While it would be wrong to say most fans didn't see this coming, the season 2 finale of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power finally confirmed that Daniel Weyman's mysterious Stranger is indeed Gandalf.
He learns his name after a clash with the Dark Wizard (and even acquires his iconic staff) but according to showrunners Patrick McKay and J.D. Payne, the original idea was for the Stranger to be another deep-cut J.R.R. Tolkien creation: the wizard Olórin.
"No one will believe us, but this was a journey of discovery for the character and the characters around him, and it was a journey of discovery for the writers," McKay tells the Los Angeles Times (via SFFGazette.com). "We wanted this to be the origin story of a wizard coming to terms with who he is and what he has to do."
Payne adds, "Deep in the history of Middle-earth, Volume 12, he confirms that Olórin had already visited Middle-earth. So Tolkien left it open that Gandalf may have come earlier than the Third Age. But there were also things that we discovered inside the story that really seemed to fit with the character as you meet him later on."
Neither Saruman nor the Blue Wizards were strongly considered because they didn't fit the story, and it was by the season 1 finale that McKay and Payne had decided on Gandalf (hence the "If in doubt, always follow your nose" line).
This story is set in the Second Age and pulls more from Tolkien's writing than filmmaker Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings movies. Now, it seems the idea is for this five-season series is to tell a new story while getting the wizard to where we find him in The Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring as Gandalf the Grey.
"What we do on this show all the time is we look for ellipses in the mythology and then those become great opportunities to hopefully fill in the blanks," McKay explains. "Gandalf the Grey falls to the Balrog and then is sent back as Gandalf the White, who’s not exactly the same guy but he is the same guy. This is the idea that perhaps there was an even earlier iteration before he was the Grey."
"We were very fortunate to get hired for this gig because we pitched it as heavily-serialized, long-form storytelling — a 50-hour movie," he continues. "So while there are discoveries along the way and you never want to be locked into a plan that misses something that could be better, the signposts that we’re hitting are holding to that plan."
"We have a destination and an arc and a journey for him that will hopefully tie into later stories in a way that is unexpected...You might also eventually see him get a hat."
The Amazon series already features familiar characters like Galadriel and Sauron, but it was perhaps inevitable that it would eventually get a heavy-hitter like Gandalf. Heading into season 3, we'd imagine the presence of the iconic wizard will bring back any lapsed or uncertain fans.
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season 2 is now streaming on Prime Video.