Filed March 1, 2004, 12:17 a.m.
It certainly comes as no surprise to assume that Dr. Howard Dean is crying himself to sleep tonight on his huge pilla'. If only Dean would have hired the campaign managers happily responsible for slam dunking this year's Academy Awards he could have charged the stage in all his WWE glee proclaiming: "We're going to Art Direction, and Adapted Screenplay and Editing ... and we're not gonna' stop until we clean sweep the Oscars. YYEEAAHH!!" As a matter of fact, the sweeping domination of this years' ceremony was so predictable that the only contender for closest second probably belongs to John Kerry.

Well, enough with governmental politics, and let us turn to the ones of Hollywood. To those of you who do not yet know, or could not have already guessed, "Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" came into the 2004 Academy Awards loaded with an enormous 11 Oscar nominations, and walked away with a win for every single one. To be totally honest, this comes as no surprise, as Peter Jackson's seven-year creative journey has brought him all the glory this epic trilogy so richly deserves.

What is ironic, however, is that with an awards ceremony often known for infamously dipping its hands into the pits of dirty politicking, this year truly left no time to even get that ball rolling. The 76th Academy Awards ceremony was moved ahead by four calendar weeks this year in order to, among other things, boost recently slacking ratings. And while we knew three years ago tonight, that "Return of the King" was looking ahead to this chest of wins, it is hard -- if not impossible -- to judge what kind of impact this early bird ceremony actually made. It is not necessarily mysterious to see all of this year's projected winners actually win -- aside from "King" -- but it is, admittedly, a tad fishy. Yes, my friends, how much does the conventional wisdom weigh? Whatever it is, it is hopefully not to the consequence in evolving the range of Oscar.

Come next February it is safe to say that Rubbermaid's own, Joan and Melissa Rivers, will greet us on the red carpet at the Kodak Theatre, so here remains the true question to ponder: Will the shortened awards season negatively affect the results of a progressively varied competition? This year's analysis is flawed thanks to Frodo. All one can hope is that the recognition of worthy independent cinema will not be stifled by Academy members who are increasingly pressed for time with their ballots.

At the sake of sentimentality, I say today is in many ways a breath of fresh air -- three full years in the waiting. So farewell, our King. We, the Academy, can only hope to have grown with you as much as we have aged these 36 months in your shadow.