Rings of Power, Season 2, Episode 7 Review – Doomed to Die

The Fantasy Review’s review of Rings of Power, season 2, episode 7, Doomed to Die.

What even is the point in a spoiler-free review of Rings of Power, season 2, episode 7 when we are so far into the season? Just watch the episode (or don’t, because it’s not worth it), and come back later.

Spoiler-Filled Review of Rings of Power, Season 2, Episode 7

The Sack of Eregion

Rings of Power, season 2, episode 7 opens on a peaceful panoramic of Eregion, with Celebrimbor taking a well-deserved break with a cup of tea. No milk though… ew.

So, he’s made the Nine Rings for Men – or nearly had – and is pretty chuffed with his work, but Sauron’s idyllic veil over reality will end soon, I can feel it in my bones. Celebrimbor is not going to be happy.

For all the issues I have with this show, Charles Edwards’ performance as Celebrimbor has been a highlight of the season. We should get him a t-shirt that says “Some Elves are Old. Get Over It!” or something, because he was a brilliant casting choice. 

Edwards conveys all of Celebrimbor’s pride, his guilt, his feelings of inadequacy in comparison to his lineage, all in his facial expressions and tone of voice. I give no credit to the writers for this performance – just an actor who knows what the hell he is doing!

I shall miss him. But I’m sure he’ll make for a pretty flag.

Annatar/Sauron comes to check on Celebrimbor’s work and the Rings of Power are nearly complete. His timing is impeccable, as a moment later and Celebrimbor might have seen through the veil – hints of reality are seeping through, and that’s no surprise, considering the strain Sauron must be under with the Sack of Eregion beginning. 

Annatar leaves Celebrimbor in peace to stroll the gardens which seem to be on fire… Despite fireballs being a hilarious siege weapon that makes no sense, they use them in nearly all fantasy shows and films. This is because they make the scenes look absolutely epic, and in this case, the shot above the city of Ost-in-Edhil, smoking and on fire, chaos everywhere, looks incredible.

Outside Ost-in-Edhil, Adar and his family-loving orcs (who just want to retire and live quietly in their own little Shire) are stepping things up a bit. Sam Hazeldine is another actor we should give credit to, for pulling off one of the best performances of Rings of Power, but having a terrible script.

Hazeldine makes an incredible Dark Elf and Mother of Orcs, and despite my jokes here, he’s an addition to the show I really love. I think I would have preferred him being a right-hand-man to Sauron, instead of his own boss, but everything from his voice and performance, to his costume and prosthetics (great work there from the makeup and costume departments) is brilliant.

They’re Taking the Orcs to Eregion

Back in the city, Annatar and Mirdania have a cute moment all the shippers are going to love. He claims Celebrimbor’s mind is gone and Annatar is now in charge of the city’s defences. 

I wonder what he means by “when the time comes, I will see to it you [Mirdania] are duly rewarded”? Actually, no, she’s gonna die. Moving on.

So, the siege engines have gone silent. The orcs, stuck on the other side of the river, are turning away from the main city. They start chucking rocks at the cliffs, confusing everyone watching, so we needed (no sarcasm here) Mirdania to tell us plainly that they are damming the river. 

The reason this makes no sense is because that’s a lucky fucking shot. After one throw of one rock into the cliff, a massive chunk of the mountain falls off into the river. THEN, it causes a domino effect, breaking even more into the river. I mean… how???

Is Saruman throwing the rocks?

This just wouldn’t work and I don’t know why they didn’t just bring over a bridge of some kind, using boats, or something like that. Orcs are expendable (not to Adar in this show, but they are, and that’s how all these sieges went in the books), so just keep throwing more of them at the river with bridge stuff, or until their bodies pile high enough to make one out of orc corpses. 

Arondir, What Do Your Elf Eyes See?

Well, he sees the river going down fast, due to the damning damming techniques of the orcs. Arondir has barely been in Rings of Power, season 2, and to be fair, that makes sense. 

