Maxim Baldry, who is set to play Isildur in Amazon’s Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power opens up about how season 1 sets up his character’s tragic destiny. In 2017, Amazon acquired the television rights to The Lord of the Rings from the Tolkien estate for a record-breaking $250 million. Five seasons are planned for this epic, though Prime Video has only officially ordered two so far. Set during the Second Age of Middle-earth, the events depicted in The Rings of Power will take place thousands of years before the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit films directed by Peter Jackson.
Played by Harry Sinclair in the prologue of Jackson’s version of The Fellowship of the Ring, Isildur, son of Elendil, was the King of Arnor and Gondor, and the distant ancestor of Aragorn. Fans of both the books and the films will know that Isildur was the man responsible for cutting the One Ring from Sauron’s hand with the shards of his own father’s sword. When pressed with the decision to destroy the Ring in the fires of Mount Doom, he tragically succumbed to temptation and decided to keep it as an heirloom instead. The Ring, however, would ultimately betray Isildur, and he was slain by a party of Orcs while the Ring itself was lost in the waters of Gladden Fields. Centuries later, the Ring would come into the possession of the halfling known as Smeagol, and ultimately lead to his transformation into the creature Gollum.
Screen Rant spoke with Baldry during San Diego Comic-Con 2022 about his role on The Rings of Power and what season 1 has in store for his character. Suggesting that the show’s inaugural season will find the future king grieving the loss of his mother, he also says that he is “quite vulnerable” and that his “relationship to his father is strained.” Check out his full comments below:
[Isildur] is grieving in season 1; he's lost his mother. I actually didn't realize that he was quite vulnerable. I think his relationship to his father is strained, because there's things unsaid between them. I don't think there's good communication; comms are down.
But there's a deep-rooted connection to himself that he knows he wants to find out there. He doesn't quite know what it is, but he's trying to do the right thing to fulfill his father's dream. He's also understanding that maybe there's something else out there for him.
What makes the upcoming Rings of Power series so fascinating is that the history of the Second Age of Middle-earth was ever only written in the broadest strokes by Tolkien. Leaving the show’s creative team to piece together parts of Tolkien lore taken from sections of The Silmarillion and the appendices of The Lord of the Rings books, the existing canon leaves plenty of untrodden ground to explore on screen. Continuing to develop Isildur’s character, when fans already know what ultimately lays ahead of him, certainly offers the show’s creative team a unique challenge. If anything, this means The Rings of Power's iteration of Isildur can become even more tragic as he starts his rise to power.
One thing that avid Tolkien fans will inevitably be watching for is how closely the show adheres to the source material. While the official Tolkien canon may only provide the most basic overview of the events of the Second Age, some fans will certainly be expecting Amazon to treat that material as sacrosanct and not give into the temptation to stray too far from what has already been written. How the show depicts Isildur, and his father Elendil, will certainly go a long way to showing how seriously the showrunners are taking those massive expectations. Thankfully, fans will not have too much longer to wait to find out, with Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season 1 slated to hit Prime Video on September 2.
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