Rings of Power

The first taste of Prime Video's long-awaited, big-budget series reveals one of the most captivating fantasy worlds in TV history.

'The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power' has a brand new trailer—catch the series when it premieres on September 1, 2022 on Prime Video.

Having invested hundreds of millions in mounting a series version of "The Lord of the Rings," Amazon has gotten its money's worth in production values but ...

The initial reactions to the first two episodes of the Amazon adaptation are promising, with 'The Guardian' calling the prequel “so astounding it makes 'House ...

The prologue that opens Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring explains the rise of the villainous Sauron, his creation of ...

“It was an extensive jigsaw puzzle of facial hair,” hair and makeup head Jane O'Kane says of Arthur's transformation. The team included makeup and hair artist ...

El elenco de “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” (“El señor de los anillos: Los anillos de poder”) charla sobre la primera serie televisiva basada ...

Among the many familiar elements in the Prime Video series coming Sept. 2 is the dwarf stronghold of Khazad-dûm. If you've watched Peter Jackson's classic Lord ...

The Rings of Power takes place in the Second Age of Middle-earth, thousands of years before Frodo and friends ever thought about leaving the Shire. This is the challenge The Rings of Power faces. Instead, these elements do a lot of heavy lifting in settling the viewer into this complex story. The first two episodes alone serve up a feast of sweeping shots over snowy mountains, open plains and painfully gorgeous elven architecture. Judging from screeners of the first two episodes provided by Prime Video, The Rings of Power makes a steady return to Middle-earth, offering all the things that endeared the originals to so many of us those many years ago: the breathtaking vistas, the latex prosthetics and even the occasional bouts of ponderous dialogue delivered to some point on the horizon. If you've watched Peter Jackson's classic Lord of the Rings film trilogy, you've visited Khazad-dûm as a terrifying tomb littered with skeletons, festooned with cobwebs and policed by a particularly nasty fire demon.

Galadriel (Morfydd Clark) · Halbrand (Charlie Vickers) · Elrond (Robert Aramayo) · High King Gil-galad (Benjamin Walker) · Celebrimbor (Charles Edwards) · Isildur ( ...

Nori is a harfoot, one of the nomadic ancestors of the hobbits. [We Just Got the Best Snapshot Yet of How Much Progress Students Lost in the Pandemic.](https://time.com/6210490/pandemic-learning-loss-naep/?utm_source=roundup&utm_campaign=20220902)The Results Are Staggering [Jackson, Mississippi Has No Safe Tap Water for the Foreseeable Future.](https://time.com/6209710/jackson-mississippi-water-crisis/?utm_source=roundup&utm_campaign=20220902)It's a Crisis Decades in the Making He will play a major role in determining the fate of Númenor. The son of Bronwyn, Theo’s character is another invention of the show. But during the Second Age the subterranean kingdom is flourishing, thanks to the riches hidden in the mountain where the dwarves reside. Readers and fans of the popular Shadow of War and Shadow of Mordor video games will recognize Celebrimbor as the elf smith who was tricked into forging the rings of power by a disguised Sauron. [The Rings of Power](https://time.com/6197384/rings-of-power-trailer-breakdown-lord-of-the-rings/), the new J.R.R. Lord of the Rings fans got a brief look at High King Gil-Galad (played by Mark Ferguson) in the first few minutes of Fellowship of the Ring. Lord of the Rings fans will recognize Elrond, the half-elf, half-man who presides over the elven land of Rivendell. Payne and Patrick McKay](https://time.com/6205593/the-rings-of-power-secrets-cast-creators/) have already plotted out five seasons that will culminate in a battle between Sauron’s evil forces and the Last Alliance of Elves and Men. To understand the story, you need to know the main players of the Second Age. The show promises to show how she evolves into the wise stateswoman we meet in Lord of the Rings.

What's a harfoot? And when is Amazon's TV prequel set in the "Lord of the Rings" timeline? We have answers to all your questions about the show.