He and all the characters he was with in season 1 have nothing to do with this storyline and are spare parts right now – I mean, they were always spare parts – and the showrunners have no idea what to do with them.

But now, in Rings of Power, Season 2, Episode 7, the writers set out to fix their mistakes… by killing everyone.

Just Stop Oil – I Mean… Gold

King Durin III receives a message in Khazad-dûm from the Elves, asking for help as Eregion is under siege. His answer? Keep digging and move Prince Durin and Disa. 

The Ring would NOT have this effect on him!!! Okay, now that’s out of my system we can move on.

Narvi is sent down into the mines by King Durin III, but puts down his axe and stands with Prince Durin and Disa, after notices that his King is not acting normally. This makes sense – the King is acting insane, and the Elves are in trouble.

I am genuinely happy to see Prince Durin and Elrond in the same room again! Their friendship was one of the highlights of season 1 and I have missed their banter.

Elrond asks for Durin’s help in Eregion, and I am so glad they did this because I worried they were going to ignore this alliance.

One Does Not Simply Walk into Eregion

The orcs march on Eregion, now that the river has magically dammed. The march is a disorganised mess and it looks like they couldn’t get enough extras for the orcs, so they look thin on the ground. 

Inside, Celebrimbor has noticed that he is in some kind of time loop. How Sauron’s veil is a repeating cycle of time I will never know, but it is. And when Celebrimbor tells Annatar of his concerns, Annatar/Sauron just goes ahead and admits it was him?

“You sought peace, and I gave it to you.”

How does he think that is going to go?

So, Celebrimbor has worked out that Annatar is not who he says he is, and says as such. Charles Edwards gives such a great performance! He’s half-mad, floundering, scared, and angry, all at the same time. His acting is a joy to watch.

It turns out, all Celebrimbor needed to do was smash a window and he would see what was happening outside. The quick switch from him looking clean to looking like he’s been dragged through a hedge backwards and beaten with a hammer looked pretty awesome though.

I knew it! The “Mithril” from episode 6 was actually Sauron’s blood. 

“You are He. Are you not?”

Oh, the cold calm of his voice! Give this man an Emmy.

Sauron lets Celebrimbor go for a stroll outside, but the Elf is immediately knocked over by a flying rock. Luckily, he isn’t dead… yet.

Celebrimbor runs to find Mirdania and tells her about Sauron’s influence over everything, but she’s not going to believe him, is she? To be fair, he does look and sound insane.

“This is the thinnest part of the wall”

Thank you for that bit of exposition.

Holy shit. What a way to kill Mirdania. I am not entirely sure how Sauron could have made that happen, but he did, and to be fair, it was brutal. It’s nice to see the show not flinching away from the brutality of these events. 

Sauron tries to get Celebrimbor to keep working on the Rings, to finish the Nine, and in return he promises to spare the city. However, we hear the sound of a horn, and that can only mean… reinforcements!

Before I continue, I want to mention how weak the orcs look. They are disorganised, with no distinguishable ranks among them. Archers and infantry are side-by-side, with the archers standing 2 feet from the walls of the city for some reason. 

There are barely any orcs. Now, I think this is because the CGI armies of The Hobbit films were a little crazy, but at least it made the battles look epic in scope. This looks like a handful of orcs doing a bank heist or something.

We are supposed to believe that Adar has a HUGE army of orcs, but I can’t see this army, Can you?

Boil em, Mash em, Stick em in Eregion

The reinforcements are the Elves from Lindon, led by Elrond. It would have been nice to see Celeborn here, but nevermind. He gets in the way of the Haladriel/Saurondriel shipping.

At least the Elven army looks epic! I can see where the budget went now.

About 20 orcs come out of the woods to prevent Elrond and his army from reaching Eregion. Wait, Gil-galad is there? 

Take a look at these speeches said before battle, for a minute:

“Arise, arise, riders of Rohan!
Fell deeds awake, fire and slaughter!
Spear shall be shaken, shield be splintered!
A sword-day, a red day, ere the sun rises!
Ride now, ride now, ride to Gondor!”

