Cutting out the Scouring of the Shire was severely damaging. Tolkien mentioned in the Preface that Saruman's death on Frodo's doorstep was planned from the beginning; to me, the hobbits coming home to find that the war has preceded them, and that they've grown enough to be able to do something about it, is the whole point. But that's only one of Jackson's offences against the original.

Next time we're in town, I really must see if the Beeb's audio version of LotR is available on CD --- there was suppposed to be an anniversary issue (50th?). Vastly superior; the only subplot that got dropped (reluctantly) was Tom Bombadil, as is traditional in adaptations of LotR. Treebeard was magnificent.