"That tension is always there, especially with the rise of Sauron." "It's beautiful to see groups of beings overcoming the things that stand between them as obstacles, and coming together for each others' greater good." After the War of Wrath, the humans who fought with the elves were gifted the island of Númenor. "We get to see it in full swing," executive producer Lindsey Weber says. "The serenity and wisdom that we see in Cate Blanchett's wonderful portrayal (in Jackson's movies) is hard-earned. Although the actor can't yet share the significance of the broken sword, he teases that he prepared for the role by researching original trilogy characters such as Boromir: men whose "minds get corrupted." They're just trying to manage and stay ahead of any danger that might be coming toward them," and are still trying to find a permanent home. "It's this great narrative of the forging of the rings of power, the rise of Sauron, the epic of Númenor – the island kingdom of men – and the last alliance and battle between elves and men and Sauron and his forces. Although the elves believe that evil was eradicated in the war, Galadriel is convinced there are still dark forces in Middle-earth, and she sets out to avenge her brother's death. "But from what we know about Tolkien, evil is always right around the corner." "The question the first season asks is, 'How far into the darkness would you go to protect the things that matter the most?' " During the Second Age, the elves forged 19 magical rings: three for themselves, seven for the dwarves and nine for the leaders of men.

El elenco de “El señor de los anillos: Los anillos de poder”) habla sobre la primera serie televisiva basada la obra de J.

“Tolkien escribió miles de años de historia en los que Galadriel estuvo”, dijo la actriz galesa Morfydd Clark quien da vida al personaje previamente interpretado por Cate Blanchett. Al crecer en Gales su madre también le decía que la historia de Tolkien estaba inspirada en ese rincón del planeta. Pero ser una de las primeras actrices de color con papeles prominentes en las versiones en pantalla de esta historia, junto con sus compañeras de reparto Nazanin Boniadi y Cynthia Addai-Robinson, tras los capítulos anteriores dirigidos por Peter Jackson, que también incluyen la trilogía de “The Hobbit” (“El Hobbit”), es igualmente un hito para ella. La tenaz Galadriel promete vengar la muerte de su hermano fallecido en su lucha contra el mal y busca acabar con Sauron, quien comienza a amenazar su mundo. “Este es un momento emblemático, necesario, revolucionario y estoy muy orgullosa de levantar la bandera para las generaciones futuras en una franquicia de esta escala”. Bayona, así como otros importantes miembros del elenco, visitaron recientemente la Ciudad de México para una de las primeras premieres con público de la muy anticipada serie de Amazon Prime Video que debuta el viernes a nivel mundial.

From the moment we meet a young Galadriel, Prime Video's big swing really feels like Lord of the Rings. By Esther Zuckerman. August 31, 2022.

CIUDAD DE MÉXICO (AP) — La serie “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” (“El señor de los anillos: Los anillos de poder”) va miles de años atrás.

Amazon's big bet on the timeless works of J.R.R. Tolkien started with a $250 million bid at an auction in 2017. Five years later, the first episodes of what ...

[according to Entertainment Weekly](https://ew.com/tv/lord-of-the-rings-the-rings-of-power-character-guide/). [according to USA Today](https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2022/07/22/lord-of-the-rings-rings-of-power-comic-con-trailer-amazon/10128600002/). “The show begins with Nori and her closest friend Poppy Proudfellow (Megan Richards) discovering a mysterious man (Daniel Weyman), who seems to have fallen from the sky in a flaming meteor.” - Celebrimbor (Charles Edwards): We know his name, at least. In “The Rings of Power,” Isildur is “still a young man living on the island of Númenor,” (Jackson, whose “Return of the King” won a Best Picture Oscar in 2004, is not involved in “The Rings of Power” project.) The author, as explained by [Vanity Fair](https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2022/02/amazon-the-rings-of-power-series-first-look), “squeezed thousands of years of history into about 150 pages of postscript ... [Vanity Fair’](https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2022/02/amazon-the-rings-of-power-series-first-look)s Anthony Breznican and Joanna Robinson wrote in February. Similarly diminutive in stature, these harfoots haven’t yet settled in the Shire, preferring instead to wander as nomads and live in close-knit communities.” There will be frightening moments, but viewers shouldn’t expect to see the sex and nudity featured in HBO’s popular fantasy series “Game of Thrones.” [appendices](https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/The_Lord_of_the_Rings_Appendices),” which appear in six parts at the end of Tolkien’s third book of “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy. “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” premieres Sept.

Bezos thanked showrunners Patrick McKay and John D. Payne for ignoring his notes on the series.

The billionaire said he received the directive from his Tolkien-obsessed son after Amazon paid $250 million for the rights to make 'Lord of the Rings' ...

A man in the background looks on while a blond woman looks toward the ground seriously. Morfydd Clark as Galadriel, with Charlie Vickers, in “The Rings of Power ...

And as for women in “The Rings of Power” — and Jackson, let’s recall, memorably put a sword in Liv Tyler’s hand in “The Fellowship of the Ring” and invented a female elf warrior, Tauriel, for his “Hobbit” movies — Galadriel is its most engaging character by far. Tolkien sold the right to adapt “The Hobbit” and “The Lord of the Rings” back in 1969; in 2017, Amazon paid his estate for the rights to the appendices and any references to the Second Age in the trilogy. (I reject out of hand all arguments that employ the word “woke” or use “diversity” in a negative sense.) “The Rings of Power” does, in a few instances, too obviously adopt the language of modern American prejudice to make a point, but that is a matter of poor writing rather than a bad idea. And as in “The Lord of the Rings,” the necessary cooperation of the mutually suspicious virtuous races of Middle-earth — men, elves, dwarves and Harfoots — to battle a rising evil is a theme. (The estate is a producing partner.) It is left to the legions of fans to defend the works on the plains of social media, like Éomer and Aragorn at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields. It’s true that Jeff Bezos could pay for the whole thing out of his own pocket without the slightest dent in his lifestyle, but it’s safe to assume Amazon is not in this to lose money, and in order to make back its nut— or simply not be deemed a failure — “The Rings of Power” is going to have to attract not only fans but people who have never read the books or even seen the movies. And in this respect, “The Rings of Power” is an enjoyable ride. Things have been quiet, except in the mind of Galadriel (Morfydd Clark), who will grow up to be Cate Blanchett; against the common wisdom, she’s convinced that Sauron, that shadowy personification of evil, is growing in strength, and as commander of the Northern Armies she is obsessively pursuing him to the frostbound ends of Middle-earth — even as the current Elven administration is ready to pull back its defenses, proclaiming peace in their time. Doom, it is largely based on the novel’s appendices — or even whether it is in the “spirit of Tolkien,” whatever that means to any individual reader. The series is entirely conventional, but “LOTR” is itself conventional. It looks good, has a few charismatic performances that sell the characters and is all in all watchable, if something less than compelling — predictable even in the suspenseful parts, occasionally exciting and sometimes sort of boring. To judge by the vlogosphere, “force for evil” is the predominant view.

There's a reason folks who know a ton about the works of JRR Tolkien are often referred to as scholars. Watching The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit is the ...

Unlike the scattered, separated version of the Dwarves we see in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, we're going to see Dwarves in their prime throughout The Rings of Power. As Amazon was unable to secure the rights to use The Silmarillion to craft the stories in The Rings of Power, the actual source material being used will instead be the Appendices in The Lord of The Rings. Most folks only know the kingdom of the Dwarves as a tomb and home to an angry Balrog who loses a fight with Gandalf. The Men of Númenor aren't quite like the men of the rest of Middle-Earth. That means their evolution happens much faster than the other races of Middle-earth, and what we will see in The Rings of Power are one of the ancestors of Third Age Hobbits, known in this time as Harfoots. The ships Bilbo, Frodo and other board at the end of the movie are traveling back to Valinor. The way Elves and other creatures of Valinor lived while there is wildly different from the way they live in Middle-earth. The Elves you have seen across all of Tolkien's movies -- and soon this TV series -- live in Middle-earth, but they are not from Middle-earth. The Rings of Power takes place before what you've seen in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, but not like 10 years back like you might see in lots of other prequel stories. The Rings of Power takes place thousands of years before the events of The Hobbit, during a period of time referred to as the Second Age. Armed with whatever you remember from the last time you watched The Lord of the Rings and this quick terminology guide, you'll be prepared to enjoy this series without feeling terribly lost at these words you've never heard used in the movies before. There's a reason folks who know a ton about the works of JRR Tolkien are often referred to as scholars.

“The Rings of Power” is set around a thousand years before Frodo (Elijah Wood) and his Fellowship took their journey in the movies. So, very few characters are ...

His exact identity before he was corrupted by the rings is unknown. “The Rings of Power” is set around a thousand years before Frodo (Elijah Wood) and his Fellowship took their journey in the movies. [Nazgûl](https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Nazg%C3%BBl). And there’s no reason to think he could still be alive thousands of years from this time period, to meet Frodo. Spoiler alert — since they’re in the movies a thousand years later, obviously, they’re not. The show chronicles the rise of the villain Sauron and the forging of the Rings of Power (one of which is the One Ring that Frodo will eventually destroy).

