[Kalimac]

I agree that there was a definite inconsistency introduced by shuffling the scenes around like that. There's no way that Merry and/or Pippin wouldn't have called out Gandalf's name unless they were physically gagged. It'll be interesting to see how the extended DVD handles it (NO, I'm not saying that this forgives everything. Just that it may ameliorate it slightly).

There is one interesting bit in "Flotsam and Jetsam" though, when Pippin is telling the story of his and Merry's adventures, and he tells about how when they described Gandalf's fall to Treebeard, Treebeard "looked at us rather curiously, I thought" (sorry, the book isn't in front of me so the quote may not be exact). Also, in the chapter where they first meet Treebeard, he shows a definite reluctance to believe in their news. There's a heavy implication there that Treebeard has seen Gandalf in the woods even before meeting with the two hobbits, and of course the question there is; how did he know it was Gandalf if Gandalf didn't know himself who he was? He was all in white, and was easy enough to mistake for Saruman, yet somehow Treebeard knew. Hoom, hmmm, as he might say...