Théoden to the Rohirrim (Book)

“Sons of Gondor, of Rohan, my brothers,
I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me.
A day may come when the courage of men fails,
when we forsake our friends
and break all bonds of fellowship,
but it is not this day.
An hour of wolves and shattered shields,
when the age of men comes crashing down,
but it is not this day!
This day we fight!!
By all that you hold dear on this good Earth,
I bid you stand, Men of the West!!!”

Aragorn (Movie)

Now, let’s look at what the genius writers of Rings of Power, season 2, episode 7 came up with for Elrond before he charges into battle at the Sack of Eregion, the beginning of the War of the Elves and Sauron:

“Death to our foes!”

Elrond in Rings of Power

Robert Aramayo is a fantastic actor and depicts a great version of Elrond, but he is given some of the worst lines. 

What a contrived nonsense. If Galadriel was in danger of dying to orcs, while a fucking army of Elves on horseback were charging at them, they would not stop, for two reasons. One reason is that they would not be able to. 

The second is that her death would just be another casualty of war, and to stop and chat about it with the enemy is just weakening your position. They had a lot of momentum. Now that is gone, if they start fighting now, the Elves will just be cut down from their mounts, making the horse a hindrance rather than a strong advantage.

Commander Elrond

They say “Commander Elrond” like it is a joke, something he’s not cut out for: this politician. Ridiculous. 

I’m really struggling to find any positives at this moment of Rings of Power, season 2, episode 7. Elrond, sorry, Commander Elrond, is sitting across from Adar at a table, in the Orc’s camp, with orcs surrounding the tent and no Elves in sight. 

Where the fuck is Gil-galad? Why did Elrond agree to have this discussion on Adar’s turf? Why would Gil-galad allow it? So many questions, so little writing talent.

“You are a courtier, more suited to wielding a scroll than a sword.” No he’s fucking not. Jesus Christ.

Right, I’m skipping past this. Elrond and Adar have a chat. Galadriel says the only thing that makes sense in this scene (“You should have kept charging, Elrond.” Well, yes, he should). Somehow, Elrond also knows what Sauron wants and why. 

We have a conversation that goes around in circles, then Elrond gives Galadriel a snog before leaving her to die. The music when they kiss is hilarious. No, I’m not an idiot. There is no reason for them to kiss other than for Elrond to give her the Ring.

Unless Elrond just really likes his girls tied up. Kinky Commander Elrond.

As he leaves, Elrond tells Vorohil his whole plan about the Dwarves, although Elrond speaks in Sindarin and Vorohil speaks in “English” (it’s what the subtitles say!). It can’t just be me who thinks Vorohil looks similar to Sauron in episode 1 before he became a sludge monster, can it?

Khazad-doomed

Prince Durin gives an inspiring speech to the Dwarves of Khazad-dûm, getting the warriors ready to march for Eregion. It’s a speech you would expect from any generic classic fantasy story and I don’t hate it – I like classic fantasy and I love a cliche, so nothing to complain about. 

Except for the fact that this speech, in the timeline, should have been given ages ago as the orcs are literally just about to march against the Elves. Again.

We join Elrond in battle whose horse does the most awful CGI kick of an orc I have ever seen and made me laugh out loud. I’m not someone who cares too much if the CGI is wonky – I barely notice, to be honest – but this was just something out of BBC’s Merlin or something, not Amazon’s million-plus-dollar investment.

Instead of returning to the battlefield and having an epic battle in the open, like we were promised five minutes ago, we instead see a small-scale skirmish between the Elves and orcs in the woods. 

There is no structure to this battle. It looks like the actors and orc extras don’t know what is going on either. Another example of where this show needs better writers and better directors, who actually had experience in these kinds of scenes. 

Daddy, I Thought You Loved Us!

The orcs finally breach the city! Wait, no they didn’t, because we need to drag this episode out even more.

At Adar’s camp, the orcs start complaining that they are dying and maybe they should retreat. Adar refuses, of course. Where is this even going? Are the orcs going to revolt? Retreat on their own? I just don’t see the point in this.