Amazon's new Lord Of The Rings TV show, The Rings Of Power, debuts on Amazon Prime Video tonight. Here's five good reasons to tune in.

Amazon has adapted the appendices to The Silmarillion, and the only way to do that and make it a palatable TV show is to make a lot of changes. Some of these mysteries include a mysterious stranger encountered by some of our heroes, who may or may not be connected to The Lord Of The Rings. I’ll be recapping each episode as we go as well, so be sure to [follow me here on this blog](https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/#196d790943ab) and on It’s simply outstanding, adding layers of drama and emotion to the show that simply wouldn’t exist without it. Could he already be there right before our noses, hiding in plain sight disguised as one of the characters? The good news is that this show, at least in its first two episodes, stays faithful to Tolkien’s themes, if not the letter of his writing. The Rings Of Power is anything but cheap. Galadriel, Elrond, Durin, Bronwyn and and every other character introduced in the sprawling two-episode premiere already have my attention. Everything from the special effects to the wildly detailed costumes is extraordinary. It’s one of the best-looking TV shows I’ve ever seen. I entered a skeptic, but walked away a believer. Here are five.

Amazon's pricey, gorgeous fantasy spectacle delivers what fans expect, but it could thrive by giving them what they don't.

“Rings of Power” is spectacular on the screen, but This could make “Rings of Power” an outlier in the TV-fantasy environment post-“Game of Thrones,” whose good-guys-get-decapitated ethos was in many ways a reaction to Tolkien. But she is interesting, and that’s what “Rings of Power” will need to be, more than faithful, to sustain itself over multiple seasons. One day, fate serves one up in the form of a meteor. And in an outpost deep in human country, the elf warrior Arondir (Ismael Cruz Córdova) nurses a forbidden crush on a mortal healer, Bronwyn (Nazanin Boniadi), whose downtrodden neighbors picked Sauron’s side in the last war. A multiseason series can’t live in the operatic intensity of a fantasy film; it needs to build a world, evolve character and develop story arcs over time. (Númenor, the Atlantis-like kingdom of humans whose rise and fall dominates the Second Age, doesn’t even figure into the opening hours.) Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy and the Peter Jackson movie adaptations, to the era when the fateful magic knickknacks of the title were forged. Payne and Patrick McKay, have a Wikipedia-like mishmash of family trees and invented alphabets that describes the series’s time period, the Second Age, this way: “Of events in Middle-earth the records are few and brief, and their dates are often uncertain.” But while I am a middling-level Middle-earth-ophile (have read “The Silmarillion”; do not speak Here she’s a young, headstrong and deadly warrior, with “Crouching Tiger” moves and a conviction that Sauron, the once and future big bad, is still alive and plotting. [current fantasy competition](https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/19/arts/television/house-of-the-dragon-review.html), a sky filled with wheeling and menacing dragons.

Executive producer Lindsey Weber talks about where “Rings of Power” fits into J.R.R. Tolkien's mythology, and how it hopes to appeal to newbies as well as ...

Q: What is at stake in “The Rings of Power”? Were viewers like that considered when creating “The Rings of Power?” We know what the last shot of the series will be. It is the rise of the dark lord Sauron. [“The Rings of Power”] is really the length of three feature tent-pole films shot on the schedule of two for the price of one. It’s a very different time for the people of Middle-earth in the Second Age. Q: “The Rings of Power” reportedly had an enormous budget. A: The rings of power takes place in the Second Age, which is thousands of years before the events of the Third Age, which most people know — Frodo and Bilbo and all of that. It is the rise and fall of Tolkien’s Atlantis, the story of Númenor. It’s based on the appendices, which tell the story of the Second Age. New characters will be introduced, as well as younger versions of immortal characters first met in the original Lord of the Rings trilogy (which is currently streaming on HBO Max, if you’d like a refresher on this world). A: Anyone who has the Lord of the Rings books in their home already has it.

Artist/JRR Tolkien devotee Jenna Kass and TV critic/fantasy philistine Dylan Roth are a married couple who have joined forces to review the new original ...

