Spoilers for Rings of Power Season 2 lie ahead. If you haven’t seen the first three episodes, you can stream them now with an Amazon Prime subscription. Then make sure to catch new episodes as they drop every Thursday.
When it comes to the “three rings of the elven-kings” the elves can’t get on the same page about what to do with them at the start of Rings of Power’s second season. Now, following the release of the first three episodes on the 2024 TV schedule, Benjamin Walker, who plays High King Gil-galad, spoke to CinemaBlend about the elves’ disagreement that led to Elrond jumping off a waterfall and the Elvish word that describes how his character felt in the moment.
In the first episode of Season 2, after the prologue revealed the attempted assassination of Sauron, we flashed into the present, where Morfydd Clark’s Galadriel and Robert Aramayo’s Elrond were bickering over what should be done with the rings. Eventually, Gil-galad got involved, and ultimately, when a consensus could not be reached, Elrond jumped away with the rings.
Overall, it was a deeply frustrating moment for the High King. So, when I asked Benjamin Walker how his character was feeling, before I could even get the question out during our Rings of Power interviews for CinemaBlend, he told me this about Elrond and Galadriel:
Right, well, they’re talking, they’re bickering like children.
They sure were, and after Gil-galad learned about why this was happening, he exclaimed an Elvish word that clearly communicated his frustration.
To that end, between the two elves fighting and Elrond ultimately jumping off a waterfall with the rings, Walker told me that there’s a great “Elvish swear” that encapsulates his character’s feelings in that moment:
One of my favorite parts of Gil-galad, and a nice little nugget that I feel like sums up his character at this point, is the Elvish word ‘grach,’ which is an Elvish swear that means ‘crap’ or ‘come on!’ I think he’s about as frustrated as we’ve seen him at this point, kind of like a parent of like. Like ‘Why I otta…’ So I think he’s frustrated.
According to Sindarin – The Noble Tongue, “grach” means “of the curse,” and in a debate about the term on Reddit, many noted that it could translate to “danger.” In both cases, the word fits Gil-galad’s mood perfectly.
It truly is a great word to describe this scene as a whole. I mean, it literally opened with Elrond and Galadriel chasing each other on horseback and yelling over who gets to hold the rings. At one point, Gil-galad even had to tell them both to just be quiet. While their arguments were valid, Gil-galad understandably felt like he had to act like a parent at the moment, as Walker explained:
In terms of shooting on that day, they’re both such great actors. And it was exhilarating to kind of have to step in between them and say, ‘Go to your room! Now, you go to your room, not off the waterfall! I meant…Ah, grach!’ That it was, I mean, it was exhilarating.
While “grach” has a negative connotation, and it describes Gil-galad’s over-it-attitude very well, it seems like Walker himself loved working on that scene with his fellow Rings of Power cast members. And it was fun to watch too, as the tension built so well, and it ending with Elrond jumping off the waterfall was, to use Benjamin Walker’s words, exhilarating.
Now, the question will revolve around how this rift between the elves will impact the show moving forward. In the following episodes, we saw them decide to wear the rings, despite Elrond’s desire to destroy them. Plus, despite their feud, Gil-galad assigned Elrond to lead the task force Galadriel is part of.
So, while they can’t agree, they are all trying to do what’s right, but man, sometimes you just need a second to scream “grach!”