The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

The Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power ups the ante in Season 2, but still takes its time to explore various sets of characters. It’s rare when a show gets five guaranteed seasons, and the show’s producers and writers are taking advantage of this expanded time to make the stories as good as they can be.

Lavishly made, endlessly beautiful to watch and substantive enough to make you care, this is fantasy at its absolute highest level. It builds on the promise of that Season 1 finale to deliver truly epic adventure.

If you enjoyed what you saw in 2022, these eight episodes will, much like magical rings, really get their hooks in you. Five seasons are planned, and I, for one, want to see them all.

What matters is that “The Rings of Power” chooses to focus on certain details, rather than settling for capturing Tolkien’s broad sentimentality. It may seem like “The Rings of Power” begins badly — and again, it only seems that way — but there’s no mistaking it ends well.

if you've bought into the kind of fantasy experience this show is selling, there's a lot to like in the second season, from a great Morfydd Clark performance to some wonderful monsters and an overarching mythology that, when it's firing, really is gripping. "The Rings of Power" might never be as magical as the writing that inspired it, but it's still trying to be, and sometimes that's what matters most.

There will undoubtedly be plenty of viewers who find the sacrifice of smaller, more intimate character moments well worth it for this kind of epic storytelling which, admittedly, takes some big swings and looks great doing it. But if you wanted to know enough about the characters who die during this battle—and elsewhere in the course of the season—to truly mourn their loss, you may find yourself more than a little disappointed.

In the end, The Rings of Power season 2 is largely so carefully crafted, so creative, and so captivating that it’s incredibly easy to enjoy and appreciate what works, and ignore nearly everything else.

The show has made a major leap forward with a magnificent second season. .... While there will likely still be some pushback from fans of the original film trilogy and Tolkien’s written work, this is undeniably the most striking fantasy show of the year.

There’s plenty of action throughout, none of which feels harried, and building to a grand and explosive confrontation that honors the scale of what Jackson wrought for the big screen without severing our emotional connection to the story. But the story’s timelessness grounds it in foreboding; this season has a lot to say about the rise of charismatic empty suits and the peril of trusting in shiny new promises.

Whenever these minor missteps threaten to derail the proceedings, we're whisked away on episodic adventures filled with monstrous creatures from Tolkien's bestiary or refreshingly lighthearted bursts of earnest sincerity or stirring songs telling tales of tragedy and whimsy. (Trust me, Bombadil fans, you won't be disappointed.)

I’m mostly positive on this show and am mostly pleased with how this season is shaping up.

Remains a worthy backstory complement to Peter Jackson’s Oscar-winning cinematic trilogy.