That being said, if this premiere is anything to go by, I think it’s important to acknowledge that this isn’t a show made for the lovers of Tolkien’s writings. I care about some of the threads more than others, of course, and I’m still nursing some very petty grumblings, but I’m certainly not hate-watching. The other characters are a mix of canon and creation. And since she’s the main character, her being stubbornly right in the face of everyone being patronizingly wrong takes up a lot of air, especially in Episode 1. (The viewer is clearly supposed to assume this is Gandalf, though this could be a deliberate mislead.) DYLAN: I can’t blame Rings of Power creators JD Payne and Patrick McKay for choosing a character who’s familiar to mass audiences as the lead of their show, nor for the decision to reimagine Galadriel as an action hero. I understand that the series uses a mix of original and refurbished characters and concepts from the Sil and other Tolkien back matter. I came to this show telling myself I wasn’t expecting—or necessarily looking for—orthodoxy, that instead my focus would be on whether this felt like Tolkien to me in the way that the best moments of the Jackson films did. I’m interested in Galadriel having fought for so long that she can’t imagine moving on, and the way that’s frightening both to her and to her peers. High fantasy isn’t my preferred genre to read or to watch, but like most people of my generation I was swept up in the splendor and excitement of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings film trilogy, which I’ve watched front to back at least a dozen times. This is probably the context that the producers and financiers of The Rings of Power are expecting from the bulk of their audience, whereas your interest, Jenna, is coming from a more educated place. Can this latest on-screen voyage to Middle Earth satisfy both a diehard with the wisdom of the Eldar and your average Sam, Pip, or Merry?

Amazon's “The Rings of Power” will struggle to recreate the magic of Middle-earth, a world not fit for “cinematic universe” treatment.

No wonder people say that reading “The Lord of the Rings” feels more like an experience than a book — What makes Tolkien’s work unique is the moral heart of his story and the consistency with which he maintains it. It will be because the new adaptation lacks the literary and moral depth that make Middle-earth not just another cinematic universe but a world worth saving. Many of the most popular cinematic universes have been born of visually centered mediums: “Star Wars” in film, “Star Trek” in television, and Marvel in comic books. Rowling in the “Fantastic Beasts” films, for example — is no guarantee that derivative works in a different medium will have the special qualities that made the originals successful. It evokes the flavor of Anglo-Saxon epic poetry and Old Norse sagas, giving readers the sense that they are reading something very old that has been translated by Professor Tolkien, not composed by him. (He sold the film rights in 1969 only in order to help [pay a tax bill](https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tolkien-family-in-quest-for-lord-of-the-rings-tv-rights-amazon-netflix-6shrcdbsg); the television rights were [sold](https://www.polygon.com/23311153/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-hobbit-film-game-rights-embracer-group) to Amazon by his heirs.) (As a scholar of Tolkien’s works, I get regular requests to proofread tattoos that use Tolkien’s Elvish languages.) The cultural and linguistic cohesion that lends Middle-earth its magic is not so easily mimicked. So it is hard to believe that he would have approved of a team of writers building almost entirely new stories with little direct basis in his works. Tolkien’s world in the era of the “cinematic universe.” But the investment is also part of a common strategy in Hollywood: Entertainment companies seem to have decided that owning the rights to beloved works, rather than producing original stories, is the key to maximizing profits. The writing that this dynamic is particularly good at producing — witty banter, arch references to contemporary issues, graphic and often sexualized violence, self-righteousness — is poorly suited to Middle-earth, a world with a multilayered history that eschews both tidy morality plays and blockbuster gore.

The A.V. Club takes a detailed look at the most important realms and lands in the new version of Middle-earth.

