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!
This month Empire Magazine has releasing dueling covers for the upcoming second season of Amazon Studio’s The Rings of Power. One features Morfydd Clark’s Galadriel and the second Charlie Vickers’ Sauron – apparently in fair form? We’ve seen quite a few of these images of Vickers’ more traditionally Tolkien elven appearance which feels closer to Annatar than Halbrand did in The Rings of Power’s first season.
The issue includes more look at the fair form, as you can see below:
Empire also introduced a new Hill Troll (as opposed to a Cave Troll which I have previously written about in this feature series – What are Cave Trolls?), apparently inspired by Jonathan Banks’ character from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul – Mike Ehrmantraut.
Eagle-eyed viewers will remember we already met a new species of troll in The Rings of Power season one when Galadriel went toe-to-toe with a Snow Troll. It seems we may be setting the precedent for meeting a new type of troll in every season?
Per Empire:
“Like his fellow Cave- and Snow- trolls, the Hill-troll is not to be messed with. In fact, McKay refers to Damrod as the “eater of dragon bones” – a diet that few in Middle-earth could stomach. He’ll be voiced by Benjamin Walker, and joins the throng of the nefarious Adar, the ‘Father Of Orcs’ (a part played by Joseph Mawle in Season 1; he’s replaced in Season 2 by Samuel Hazeldine), bolstering the ranks of darkness that Sauron is fostering amid his rise to power. But inspiration for Damrod came from an unlikely place. “[He] was inspired in part by Mike Ehrmantraut in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul,” says McKay, “if you look at the way he moves and his casual sense of strength.” Sounds like this troll will be even grumpier than the usual kind.”
Is that the same Benjamin Walker who plays High King Gil-Galad on the show?
*insert double eye emoji here*
Empire ALSO gave us an exclusive look at Robert Aramayo’s Elrond in his battle armour.
… in an image which evokes Hugo Weaving’s battle ready Elrond from The Last Alliance of Men and Elves sequence in the opening of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring film from 2001.
Empire reports:
“We love a good battle,” says McKay, promising big things in the spectacle department upon the show’s return – set to bring a significantly larger clash to our screen. “The plan with Season 2 would be to do something much bigger, on a much grander scale that would take place not just overnight, but over multiple days, weeks, months and episodes,” he teases. Charlotte Brändström, who’s taken over from J.A. Bayona as producing director for Season 2, says this battle will be “ten times bigger” than the one witnessed in the first run. “It’s really the battle of the darkness against the light,” she promises, “with some very dark and quite violent moments.”
You can preview the full issue here and it went on sale yesterday. Which cover will you be picking up?
