I just saw Two Towers and it was better than I had expected. I was worried, because Peter Jackson has publicly commented that this is an action movie, that he deliberately departed from the story of the book, etc. This worried me, and I see what he meant --there's a McGuffin in which Aragorn gets separated from the rest of the party for no real reason, Faramir acts very differently from his character in the book and indeed destroys one of Tolkien's points in the process, and there is an extraneous visit to a beleaguered Osgiliath--but none of this really detracts too much from the movie. They had to insert Arwen and Galadriel as well, to which no one who appreciates beauty can object.

What is actually done better than a literal rendering of the book is the intercutting of the two storylines which in the novel were separated into Book 1 and Book 2. This allows for the stupendously-rendered battle of Helm's Deep to act as one of the butt-kickingest climactic fight scenes in movie history.

As to the acting, I just can't understand how someone could see Viggo Mortensen's Aragorn and Ian McKellen's Gandalf in that light. Granted, the humor in the first movie was rather broad, and Merry and Pippin were pains in the ass, but surely Christopher Lee and Cate Blanchett made up for that!

As to characterization, I'm happy to say that an improvement on the first movie has been made: Merry and Pippin cease to be stupid buffoons who cause every setback and attack, and begin to understand what the world is coming to--which bodes well for their development into adults in the final movie. New characters Eomer, Faramir and Eowyn are very well-played, though they're all small roles. The bigger roles of Theoden and Grima Wormtongue are done brilliantly; it reminds you that Brad Doruif is a fine, fine actor despite having been stereotyped as a lunatic or weirdo ever since One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

I think Tolkien fans may lament at some of the plot changes, but will ultimately accept this as a great adaptation. More importantly, I think general moviegoers are more likely to enjoy this as a combination of costume epic and hard-hitting action-adventure film; it just happens to have much better acting and writing than, say, The Scorpion King.

As a final endorsement, I saw this movie with my wife (who normally goes with me to more "intellectual" or romantic films) and my friend David (who normally goes with me to action movies). They never like the same films, but this time all three of us thought it was one of the best movies we've seen in a long time!