Super Bowl LVI ended the long wait by fans of J.R.R. Tolkien for the first real look at Prime Video's hotly anticipated The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, a planned five-season epic set during the fabled Second Age of Middle-earth.
Although the teaser trailer is short on information, the 60 seconds of footage is jam-packed with images, from breathtaking scenery to intriguing-but-fleeting character vignettes, introducing viewers to figures both new and familiar.
Behold, the Kingdom of Númenor, Before the Fall
The breathtaking opening shot is almost certainly one of the cities of Númenor, the island kingdom of Men, whose destruction was one of the major, if catastrophic, events of the Second Age of Middle-earth. The question is, which city of Númenor is it.
The architecture, with its arches and great, looming statue that juts out of the cliffside, is unmistakably Middle-earth, and recognizable by anyone who watched Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings, or purchased any number of J.R.R. Tolkien calendars and artbooks. It's possibly Númenor's capital, Armenelos, the City of the Kings, but the water, and the absence of, Nimloth, the White Tree, suggest otherwise. The other prime candidates are one of the great port cities, Andúnië on the west coast -- important to both Men and Elves -- or Romenna on the east coast.
Middle-earth's Familiar Landscape - With Unfamiliar Figures
Fans of Jackson's The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings will, no doubt, instantly recognize the distinctive terrain of New Zealand, used as a stand-in for Middle-earth since the 2001 release of The Fellowship of the Ring. It's worth noting The Rings of Power is moving production to the United Kingdom for the second season, marking a major shift for the franchise.
Although dwarfed by the landscape, the two figures wearing what appear to be enormous, moose-like antlers will no doubt draw some attention. We don't know much about them, but a caption in the recent Vanity Fair feature about The Rings of Power identifies the pair as "nomadic hunters." Whether the antlers are some kind of hunting trophies or merely oversized fashion accessories is a question that may have to wait until the series' September premiere.
Galadriel Is Central to the Story - and an Elven Action Hero
Portrayed so memorably by Cate Blanchett first in The Lord of the Rings and then in The Hobbit, Galadriel is remembered as Lady of Lothlórien, and one of the greatest of all the Elves of Middle-earth. However, The Rings of Power introduces Galadriel as she was thousands of years earlier, as played by Morfydd Clark, before she possessed one of the three Elven rings.
As the trailer reveals, this isn't the Galadriel we know, with shimmering robes and solemn pronouncements. This Galadriel is an Elf of action, scaling ice cliffs, tempest-tossed upon the Sundering Seas, and galloping across the plains while dressed in chain mail. It's she who begins the series hunting down the last surviving allies of the defeated Dark Lord Morgoth, and apparently worrying about the reemergence of his lieutenant, Sauron. (That name probably rings a bell.)
The Elf Arondir Is Among The Rings of Power's New Characters
The first person of color to play an Elf in a Tolkien adaptation, actor Ismael Cruz Córdova (Ray Donovan, Berlin Station) is Arondir, a skilled archer and, according to Vanity Fair, one-half of a "forbidden" relationship. (The other half is Bronwyn. a human healer, played by Nazanin Boniadi.)
While Amazon has received praise of its multicultural casting, the studio has also received pushback from corners of the internet accustomed to a Middle-earth that's overwhelmingly white, and intent on keeping it that way. However, the studio is unfazed by the trolls. “It felt only natural to us that an adaptation of Tolkien’s work would reflect what the world actually looks like,” executive producer Lindsey Weber told Vanity Fair. “Tolkien is for everyone. His stories are about his fictional races doing their best work when they leave the isolation of their own cultures and come together.”
Elrond Is an Ambitious Leader, But Not Yet Lord of Rivendell
Like Cate Blanchett's Galadriel, Hugo Weaving's Elrond is an important figure in Jackson's The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, providing safe haven and wise counsel to the heroes of both films. In The Rings of Power, the half-elven Elrond isn't yet mighty Lord of Rivendell, whose word is law within its borders. He's instead an ambitious young leader and architect, played by Robert Aramayo, who will rise to prominence in the Elven realm of Lindon, whose capital, the Grey Havens, was founded during the Second Age.
Is This Lindon or Another Elven Realm?
The imagery is evocative of Rivendell and Lothlórien, seen in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, which are certainly possibilities, as the former was established by Elrond during the Second Age, while Galadriel and her husband Celeborn had settled in the latter before the War of the Elves and Sauron. Although The Rings of Power is utilizing a condensed timeline for its story, it seems likely Rivendell and Lothlórien will appear in later seasons, and not in the first.
Instead, we're probably looking at Lindon, the Elven kingdom in the west of Middle-earth, best known to fans of the Lord of the Rings films for its capital, the port city the Grey Havens (also known as Mithlond), from which Gandalf, Bilbo, Frodo, Elrond, Galadriel and Celeborn depart for the Undying Lands at the end of The Return of King.
Durin IV, Who Bore One of the Dwarf-Lords' Rings of Power
Played by Owain Arthur, Durin IV was, as the number suggests, the fourth in the line of rulers whose people settled Khazad-dûm, the greatest of the Dwarven realms, later known as Moria.
Like the previous three kings named Durin, this one was widely regarded to be a reincarnation of Durin I, also known as Durin the Deathless, and was said to resemble him. As his princely title indicates, Durin IV may not yet have ascended the throne as The Rings of Power opens, nor inherited the mightiest of the Dwarven rings of power, given to Durin III.
No, Dwarven Princess Isa Doesn't Have a Beard
The first female Dwarf to appear in a Tolkien adaptation, Princess Disa is played by Sophia Nomvete, the first Black actor to portray a Dwarf of Middle-earth. The Lord of the Rings Appendix A mentions a similarly named Dwarven princess, Dis, the younger sister of Thorin, and mother of Fili and Kili. However, she was born in the Third Age, not the Second.
Dwarven women are relatively rare in Middle-earth, apparently accounting for just one-third of the population. What's more, as Gimli famously revealed, they're frequently mistaken for Dwarven men, because they, too, have beards. Because of that bit of Dwarven trivia, a promotional image of Princess Disa was met with demands on social media that she be depicted with a beard.
Is This Khazad-dûm, in Its Glory Days?
We know from the promotional materials for The Rings of Power that the Prime Video series will visit the great Dwarven realm of Khazad-dûm, thousands of years before its fall in the Third Age of Middle-earth, after which is was called Moria, the Black Pit. Considering the trailer introduces Owain Arthur as Prince Durin IV and Disa, the Dwarven princess played by Sophia Nomvete, it seems like a safe bet that this is Khazad-dûm in the Second Age.
Although the Dwarven realm was founded in the Third Age, it was during the Second Age that Khazad-dûm began to expand, with an influx of refugees from the Blue Mountains, and established friendly relations with the Elves.
It's All-Out War in Middle-earth - But Which One?
One of the final images of The Rings of Power teaser depicts a fierce battle, which no doubt brings to mind the War of the Last Alliance, depicted in flashback in Jackson's The Fellowship of the Ring, which ended with Sauron's defeat. However, that conflict closed out the Second Age, nearly a century after the Fall of Númenor.
While it's, again, important to note the condensed timeline of the Prime Video series, which moves some key events of the period into close proximity of each other, it seems highly unlikely we're going to see that war, in which Men, Elves and Dwarves fought Morder and its allies, so early in The Rings of Power. A more probably candidate is the War of the Elves and Sauron, which occurred in the middle of the Second Age, nearly a century after the forging of the One Ring.
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power premieres Sept. 2 on Prime Video.