The Big Picture

Prime Video’s
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power
explores the Second Age of Middle-earth, revealing the origin of the powerful rings and diverse characters.
In this interview, Cynthia Addai-Robinson discusses the challenges her character, Míriel, will face in Season 2.
Addai-Robinsons also talks about how Season 2 delves into darker themes and the villain’s journey, highlighting Míriel’s struggles and hope for the future.

Adapted from J.R.R. Tolkien’s beloved fantasy series, The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power brings the Second Age dwellers of Middle-earth to the screen for the first time. Set thousands of years before Frodo Baggins and co., Rings of Power provides the origin story of the powerful rings at the center of Tolkien’s famed adventures, intertwining Elves, Dwarves, and Man.

As the Queen-regent of Númenor, Cynthia Addai-Robinson’s Míriel made major sacrifices in Season 1. Leading her people into a losing battle, Míriel had no choice but to retreat home after losing her father, King Tar-Palantir, in the season finale. That wasn’t her only defeat — Míriel’s premonitory visions have always provided her valuable foresight, but her recent blindness threatens to keep her in the dark. In addition to Addai-Robinson, the series also stars Morfydd Clark, Charlie Vickers, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Robert Aramayo, and Daniel Weyman.

When Season 2 returns to Amazon on August 29, Addai-Robinson will be back as the reigning leader of Númenoreans, seeking vengeance while defending her people and their island from Sauron and the other villains of Middle-earth. Last year, when The Rings of Power Season 2 was filming in England, Collider’s Steve Weintraub and a few other reporters got to visit the production. During a group interview, Addai-Robinson discussed Míriel’s Season 2 journey, filming in Tolkien’s U.K., performing her own stunts, and more.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Epic drama set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Hobbit’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth.Release Date September 1, 2022 Cast Morfydd Clark , Benjamin Walker , Nazanin Boniadi , Peter Mullan , Lenny Henry , Robert Aramayo , Cynthia Addai-Robinson , Ismael Cruz Cordova , Joseph Mawle , Ema Horvath , Markella Kavenagh , Owain Arthur Main Genre Fantasy Seasons 2 Studio Amazon Franchise The Lord of The Rings Characters By J.R.R. Tolkien Story By J.R.R. Tolkien Expand

Have you started shooting yet?

CYNTHIA ADDAI-ROBINSON: The production has been filming, and I have been filming since, I believe, October 2022 is when we went back into production after launching the first season after our press tour. We started production here in the U.K., our first time only here. We continue to film up to the minute.

Is there any time jump between the first season and the second season?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: I don’t know if I would say there’s a time jump in some significant sense, but obviously when we left things off at the end of Season 1, you’ve had two major things that we would introduce in Season 2. So we’ve got the forging of the rings — obviously a major moment, major event, and there are implications for now that these rings have been forged, how they play into the storyline in Season 2. Obviously, our lovely Charlie Vickers is being revealed as the one and only Sauron, and now we’re gonna really track Sauron and all of his adventures, or misadventures, in Middle-earth through the second season.

Really, in the first season, you think of the hero’s journey, and we have, obviously, many heroes in their various parts of the world and different storylines. Season 2, I call it the villain’s journey. So really, we’re looking at not just Sauron’s journey and his plans and manipulations in this part of the story, but just that tracking of the influence of the rings and also different characters’ journeys through the darkness — I’ll say that very vaguely — and just corruption, betrayal, and all of these darker themes and a slightly darker tone in general for the second season overall.

Image via Prime Video

There are so many things happening on the grand scale in Middle-earth, but your character has so many large things just happening very specifically in her world — like you’re blind now. How did that change your approach in Season 2?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: As you say, Míriel, specifically within Númenor, when we last leave her, she not only is blind, but she is returning to Númenor in defeat, and the end note for her storyline in Season 1 is essentially the flags at proverbial half-mast to signify the king’s death, her father’s death. So that’s quite a lot in the first season and sets the story for Season 2 for Míriel and Númenor in general.

