Orlando Bloom, who reprises the role of elvish archer Legolas in the upcoming Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, told SCI FI Wire that the biggest challenge was the climactic Battle of Helm's Deep, which takes place entirely in the rain. "When it's overcast and raining, that just heightens all the dramatic tension," Bloom said in an interview. "That was nine weeks of night shoots that pretty much broke most of us. It was physically very demanding. We were filming it on a quarry, so just the uneven ground was a challenge, and it was nights."

Richard Taylor, who won an Oscar for makeup and visual effects on the first Rings film, The Fellowship of the Ring, told SCI FI Wire that the creatures in the second and third films echo the movies' metaphorical progression. "We tried very hard to create the analogous journey, from cottage-industry England right through to industrial-revolution northern England," Taylor said. "Through that transition, the worlds are populated by different creatures of very different organic feel. There's very much a humanoid feeling of the cave troll, the Ray Harryhausen-esque watcher in the water. More fantastical as we journey into film two. The Mūmak [an elephantine beast] stands as the biggest thing we've ever made. It was 14 and a half meters square, a massive structure, took 18 house-removal tracks to get it to location. You'll be seeing that in film two. The creatures just become more and more fantastical and more visceral and real and gritty as they take on the mantle of Sauron's world." The Two Towers opens Dec. 18.