The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power teaser is here, and it’s spectacular

The Super Bowl brought us our first eye-popping teaser for Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, Amazon Studio’s prequel fantasy series. Until late last week, Amazon had kept pretty much every detail about the new series tightly under wraps. But the dam has now burst, beginning with a big Vanity Fair exclusive with first-look images and in-depth interviews. The article is also full of casting information.

(There are some spoilers for those unfamiliar with the LOTR mythology below.)

The idea of making a spinoff series from Peter Jackson’s visionary Lord of the Rings film trilogy dates back to 2017, with Amazon Studios, Netflix, and HBO all vying for the rights. Amazon won out, in part because then-CEO Jeff Bezos was a major Tolkien fan. Amazon paid a whopping $250 million for the rights and committed to what is believed to be a five-season run. Hollywood insider gossip hints that the show could cost between $100 to $150 million per season, adding up to well over $1 billion for all five seasons.

The deal came with some tight constraints on the material that could be included in the series. The first two books in The Lord of the Rings trilogy were published in 1956, and it wasn’t long before obsessive readers were writing to Tolkien demanding even more detail, such as better maps, more information about the social and political structures, and even details about ceramics, metallurgy, tools, and architecture. That speaks to the power of Tolkien’s world-building and the extent to which the books captured the popular imagination.

So Tolkien borrowed some material from The Silmarillion (originally rejected by publishers) and produced a 150-page history that became known as the Appendices, which covered timelines, genealogies, and details about Middle-Earth’s languages and culture. That trove of material forms the basis for The Rings of Power.

The challenge for showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay: “Can we come up with the novel Tolkien never wrote and do it as a mega-event series that could only happen now?” McKay told Vanity Fair. Under the terms of the deal, the creators could not contradict anything Tolkien had written about the Second Age and had to follow the same broad narrative arc. On the other hand, they were free to create characters and fill in any narrative gaps in the original source material.

The series takes place in Tolkien’s Second Age. Per the official premise:

This epic drama is set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings and will take viewers back to an era in which great powers were forged, kingdoms rose to glory and fell to ruin, unlikely heroes were tested, hope hung by the finest of threads, and the greatest villain that ever flowed from Tolkien’s pen threatened to cover all the world in darkness. Beginning in a time of relative peace, the series follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-Earth. From the darkest depths of the Misty Mountains, to the majestic forests of the elf-capital of Lindon, to the breathtaking island kingdom of Númenor, to the furthest reaches of the map, these kingdoms and characters will carve out legacies that live on long after they are gone.

The large ensemble cast—most of whom make brief appearances in the teaser—includes Morfydd Clark as a young Galadriel, “now a hardscrabble warrior leading the Northern Armies,” who is determined to hunt down her brother’s killer. She ends up adrift at sea with a new character named Halbrand (Charles Vickers). All we know about him is that he’s “running from his past.” Charles Edwards plays Celebrimbor, whom hardcore LOTR fans will recognize as the elven smith who forged the legendary rings.