In our part of the world, the political ramifications and the divisions in society that we started to see in Season 1 are only exacerbated in Season 2, and really, where Míriel is starting from in the second season is in a place of deep loss and Númenorian society’s reaction to all the events from Season 1 and the essentially losing battle that occurred and people’s feelings around that.

Cynthia Addai-Robinson Addresses Míriel’s ‘Place of Deep Loss’
Image via Prime Video

At the end of Season 1, the king revealed the palantír. How does that play into Season 2?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: You really saw a throughline for Míriel and the visions within the palantír that the king had seen, that Míriel had been seeing, and what she eventually then showed to Galadriel. So, this throughline vision is a sense of Númenor’s fate — we will definitely see the continuation of that track through Season 2. People who are familiar with Númenor and the legend of that story, which is essentially Tolkien’s take on Atlantis, things are not necessarily looking good in the grand scheme of things for Númenor. And certainly, it continues to weigh on Míriel’s mind in terms of her next steps.

When we start Season 1, because the king has passed, the implication there is what happens to Queen Regent Míriel, and what is her journey through her father’s passing, the king’s passing? So, without getting too into the spoilers and the details, there definitely is the unfolding of what progresses when the king passes away.

Míriel Must Lean on Other Senses in Season 2
Image via Amazon Prime Video

Whenever we lose one of our senses, there’s another sense that is heightened. So, in Season 2, will we see another sense that Míriel develops that’s heightened?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: I was told early on last season that this literal and allegorical blindness was gonna play a part throughout. What was interesting for me is trying to figure out for Míriel how she could consider it almost as an asset that the loss of her sight was potentially an opportunity to kind of have a heightened awareness using her other senses and abilities — and not just for herself, but also now with her relationship to Elendil. He’s essentially, I’ll say, her eyes and ears, but they both have something to teach the other.

It was always gonna be something interesting for me, knowing that there was this blind element to the character. I wondered to myself, “OK, well, how does that play through into Season 2?” Because, aside from that aspect of the character, myself, as the actor having to represent that and play that, I knew it was gonna be an interesting challenge, and I wanted to continue to make sure that it wasn’t going to come across in any way that felt weak or diminishing; that this was about tapping into the, the strength of the character who, despite this setback, still has the qualities of leadership and the desire to lead her people and is gonna have to do it through this challenging situation.

With both huge pivotal losses that happen in Míriel’s life and all the betrayals that we see coming in Season 2, non-specifically, does that help bring Galadriel and Míriel closer, or does it drive a huge wedge between their already tumultuous relationship?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: It’ll be interesting to see. To kind of refresh, the fact that upon Galadriel’s arrival, Númenorians hadn’t seen an Elf. People had very strong feelings about an Elf showing up and also having influence over the queen’s decision-making, and ultimately, that sense was the catalyst for Míriel taking Númenorians into battle and losing. So, there’s still a lot of strong feelings about that. And, again, we’ll see in Season 2 how, in Númenorian society, that division continues to deepen. And in terms of how that plays out between Galadriel, I would say you just have to watch and find out.

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Your character was so determined to come back and fight. Suffering defeat, she goes home. How much are the regular people ready to go into battle? And is that one of the divisive things where a lot of people are like, “Why are we gonna go fight this? Why don’t we just stay here?”

ADDAI-ROBINSON: What was interesting in terms of the division in society in Season 1, and arguably, I’ll say two factions, was there were people who lean toward maintaining Elven tradition and not seeing it as an existential threat the fact that an Elf would show up, or that that would make people feel a certain way. There are a lot of people who want to hold on to that; they don’t want to lose sight of their origins, as it were. Then, you have another segment of society that is ready to leave that behind. When you think of Elven tradition or magic, or almost the equivalent of witchcraft, that is viewed as this negative thing, and the way forward is really to lean into and focus on modernization, Man, and “leaving that Elven stuff behind,” so to speak. And, again, you’ll see this hardening of those two ideas happen on the back of this return from defeat, that ultimately, Númenorians lost a lot in this battle, and that battle was really motivated by Galadriel’s plea to Míriel in the first place. So, I think a lot of people will not forget that fact.

