The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season-Finale Recap: Mask-Off Middle-earth

The first season of The Rings of Power has been a long journey (or maybe it’s been more of an adventure, since we’ve all been watching together), and the finale, “Alloyed,” thankfully did not leave us hanging on much. We ended things in a good (if slightly drawn-out) place. Halbrand was Sauron. The Stranger was (most probably) Gandalf. Galadriel got gaslighted hard, and Elrond knows it. And Celebrimbor made his three rings for — quote along with me now from The Fellowship of the Ring — “the Elves, immortal, wisest, and fairest of all beings,” while Halbrand/Sauron is now armed with the knowledge he needs to craft his own One Ring, and a land to do it in Mordor and Mount Doom. Not great, Bob!

Those are a lot of major reveals in “Alloyed,” but honestly, the season needed them. I haven’t had a problem with the series’s pacing, for the most part, but I think The Rings of Power creators and showrunners, J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay, who co-wrote this episode with Gennifer Hutchison, would have done themselves and viewers a disservice if certain mysteries were left as cliffhangers. We needed some closure here on Galadriel’s furious zeal, Elrond’s political maneuvering, Numenor’s split allegiances, and whatever the hell Halbrand was up to, and “Alloyed” deliberately checks off those boxes one by one.

The story here indulges in Tolkien lore, and in delivering moments that connect these characters to the ones we know from the novels and Peter Jackson’s films, and in slightly narrowing the focus of this very wide cast of characters for season two. The only character I would say is lacking a stand-alone arc is Celebrimbor, who both gets shown up by Halbrand and who never really had a personality of his own (did we ever get an explanation for why he wanted to speed-build that tower in Eregion?). But Charles Edwards gives a great line reading for “The mithril is proud,” and he is the focus of perhaps the funniest The Rings of Power GIF. Those are both wins for me!

“Alloyed” starts off with the Stranger, so let’s do the same: After being cast out by the Harfoots — who actually are quite ruthless despite all their “we stick together” talk, no? — he’s found by the mysterious trio of the Nomad, the Ascetic, and the Dweller, who swear loyalty to him because he’s … Lord Sauron! Those stars he’s seeking are the Hermit’s Hat pattern, visible only in Rhûn, they explain, and in that place, “you will be known at last, for who you truly are.” But the Stranger isn’t really so sure that he wants to be the ominous slave master the trio are praising him as, so when they try to bind him to fight against the Harfoot rescue party of Nori, Poppy, Marigold, and Sadoc, his decision to come to the Harfoots’ aid and Nori’s insistence that “only you can show what you are” diminishes part of the “veil” that had been placed over his powers. “I’m good!” he proclaims, and he uses the trio’s staff (decorated with what looks like an eye) to harness the wind and defeat them.

We learn a few things here — that the Stranger isn’t Sauron, but “the other, the Istar,” which he later translates for Nori as “wizard.” And although he still hasn’t identified himself by name, when he and Nori set off for the far-off land of Rhûn with the Harfoots’ blessing, his “There’s a sweet smell on the air this way … always follow your nose” immediately evokes the Gandalf moment in the Mines of Moria in Fellowship of the Ring. If The Rings of Power tries to pretend this is Saruman (or a Blue Wizard), I will lose my mind. My apologies to Radagast fans looking for proper representation of your nature-loving wizard. We have four seasons to go; maybe he’ll still show up, birds and all.

Meanwhile, in Eregion, High King Gil-galad, Elrond, and Celebrimbor are fretting that they’re running out of time to save the Elves, especially now that King Durin III has kicked them out of the Khazad-dûm and denied them the mountain’s significant mithril deposits. But then Galadriel and Halbrand show up. And, wouldn’t you know, as soon as the latter heals, he starts poking around Celebrimbor’s workshop, asking all kinds of questions and offering the smithing skills that the Númenóreans were like “Nah, we’re good” on.

Celebrimbor, though, is more ambitious, or maybe more easily flattered, or maybe just more desperate. He quickly takes to Halbrand and starts repeating what Adar had said of Sauron crafting power “not of the flesh, but over flesh.” The phrase rings a bell for Galadriel — who previously had no problem sharing her concerns or worries about literally anything or anyone — but she keeps her mouth shut as she begins to second-guess whether her human crush is actually the king he said he was. Guess what: He wasn’t! Remember how Halbrand’s armor in the seventh episode, “The Eye,” was covered in literal metal rings? That was a clue! Galadriel’s dude was Sauron all along, and ma’am, you really lost focus and were about to have a consensual workplace relationship. What are you doing?