To Lord Of The Rings fans, it’s best-known as the realm Frodo and Bilbo sail to after the destruction of the One Ring and the fall of Sauron, and therefore basically serves within that narrative as a version of Heaven. In terms of the land itself, it’s exactly what it sounds like: A wasteland of snow and ice that’s barely habitable and full of threats from both the elements and the creatures who dare to live there. Valinor is the realm of the Valar–the 14 deities who shaped the world at the behest of Tolkien’s supreme deity, Eru Ilúvatar–and as such is almost unimaginably beautiful and peaceful. Though the primary seat of Elvish rule in The Rings Of Power is Lindon, there are other wondrous places to behold in Middle-earth that were built by the Elves. How and why Celebrimbor creates these rings, and who influences their crafting along the way, is all for the series to tell you, but if you’ve read The Lord Of The Rings, you know it’s about much more than making some cool jewelry. In the trailers for The Rings Of Power, you may have noticed Galadriel spending quite a bit of time in a snowy landscape, climbing ice cliffs with her knife and searching for something evil amid the freeze. Of all the locations viewers will get to know throughout The Rings Of Power, Númenor might ultimately prove to be the most consequential. [The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power](https://www.avclub.com/tv/reviews/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-rings-of-power-2022) will finally take us back to the Second Age, the era before The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and bring with it a new live-action version of the Middle-earth landscape. Speaking of realms that aren’t faring well by the time we see them in The Lord Of The Rings, there’s Khazad-dûm, the Dwarven kingdom in the Misty Mountains that’s perhaps better known to fans of Tolkien’s trilogy as Moria. During the War of Wrath, Morgoth (the original Dark Lord) sought to mold Middle-earth in his own dark image, and he had more than a few converts along the way. It’s also, as gateways to paradise should be, a beautiful realm filled with structures made in harmony with the earth, and tributes to Elven achievements and losses in their struggle against the forces of Evil. While they’re still found all over the map in The Rings Of Power, a key feature of the Second Age is the centralized power of Lindon, the realm of High King of the Elves Gil-galad (Benjamin Walker).

At the London premiere for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos thanked the showrunners for ignoring his notes on the show.

“And after Amazon got involved in this project, my son came up to me one day, he looked me in the eyes, very sincerely, and he said: ‘Dad, please don’t eff this up.’ And he was right. “I was probably 13 or 14 years old [and] I fell in love with the adventure of course, with the detailed universe, with the feelings of hope and optimism, with the idea that everybody has a role to play. And as one of the richest men in the world, he was one of the few who could afford to spend reportedly $1 billion to get the series rights to [The Lord of the Rings](https://superherohype.com/tag/the-lord-of-the-rings) and produce [The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power](https://superherohype.com/tag/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-rings-of-power). But mostly I need to thank you for ignoring me at exactly the right times.” Bezos admitted that he was very hands-on with the series. [The Expanse](https://superherohype.com/tag/the-expanse) on Amazon Prime Video without Bezos’ support for the show.

It's a tale of the tape between the new iterations of the Game of Thrones and LOTR franchises.

The self-annihilating conflict will be known as the “Dance of the Dragons” for the massive beasts that the family’s armies ride to attack each other. House of the Dragon In Game of Thrones, Daenerys was driven to reclaim the supremacy over Westeros that was once wielded by her Targaryen ancestors—aka the House of the Dragon. We’re about to witness a clash of the titans, as fantasy obsessives now have two franchise prequels to juggle: House of the Dragon, the Game of Thrones prequel that is now two episodes in on HBO Max, and The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, which debuts today on Amazon Prime.

The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power will premiere with the first two episodes, and here's all you need to know about the show's release schedule.

The show will follow a weekly release schedule, and a new episode will release Thanks to the time difference, fans in some regions (the US, Latin America, and Canada) will get the episodes on Thursday, September 1st, 2022, at 6 PM PT (Pacific Timing). The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power will premiere with the first two episodes on Friday, September 2nd, 2022, at 1 AM GMT (Greenwich Mean Time), but the release time will vary depending on your region.

Meanwhile, Amazon is readying its own fantasy series: The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. While excitement for House of the Dragon was pretty high before ...

People are friends in The Rings of Power, whereas in Westeros friendship is always conditional, or crumbles in the face of impossible circumstance. In the first two episodes, the closest The Rings of Power gets to the gritty conflicts of House of the Dragon is a thread about elves watching over a group of men whose ancestors fought for Sauron’s master Morgoth in battles millennia ago. That’s not to say that The Rings of Power can’t get dark, but the darkness is more elemental and therefore not as viscerally disturbing; a sea monster attacks a ship in a storm, Galadriel pursues the dark god Sauron in revenge for him killing her brother in the War of Wrath. And just as there are grim scenes on House of the Dragon you’ll never see on The Rings of Power, so are there joyful scenes in that show that are unthinkable in Westeros. Like Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon tamps things down a bit. In any case, the show premieres tomorrow on Amazon Prime Video, which means it’s going to be running alongside House of the Dragon; new episodes of Rings of Power drop on Fridays and new episodes of House of the Dragon on Sundays. And The Rings of Power is set thousands of years before The Lord of the Rings, when elves were still plentiful in Middle-earth, hobbits weren’t really known, and Sauron hadn’t yet made the One Ring. House of the Dragon is already picking up where Game of Thrones left off. House of the Dragon is set over 150 years before Game of Thrones, back when the Targaryens were at the height of their power. While excitement for House of the Dragon was pretty high before the show premiered earlier this month, hype for The Rings of Power has been more tepid, although there are plenty of reasons to get excited. And just to be clear, I have no intention of slowing down on the comparisons; they’re way too fun to make. Clearly, people did not get their fill of Westeros with the end of the original series, and House of the Dragon is giving them plenty to dine on.

