Yes, The Stranger in 'The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power' Is Exactly Who You Think He Is

Grand + elf = Gandalf?

After two seasons, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power confirmed a major fan theory. Guess what? A wizard and a halfling going on an adventure felt familiar for a reason. Not only is it the same story as The Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring, but it is the same wizard. We now know with 100 percent certainty that the Stranger in The Rings of Power is Gandalf, played by Daniel Weyman.

"That's what they're going to call me," Gandalf realizes in one of season 2's final scenes, "isn't it?" The young-ish Gandalf phrases it that way because, similar to Sauron, he'll answer to more than one moniker. In The Two Towers, he says this to Faramir: "Many are my names in many countries. Mithrandir among the Elves, Tharkûn to the Dwarves, Olórin I was in my youth in the West that is forgotten, in the South Incánus, in the North Gandalf; to the East I go not."

Since he's in the East now on The Rings of Power, it will be interesting to see what happens to make him vehemently claim he won't be returning in The Two Towers. It will also be interesting to see if we will hear any of those other names on the series. We now know why Gandalf loves hobbits so much. So what's next?

For now, at least, we can rest easy knowing that Weyman is playing the wise wizard from Tolkien's books made famous by Ian McKellen in Peter Jackson's trilogy.

In the finale, the Stoors jovially call the Stranger "Grand elf" as they depart on their journey with Nori and Poppy. It's a little inside joke to them, because when Nori described her tall traveling companion they assumed he was an elf, but even taller (aka grand). That seemed to trigger a tiny pang of recognition; The name didn't fully click into place until a little later. Back at Tom Bombadil's house, the merry fellow compares finding a name to finding a walking stick, also known as a staff or "gand". (Earlier in season 2, Nori referred to the staff the Stranger saw in his dreams as a gand, too.) Put them together, and you get Gandalf. He found his staff in the ruins of the Stoor community BTW, which I thought was a nice detail.

In Old Norse, a real language, "Gandalf" translates to staff elf. When Tolkien was writing The Hobbit, he took the name Gandalf from an Old Norse poem called the Völuspá.

Okay, but what about the other wizard?

The resolution of one mystery leads to another. Before making this self-discovery, Gandalf rejects an offer to hang with the Dark Wizard, played by Ciarán Hinds. That slightly sinister character also mentions there are five Istari, or wizards, in Middle-earth. Tolkien readers may already know that. Gandalf the Grey is now spoken for, but there's also Saruman the White, Radagast the Brown, and two unnamed Blue Wizards. So which one is he? There aren't many options.

Is the Dark Wizard one of the Blue Wizards? That's possible, especially since we don't know much about them. He's probably not Radagast. If you've read the books or seen The Hobbit movies, you know that guy is considerably kookier than Hinds' character.

Is he actually Saruman? That's the most likely theory. He has a staff that looks like Saruman's and a beard that looks like Saruman's. He seems pretty insistent that a walk and talk with Gandalf will solve everything, and Saruman does love to walk and talk. Unless he's a Blue Wizard and we learn that Saruman stole his look, I'm gonna assume that he's Saruman. The problem is this is uncharacteristically villainous behavior for Saruman this early in the history of Middle-earth. He's a good guy at the beginning of The Fellowship of the Rings and then turns evil later on. Is he in his Saruman the Morally Grey phase? What is going on?! Hopefully they don't take two more seasons to reveal this one.