The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power actress Sophia Nomvete recently provided an update on Season 2 and what viewers can expect.
Speaking with Deadline, Nomvete first summarized the first season saying, “Season 1 was a time of relative peace, an introductory time meeting everybody.”
That relative time of peace will be no more in the second season, Nomvete detailed, “Season 2 is the unravelling of it all. It’s when the force of evil really starts to put pressure on Middle Earth and we watch how everyone that we know and hopefully love handles that situation.”
She added, “The stakes are higher. We see what that force of evil does to each race and to each relationship. There’s so much more action.”
“We weathered the storms, and there’s a real sense of confidence in who and what we are. I’m really excited about it,” she concluded.
It’s unclear what exactly will happen in the show’s second season given much of the first season eschewed Tolkien’s Second Age stories about Sauron, the Númenóreans, and the Elves.
The Lord of the Rings actor Bernard Hill, who played King Theoden in Peter Jackson’s film adaptations, sniffed out the series would not follow Tolkien’s lore and made it clear he had no intention of watching the show based on what he had heard and seen of it.
He told Metro, “It’s a money-making venture and I’m not interested in watching that or being in it. Good luck to them and all that stuff but it’s not like the real thing.”
The series’ showrunner Patrick McKay appeared to acknowledge the fact that the first season strayed from Tolkien’s legendarium despite repeated promises that they were always going back to Tolkien and the book in the promotion of the show.
Nevertheless, he told The Hollywood Reporter ahead of the season one finale, “Season two has a canonical story. There may well be viewers who are like, ‘This is the story we were hoping to get in season one!’ In season two, we’re giving it to them.”
Fellow showrunner J.D. Payne previously provided an update on Season 2 and noted the series would be more focused on Sauron. He told The Hollywood Reporter, “Season one opens with: Who is Galadriel? Where did she come from? What did she suffer? Why is she driven? We’re doing the same thing with Sauron in season two. We’ll fill in all the missing pieces.”
McKay added, “Sauron can now just be Sauron. Like Tony Soprano or Walter White. He’s evil, but complexly evil. We felt like if we did that in season one, he’d overshadow everything else.”
“So the first season is like Batman Begins, and the The Dark Knight is the next movie, with Sauron maneuvering out in the open,” McKay said.
It’s likely the show will try and adapt Sauron’s war against the Elves after they discover he has created the One Ring and plans to dominate them and everyone on Middle-earth.
In The Silmarillion, Tolkien wrote, “As soon as Sauron set the One Ring upon his finger they were aware of him; and they knew him, and perceived that he would be master of them, and of all that they wrought. Then in anger and fear they took off their rings. But he, finding that he was betrayed and that the Elves were not deceived, was filled with wrath; and he came against them with open war, demanding that all the rings should be delivered to him, since the Elven-smiths could not have attained to their making without his lore and counsel.”
Tolkien later detailed, “From that time war never ceased between Sauron and the Elves; and Eregion was laid waste, and Celebrimbor slain, and the doors of Moria were shut. In that time the stronghold and refuge of Imladris, that Men called Rivendell, was founded by Elrond Half-elven; and long it endured. But Sauron gathered into his hands all the remaining Rings of Power; and he dealt them out to the other peoples of Middle-earth, hoping thus to bring under his sway all those that desired secret power beyond the measure of their kind.”
As for how Sauron used the rings against the peoples of Middle-earth, Tolkien relayed, “Seven rings he gave to the Dwarves; but to Men he gave nine, for Men proved in this matter as in others the readiest to his will. And all those rings that he governed he perverted, the more easily since he had a part in their making, and they were accursed, and they betrayed in the end all those that used them.”
“The Dwarves indeed proved tough and hard to tame; they ill endure the domination of others, and the thoughts of their hearts are hard to fathom, nor can they be turned to shadows. They used their rings only for the getting of wealth; but wrath and an overmastering greed of gold were kindled in their hearts, of which evil enough after came to the profit of Sauron,” Tolkien wrote. “It is said that the foundation of each of the Seven Hoards of the Dwarf-kings of old was a golden ring; but all those hoards long ago were plundered and the Dragons devoured them, and of the Seven Rings some were consumed in fire and some Sauron recovered.”
It’s quite likely that the Dwarves of Moria will fall to their greed and uncover the Balrog that would later become known as Durin’s Bane that was shown in the first season. However, that did not actually occur until the Third Age well after Sauron’s war on the Elves and the events The Rings of Power claims to be adapting.
What do you make of these comments about the second season from Sophia Nomvete?
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