Amazon Studios The Rings of Power is here. The Second season will debut on Amazon Prime August 29th of this year. We want all Spoilerites to have the best viewing experience possible and have the widest knowledge base about the Second Age of Middle-Earth. This is a weekly Let’s Get Nerdy article series highlighting a different piece of Tolkien I think you need to know about!
This post contains potential spoilers for The Rings of Power’s second season. At the time of writing these are based on what we’ve seen in trailers and early looks, but if you may want to avoid spoilers come back later and see if I was right!
Tales of the Shire-inclined Spoilterites, we’re going to have to put off writing about The Battle of Bywater for one more week yet (I know, I know!), because yesterday Amazon Prime did us the courtesy of releasing the first trailer for the second season of The Rings of Power! If you haven’t already seen it you can watch it below:
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 2 – Official Teaser Trailer (2024)
In Season Two of The Rings of Power, Sauron has returned. Cast out by Galadriel, without army or ally, the rising Dark Lord must now rely on his own cunning to rebuild his strength and oversee the creation of the Rings of Power, which will allow him to bind all the peoples of Middle-earth to his sinister will.
If you’ve been reading some of my spoiler-filled posts over the past few months here in the Let’s Get Nerdy! feature you’ll definitely have caught glimpses of things which seem familiar (or at least aligned), with many of the rumours that have been swirling in the ether! Enough about that, let’s get down to what is actually important from the trailer itself!
We’ve got confirmation that Halbrand is Sauron and based on the Legolas-esque makeover we see throughout the trailer it seems The Rings of Power is really embracing the Annatar as “fair form” persona for the character book readers will remember featured prominently throughout The Silmarillion and The Unfinished Tales.
Sauron isn’t the only baddie kicking around The Rings of Power trailer, we also get a look at the new Adar. Actor Joseph Mawle was previously playing the character and, as I wrote about in this feature series, he was replaced by Sam Hazeldine who you can see above.
The tower of Barad-dûr also makes its debut appearance in The Rings of Power. The tower – of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers fame – is Sauron’s stronghold in Mordor. It’s construction and/or existence is likely part of the “where are they now” storyline which will involve what was previously referred to in The Rings of Power as “The Southland”.
Things seem to be going poorly for Númenor. There’s a clip of High Queen Míriel underwater facing a monster. Given the dream sequences from the first season of The Rings of Power I would suspect there’s a good chance this is a prophetic-type dream, or perhaps this is actually a glimpse at the Amazon Studios version of the Fall of Númenor. Great wave, anyone?
Further to Númenor …
Pharazôn appears back on his [redacted swear word]this season from the glimpse we catch of him in the trailer arriving with a Great Eagle quite dramatically. Great Eagles are seen throughout both The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit film trilogies and most audience members who only know them from their appearances on screen probably think of them a bit as Deus ex Machina. Of course, as with all character Tolkien, they’re a good bit more complicated than that. This association with Great Eagles showing up and rescuing people leads me to believe this scene is likely a fleeing of Númenor.
There certainly are a lot more RINGS in this Rings of Power trailer! We get a shot of the “Three Rings for the Elven Kings” – Nenya, Narya, and Vilya – in an visual homage to the shot from the introduction of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (and the hands of Celebrimbor, Galadriel, and High King Gil-
Galad who are their first bearers), as well a Dwarf Ring, which per Tolkien canon goes unnamed.
Fun [not really]fact: There are literally no Harfoots in this trailer whatsoever, just the briefest hint of The Stranger who was last seen heading east with Nori while the rest of her family and friends continued on what I presume is their journey to settle and found The Shire. Whether or not this is intentionally hiding something or Harfoots are going to play a markedly smaller role in the next season of The Rings of Power only time will tell.
Did you see anything I missed? Comment below!
In past articles I have answered the question:
