New Rings of Power Trailer Revealed at SDCC

Television

Amazon Prime has dropped an exclusive trailer of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power that debuted at its panel at the San Diego Comic-Con, and it brings great disdain to the hearts of true Tolkien fans. 

The trailer (nearly four minutes of pure agony) opens with Halbrand, who was revealed (unsurprisingly) to be the Dark Lord Sauron at the end of season 1 and is now Annatar, “Lord of Gifts,” a name given to himself by Sauron in the Second Age in the time he appeared in his fair form among the Eldar. In this show, however, he is less “Lord of Gifts” and more “Lord of Wigs.” As many LOTR fans know, this is the time when the Rings of Power are forged at the request of Sauron in disguise by Celebrimbor, “Hand of Silver,” known in the Second Age as one of greatest elven smiths of Eregion and maker of the three rings for the elves. Again, in this poor excuse of a show, “Grandmabrimbor” needed the villain to tell him about alloys when he was supposed to be the expert. 

In the books, Galadriel is the only one who was highly suspicious of this “Lord of Gifts” and would advise many to not trust him. Rings of Power Galadriel did entirely the opposite and essentially led Sauron “Halbrand” into being evil in season 1. Also, her line in the first few minutes of the trailer is, “I know you believe this ring is deceiving me, but I believe it is guiding me.” Maybe it could, I don’t know, guide you into seeing that you should have told people about Sauron from the start, GUYLADRIEL, but hey, what do I know? 

And do not get me started on the repurposed lines from Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings. There is also the reveal of Tom Bombadil, whose character in the books is an enigma, taking no side or stance in matters of major events.  In Rings of Power, he has become a mentor to the side characters, which is entirely against how Tolkien wrote him. And, oh, apparently, he has a West Country accent to boot. 

Many “member berries” appear in this trailer as well, one being the Balrog, which was not supposed to be awakened until the Third Age, and one other that I noticed the second time I watched. Very clearly, they copied the three arrows from the Uruk-hai that took down Boromir at the end of The Fellowship of the Ring. As to who it is, upon close inspection, it almost appears to be Galadriel; if so, this show would improve by removing this false character. 

Just when it seems it can’t get any worse, however, there is also a reveal of what appeared to be an Entwife. In The Two Towers, Treebeard stated to Merry and Pippin that the Ents “have lost the Entwives,” but no further explanation was given; Tolkien wanted this to remain a mystery, and fan theories speculated that the Entwives were destroyed by Sauron as collateral damage in the War of the Last Alliance. 

Everything about this show is a bastardization of Tolkien’s magnum opus, written after he suffered from fighting in The Great War, which he was heavily influenced by in the text if one knows of the history. Should anyone wish to watch this abomination, I would recommend saving your time and viewing the original films or reading the novels over this utter garbage. You will be far better off watching even the Hobbit films, which, many fans remember, were not well received when they were released. 

Rings of Power season 2 will be released on August 29th on Amazon Prime. Now, the floor is open to all of you, dear readers. What are your thoughts after watching this trailer? Will anyone still be hate-watching, or will you continue not to watch this as I will? Do tell in the comments below.