Tolkien's high-fantasy world. Before you read our review of those two episodes, which premiere Friday, September 2, avail yourself of this spoiler-free guide to ...

There are six of them: “Annals of the Kings and Rulers,” “The Tale of Years,” “Family Trees,” “Calendars,” “Writing and Spelling,” and “Languages and Peoples of the Third Age” and “On Translation” (these last two form one appendix). Shore handled the theme music for “The Rings of Power,” while “The Rings of Power” isn’t a direct adaptation of any one book the way Jackson’s two trilogies were. Peter Jackson’s trilogy was set during the Third Age of Middle-earth, whereas “The Rings of Power” takes place in the Second Age — a difference that accounts for thousands of years. And nine, nine rings were gifted to the race of Men — who above all else, desire power.” But they were all of them deceived, you’ll surely recall, for another ring was made as well — the One Ring to Rule Them All. Five years after it was announced that Amazon would bring “The Lord of the Rings” to television, “The Rings of Power” is finally here.

The Prime Video series, reportedly the most expensive of all time, had the first leg of its premiere rollout last night.

As fan @ [@Sarenity93](https://twitter.com/Sarenity93) puts it simply: “If you love LOTR and/or fantasy, it’s a must watch.” The Rings Of Power is a go big or go home series if ever one existed, and that’s a fact that’s drawn equal amounts of respect and anxiety. [@acpovcrew](https://twitter.com/acpovcrew) urges fans to go in without qualms about the “incredible” series, and just let it speak for itself. [@cadecalrayn](https://twitter.com/cadecalrayn), the series is “visually stunning” and immediately merits a rewatch. Of course, it’s impossible to talk about the enormous scale of The Rings Of Power premiere without mentioning another small-budget, indie series that’s been getting some buzz: HBO’s Game Of Thrones prequel House Of The Dragon. [Save $150Galaxy Z Fold4](https://events.release.narrativ.com/api/v0/client_redirect/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.samsung.com%2Fus%2Fsmartphones%2Fgalaxy-z-fold4%2Fbuy%2F%3FmodelCode%3DSM-F936UZEAXAA%26nrtv_cid%3D.nrtv_plchldr.%26cid%3Dopmc-ecomm-nrtiv-mob-042720-142014-theinventory-12497918%26utm_source%3Dtheinventory%26utm_medium%3Dnarrativ%26utm_campaign%3D12497918%26utm_content%3Dmob%26nrtv_as_src%3D1%26offerCID%3Dreserve%26source%3Dnarrativ&a=1782524447985141847&uuid=487f3a13-58da-4f51-b4e1-af644198317f&uid_bam=1741179819279353350&ar=1782651785371609546)

The highly-anticipated live-action series set in the fantasy world created by J.R.R. Tolkien serves as a prequel to Peter Jackson's beloved film trilogy and ...

ET. Check out the trailer and official synopsis for The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power below: Tolkien’s The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings books, and will take viewers back to an era in which great powers were forged, kingdoms rose to glory and fell to ruin, unlikely heroes were tested, hope hung by the finest of threads, and one of the greatest villains that ever flowed from Tolkien’s pen threatened to cover all the world in darkness. The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power premieres exclusively on Prime Video with two episodes today, September 1, at 9 p.m. Set in the Second Age of Middle-Earth, The Rings of Power explores the past of some key characters of Jackson’s trilogy, including Elrond (Robert Aramayo), Galadriel (Morfydd Clark), and Isildur (Maxim Baldry). [The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power](https://collider.com/tag/the-lord-of-the-rings-the-rings-of-power/) is finally getting released today, September 1, with two episodes.

The highly anticipated show set in J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle-earth will air on Fridays this fall. The first two episodes drop on September 2, 2022, ...

Before joining T&C, she was the deputy managing editor at [Hey Alma](https://www.heyalma.com/), a Jewish culture site. EDT Follow her @emburack on [Twitter ](https://twitter.com/emburack)and The show is the most expensive television show ever made. Set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R.

