7 Shows Like The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power to Watch While You Wait for Season 2

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power has concluded its record-breaking $700 million first season. Amazon Prime Video's epic fantasy series had ups and downs story-wise through Season 1, but everyone can agree that it looks amazing. The finale contained a huge revelation about the identity of Sauron (don't worry, no spoilers here) and set us up perfectly for Season 2, which is already being filmed. 

It's going to be a really long time until Season 2 comes out — co-showrunner Patrick McKay recently told The Hollywood Reporter that he expects to be working on Season 2 for "another couple years" — so if you got hooked on The Rings of Power's rendering of J.R.R. Tolkien's magical world of good and evil, you're going to have to find some other shows to provide your fantasy fix in the interim. We've put together a list of epic fantasy shows to watch if you like The Lord of the Rings show. Some of them are preteen-friendly like The Rings of Power, while others are a little more mature. None of them are as grand as The Rings of the Power — the whole point of The Rings of Power is that it's the most epic TV show ever made — but all of them will transport you to another world. 

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Watch on Amazon Prime Video

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• Everything We Know About LOTR: TROP Season 2

The Wheel of Time

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos occasionally puts his finger on the scale in influencing the shows Amazon Studios makes. That's why Prime Video is home to not one but two epic high fantasy series based on book series he likes. When you're one of the world's richest people, you get to make your favorite fantasies reality. The Wheel of Time is based on a series of Tolkienesque novels by Robert Jordan and follows Moiraine Damodred (Rosamund Pike), a woman with tremendous magical powers, as she sets out on a journey with five villagers, one of whom she suspects is the Dragon Reborn, the reincarnation of a nearly all-powerful being that will either save or destroy the world. It's a little bit rougher than The Rings of Power in every sense of the word, but it's a great next watch, and you don't even have to leave the Prime Video app. 

Game of Thrones/House of the Dragon

Look, I'm not telling you anything you don't already know. Game of Thrones wouldn't exist without The Lord of the Rings, and The Rings of Power wouldn't exist without Game of Thrones. Author George R.R. Martin conceived of his epic fantasy series as a dark, mature, realistic take on Tolkienesque world-building — a counterpoint to the aforementioned Robert Jordan's straightforward, reverent Tolkeinism. Now, The Rings of Power and House of the Dragon are going head-to-head for fantasy TV supremacy. They're both prequels based on supplemental material from their respective authors, which is kind of funny. House of the Dragon feels like the bigger hit — and feel is all we really have to go on, because it's basically impossible to measure them one-to-one — but you don't have to choose one or the other. Watch them both! And now that TROP's season is over, you have plenty more time and headspace for the backstabbing, relative-loving Targaryens. 

The Witcher

This epic adaptation of Andrzej Sapkowski's sprawling fantasy novels is Netflix's attempt to make "the next Game of Thrones," which means it has more sex and violence than The Lord of the Rings. But it's fantasy storytelling on a grand scale, and if that's what you're looking for, it more than delivers. Henry Cavill stars as Geralt of Rivia, a powerful monster hunter known as a "witcher." He's tasked with protecting Princess Ciri (Freya Allan), to whom he's bound by destiny. They go on a journey across the Continent, a magical world populated by elves, sorcerers, demons, and Nilfgaardians. That's a great fantasy location isn't it? NILFGAARD! 

His Dark Materials 

If you enjoy watching The Rings of Power as a family, make His Dark Materials your next binge. Based on a trilogy of classic coming-of-age fantasy novels by author Philip Pullman, the HBO series follows teenager Lyra Belacqua (Dafne Keen) and her daemon Pan — the out-of-body, physical manifestation of her soul in animal form — as they journey across parallel worlds as she searches for her kidnapped friend. It's a philosophical world populated by armored bears, kindly witches, evil authority figures, and a mysterious cosmic force known as Dust. It's more grounded than The Rings of Power, as some of it is set in a version of our world, but it's plenty transportive. 

The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance

Another family-friendly fantasy epic is The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance. The beautifully crafted series comes from The Jim Henson Company, and is made entirely of puppets. Puppets as far as the eye can see! A prequel to the 1982 film The Dark Crystal, the series tells the story of three elf-like humanoid Gelflings, Rian (voiced by Taron Egerton), Deet (voiced by Nathalie Emmanuel), and Brea (voiced by Anya Taylor-Joy), as they try to foment a rebellion against their evil rulers, the Skeksis, and try to save their planet Thra from a sinister force called the Darkening. In terms of looking incredible and like nothing else, it's the show most like The Rings of Power on this list. Unfortunately, not enough people watched it to justify how expensive it was to make, and Netflix canceled it after one season in 2019. But that one well-reviewed season is worth watching for fantasy fans. 

Shadow and Bone

This YA-ish fantasy series is based on the Russian history-inspired Grishaverse fantasy novels by author Leigh Bardugo, and tells the story of a young woman named Alina Starkov (Jessie Mei Li) who learns she is a Sun Summoner, a powerful Grisha (magic-user) with the ability to control light, a rare and extremely valuable skill. Her ability draws the attention of General Kirigan (Ben Barnes), who is battling an encroaching, world-swallowing darkness called the Fold that only she may be able to defeat — if she can survive the court politics and the darkness of Kirigan himself (he's a Shadow Summoner known as "the Darkling"). It's not as ambitious The Rings of Power or some of the other shows on this list, but it counts Stranger Things' Shawn Levy as an executive producer, and he knows how to make things look great and manage a large cast of young characters in a fantastical world.