Gandalf Vs. The Witch King

Originally Posted by davem

The movie messed up. The incident in the book is essential. Gandalf turns from the confrontation with Angmar in order to save Faramir. He does the right thing, because he is the only one who can save Faramir. It is an act of trust in Eru, that in the end a good act will be rewarded. Frodo makes the same choice with Gollum if you think about it. Gandalf rejects the belief that the end justifies the means, that it would be ok to let Faramir be killed in order to win the battle. To desert Faramir would have been immoral. Gandalf had no choice if he was to stay true to himself & what he was fighting for.

True, but in the book Gandalf was all too aware that the WK could not only kill more people if he was not confronted, he could even bring ruin on Minas Tirith itself since knobody else at the time had the courage to challenge him. If Gandalf had gone on to challenge the WK, it may have been that Theoden would have still lived, & by Gandalf halting the domination of the WK on the battlefield, that in itself would have at least given the soldiers of Gondor & Rohan more belief that victory was still possible. I would therefore not have blamed Gandalf for going after the WK in this situation, as Gandalf could not have just relied on hoping that a prophecy would avail. A prophecy is just that - it is a prediction & not necessarily a means to an end.

The film however does not really make out that the WK is critical to the success of Mordor, aside from being the General. If Gandalf had taken him out, Mordor would still have been well in charge of the battle of the Pelennor fields.