4. The Giants On The Mountain
As the company is hiking up the Misty Mountains, trying to find a path across the range, they are stuck in a horrendous thunderstorm that is dislodging rocks and causing them to tumble down the mountain. Taking refuge under a shelf on the side of a cliff, Bilbo thinks he sees giants throwing boulders at each other through the rain. The company searches desperately for some shelter, finding a seemingly perfect cave that is actually the backdoor for the goblin kingdom The giants are a bit of a random detail in the books, one of the many forces in Tolkiens world thatfor good or illinteract with the stories heroes but pay little attention to them, and their quests. Like the spirit inhabiting the mountain Caradhras in The Fellowship of the Ringwhich brought a blizzard to slow the fellowship and was replaced by Saruman in the movieI can see Jackson taking the giants out of An Unexpected Journey. This would simplify the plot a bit. But it would also remove some of the depth of Tolkiens works, the minor elements that make his books such a joy to read and re-read.