While it's going to be a while before audiences get to return to Middle Earth with Prime Video's Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, that doesn't mean we'll be entirely without news while we wait for the series to return in 2024. Today, the team behind the hit fantasy series announced that stars of stage and screen Ciarán Hinds, Rory Kinnear and Tanya Moodie will be joining the massive ensemble cast, in recurring roles for Season 2.
Veteran actor Hinds is known to audiences around the world for his roles on Rome, Game of Thrones, and more recently Netflix's Treason. In the world of film, he was recently nominated for an Academy Award for Belfast, directed by Kenneth Brannagh. His earlier film work includes a variety of stories and genres, and includes Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, Silence, Zack Snyder's Justice League, and Persuasion.
Kinnear can currently be seen on Our Flag Means Death, and has also appeared on Black Mirror, and Penny Dreadful, and film audiences will recognize him from the Daniel Craig James Bond films where he played the role of Bill Tanner. For his theater work, Kinnear has won two Olivier awards, most recently for playing Iago in the National Theatre's 2013 staging of Othello.
Moodie's earlier work exists largely in the theater space. She boasts two Olivier nominations, and appeared in a Royal Shakespeare Society production of Hamlet. However, she also has an extensive television resumé, appearing in A Discovery of Witches, The Man Who Fell To Earth, and Sherlock.
Season 2 of Rings of Power went into production in October, and in a change from the first season, moved production from New Zealand — where The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogies were both filmed — to the UK. The new season will see Galadriel (Morfydd Clark) reeling from the revelation that Halbrand (Charlie Vickers) was actually Sauron all along. Meanwhile, Nori (Markella Kavenaugh) and The Stranger (Daniel Weyman) have headed out on adventure, and the people of the Southlands are recovering from the erruption of Mount Doom that destroyed their home. With so many moving parts in play, it will be interesting to see how Hinds, Kinnear and Moodie fit into things in Season 2.
The trio are not the only new faces joining the massive cast, as Gabriel Akuwudike, Yasen ‘Zates’ Atour, Ben Daniels, Amelia Kenworthy, Nia Towle, and Nicholas Woodeson are also set to appear, along with Sam Hazeldine, who will take over the role of Adar from Joseph Mawle. They join returning cast members Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Robert Aramayo, Maxim Baldry, Nazanin Boniadi, Ismael Cruz Córdova, Charles Edwards, Trystan Gravelle, Sir Lenny Henry, Ema Horvath, Tyroe Muhafidin, Sophia Nomvete, Lloyd Owen, Megan Richards, Dylan Smith, Leon Wadham and Sara Zwangobani.
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 2 is currently in production with no set release date. Check out our interview with Clark and Vickers below: