It looks like Galadriel’s fight against Sauron won’t stop for anybody. According to Comicbook, the filming of the second season of Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power won’t be affected by the WGA Strike. The Prime Video series will continue production through the final days of filming on the new episodes, but all of these will be done without the series showrunners, John D. Payne (Flash Gordon) and Patrick McKay (Flash Gordon), who are part of the WGA. 

According to Comicbook, only nineteen days are left on the filming schedule for the series and the remainder of the filming will be overseen by the non-writing executive producers and directors. The decision to continue filming amid the strike comes after the production team took a look at the weeks ahead. Sources via Comicbook say that both the Director’s Guild of America and the Screen Actor’s Guild could have a strike at the end of June. Not wanting to risk delaying the second season of the show, the show would rather risk not having the showrunners for rewrites. 

Many actors have joined the second season of the popular series including Oscar-nominated actor Ciarán Hinds (Belfast, Game of Thrones); Rory Kinnear (Our Flag Means Death, No Time to Die); Tanya Moodie (Motherland, A Discovery of Witches); Selina Lo (Hellraiser, Boss Level), Nicholas Woodeson (The Hustle, Firebird), Oliver Alvin-Wilson (Murder in Provence, The Bay), Gabriel Akuwudike (1917, Hanna), Kevin Eldon (Shadow and Bone, Sanditon), Nia Towle (Persuasion), Gavi Singh Chera (Mother Teresa & Me, The Undeclared War), Ben Daniels (The Exorcist, Jupiter’s Legacy), Will Keen (His Dark Materials, The Man from Rome), newcomer Amelia Kenworthy, Stuart Bowman (Versailles, Gary: Tank Commander), Yasen Zates Atour (Young Wallander, The Witcher), William Chubb (Vampire Academy, Empire of Light), and Calam Lynch (Bridgerton, Benediction). 

Prime Video is keeping details of the popular show’s second season under wraps with very little information being shared with the general public. For this reason, no character details have been revealed regarding the roles all the actors above will play. 

It was also announced previously that Game of Thrones alum Joseph Mawle (1923, MotherFatherSon) wouldn’t be returning to play Adar in season two and that the role had been recast with Sam Hazeldine (Rain Dogs, Peaky Blinders) taking on the villainous role. 

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power show centers around the story of the creation of the rings of power, how they came to be, and how they relate to the overall story of Lord of the Rings. The show, which includes multiple perspectives and different narrating characters, focuses mainly on the story of a younger Galadriel, played by Morfydd Clark (Dracula, His Dark Materials), who is convinced that the elves have not defeated Sauron and that they should keep trying to defeat him once and for all. Galadriel will recruit the help of the Númenórean Queen Míriel, played by Cynthia Addai-Robinson (Power, Shooter), and blacksmith Halbrand, played by Charlie Vickers (Medici, Palm Beach), to go help the south defeat the evil trying to take over their land. Throughout the show, the audience also meets Arondir, played by Ismael Cruz Córdova (The Undoing, Berlin Station), an elf that has been stuck patrolling the small towns of the south for signs of Sauron; Nori, played by Markella Kavenagh (The Gloaming, My First Summer), a Hardfoot who finds a man in the crash site of a meteorite and learns that this stranger, played by Daniel Weyman (Silent Witness, Gentleman Jack) can use magic; and a younger Elrond, played by Robert Aramayo (The King’s Man, Behind Her Eyes), who is helping Lord Celebrimbor, played by Charles Edwards (The Crown, Under the Vines), to build a new elvish city with the help of his dwarf friend Prince Durin, played by Owain Arthur (Casualty, A Confession). 

Season two of Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is expected to premiere sometime in 2024. The first season of the show is available to stream on Prime Video. The Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit trilogy are available on HBO Max and Netflix.