The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power has added three new actors to its season 2 cast. The Oscar-nominated Ciarán Hinds (Belfast), Rory Kinnear (Men), and Tanya Moodie (Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker) have now joined the second chapter of the Middle-earth prequel series, which is currently filming in the UK. There are no character descriptions or names for the actors yet. The new actors join a cast of 23 series regulars who will appear in a total of five seasons. This is in addition to the seven new members announced in December last year, which feels a bit worrying, given the key complaint with The Rings of Power season 1 was how disconnected the storylines felt.
Hinds received Oscar and BAFTA nominations for Best Supporting Actor, for his performance in Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast. He also appeared in the critically acclaimed There Will Be Blood, as Aberforth Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2, and prominent TV shows like Game of Thrones and Rome. Black Mirror fans might recognise Kinnear from the pilot, where he played a fictional British Prime Minister, who was forced to have sex with a pig on live television. He also appeared in Alex Garland’s folk horror film Men, playing the multi-faced representations of patriarchy. Meanwhile, Moodie has appeared in BBC’s Sherlock, with film credits for the Oscar-nominated Empire of Light and J. J. Abrams’ Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 1 Review
Speaking to Deadline last year, co-creator and co-showrunner Patrick McKay confirmed that elf Círdan the Shipwright, who carries one of the three rings forged by Celebrimbor (Charles Edwards), will be introduced in The Rings of Power season 2. Other ring-bearers such as Dwarf-kings and Nazgûl will make their mark as well. Season 1 was filmed over the course of 18 months amidst the pandemic, resulting in eight episodes released on a weekly basis. A report from last year suggested that the upcoming season will follow suit in terms of episode count, ultimately leading up to 50 hours’ worth of The Lord of the Rings content on Amazon Prime Video, over the course of a total of five seasons. It cost Amazon over a billion dollars (about Rs. 8,266 crore) for the rights alone, which is over two-and-a-half times what Warner Bros. dumped into Peter Jackson’s award-winning film trilogy.
Drawing from the appendices of author J.R.R. Tolkien’s mainline books, The Rings of Power is set thousands of years before the events of The Lord of the Rings films, and explores the vast history surrounding the Second Age Middle-earth as it follows both familiar and new characters’ confrontation with the re-emergence of evil in the lands. As mentioned before, the series previously added seven new cast members for season two, namely Ben Daniels (The Crown), Nicholas Woodeson (Skyfall), Nia Towle (Persuasion), Amelia Kenworthy, Sam Hazeldine (Peaky Blinders), Yasen Atour (The Witcher), and Gabriel Akuwudike (1917).
Currently, there is no release window for The Lord of The Rings: The Rings of Power season 2. All eight episodes of the first season are now available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.
