Fans of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy have just eight more months to wait until they can embark on another adventure. Amazon Studios just released a first look at the title sequence for its upcoming Lord of the Rings series, The Rings of Power, and the stunning footage was made entirely with old-school movie magic.
The minutelong title sequence is full of molten metals pouring through letters carved into a thick slice of redwood while nostalgic Middle-earth music tugs on the heartstrings of fans of the Peter Jackson films. The red-hot metal snakes through the grooves as sparks, smoke, and steam dance along. It’s hard to believe the visually stunning effect was made without computer-generated imaging, which is probably why IGN put out a behind-the-scenes companion video showing how the teaser was produced.
The Rings of Power will take place during the Second Age of Middle-earth, thousands of years before The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. According to showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay: “The Rings of Power unites all the major stories of Middle-earth’s Second Age: the forging of the rings, the rise of the Dark Lord Sauron, the epic tale of Númenor, and the Last Alliance of Elves and Men.”
If the immense effort put into creating the title sequence without CGI is any indicator of the series’ quality, it appears the fate of Tolkien’s epic fantasy is in good hands.
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