One Scene in Rings of Power Season 2 Rewrites a Lord of the Rings Origin Story
"Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky…"
Sauron (Charlie Vickers) doesn't waste much time in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 2. Over the course of the season's first three episodes, the Great Deceiver not only manages to manipulate Adar (Sam Hazeldine) into turning his sights on the Elven kingdom of Eregion, but he also travels to the city itself to meet again with Celebrimbor (Charles Edwards). Once back in Eregion, Sauron then assumes the form of Annatar, the Lord of Gifts, as part of a ruse to trick Celebrimbor into forging the remaining rings of power.
All of this happens with little to no interference from Galadriel (Morfydd Clark), Elrond (Robert Aramayo), Gil-galad (Benjamin Walker), or any other Elf who knows about Sauron's true identity. That's not to say, however, that Galadriel and co. are completely unaware of Sauron's movements and machinations. On the contrary, Galadriel becomes concerned about Celebrimbor's safety following a terrifying and nightmarish vision that she experiences in the second episode of The Rings of Power Season 2.
The vision in question both foreshadows several major events that are still to come and provides The Rings of Power's answer to one long-debated point of J.R.R. Tolkien lore.
“...Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die”
“I’ve had an unexpected visitor.”
Early in The Rings of Power Season 2's second episode, titled "Where the Stars are Strange," a trip Galadriel makes to pay respects to her fallen brother, Finrod, is interrupted by the arrival of Celebrimbor himself. When she asks him what news he is bringing to her and her fellow Elves at Lindon, Celebrimbor ominously replies, "I've had an unexpected visitor." In the moments that follow, several seeds that Galadriel herself planted in the ground grow rapidly into vines that trap Celebrimbor in a tight embrace, lift him into the air, and then impale him on the spikes of a nearby tree. As this is happening, Celebrimbor begins to recite — in Black Speech — the opening lines of the infamous Ring Verse.
"Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky," he says. "Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone… Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die." Several of the Verse's other lines will one day be inscribed by Sauron on his One Ring. ("One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them.") Altogether, the poem details not only how many rings of power will ultimately be made, but also Sauron's intention to control the mind of every other Ringbearer through his One Ring. Taking that into account, it's easy to see why the Ring Verse is partially recited in "Where the Stars are Strange," especially given Celebrimbor's role in the creation of the rings of power.
The Debated Origin of the Ring Verse
What's noteworthy is that it's never actually been clear where the full Ring Verse comes from — specifically, the lines that come before and after the One Ring's inscription. In The Fellowship of the Ring, Gandalf tells Frodo that the inscription is "only two lines of a verse long known in Elven-lore." Later, during the Council of Elrond, Gandalf recalls how Celebrimbor heard Sauron speak the inscription's words on the day he put the One Ring on for the first time and that it was in that moment that all the Elves became aware of the Dark Lord's treachery. Those two book moments confirm that the parts of the Ring Verse that are inscribed on the One Ring were first written by Sauron himself.
Tolkien fans have, therefore, long wondered whether the lines that accompany the inscription were written before or after the actual gifting of the rings of power. The consensus among some fans seems to be that they were written by Elves after Sauron’s plans were discovered, and potentially after the War of the Elves and Sauron altogether. In "Where the Stars are Strange," though, The Rings of Power offers up a different answer to that question — namely, that the Ring Verse's opening lines may have been uttered for the first time as part of a supernatural prophecy born out of the creation of the three Elven Rings. The scene alternatively suggests that — in The Rings of Power's version of Middle-earth — Sauron himself may have originally conceived of the entire Ring Verse in secret.
In one upsetting vision, Galadriel sees the seeds she unknowingly planted in The Rings of Power Season 1 come to terrifying fruition.
In all likelihood, certain Tolkien fans will still continue to debate the specifics of the Ring Verse's history amongst themselves. It is nonetheless nice to see The Rings of Power avoid the issue altogether by introducing the poem prior to the in-universe creation of the One Ring. The fact that it does so in a sequence that also chillingly hints at the tragic turn of fate awaiting Celebrimbor just makes Galadriel's vision in The Rings of Power Season 2's second episode all the more memorable.
