Prologue: One Ring to Rule Them All...
Prologue: One Ring to Rule Them All... is the first scene of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring narrated by Galadriel. An extended edition of this scene was released in The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (extended edition).
The prologue was renewed when The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey came out.[source?] Until then, Ian Holm had played the young Bilbo Baggins and the older one as well. But in the film series, the young Bilbo was portrayed by Martin Freeman and in the renewed prologue you can see him picking up the Ring from inside Gollum's cave.
Summary
This scene shows the forging of the Rings of Power, forging of the One Ring, Battle of the Last Alliance when Isildur cuts Sauron's finger with the Ring on it, Isildur's corruption and his death. Then the scene jumps to events from The Hobbit, showing Bilbo Baggins finding the Ring in Gollum's Cave.
Differences from Tolkien's writings
- Place: In the movie the battle takes place on the slopes of Mount Doom, while in the books it happens near Barad-dur[1].
- Fight with Sauron: In the movie Elendil is immediately killed by Sauron, and Gil-galad isn't even shown to fight with him. In the books Elendil and Gil-galad fight with Sauron and die after a long fight.[2]
- Omissions: Anarion is not mentioned, nor is his death. Certain specifics are also abridged, such as the Riddle Game, for the sake of compressing time.
