Lord Of The Rings: 10 Smartest Changes Peter Jackson Made From The Books

Arwen's role in the books is surprisingly minuscule. She only appears several times, with a handful of lines of dialogue. Nevertheless she is an important character due to the impact she has on Aragorn. Tolkien knew what he was doing, despite her relatively small part, he wrote her in such a way to give her gravitas.

On the big screen, however, things don't always translate the same way. Jackson was required to flesh things out. An obvious way to introduce her, was by folding other characters into Arwen's story. In the books, Glorfindel was the elven lord or saved Frodo from the Nazgûl.

He's presented as one of the most powerful characters in Middle Earth, and was responsible for foretelling the prophecy of how no man would kill the Witch King. But he never really pops up in later books. Jackson simply transposed his role to Arwen.

Jackson also added the dream sequence between Arwen and Aragorn, during the Two Towers, as a way to remind the audience of her significance to Aragorn's struggle. Ultimately the director got the balance right when it came to beefing up Arwen's role. But he almost made a grave error.

Originally, Arwen was set to fight at Helm's Deep with the elves. They even filmed whole sequences, before Jackson realised it moved too far away from Tolkien's original vision.