Creators reveal The Rings of Power Season 2 features dark, twisted psychology, with strained friendships, fractured kingdoms

Co-creator McKay, who couldn’t attend the premiere, revealed details about Sauron’s return through a media statement, sharing, “We’re going to watch as he uses deception, manipulation, lies, coercion, and cunning to set the chess pieces in motion. This season is about reaching a deeper understanding of his modus operandi – and seeing it in action. Each of these societies and heroes that we set up in Season 1 reveals serious cracks in the foundations that Sauron can exploit.”

“What the audience will start to realise as the season goes on is this is not a story about several different worlds but a story about one world – and Sauron is the spine that connects all of it. There is good and evil in Tolkien. But what side you are fighting for is something that everyone has to struggle with. Evil is not something in some far-off place. One of the central themes is the evil that dwells inside us all,” he added.

The cast and crew of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power at the world premiere of the show’s Season 2 in Singapore. (Express photo by Anandu Suresh)

The Singapore premiere turned into a star-studded affair, with director Charlotte Brandstrom and cast members Charlie Vickers, Markella Kavenagh, Ismael Cruz Cordova, Charles Edwards, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Trystan Gravelle, Megan Richards and Tyroe Muhafidin attending, much to the delight of the fans present at the theatre.

Brandstrom, who directed the visually stunning sixth (Udûn) and seventh (The Eye) episodes of Season 1, mentioned that while the second season gets darker, the stakes also get higher for the characters.

Young actor Charlie Vickers, who played Halbrand in the first season of The Lord of The Rings: The Rings of Power and later revealed his true identity as Dark Lord Morgoth’s former right-hand Sauron, said that the character has a different look this time, hinting at a more twisted arc. “For me, it was about approaching and trying to find a through line from the first season to the second season. He (Sauron) is very good at working his way into people’s minds and becoming what they need. So Sauron this season is all about Celebrimbor. He comes in a guise and manipulates and makes a lot of rings with him,” Vickers said.

Set thousands of years before the events of JRR Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings book series, the show is developed from the appendices of the novel. “Sauron has returned. Cast out by Galadriel, without an army or ally, the rising Dark Lord must now rely on his own cunning to rebuild his strength and oversee the creation of the Rings of Power, which will allow him to bind all the peoples of Middle-earth to his sinister will,” the official synopsis states, adding that the new season will also showcase friendships getting strained and kingdoms beginning to fracture, leaving the forces of good struggling more than ever to hold on to what matters most of all — each other. The Lord of The Rings: The Rings of Power Season 2 will exclusively premiere worldwide on Thursday.