The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Energy has lastly stopped taking part in coy about one among its greatest mysteries: the id of the Stranger (Daniel Weyman).
Ever because the Stranger fell to Center-earth in Season 1, he and his Harfoot touring companion, Nori Brandyfoot (Markella Kavenagh), have been making an attempt to determine who he’s. However whereas they have been at nighttime, viewers acquainted with J.R.R. Tolkien’s work and Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings motion pictures can have acknowledged a number of not-so-subtle hints on the Stranger’s true nature. From his grey robes and beard to his standing as an Istar, or wizard, the Stranger has been giving off Gandalf vibes since day one. Want extra proof? How about his affection for Harfoots, aka ancestral Hobbits? Or the truth that he full-on quotes Gandalf from The Fellowship of the Ring within the Season 1 finale?
Now, in its Season 2 finale, The Rings of Energy lastly confirms what the viewers has guessed for fairly a while, formally revealing that he’s Gandalf.
How do we all know the Stranger is Gandalf in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Energy?
Daniel Weyman in “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.”
Credit score: Courtesy of Prime Video
The Gandalf identify reveal comes after the Stranger defends the Harfoots and Stoors from the still-mysterious Darkish Wizard (Ciarán Hinds). Whereas the Darkish Wizard claimed to know the Stranger from their time earlier than arriving in Center-earth, even promising to inform him his true identify, it is the Stoors who give the Stranger his new identify as thanks for his assist.
Stoor chief Gundabale Earthauler (Tanya Moodie) kicks issues off, thanking him as “Grand-Elf.” Because the thanks proceed down the road of Stoors, “Grand-Elf” will get warped into one thing nearer to “Gandalf.” Consider it like one massive recreation of Tolkien phone.
Gundabale calling the Stranger “Grand-Elf” did not come out of nowhere. In episode 4, when Nori and Poppy (Megan Richards) first encounter the Stoors, they describe the Stranger as an enormous.
“What, like an Elf?” Merrimac (Gavi Singh Chera) asks.
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“Bigger than that,” Poppy says.
“So he’s a great big Grand-Elf,” a skeptical Gundabale retorts.
This alternate is not the primary time The Rings of Energy hinted on the Stranger’s identify being Gandalf. A dialogue in episode 2 about him needing to discover a “gand” — from the Outdated Norse “gandr,” that means “staff” or “wand,”— pays tribute to the truth that the identify “Gandalf” means “Elf with a wand.”
In fact, Gandalf is not truly an Elf, however in The Rings of Energy, like in Tolkien’s legendarium, he does not appear to thoughts the identify. “That’s what they’re going to call me,” he tells Tom Bombadil (Rory Kinnear), realizing that Gandalf is the given identify he is been trying to find all season. (He additionally discovered the right “gand” within the aftermath of the combat, so it is a fantastic day of discovery throughout!)
Like many components of The Rings of Energy, the Stranger’s — let’s simply name him Gandalf now, we could? — identify reveal differs from Tolkien’s lore, whereas nonetheless holding its spirit alive. In Tolkien’s Unfinished Tales, he writes that “Gandalf” is the identify given to the wizard by the Males of Center-earth. Different names he has embrace Mithrandir, from the Elves; Tharkûn, from the Dwarves; and Olórin, his unique identify in Valinor, and sure the identify the Darkish Wizard wished to share with him.
Nonetheless, given Gandalf’s deep connection to Hobbits in The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, him receiving a reputation from their ancestors is a candy gesture in direction of what’s to return. The added give attention to the linguistic journey of his identify, from the hints at “gand” to the evolution of “Grand-Elf” to “Gandalf,” additionally appears like an extra tribute to Tolkien, himself a language nerd.
Gandalf’s official arrival in The Rings of Energy nonetheless raises a number of questions. First off, this is not the Gandalf we all know from the Third Age, no less than not but. What’s going to the remainder of his journey seem like earlier than we takes on the mantle of Gandalf the Gray? Will the following few seasons of The Rings of Energy mainly be Gandalf: Origins?
Second, in keeping with Tolkien lore, Gandalf and the opposite Istari weren’t current in Center-earth in the course of the Second Age. The Valar despatched them there centuries into the Third Age. The Rings of Energy has already extremely compressed Tolkien’s timeline, so that is par for the course for the present. However how will Gandalf’s presence in Center-earth now influence — or hinder — Sauron’s (Charlie Vickers) rise? For that matter, how will the presence of the remainder of the Istari, together with the Darkish Wizard, shift the battles to return?
We’ll have to attend till Season 3 to see. For now, I am glad to not surprise, “When will we learn the Stranger is Gandalf?” As a substitute, my greatest Rings of Energy query has formally turn into: “When will we learn whether the Dark Wizard is a Blue Wizard?” Deliver on the solutions!
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Energy Season 2 is now streaming on Prime Video.
