J.R.R. Tolkien’s character from The Lord of the Rings, Tom Bombadil, will make his big debut in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 2. This is the first time the character will be brought to life in live-action as the character didn’t make the cut in Peter Jackson’s movies.
Bombadil is being played by James Bond actor Rory Kinnear in the series, and in a recent interview with Games Radar+, he offers some new details and insight into what this character will be like in the series.
Kinnear started: “Well, I guess with the other adaptations, I think Peter Jackson said it, it doesn’t necessarily drive the story on, particularly in the narrative of it.
“But in the pages and in people’s imaginations, he is this incredible character that has so much knowledge and so much sense of fun and so much life about him, as well as the whole of humanity and history and the earth. This is sort of representative of all that Earth is, and Middle-earth.”
Kinnear continued to explain that they will get to explore the character more fully thanks to long-form storytelling of the series, saying: “Obviously over multi-season episodic TV, you’ve got more time to investigate those stories.
He goes on to say that they will be using the character in a different way than Tolkien did: “In the way that [showrunners] J.D. [Payne] and Patrick [McKay] are telling the story, they’re able to create a role for him that isn’t necessarily the one that he has in the books. So whilst they’re using that character, they are using him in a different way to how Tolkien did.”
Judging from what we know about the character so far, his main point of contact in the story will be The Stranger. Actor Daniel Weyman teases a bit more of what to expect from these interactions.
Weyman said: “Even though he might not be present in all the scenes in the books, actually, he’s always sort of there because he’s so extraordinary.
“He’s sort of keeping you company on your journey through the books and I think that’s a great thing about Tom on this journey for The Stranger. His presence is so extraordinary that even when you’re not with him, he’s sort of in your mind because of how he’s interacted with you.”
Kinnear adds: “And how Tolkien writes him – he’s so open-ended and opaque in some ways that people are able to project so much onto him. I think again, that’s his power, both in terms of a reader’s imagination, but also the potential in the interactions with The Stranger, and his role going through The Rings of Power as well.”
The series takes place “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.”
In Season 2, “Sauron has returned. Cast out by Galadriel, without army or ally, the rising Dark Lord must now rely on his own cunning to rebuild his strength and oversee the creation of the Rings of Power, which will allow him to bind all the peoples of Middle-earth to his sinister will.
“Building on Season 1’s epic scope and ambition, Season 2 of Amazon’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power plunges even its most beloved and vulnerable characters into a rising tide of darkness, challenging each to find their place in a world that is increasingly on the brink of calamity.
“Elves and dwarves, orcs and men, wizards and Harfoots… as friendships are strained and kingdoms begin to fracture, the forces of good will struggle ever more valiantly to hold on to what matters to them most of all… each other.”
The Rings of Power Season 2 premieres August 29th on Prime Video.
