LOTR: The Rings Of Power - Episode 7 Review: Stirring Up For A Great Finale

{rating}

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power's penultimate episode 'The Eye' is busy setting up a firecracker end for the season 1 finale. The tempo has been going up with the strife in the Southlands - now termed Mordor, after the fire and devastation unleashed by the onslaught of the Orcs. The surviving members of Numenoreans and the original inhabitants are still searching for survivors while some are recovering from the brutal injuries suffered while in battle.

The heroes like Galadriel, The Queen, Theo, Bronwyn and others are fighting their own devastations amidst the doom and gloom. Elendil's anger against Galadriel seems justified following the taken-for-granted loss of his dear son Isildur.

The glimmers of hope come in the parallel tracks where the Harfoots continue to trudge their way to safety despite their carriages bearing the brunt of the evil eye and Elrond and Durins' enduring friendship despite the Elder Durin's opposition to sharing the Mithril find.

Miriel's promise to return to Middle Earth with renewed reinforcements and vigour, and Nori, Poppy, and Marigold's conviction that they have to help the Stranger are again glimmers of hope against deep darkness and despair.

The mental trauma borne by almost every member of the cast of characters after the cataclysmic volcanic disruption is there for all to see. The tide of evil is rising across Middle Earth.

This is The Rings of Power's bleakest episode and a long-drawn one too at that. But what the viewer can hope to garner from the past episodes is the enduring hope that always comes after a seemingly unyielding series of tragedies. And that's what the LOTR Episode 7 hopes to be a springboard for.

When Galadriel reveals the tragic loss of her husband (going against the book) in the war against Morgoth to Theo as the two scurry across the apocalyptic wasteland together, a lot of the earlier featured chemistry between Halbrand and Galadriel begins to show a growing form.

The mystery regarding Sauron's true existence is still not resolved and some of the presumed deaths in the devastation of the southlands and creation of Mordor comes across as iffy.

The show continues to engage and interest this time with a emotional heft that packs a wallop.

The actors look suitably devastated and the cinematography lives up to the gloom and doom orchestrated by the fabulous production design.

We all have to feel the pain of loss in order to value what we have and the inhabitants of The Rings of Power are coming to that turning point in their respective written trajectories.

It's all been set-up in such a way that we are now expecting a glorious victory of good over evil in the grand season finale of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.