"The Great Wave" is the fourth episode of the first season of the American fantasy television series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. The series is based on J. R. R. Tolkien's history of Middle-earth, primarily material from the appendices of the novel The Lord of the Rings (1954–55). The episode is set thousands of years before the novel in Middle-earth's Second Age. It was written by Stephany Folsom and showrunners J. D. Payne and Patrick McKay, and directed by Wayne Che Yip.
The series was ordered in November 2017. Payne and McKay were set to develop it in July 2018. Filming for the first season took place in New Zealand, and work on episodes beyond the first two began in January 2021. Yip was revealed to be directing four episodes of the season that March, including the fourth. Production wrapped for the season in August 2021. The episode uses a palantír seeing stone to show the future destruction of the island kingdom of Númenor. It also introduces Adar (Joseph Mawle), an Elf who was transformed into one of the first Orcs. Sophia Nomvete provided the vocals for her character, Disa, who sings "A Plea to the Rocks" in the episode.
"The Great Wave" premiered on the streaming service Amazon Prime Video on September 16, 2022. It was estimated to have high viewership and received generally positive reviews.
Plot Queen Regent Míriel has a vision of Númenor being destroyed by a giant tsunami. Galadriel and Elendil present Míriel with proof that the forces of Sauron are attacking the Southlands in Middle-earth and Galadriel asks her to intervene. Míriel refuses and Galadriel asks to speak with her father, King Tar-Palantir, who hasn't been seen in years. Míriel has Galadriel imprisoned. Isildur and his friends Valandil and Ontamo are dismissed from their cadet training after Isildur makes a mistake while distracted.
Arondir meets Adar, the Elvish leader of the Orcs, who lets Arondir leave with a message for the Southlanders: forsake their claim to the Southlands and swear fealty to Adar or be destroyed. Theo returns to Tirharad to recover food from the tavern and is attacked by Orcs. Arondir rescues Theo and they return to Ostirith. Tavern owner Waldreg reveals to Theo that he is a follower of Sauron and explains that the broken sword is a gift from the Dark Lord. The Orcs now know that Theo has the sword.
In Eregion, the realm of the Elven-smiths, the Elves and Dwarves begin building Celebrimbor's new forge. Celebrimbor believes Prince Durin IV is hiding something and Elrond investigates. He learns that Durin IV has been mining a new ore that is very light and strong. Elrond promises to keep this secret and gives it the name "mithril". When the mine collapses, King Durin III shuts down further mithril mining. Durin IV is initially furious, but reconciles with his father and agrees to investigate the Elves' true intentions.
On Halbrand's suggestion, Galadriel escapes and sneaks into Tar-Palantir's tower. She finds the king in ill health, protected by Míriel. The latter explains that there was a rebellion because the king wanted to renew relations with the Elves, and Míriel was placed on the throne in his stead. This gave her access to a palantír seeing stone which first showed her the vision of Númenor's downfall. She shows this vision to Galadriel and explains her belief that helping Galadriel will bring upon this cataclysmic future.
As Galadriel is being escorted back to Middle-earth, the petals of Númenor's White Tree begin to fall. Míriel says this signifies the tears of the Valar and changes her mind. She announces that she will take an expeditionary force with Galadriel to assist the Men of the Southlands. Isildur, Valandil, and Ontamo volunteer to join the force.
Production Development Amazon acquired the television rights for J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings (1954–55) in November 2017. The company's streaming service, Amazon Prime Video, ordered a series based on the novel and its appendices to be produced by Amazon Studios in association with New Line Cinema. It was later titled The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. Amazon hired J. D. Payne and Patrick McKay to develop the series and serve as showrunners in July 2018. Stephany Folsom joined the series as a writer by July 2019, and Wayne Che Yip was set to direct four episodes of the first season by March 2021. The series was originally expected to be a continuation of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings (2001–2003) and The Hobbit (2012–2014) film trilogies, but Amazon later clarified that their deal with the Tolkien Estate required them to keep the series distinct from Jackson's films. Despite this, the showrunners intended for it to be visually consistent with the films. Amazon said in September 2019 that the first season would be filmed in New Zealand, where Jackson's films were made.
The series is set in the Second Age of Middle-earth, thousands of years before Tolkien's The Hobbit (1937) and The Lord of the Rings. Because Amazon did not acquire the rights to Tolkien's other works where the First and Second Ages are primarily explored, the writers had to identify references to the Second Age in The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and its appendices, and create a story that bridged those passages. The first season focuses on introducing the setting and major heroic characters to the audience. Written by Folsom, Payne, and McKay, and directed by Yip, the fourth episode is titled "The Great Wave".