Unless the orcs turn on Adar, kill him, and this leaves a nice vacuum for Sauron to come in and take control again. But then that also makes sense, as the orcs switch one guy who thinks the orcs are expendable, with another guy who is probably worse.

Galadriel escapes, witnesses Adar crying over one of his dead kids, and tries to sneak off quietly. She is saved by Arondir and she has a plan to enter the city through, wait for it…

A hidden entrance. 

For once, just once, I would like to watch Rings of Power without rolling my eyes every two minutes. It’s giving me a headache.

Is It Over Yet? 

It says something about this show that I was more entertained by the Advertisements.

We’re back in Khazad-dûm and the Dwarves still haven’t left the mountain. All the Elves will be dead in 10 minutes! Hurry up!

Are you kidding me?

So, the dwarves stay home because the King has gone crazy, killing people and digging by himself. Skipping this nonsense.

We jump over to Celebrimbor and Sauron having a chat while the Elf completes his work on the Nine Rings for Men. Sauron apologises for treating Celebrimbor “like Morgoth treated me”. That is a heap of exposition for a show that already can’t juggle everything that is going on.

We can also skip over the rest of their conversation that felt awkward and added nothing. Celebrimbor then tries to destroy the Nine Rings, but even he must have known it wasn’t going to work? I mean, he made them!

The Elves of Eregion sent flaming projectiles, which they cannot control, down into the battle at their walls, which is filled with both Elves and Orcs… seems like a good idea?

Saw: Part 2

Instead of being tortured by his captors to reveal the location of the 7 Dwarven Rings, Celebrimbor tortures himself so that he might escape to hide the Nine Rings for Men.

He is found wandering the grounds by some soldiers who are like “come on, Grandad. Let’s get you back inside.”

Galadriel walks in and saves the day, telling those silly boys off. Turns out, Celebrimbor knew who Annatar was all along and blinded himself to the knowledge so he might reap the rewards. Apparently Galadriel did the same thing, but I have no idea how.

Sauron screams because the Rings are gone.

The Final 10 Minutes of Rings of Power, Season 2, Episode 7

This is all supposed to look epic and we are supposed to have an emotional reaction to named characters dying (we know, because the music says so). Well, all the battles look insane – which is how battles end up, sure, but there is literally NO structure to the plot of the battle, so it was insane from the start.

And then Rían dies, or something? I mean, I had to look her name up. With her and Mirdania dying, that’s Rings of Power just killing off its made-up characters who no one cared about anyway. Where’s the emotional connection in that? 

Celebrimbor has a last stand against Sauron. Do they really think this is enough Elves to capture Sauron? 

And… they all die.

That troll they brought in with episode 1 or episode 2, I can’t be bothered to check, marches towards the walls of Eregion, because he really hates Sauron, or something. The orcs are horrified that the troll kills them too, but Adar doesn’t care. What is the point???

Arondir takes it upon himself to fire toothpicks into the giant troll. This epic threat to everyone’s lives is killed easily by the Elves and we move on swiftly. I have said this before: Rings of Power is nothing more than mystery boxes pretending to be a cohesive narrative that makes sense, and the reveals are always shit, so what’s the point?

So, the Dwarves aren’t coming and Elrond and the Elves are weak. We get a brief glimpse of Gil-galad again – that’s where he went! – and Adar and the orcs march towards the walls of Eregion… in the sunlight.

I think Adar kills Arondir, which is another character that was made up by the show they have decided to kill off. He probably isn’t dead though, but it would at least be slightly emotional.

This loss does not feel as devastating as the show wants us to think it is. This moment feels hollow, unearned, and Adar’s face while he is choking Elrond looks like it is actually animated. Where are the cool prosthetics from other scenes? Could they just not be bothered on this day of filming?

Rings of Power, Season 2, Episode 7 ends how it begins – in disapointment.

Somehow, Adar now has Galadriel’s Ring. That’s how the episode ends. And that is where I will go and watch something else, that is (hopefully) good. 

Related to: Rings of Power, Season 2, Episode 7 Review