Quoth the Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power showrunners, two years ago.
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| Morfydd Clark as Galadriel in 'The Rings of Power.' |
Speaking with Morfeli Reporter from the set of season two, Patrick McKay and J.D. Payne addressed a number of issues that fans had brought up regarding the debut run of their Prime Video series. McKay promised that this follow-up to adapting J.R.R. Tolkien's epic fantasy universe would be "10,000 times bigger and better in every way".
On Thursday, we will see how successful they were in pulling all of this off when Prime Video premieres the first three episodes (of an 8-episode new season) centered on dark lord Sauron's (Charlie Vickers ) plan to gain control over Middle-earth with Galadriel,Morfydd Clark,Ellrond Robert Aramayo and other key players. In advance of the premiere, I talked to McKay and Payne about their approach to elevating season two (and from what few episodes I've seen, these guys have indeed leveled up).
“Whenever you get to do something the second time, you have all of the benefit of everything that’s been learned,” Payne said. Of course, having done it the first time is a major benefit — “helps enormously,” as Temuera Morrison puts it. We know our actors so much more second season. We know their voices. These are the people we know how they live. So I feel like we knew where the bull's-eye was in terms of how to write to each their strengths. Some of that is to be expected in season one, when you have an entire world to create. You have to teach Second Age lore.
All those weirdos you commandeer with a face full of pleasure have to be gathered in half a dozen or so worlds. It’s a lot to onboard. And now, we can literally just get to work straight away purely by virtue that this is the next part of our story — it's reloaded and were ready. We can start with a bang. “Sauron is on the move and he does not sleep — as it so with this series,” Elfqueen64 points out.
That is not to say, however, there are no quiet moments in season 2. The showrunners note that they have simply been able to introduce the new episodes with more momentum.
As McKay put it, “Even as a fan there are so many shows you watch where their first season they were still figuring out the tone and rhythm of how to make them work … even The Sopranos. That goes with the territory of kicking off a big, ambitious show so. Figuring out what your lane is for the first half of Season 1. J.D.: And I think with this show, we really have learned what it wants to be in Season 2.
When we said that to you, I don't think [it was] like patting ourselves on the back. Just saying, 'That's the bar.' That’s where it needs to be. We are so proud of season one and what it achieved in the way that we never thought possible, and everyone was probably most shocked by the success,” he said.
The EPs also pointed to the impact of promoting Charlotte Brändström to producing director for Season 2. Swedish-French director co-wrote two episodes of the show's first season, one of which was episode 6 — widely regarded as last season’s best hour. For one film, this time directed half the season as it contributed a great director — no start and finish but an eyelet around every episode.
McKay said, “We had worked with Charlotte Brändström and her DP Alex Disenhof on episodes six and seven of season one that we all think are our favorite episodes.” Those are the episodes we really landed on a tone for the show — they are earthier, grittier; it´s much more dramatic and sentimental essentially [laughs], so even acting wise you´ll see how everyone rose to meet that necessity. I think they helped us cinematically, but also in terms of performance and tone.
I think in part what they've done is some of the lift we all believe the show has gotten. They are some of our closest partners, and honestly I just think they helped us step up the level we were playing — wanted to make sure credit went their way.
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