‘The Rings of Power’ Builds Plenty of Promising Story and Characters in First Two Episodes — Review
The first two episodes of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power are now available to stream on Prime Video. Let’s discuss them!
WARNING: Spoilers ahead for episodes 1 and 2 of The Rings of Power
It would be an understatement to say I was afraid (and therefore enraged) of what Amazon would do with Middle-earth after it was reported in November 2017 they had acquired the rights to The Lord of the Rings. There is no fictional world, no story I am more attached to or feel more strongly about than Middle-earth’s. I can practically say I grew up in Middle-earth, and have been visiting its fields, mountains, and cities on a regular basis since I was five years old and my father showed me the movies for the first time. While I have read the books a couple of times, The Lord of the Rings lives on the screen for me. It is Peter Jackson’s magical interpretation of Tolkien’s world that captured my imagination as a kid, and continues to do so to this day. So, to think that my beloved Lord of the Rings would now just be another player in the “streaming wars” was not something that I was hopeful about.
We’ve come a long way since then, and I hated the idea of this show just as much as I got excited for it once more details started to transpire. As recent reports suggested, my initial concerns were somewhat legitimate, since Amazon started hearing pitches about spin-off shows centered around Aragorn or Gimli, something that would have made Tolkien roll over in his grave. But the idea of having an adaptation of the events of the Second Age as a five-season show was something that felt just perfect, worthy of Tolkien’s work. And every detail revealed over the past few months about the series has done nothing but reinforce my sentiment that JD Payne and Patrick McKay may have captured lightning in a bottle, in a similar way to how Peter Jackson did it over 20 years ago. I am now delighted to say that so far, the show has exceeded my expectations.
I thought the decision of releasing the first two episodes at once was very smart, as audiences needed some time to familiarize themselves with the new era presented on screen. While the episodes pretty much covered everything I had figured from the trailers, and I was already familiar with most of the storylines after following the marketing campaign quite closely, that is not the case for most audience members. People needed time to adjust to the new locations and characters — even well-known characters like Galadriel and Elrond are completely different from how they were depicted in Peter Jackson’s trilogy. The Rings of Power, much like Tolkien in his writing, takes its time to set everything up.
In a move that was clearly inspired by, if not a straight-up rip-off of the prologue from Fellowship of the Ring, The Rings of Power starts with Galadriel narrating the events of the end of the previous age and how, despite coming out on the victorious side, there is still fear of the evil they seemingly destroyed not being completely extinguished. Much like what Peter Jackson was able to do with his five-minute prologue, I was longing for a longer version of the battle against Morgoth’s forces. At first, I was a little put off by the paper boat and the river, but I was satisfied by the end with the payoff on the actual boat.
I was also surprised by what followed. I was convinced all the sequences of Galadriel on a quest were from later in the season, after she’d picked up Halbrand. I was delighted, however, to be proven wrong, because now I absolutely have no idea what awaits us beyond episode 3, where I assume we’re meeting the Númenóreans. I thought Galadriel’s story would start in Lindon, where we meet Elrond and Gil-galad. I have a few minor complaints about the former, but I loved everything surrounding the latter.
What didn’t work for me about Elrond is the fact that he feels like a plot device right now, a tool used by the writers to set some subplots in motion. The writers wanted Galadriel to get on the boat to Valinor, where she would eventually jump. But the Galadriel they’d introduced so far wouldn’t leave her quest so easily, so she needed some convincing. And Elrond comes in. Then, Celebrimbor needs help on a certain construction project he’s setting up, so he uses Elrond to help him out. The writers will now use the character as a tool to introduce the dwarfs, set that subplot in motion, and also build the place where I imagine the Rings of Power will eventually be forged. He doesn’t feel like a character yet, because he’s not making his own decisions. But I am hopeful that will change soon — this is just a minor complaint for now.
The first episode introduces three subplots, through three different species and locations, that will set off the main story of The Rings of Power. We’ve already discussed the elves, but there are more elves around. Arondir is a member of a squad watching over the Southlands, near a human village where he’s not exactly welcome. There lives Bronwyn, perhaps the only human that is friendly to him, and with whom he has some romantic tension. What they don’t know yet is that the evil is not far off, and in the second episode orcs have already reached the village. What is going on exactly? Well, they are living in dangerous territory. So dangerous that Mount Doom can be seen in the background in multiple shots, and they are, in fact, in what will later be known as Mordor. I imagine we are going to see Sauron conquer this land over the season, leading up to the reveal of Annatar, the name he goes by in this Age, for the season finale.
I’m also very intrigued by the sword Theo picks up, and I imagine that will play a huge role in the third episode, when the villagers are inevitably attacked by the orcs. We’ve already seen Arondir captured by them, and I believe we are in for the first minor battle of the season in episode 3. How the sword will factor in, we don’t know yet.
The third story set up in the first episode is the harfoots’. Led by Nori, who seems like Frodo, Sam, Pippin, and Merry merged into one young girl, we start to see how this species lived through the Second Age, with a rather amusing and endearing introduction scene in the first episode. The first episode ends with the introduction of another key player in the season, The Stranger, who arrives by meteor in the final moments. We’d already seen some of this in the trailer, but the show builds up the questions of who he is and what he’s doing there even more than the marketing campaign did. After watching both episodes, it is pretty clear to me that this is Gandalf, who just arrived on Middle-earth. That pretty much checks all the boxes, but the fact it’s too obvious makes me think that it might not be Gandalf, so I guess we’ll see. It would explain why he’s so fond of the hobbits in the Third Age, and also why he exhibits magic powers. The scene in the second episode where the trees behind him start to shake is very reminiscent of some Gandalf scenes in the Peter Jackson movies, like when he frightens Bilbo in Bag End, and then we have him whispering to fireflies, much like he did with moths in more than one occasion.
My bottom line is that this feels like Tolkien on television. The dialogues, the scope, and taking the time to set things up carefully are very Tolkien-esque, while other techniques like setting up season-long mysteries or subplots feel like the best television has to offer. I was looking forward to The Rings of Power more than House of the Dragon, and I still feel that way. I hate the fact we have to wait a whole week to see what happens next, and I haven’t felt that way about a television series in a long time.
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as authors like Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