'The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power' VFX sequences used 1500 visual effect artists and 20 studios, and generated over 9500 VFX shots to recapture ...

What made “Rings of Power” unique was “we found a way that all assets could be shared and they all talked to each other. The Sundering Seas sequence took weeks to put together, with a special focus on making the waves look terrifying and violently strong. Their goal wasn’t about who could do the job, it was ensuring everyone could come together and work cohesively to deliver the spectacle that was required of it. “Rings of Power,” streaming on Prime Video, is set thousands of years before the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, in the Second Age of Middle-earth. As for finding the right VFX studios, he compares it to a casting audition. It is finished to a theatrical resolution.”

A set of zooming J.R.R. Tolkien maps will help you understand where locations in LOTR: The Rings of Power are in the Second Age, and how that fits into the ...

Tolkien](https://www.polygon.com/lord-of-the-rings/22550950/sam-frodo-queer-romance-lord-of-the-rings-tolkien-quotes) didn’t just love maps — he ascribed the entire world-building success of [The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings](https://www.polygon.com/lord-of-the-rings/22550950/sam-frodo-queer-romance-lord-of-the-rings-tolkien-quotes) to his cartographical exercises. In Rings of Power, the camera swoops over sections of this map like an Indiana Jones movie might. A few key locations emerge in the opening two episodes of Rings of Power, including Forodwaith, where Galadriel is hunting down clues of an lingering evil; Rhovanion, home to the hobbit-like harfoots; and the Eregion region, where one can find the dwarven kingdom of Khazad-dûm tucked away underneath a mountain range. It’s such a thrill to see the dang map on screen that I was left wanting to see the full thing. And it’s no surprise that the new Amazon series [The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power](https://www.polygon.com/23329258/lord-rings-power-review-episode-release) honors Tolkien’s achievement in rendering Middle-earth in map form. The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is an exception to a point; as the first two episodes jump around Middle-earth to introduce us to new elves, dwarves, humans, harfoots, and others, the action occasionally cuts away to the same designs Tolkien drew from as he pieced together Frodo’s story.

James Poniewozik, The New York Times's chief television critic, writes that in the early going, the series “does not reinvent the ring.” It does, however, “add ...

The critic Nick Schager admires how the show incorporates beloved characters — particularly Galadriel (“the soul of “The Rings of Power”) — while also establishing stunning new kingdoms. (“Its emotional core, though simplistic, is just as big and openhearted.”) The brute force of its size also raises some existential questions: “At what point is a television show so big and so uninterested in being TV-shaped that it essentially makes it another species?” “These pastoral scenes manage to capture the magic of the late-80s BBC version of ‘The Chronicles of Narnia.’” And despite the enormous computer-generated expenditures in evidence, Pulliam-Moore most appreciates practical effects like the hide-y holes at the Harfoot encampment, which provide “some of the series’ most truly magical moments.” Despite the promise of an “awfully big adventure,” he thinks one of the best parts of the show is something — or someone — small: the proto-hobbits known as the Harfoots. The critic Robert Lloyd thinks the series fits into a gray middle area, “neither a disaster nor a triumph,” adding that he feels that casting actors of color and foregrounding female characters, particularly Galadriel (played by Morfydd Clark), benefit the show. Variety’s chief TV critic, Caroline Framke, sees beauty in how the series balances so many disparate characters and story lines, like spinning plates: “When one threatens to come crashing down, the show can simply move on to the next until it’s ready to pick up where it left off.” The steadiest of those plates, though, remains Galadriel. karaoke.” For now, he frets about finding laughs where there aren’t supposed to be any — in the maps (“more funny than informative”), the special effects (almost “Monty Python”) and the plotting. “Look for inflammatory statements in ALL CAPs and words like ‘woke,’ ‘SJW,’ and ‘normies’ used in the pejorative sense,” she writes. If viewers are disappointed by the Amazon series, Drout predicts, it will because it lacks the “literary and moral depth” of Tolkien’s world. The show “needs more politics and personality and nonmagical conflict,” Douthat writes. More important, it manages, eventually and occasionally, to create its own swashbuckling, storytelling magic.” Some of those magic sparks come in the form of a “star-man,” who travels to Middle-earth via a meteor, and a nuanced portrayal of Galadriel: “A troubled, obsessed Carrie Mathison-like Galadriel may not be purely Tolkien,” Poniewozik writes.