it to precisely the state that they found it in as a condition of filming there. In one of the TTT EE documentaries, they explain how they carefully removed the turf, preserved it during the filming, and then returned it when they had finished. <P>Hobbiton is, I believe, still there and has become something of a tourist attraction. I'm not sure about how I feel about that. I suppose it depends upon what the land was being used for before. Helm's Deep was filmed in a quarry, so hardly a great loss to the landscape there. And I can't think of any other outside locations that were really affected by the filming. Much of it (Fangorn, Lothlorien etc) was done in a studio.<P>As for merchandising, well it's inevitable really. And they will only sell these things if people are prepared to buy them. And I speak as one who has a few items myself (calendars, Uruk-Hai/Rohan mugs etc) . And I would love one of those metal casts of Bilbo's trolls, if only it wasn't so costly. Personally, the only thing that I have a real problem with is the endorsements of such products as Pringles and KFC. Remember, there has always been a certain amount of merchandising around the books (diaries, calendars and the like).<P>I too am a big fan of the films. But I agree, Lord of Angmar, that Tolkien would have disapproved of many of the changes, those made to the characterisations particularly. But I like to think that he would have enjoyed the visualisation of his world. For me, so much of that aspect of the films (Lemming-Hyenas apart ) rings true from the books.