Love this trilogy (and the Hobbit ones, too, don't judge me) a great deal, but there's two sticking points certain people bring up online to either mock or ridicule it that drive me nuts whenever I hear them:
* "It's just a bunch of walking". No, not really. MAYBE Fellowship of the Ring could be accused of that, but it's not like there's nothing happening during or between any of it. And besides, the other 2 movies are straight up war films after a point for half of them. You wanna see a movie that's nothing but walking? Go watch Gus Van Sant's "Gerry". It's just nearly 2 hours of Matt Damon and Casey Affleck wandering the desert for no reason.
* "Why didn't they just use the eagles to fly to Mordor?" Ah yes, that old chestnut. First of all, Gandalf can't just call Gwaihir and his Great Eagles in whenever he wants. They're not a taxi service. Two, even if they did try this, the eagles would be at risk of getting shot down easily and the Ring would be claimed by Sauron like it was effortless. And three, there's still Saruman and his Uruk-Hai over in Rohan to deal with. That's why the Fellowship eventually had to split up: one group going to Mordor, the other dealing with the defense of Rohan.