Here’s a fun, nerdy fact about Lord of the Rings: In Old Norse, Gandalf translates to “staff elf.” J.R.R. Tolkien based the name of his wise, old wizard on the word Gandálfr, a combination of the words gandr (which means wand, staff, magic, or monster) and alfr (elf).
And yet, while we know a decent amount about Gandalf’s mystical origins and his epic journey throughout the saga of Middle-earth, the staff that gives him his name is mostly a mystery in Tolkien’s books. Actually, calling it a mystery is being generous. For a writer known for his verbosity, Tolkien never spilled much ink describing Gandalf’s staff or where it came from — which inadvertently cleared the way for Amazon’s prequel show The Rings of Power to turn it into one of Season 2’s central mysteries.
Dwelling on Gandalf’s staff isn’t the worst idea that showrunners Patrick McKay and J.D. Payne have ever had, but in turning its origin story into a mystery box, Rings of Power is doing a disservice to its own story and source material, while also proving once and for all that the mystery box genre has worn out its welcome.
Here’s what you actually need to know about Gandalf’s staff, and why The Rings of Power’s newest stick obsession is a big mistake. Warning: Spoilers ahead for Season 2 Episode 4.
Gandalf’s staff
First introduced in The Hobbit in 1937, Gandalf is a Maiar, one of a handful of wizards sent to Middle-earth by the god-like Valar to help in the fight against Sauron. In Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth, a collection of essays and short stories published in 1980, Gandalf’s staff is described more as a walking aid than a powerful magic weapon. Tolkien writes that Gandalf was “less tall than the others, and in looks more aged, grey-haired and grey-clad, and leaning on a staff.”
However, we do know that it holds power, and in The Fellowship of the Ring, Tolkien describes one of its most useful abilities:
“As the wizard passed on ahead up the great steps, he held his staff aloft, and from its tip there came a faint radiance.”
Aside from some sketches by Tolkien himself that depict the staff as basically just a long stick, that’s pretty much all the writer told us about Gandalf’s magic weapon. Of course, when Peter Jackson made his Lord of the Rings movies he had to show us the staff in live-action, which is where we get its iconic gnarled design. But to be clear, that’s not based on the books. It just looks cool.
If it sounds like I’m about to say something slightly negative about Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movies, let’s just say that the entire trilogy is perfect and I wouldn’t change a thing. However, I do think that Jackson’s decision to embellish Gandalf’s staff, starting with 2001’s Fellowship of the Ring, is what brings us to this current, frustrating moment in The Rings of Power Season 2.
Rings of Power’s New Mystery Box
If you’re unfamiliar with the term “mystery box,” it’s a way to describe a TV show where the main thing driving the story forward is a mystery that the audience (and sometimes also the characters) doesn’t have the answer to. Lost was a pivotal mystery box show, keeping fans hooked with various questions about the island that ultimately didn’t provide a satisfying answer. Westworld and its robot conspiracies was another popular mystery box — albeit one that fans managed to solve before they were supposed to. And for reasons I don’t fully understand, The Rings of Power is a mystery box show, too.
In Season 1, the biggest mystery was: Who is Sauron? There were plenty of candidates (including the mysterious Stranger), but by the end, almost everyone guessed correctly that the answer was Halbrand (Charlie Vickers). The Season 1 finale confirmed as much, while also strongly hinting that the Stranger (Daniel Weyman) is an amnesiac Gandalf.
So what’s the mystery box at the heart of Season 2? That’s a little less clear, but one recurring question the show clearly wants us to ask is how Gandalf got his staff. In the three-episode premiere, the Stranger reveals that he’s been dreaming of a staff. He then picks one off the ground and tries to use it, but his magic spell backfires. Wrong staff!
In Episode 4, we get another false alarm. The Stranger finds a gnarled old tree and tries to remove a branch. The camera zooms in on one specific branch with a familiar, twisty shape as the music crescendos... then the tree comes to life and attacks the Stranger. Wrong staff, again!
It’s clear that before the end of The Rings of Power Season 2, the Stranger/Gandalf will find his staff. But here’s the thing: I couldn’t care less how he finds it, and I have a feeling I’m not alone. Not every tiny little piece of sellable IP needs an origin story. And the fact that Tolkien didn’t think it was worth explaining should probably be a big warning sign. But, alas, this is the story we’re getting.
If all of this proves anything, it’s that the mystery box has outworn its welcome. Prestige genre TV needs a new gimmick. And the The Rings of Power should know better. It already has plenty of magical objects that can serve as more relevant mystery boxes than a staff. In fact, they’re right there in the title.
