The elaborate costumes of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power were always fated to connect with cosplayers, but the show's costume designer wanted fans to face a bit of a challenge when recreating the designs.
Morfydd Clark, who portrays Galadriel in Amazon's epic fantasy series, recently spoke with Empire about her character's outfits, and about the fans who have taken on the daunting task of recreating them. Clark says that The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power's costume designer made a special effort to keep the series' costume designs complicated enough to challenge cosplayers: "Kate Hawley, the costume designer, was like, 'I want to make it really difficult for them. I want it to be a real challenge.'"
According to Clark, despite Hawley's best efforts, it hasn't taken long for fans to put in the work and create costumes inspired by Galadriel. Clark tells Empire that, when attending San Diego Comic-Con with the rest of the LOTR: The Rings of Power cast, long before anyone had actually seen the series, one fan had already gone the distance and crafted a cosplay based on promotional stills of Galadriel. As Clark puts it, "I got to meet one cosplayer who’d made the armour that was in the first image of Galadriel that was released, and it was incredible."
LOTR: The Rings of Power's Galadriel is a different take on the character than some may have expected based on her portrayal in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy. Because The Rings of Power is a distant prequel to the LOTR stories fans are familiar with, this version of Galadriel is much younger and more conflicted. Clark says she finds this portrayal of Galadriel honest and exciting: "I think it's really interesting that she is so conflicted and going through so much because I feel the people in my life who ended up the most kind of chill and serene as Galadriel... have usually been through a lot."
Despite drawing some criticism from The Lord of the Rings fans for its deviations from established canon, The Rings of Power has performed quite well with critics. Only two episodes have been released at the time of writing, so it's difficult to say where the show will ultimately land, but one thing that's nearly certain is that cosplayers will see even more character designs to replicate as the show goes on.
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is currently streaming on Amazon Prime.
Source: Empire Magazine