New trailer finally makes LoTR: Rings of Power look like a Tolkien-worthy epic

With about six weeks to go before its premiere on Amazon Video, the upcoming Lord of the Rings prequel tv series, The rings of powertook advantage of a massive San Diego Comic-Con stage to debut its most enticing trailer yet.

Based on notes and lore written by JRR Tolkien, the new TV series will revolve around the “Second Age” era of his series – as in, thousands of years before characters like Frodo and Sam existed. This week’s trailer is really starting to set the stage for an epic battle between the restored populations of men, dwarves, and elves, and a dreaded evil that rises again from Middle-earth – which bears “many names” but is clearly personified by Sauron.

“Have you heard of Sauron?”

Galadriel’s character, previously played by Cate Blanchett but now entrusted to Morfydd Clark (Are dark materials), is the first in the trailer to see a vision of a new evil rising as Prince Durin IV (played by Owain Arthur) is immediately warned that Sauron’s troops intend to “bury us all under the mountain” (that i.e. Khazad-dm). We finally also see the previously teased ‘Stranger’ character from the new series, played by Daniel Weyman, who approaches Bronwyn’s son Theo in a shared prison cell and grimly asks, “Have you heard of Sauron?”

While we don’t get a direct look at an obvious villain, a Sauron-like hand is visible in certain scenes (including one in which many orc-like monsters bow in his wake), while a menacing sword, made of dark dust and fire, emerges in Theo’s hand in a manner similar to the Morgul-blade film series. All the while, a previously unseen eye-shaped mark appears in the trailer, perhaps signifying the presence of Sauron or some equivalent evil. In addition to some zoomed-out, Tolkien-worthy battle scenes rendered as mere blips, the trailer also showcases more than a few examples of the series’ opposing races teaming up at times when their combined powers are needed to head off some great evil. to offer.

Galadriel is clearly held up throughout the trailer as the protagonist of the series; in the opening beat, she observes a huge pile of expired elf helmets at the end of a massive battle (perhaps from the end of Tolkien’s First Age, or earlier in the Second Age), and she additionally draws a sword and swims away from danger. Elf hero Arondir also gets a few key moments in the trailer, basically faking it as your favorite arrow-slinging warrior from the original Peter Jackson trilogy – and indeed, this is a trailer for war and danger, not the quirkiness of the “Harfoot” characters who serve as ancestors of the more famous race of hobbits. (To see more of the new series’ harfoots, rewind a week to a more solemn teaser trailer.)

In addition to today’s trailer, those in attendance at SDCC were treated to not one but four exclusive clips from the series, each focusing on different protagonists. The dwarfish prince Durin IV takes part in a brick-breaking competition; the leading harfoot duo encounter in the series and nearly get caught by a sleeping giant; Arondir manages to defeat some orc captors while being held in chains; and the lead elf duo Galadriel and Elrond share a solemn moment of conversation that, at least in the context of this event, could be seen as flirtatious.

These scene-specific trailers may not make their way to YouTube before the series’ launch, in which case we’ll all have to wait to see them until September 2, when the series will premiere, one episode a week, exclusively on Amazon Video. Worth noting: Our international readers will appreciate Amazon’s efforts to launch the series in “more than 240 territories” simultaneously.