Writing The writers wanted to establish a working relationship between Queen Regent Míriel and her cousin, Chancellor Pharazôn, in the episode. This was in anticipation of Pharazôn turning on Míriel in future seasons. The episode also shows that Míriel has been having visions of Númenor's destruction in a great tsunami after looking into a crystal ball-like palantír. The showrunners said there was ambiguity about the abilities of the palantíri in Tolkien's works. They are primarily used to communicate across great distances, but there are also indications that they can be used to communicate across time. The palantíri can also be misused and mislead the user. The showrunners wanted to explore all of that and knew that there are seven palantíri present in Númenor during the series' events. Using the palantír to show a vision of Numenor's destruction allowed them to lean into the fact that Númenor is doomed, with Tolkien giving it a similar fate to Atlantis. By letting the audience know that, they could tell that story in a similar way to the film Titanic (1997) in which the viewer is aware of the tragic end that is coming and they can watch as the characters' choices move them away from or towards that tragedy. This is especially seen in Míriel, who takes steps to prevent the destruction of Númenor but potentially helps bring about that fate through her actions. They compared elements of Míriel to Cassandra from Greek mythology. Míriel star Cynthia Addai-Robinson said there was an earlier version of the script where a set of stones falling over was a key sign for Míriel at the end of the episode, before the final version of the script which uses the leaves of the White Tree of Númenor as a sign for her instead.
Discussing Isildur's story in the episode, star Maxim Baldry explained that he has grown up in Númenor not fitting in, unlike his friends Valandil and Ontamo, and Isildur is looking for "something more to life". He added that the character is conflicted by these feelings because he also wants to remain with his family. After the season finished, the showrunners gave Isildur's storyline as an example of elements from the first season that were "small" and did not meet audience expectations for a The Lord of the Rings story. For future seasons they wanted to ensure that all the story beats were tied to more "existential" ideas.
Adar was inspired by one of Tolkien's explanations for where Orcs come from, in which Elves were corrupted by dark forces into the first Orcs. The showrunners felt that was a compelling idea that could be revealed as part of Adar's backstory. Further exploring Orc culture was one of the reasons the showrunners wanted to make the series, and they wanted to explore the idea that the Orcs are not inherently evil considering Tolkien's view that nothing in his world was evil in the beginning. However, they did not want to introduce "good" Orcs and believed they should continue to be portrayed as "pretty horrible". The idea that the Orcs are fighting for what they think is right was inspired by Claude Rains's antagonist Alexander Sebastian in Alfred Hitchcock's film Notorious (1946). The showrunners felt Adar's care for the Orcs as his "children" would be relatable to the audience.
The showrunners wanted to give the Dwarf princess Disa an element that set her apart from the male Dwarves that had been seen in previous Tolkien adaptations, and developed the idea of her magical ability to resonate stone with her voice. They described her role in Dwarvish society as combining elements of an artist and a priestess. The showrunners thought this aligned with the established culture and society of the Dwarves, and was a believable extension of the echolocation that real-life cave-dwelling creatures have developed.
Disa actress Sophia Nomvete felt there was a pain at the center of her character's husband, Prince Durin IV, that was created by the absence of his friend Elrond in the years before the start of the series. Nomvete said Disa was aware of this and wanted to help him overcome this. In researching Dwarvish culture for the series, Nomvete read about Aulë, the creator of the Dwarves, and felt the dynamic between him and his wife Yavanna was reflected in the relationship between Disa and Durin. Durin actor Owain Arthur saw the scene between Prince Durin and King Durin III as a coming-of-age moment for the prince where he has to decide between his personal wishes and the expectations of his father. For the preceding scene, where Durin and Elrond discuss their respective fathers, Arthur and Elrond star Robert Aramayo discussed their own relationships with their fathers as preparation. This storyline introduces the powerful ore mithril to the series. Yip felt this introduction would register for audiences who were not familiar with Tolkien's lore because of the time that had been invested in the relationship between Durin and Elrond so far in the series: "You don't need to necessarily understand exactly what Durin is talking about regarding the mithril, but you can see how much it means to him".
Casting
The season's cast includes Cynthia Addai-Robinson as Míriel, Robert Aramayo as Elrond, Owain Arthur as Durin IV, Maxim Baldry as Isildur, Nazanin Boniadi as Bronwyn, Morfydd Clark as Galadriel, Ismael Cruz Córdova as Arondir, Charles Edwards as Celebrimbor, Trystan Gravelle as Pharazôn, Ema Horvath as Eärien, Tyroe Muhafidin as Theo, Sophia Nomvete as Disa, Lloyd Owen as Elendil, Charlie Vickers as Halbrand, and Leon Wadham as Kemen. Also starring in the episode are Anthony Crum as Ontamo, Alex Tarrant as Valandil, Peter Tait as Tredwill, Geoff Morrell as Waldreg, Ian Blackburn as Rowan, Ken Blackburn as Tar-Palantir, Peter Mullan as Durin III, Laura Medes as young mother, Carmel McGlone as Edda, Jason Hood as Tamar, Adam Faiz as guild merchant, Antonio Te Maioha as the sail master, Phil Grieve as Bazur, Luke Hawker as Magrot, Jed Brophy as Vrath, and Edward Clendon as Grugzûk. Robert Strange plays an unnamed Orc in the episode.
Design