That insecurity and uncertainty in her mission and herself is exactly what Halbrand/Sauron tries to manipulate to get Galadriel on his side, and so we tumble into her mind in a sequence that tweaks her memories. First, he play-acts as her brother Finrod, trying to convince her that her brother wasn’t hunting Sauron, but trying to ensure peace — which “was Sauron’s task as well.” When that doesn’t work because Galadriel’s love for Finrod is too strong, Halbrand/Sauron shifts them to the raft where they first met. This time he’s trying to appeal to Galadriel’s affinity for “the light of the One” and promising her that together they can heal everything he helped ruin alongside Morgoth as his second-in-command. It’s all very Angelus and Buffy, with Halbrand/Sauron insisting that he “alone can see your greatness” and that he would “make you a queen, fair as the sea and the sun, stronger than the foundations of the Earth.” (Did you hear that final phrase in Cate Blanchett’s voice? Me too!) But again, Galadriel denies his offer of fascism pretending to be unity — “I see no difference,” he responds to her query of whether he would “save or rule?” — and she escapes the shadow that he throws over her memories.

Back in the real world, though, things aren’t so easy. Halbrand/Sauron isn’t wrong that she helped bring him back, so driven was she by her quest to find him that she did more than just that. And although Galadriel sort of tries to underplay that to Elrond at first, by the time she hands over Finrod’s dagger to help craft the three rings for the elves, her oldest friend has found the archival scroll that proved Halbrand was no king. The look they share is in direct contrast to her earlier appeal that Elrond just trust her, okay, and I hope that this friendship isn’t immediately back to normal. This is too heavy a revelation to be water under the bridge.

Galadriel let her single-mindedness (and Halbrand’s flirty glances, let’s be real here) get in the way of her own logic, and now Halbrand is fully mask-off as Sauron, wearing that billowy black cape every evildoer gets when they reveal their true intentions and striding into Mordor. My man might even be wearing eyeliner. He is taking this whole baddie thing very seriously, and even if you weren’t aware what eventually happens in Middle-earth because of Sauron, the vibes are bad.

Oh, and Elendil and Míriel have a little Moulin Rouge! moment as they discuss what will surely be more battles to come, and trade utterances of “come what may.” That’s nice for them, but Númenor is still pretty boring. Get more exciting in season two, you guys. See you then!

Mithril Links

• Hello! I am not your normal TROP recapper, but this isn’t a Halbrand/Sauron situation where it’s been me in disguise the whole time. My name is Roxana Hadadi. I’m a TV critic for Vulture, and I’m stepping in for Keith Phipps this week to cap off this season of recaps of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. A big thank-you to Keith for his exceptional service and insightful recaps, and for letting me fill in!

• No dwarves or Khazad-dûm this week, meaning that the Balrog woken by King Durin’s environmental littering remains a problem for season two. Also absent in “Alloyed”: The Southlanders on their way to Pelargir; Adar reigning over his new digs in Mordor; and Celeborn, who is the most MIA husband in history.

• Isildur is also still unseen, and if I didn’t know he had to come back for this story, I would be so pleased by his continued absence. Bye (for the time being), kid, you are the most annoying nepo-baby alive!

• Related: This show can try its best, but I will never care about Eärien, not even if she starts using that palantír and getting lost in “what is from what was, what was from what will be.”

• Is this the last we see of the other Harfoots since Nori leaves them behind to accompany the Stranger? If so, best of luck to you all; don’t let Malva read the map; and RIP to Sadoc, who was played so wittily and wisely by Lenny Henry.

• Halbrand/Sauron’s line to Galadriel about how he would “never forget” her aid and “see to it that no one else does either” didn’t really come to pass, did it? In the proper Lord of the Rings trilogy — at least in Jackson’s films — no one is ostracizing Galadriel for whatever assistance she provided to Sauron so many years ago. She’s more in self-isolation than forced exclusion, right?

• Speaking of Halbrand/Sauron, his telling Celebrimbor that the information about alloys “is a gift” is a nice little nod to one of the evil one’s many nicknames: Annatar, or “Lord of Gifts.”

• The Nomad, the Ascetic, and the Dweller were weird and spooky, and the visual effects involved in the Dweller’s transformations (that cloak collapsing into a pile of leaves) and Gandalf’s evisceration of them into glowing blue butterflies was pretty solid. I’ll miss those ruthless arsonists!

• Do the seven rings for the dwarf-lords and the nine rings for the “race of men, who above all else, desire power” get forged next season?

• I haven’t been super-hot on Benjamin Walker’s performance as High King Gil-galad, but his irritated “You should not be standing here at all” to Galadriel was the most relatable he’s ever been, and his “The low man?” the funniest.

• Yes, that was Fiona Apple’s “Where the Shadows Lie” playing over the end credits, with her wonderful warble digging into “and in the darkness bind them.” Available only on Amazon Music because of corporate synergy, baby!

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