Eowyn is the only female character in the original trilogy that we actually see in battle. It is clear from Aragorn’s first meeting with her in the Two Towers that she is good with her blade, and that she is a shield maiden of Rohan. Even then though, the main action that is shown of her is when she is riding on a horse slashing at the calves of the Oliphaunts, and when she stabs the Witch King of Angmar in the face, after cutting off his Fell Beast’s head. Whilst these are very worthy actions, and stand her out as one of the only female characters who actively gets involved in the fight, they are such fleeting glimpses compared to the onslaught of orc fights shown with Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli, the male members of the trilogy.
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It may irritate fans further then, to learn that there were actually two extra scenes filmed in which both Eowyn and Arwen can be seen fighting their own epic battles against the evil orcs that are trying to invade Helm’s Deep. For Arwen, this scene takes place in the main battle, as she appears in the background and defends the keep alongside Aragorn and the others. She storms out on foot to the fields in front of the vast stone walls that are being over-run and can be seen guarding Aragorn’s back by combating her large foes with a short sword.
Arwen had her own armor designed for this scene, and Liv Tyler who plays the character had to practice and learn several fight sequences so that her stunts were on par with the others, but when it came down to it, the directorial team decided that the scene didn’t fit, because it was too complicated to explain why Arwen would be at Helm’s Deep in the first place. The extra time couldn’t be afforded to work around this, and have her summoned/arriving, so the scene was cut.
Similarly for Eowyn, her epic fight scene took place beneath Helm’s Deep, in the Glittering Caves. This is a place that appears in Tolkien’s original books, and it is Gimli and Eomer that are trapped inside by a host of orcs who bar the only entrance/exit. They are actually trapped for a few days down here, which is why Peter Jackson and the crew built the set and wanted to incorporate it into the movies.
In the scene that was shot, Eowyn can be spotted holding off against the orcs single-handedly, slashing at them with her blade, ducking out of the way of their axes, and yelling triumphantly as she knocks them down. She looks so heroic in this scene, as the one defendant against several enemies that just keep pouring into the caves, and her hands are red with blood by the end of the scene. However, when the final editions of the films were put together, it was found that the running time was way too long, and the decision was made to take out all of the scenes that related to the Glittering Caves, including Eowyn’s sword mastery.
Many fans of the franchise find it deeply aggravating that these two scenes didn’t make the final editions, because one of the biggest criticisms of the Lord of the Rings is that it take a misogynistic view of women, and shows them as weak and dependent on men to save them, but these two fight scenes by these two very strong female characters could have changed that. It is thought that Tolkien actually highly valued the female characters in his stories, and wanted them to be powerful and capable in their own right, but it is also important to remember that the books were written in a very different time period, before society had evolved and women were allowed to go to war.
Perhaps Peter Jackson could have done things differently, and re-written some of the negativity in this area, but unfortunately these two scenes just weren’t relevant enough to the main plot points in the story as a whole.
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