The first two episodes of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power showed us many a splendid thing, from the elves of Eregion to the dwarves of Khazad-dûm to the wandering Harfoots. But one thing we didn’t see was the island of Númenór, which lies between Middle-earth and the sacred lands of Valinor, where the elves dwell with the godly Valar. Based on the ending of the second episode, we’ll see it soon, and by all accounts, it’s going to be spectacular.
“You’re talking about depicting a kingdom that’s at the peak of its power and wealth, so that needs to obviously come across in the production design, in the sets, in the costumes,” star Addai-Robinson, who plays Queen Regent Míriel, told SyFy Wire. “So there are those details that hearken back to what we were talking about, the Elven ancestry, and you see it in the architecture, you see it on the walls of the town. These are 360-degree view, complete sets that truly blew me away, that truly transported me. Every sense is stimulated. The smell in the air, the sound of lapping water, the visuals of seeing all of our incredible background artists in full regalia, you don’t have to make a giant leap. It’s not a green screen fest, where you have to look at tape and try to imagine. It’s all there. It’s all built with the utmost care. I have never worked on anything that truly had that amount of detail embedded in the world, so that some days you really would look around and you were just there. And you could then be present and really be that character in that place, in that moment.”
Lloyd Owen, who plays the seafaring Númenórean Elendil, agreed that the sets are something else. “They built Númenór,” the actor said. “I mean, it’s quite extraordinary, the set that they built, the granular level of detail. So this is Atlantis. This is Tolkien’s Atlantis, but it’s also the Greek empire at its peak. It’s the Roman empire at its peak. It’s Byzantium. It’s Santorini. It’s all of those things, and to step into that has been absolutely fantastic. In fact, my first scene away from the set was on a beach, and said to me at the time, ‘Do you realize this is the first time we’re establishing the physical geography of Númenór?’ What a privilege that was to be on that beach riding a horse, and then saying, ‘This is the island of Númenór.’ It was a great moment.”
Númenór will be divided against itself on The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power
The island of Númenór is raised up after the end of the First Age of Middle-earth, and populated with long-lived human beings; Aragorn, who is 80 years old at the time of The Lord of the Rings, is descended from them. In the Second Age, when The Rings of Power is set, his ancestors will be at the height of their influence.
“When we see the island kingdom of Númenór, we see a perceived unity,” said actor Trystan Gravelle, who plays the Númenórean royal advisor Pharazôn. “We see it as a masterclass in social cohesion, but I think there is an emotional disconnect at its center. There is a schism between the Faithful, who want to remember and celebrate their Elvish connections and roots, and the King’s Men, of which Pharazôn is one, who want to be a little bit more innovative and I guess take it in a direction where they celebrate themselves and don’t need to look at themselves as second class citizens. Because I think that’s probably what you would do if you were celebrating Elvish culture. You’d be asking yourself the question, ‘Oh, what am I doing here? And why can’t I live forever?'”
Númenór is indeed based on Elvish culture; it’s about as close as humans will ever get to imitating the perfect elves. That makes some of them feel like they’re second bananas, a divide that Míriel will have to negotiate as ruler. “She is sort of navigating between essentially two ideas,” Addai-Robinson said. “ the idea of maintaining tradition and adhering to tradition, specifically the sort of Elven tradition in Númenórean ancestry, and the idea of progress, modernization, moving forward and leaving the old ways behind. So through the course of Season 1, we’re going to see how she navigates between those two factions, and the implications of the choices that she ultimately needs to make, that determine the fate of her people.”
We’ll meet a young Isildur in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power
Elendil and his son Isildur (Maxim Baldry), who Lord of the Rings fans will remember as the guy who refuses to throw the One Ring into the fires of Mount Doom at the end of the Second Age, are on one side of the divide: they believe in the Elvish traditions, although Elendil does waver at times. “His heart is Elvish,” Owen said. “His heart is connected to the Faithful, but his head realizes that, pragmatically and practically, the safest place to be is in Númenór. And this move towards a slightly more nationalistic Númenór, again, is replicated in the family, because some of the children are taking different positions accordingly. So, he feels that pull to responsibility, and it’s a gradual realization perhaps of where his fate might lie, despite the fact that he’s the reluctant hero in that story. So that’s where we see him Season 1.”
As for Isildur, we’ll meet him when he’s “a young sailor who is at a bit of a crossroads, confused, wants to follow his father’s footsteps and become a ship’s captain, but also wants to do his own thing and travel and explore and find himself, find his voice,” according to Baldry. “I wanted to make him as relatable as possible and as human as possible, because he does make a lot of mistakes along the way, and I think you could see yourself in him.”
There’s also a new addition to the family: Isildur’s younger sister Eärien (Ema Horvath), an aspiring architect. “When we meet her, she’s dealing with the death of their mother,” Horvath said. “Anárion has run away to the other side of the island and her oldest brother Isildur is kind of toying with that idea. And she’s the one sort of tasked with being the mom and trying to keep everyone together. And at the same time, she’s quite ambitious and fairly talented and smart, and selfishly also wants to take advantage of that. So she’s balancing her own ambition with the love for her family. I think her world is very small at this point, the sort of larger philosophical questions about Númenór are starting to enter her mind, but they’re not fully present.”
New episodes of The Rings of Power come out on Fridays on Amazon Prime Video.
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