The Rings of Power Season 2: Who is the Dark Wizard in Rhûn in Season 2?
Who is the Dark Wizard in Rhûn: Spoilers are ahead for the first few episodes of The Rings of Power Season 2, now available on Prime Video. Ciarán Hinds, who appeared in the film Belfast, plays one of the new characters appearing in the second season of The Rings of Power, which picks up just after Galadriel discovers that Halbrand is Sauron and that the creation of the rings is part of his plan to take control over all living things in Middle-earth.
Sauron’s plan is taking shape and many can already sense his return in the air, even without having seen what Galadriel has seen and what she, Gil-Galad, and the elf Círdan know, and one of them appears to be a dark wizard who is in the lands of Rhûn. This wizard orders his followers to search for the stranger who fell from the sky, who appears to be Gandalf, and it is clear that he is on the side of darkness. If we remember Tolkien’s stories, Rhûn is the land where the men who were allies of Morgoth are found, and where we find Sauron’s allies in The Lord of the Rings, and with this, this wizard is not exactly good.
Who is the Dark Wizard in Rhûn?
The name of this wizard is not revealed in his first appearance in the series and it is possible that, as with The Stranger, the series is saving that detail to reveal it at the key moment, but several clues point to his true identity. According to Tolkien’s stories, only three wizards ever traveled to the lands of Rhûn: Saruman, who appears in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films, Pallando, and Alatar, who are the two blue wizards who stayed in the East. Everything seems to indicate that this wizard is one of the Istar, like Gandalf and Radagast, who were sent to protect Middle Earth.
Is this Saruman?
Saruman is an ally of Sauron and builds his army of orcs to retrieve the ring and fight the humans in The Lord of the Rings films, but we know that before that he was a white wizard and that he became a friend and mentor to Gandalf, and he is swept away by the darkness long after the two meet. This detail suggests that this dark wizard cannot be Gandalf (with this, there is a greater chance that The Stranger is Gandalf), and neither can he be Saruman.
Is this Pallando or Alatar?
Pallando and Alatar are the only two remaining blue wizards who are likely candidates for this dark wizard. They did travel to Rhûn and even stayed there after Saruman returned, and no one knows what happened to them. The task of these wizards was to prevent Sauron from taking power in the East, where Rhûn is located, but, as it is not known what happened to them and Rhûn eventually aligned with Sauron, we can assume that they went over to the dark side and began working so that Sauron could return.
The dark wizard played by Ciarán Hinds has to be one of them, and it is he who may have founded the cult of Sauron followers that includes the three mysterious characters who pursue the Stranger. In The Hobbit, Bilbo asks Gandalf about other wizards and he mentions Saruman and two blue wizards whose names he doesn’t remember, so he must have met them or known of their existence, and that connects to The Stranger and the persecution he’s undergoing.
