The Lord of the Rings trilogy was an incredible undertaking. For years, a talented cast and crew set up shop in New Zealand and gave everything they had to make some of the greatest movies of all time. And after that, they told the world how they did it.

The commentaries on the Lord of the Rings Extended Edition DVDs are full of fascinating stories about the making of the films. Good days, bad days, difficult decisions — it’s all in there. And only the most dedicated, most diehard fans have sat down and listened to the entire thing.

Someone Else Was Originally Going to Give the Opening Narration

The first voice audiences hear in the Lord of the Rings trilogy is that of Galadriel, the immortal Elf who guides the Fellowship on their journey. She explains the events that led up to the Ring being lost. But it nearly wasn’t her speaking. Director Peter Jackson considered having Gandalf narrate the opening, and then Frodo.

All the actors agreed, however, that Cate Blanchett’s Galadriel was by far the best choice. Sean Astin pointed out in the commentary that if Frodo gives the opening narration, it means that audiences know from the beginning that he doesn’t die. And that would have ruined the tension of some of the scenes where Frodo’s life is in danger.

Billy Boyd Had an Unfortunate, Very Funny Accident

The actors playing the Hobbits got very close to each other during the making of the movie, close enough to mock each other over embarrassing incidents. One of these happened during the scene where Merry and Pippin steal Gandalf’s firework and light it. Billy Boyd wasn’t expecting the firework to actually go off in front of him.

According to him, he “shrieked [and] wet myself” as soon as the explosion happened. It wasn’t enough to actually hurt him, but it certainly scared him, and Dominic Monaghan didn’t let him forget it. He gave Boyd the nickname “pissy legs” for the rest of the shoot. But Boyd and Monaghan are still best friends to this day!

David Wenham Had an Inexpensive Horse

David Wenham played Faramir, the underappreciated second son of Denethor, Steward of Gondor. He loved his brother Boromir, but he was constantly in his shadow. And one amusing coincidence brought him a little bit closer to his character: he had the cheapest of the Lord of the Rings horses.

Wenham said in the Return of the King cast commentary, “The horse master told me that he’d bought [Faramir’s] horse for $200. Sort of goes with the whole Faramir character, really. ‘Oh, Faramir, give him the cheapest horse. Nobody loves him.’ Probably a gift from Denethor.” But the horse itself, like all the horse actors, still did a very good job — and David Wenham got something else to add to the character of Faramir.

Sean Astin Got Super Stressed During One Scene

Samwise Gamgee was supposed to hate Gollum, and one incident made his animosity towards the character feel even more real. During one scene involving Sam, Gollum and Frodo, Andy Serkis accidentally ripped Sean Astin’s wig off, and Astin reacted badly. He wasn’t actually angry at Serkis, it was just the stress and exhaustion of making the movie.

However, Serkis believed that Astin actually was angry with him, and it added to both their performances. It was one of those happy little accidents that seems stressful at the time but actually turns out to be a blessing in disguise. Certainly, the Sam and Gollum scenes are some of the best-acted in the trilogy, and that’s really saying something.

Gandalf’s Smoking Was Nearly Taken Out

Gandalf is inseparable from his pipe during The Fellowship of the Ring. There’s even one memorable scene where he and Bilbo smoke together and Gandalf creates a ship out of smoke. But, because of the dangers of smoking in real life (at the time, there was a very real fear that children could take up smoking if they saw it on screen) the filmmakers considered cutting it out.

The plan was to have Gandalf sucking on toffees instead. Ian McKellen remembered in the commentaries that the idea was that Gandalf had just given up smoking and was eating toffees to calm himself. But in the end, it was decided that Gandalf smoking a pipe would pose no problem after all, and they could go ahead with it. And that was definitely for the best, because it’s an intrinsic part of Gandalf the Grey’s character.

Bernard Hill Looked to Real Life for One Sad Scene

One of the saddest scenes in The Two Towers is when Theoden grieves his slaughtered son. After the funeral, he speaks to Gandalf, and delivers the line, “No parent should have to bury their child.” Bernard Hill actually took that from a real-life conversation he had with a grieving woman.

A fan of some of Hill’s earlier work approached him once and had a conversation with grief about him, “because her daughter had been killed in a terrorist attack in Northern Ireland,” Hill remembered in the commentary. “…She turned to me and said, ‘No parent should have to bury their child.’ And it just lodged in me so strongly I thought, at some point I’ll have to share this with people.”

Billy Boyd Wrote the Trilogy’s Best Song

When Pippin ends up in the service of Denethor, the mighty Steward gets him to sing a song for him while he eats. Pippin sings “The Edge of Night,” a beautiful song about leaving home behind. The lyrics are from “The Walking Song” in the Fellowship of the Ring book, just rearranged. But Billy Boyd himself wrote the music.

He wanted it to have a “Celtic feel,” he explained in the commentary. It needed to be a sad and mournful song, and “not something Merry and Pippin would stand on a bar and sing.” Boyd did an amazing job, because the song, intercut with Faramir’s suicide charge against the forces of Sauron, makes for a devastating scene.

Orlando Bloom and John Rhys-Davies Had a Boating Incident

Orlando Bloom and John Rhys-Davies played Legolas and Gimli, two characters who are meant to be antagonistic towards each other at the beginning of The Fellowship of the Ring. And then, one accident ended up causing a minor and very convenient rift between their actors.

One scene required Legolas and Gimli to ride in a boat together, and Bloom wasn’t a very good kayaker. He began showing off, calling for everyone to see his “special move,” and then immediately capsized the boat with Rhys-Davies in it. “It made the two of them feel sort of antagonistic to each other for about three weeks, which was perfect for their characters,” Astin said in the commentary.

The Mouth of Sauron Nearly Looked Different

The Mouth of Sauron is a horrifying creature. His enlarged mouth, bloody teeth, and lack of eyes make him instantly off-putting. But the filmmakers nearly went in the exact opposite way with him and made him beautiful. The idea was that if Sauron’s true form in the books was beautiful and enticing, the Mouth of Sauron should be too.

However, in the end, Peter Jackson and co decided audiences wouldn’t get it, and decided to stick with the menacing Mouth of Sauron instead. It’s still interesting to think about how a beautiful representation of Sauron would have changed the scene at the gates of Mordor entirely, though.

Sean Bean Was Terrified of Helicopters

Sean Bean had a problem while filming in New Zealand: helicopters were needed to take the cast from one remote location to the next, but he was afraid of getting in one. So Bean simply hiked up the snowy mountain used for the exterior shots of Moria. In his full and very heavy costume, no less.

“It was like mountaineering,” Bean explained on the cast commentary. “And the helicopter came over at one point I think, and they all saw me climbing, in my Boromir costume, climbing up this mountain to get to the set cos I was terrified of going in the helicopter. It must have been quite a sight.”