Season 2 of ‘Rings of Power’ Gets Dark

We’re told that this is a darker season in Season 2. How does that impact Queen Míriel’s decisions?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: I think what’s always interesting to me, just in general, about Tolkien and his works, or any really good dramatic work, is the yin and the yang. So, you have darkness, but you have this counterbalance of light, and people at least trying to work their way to the light, work their way to something hopeful. If you’re going to be battling and fighting, what is it ultimately for?

So, I would say that despite the fact that this does take a darker tone, there are still gonna be those elements that speak to hope and light and even levity because, obviously, people want to still have those moments of pause amongst the relentless push of darkness. Without getting into specifics, even though things are taking a dark turn, when I think about it, if cynicism sets in, then all is lost. People still need a reason to feel like the fight is worth fighting and that circumstances could be changed. So I would say that very generally, but I do think it applies in general to a story like this, that you have to feel like there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, that there’s hope that the fight can be ultimately won. Because at this point, Season 1 was a time of peace. Now evil has emerged, and how are all of these characters trying to fight against that, essentially?

Specifically for your character, how do you find that balance of the remembering of the light?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: When I think about it just as myself, as a person, as a human being, I think cynicism is a very sinister, sneaky thing, and sometimes you can even catch yourself in that moment, and it’s about returning again to things that sometimes can feel very earnest. Arguably, you could even say we’re in a bit of a cynical time in society, and so to try to counter that with a different narrative at times can feel naive, earnest, old-fashioned. But there’s a reason why certainly this story over many, many many years has continued to endure.

My take personally is that I think you’re always trying to find the best in people and hope that people have good intentions of fighting the good fight. Maybe that’s kind of corny, but that speaks to me personally. This story endures because, ultimately, that’s one of many themes that you don’t wanna just let evil win because people decided to be complacent or turn fully cynical; that this is a fight worth fighting for, to know that evil doesn’t have to win the day ultimately.

I want to compare and contrast filming in England to filming in New Zealand.

ADDAI-ROBINSON: As you said, in Season 2 we’re now in the U.K. We’re utilizing, essentially, the landscape of Tolkien. He spent quite a bit of time here. A lot of his references to certain fictional lands are based on landscapes in England and the rest of the U.K. as well. Really, it’s taking advantage of that, taking advantage of the proximity of being in the U.K. to other locations we’re portraying in addition to the lands that we’ve shown in the first season. We’re portraying a few other new landscapes, and so we’ve had the benefit of being geographically in proximity to, speaking again, very, very generally to some very specific landscapes that you will see in the second season.

Filming Season 1 in New Zealand — which obviously New Zealand is so strongly affiliated with Middle-earth as well — for me, it was a place that I’ve worked in before that I have a deep love for, and love that it really set the tone and set the look and feel of the first season. So it’s exciting to continue and move to another place. We also have a lot of new crew in addition to some of our returning crew that worked with us back in New Zealand. With any show, there’s always gonna be an evolution in trying to utilize the aspects that are new to your advantage, so I think you’ll see all of those things on screen as well.

So we spoke to the stunt coordinator, and I’m still surprised to know that all of the principal cast do all of their own stunts. Did you participate in a lot more stunts this season than last season? Can you kind of walk us through what your experience is so far filming stunts?

ADDAI-ROBINSON: I definitely can’t get into any specifics. What’s great about working on a show like this is there are all these different skill sets, things that you hope that you get to do, or you never thought you’d do. Maybe you’re on a horse. I’m a city girl, so the idea of riding a horse, even, is a big deal to me. And in Season 1, with our wonderful stunt department in New Zealand, we had these almost like a kind of summer camp of horse riding and sword fighting and tumbling or whatever was specific to you in your world. So, we’re just continuing that into the second season. As for me specifically, if I said much more, it would give some things away, so I’ll just leave it at that.

Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power is set to premiere on Amazon Prime on August 29, 2024.

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