‘Rings of Power’ Season 2, Episode 4 Explained: Who Is Tom Bombadil?

The fourth episode of Prime Video’s “Rings of Power” did something not even Peter Jackon’s “Lord of the Rings” movies could – bring Tom Bombadil (Rory Kinnear) to live action.

Tom Bombadil is one of the most powerful and mysterious characters Tolkien ever created in Middle-earth, but he was unfortunately cut from appearing in Jackson’s adaptations. We now got our first taste of him in “Rings of Power” Episode 4, and he’s every bit the enigmatic oddball that appeared in the books.

“Tom Bombadil is enigmatic, whimsical, eternal being, and he’s around during this story,” showrunner Patrick McKay told TheWrap. “The idea that our characters might stumble across him, hopefully in the most delightfully unexpected way, was always appealing to us.”

He continued, “I like to say that he’s sort of the most ‘Lord of the Rings’ thing in ‘Lord of the Rings.’”

The Stranger (Daniel Weyman) stumbles across Tom while looking for Nori (Markella Kavenagh) and Poppy (Megan Richards) after they were separated. The Stranger comes to find that Tom might have been the person he was searching for in Rhǔn to begin with – someone to help teach him to control his magic.

McKay and executive producer Lindsey Weber agreed that finding the right person was both hard — and easy, as it turned out, when Rory Kinnear came into play.

“You can’t reduce Tom to boxes,” Weber said. “There has to be that twinkle and that mystery. He’s the most enigmatic, the most wise, the most unusual. He’s singular. All the boxes have to be ticked, and how many people can do that?”

When Kinnear’s name was floated, it seemed like all those boxes got ticked at once.

“We had one conversation with him, he was in Cornwall directing an opera,” McKay said. “Tom Bombadil’s his wife’s favorite character, and he’s just a delight to work with. He’s funny but he has these dramatic chops, he sings – he sings a couple times – and really he’s sort of exactly what you want.”

There’s still a lot about Tom Bombadil that’s a mystery. We broke down everything we know about the character below.

What is Tom Bombadil?

What Tom Bombadil is isn’t a very cut and dry thing. He claims in the books to have been around before the Dark Lord arrived in Arda, which implies he may have been around before the Valar. It’s insinuated that Tom was the first living creature on Arda.

Many fans have come to assume that Tom is the God of Tolkien’s work. He certainly looks the part, and many of his abilities lend credence to the theory. It’s never stated though just what sort of magical creature Tom is or why he’s been around so long.

How old is Tom?

Like Tom says in Episode 4, he’s Eldest. He’s the oldest living thing in Middle-earth and all of Arda. He says a similar line in the novel “Fellowship of the Rings,” telling the hobbits, “Eldest, that’s what I am.”

Tom was likely the first living thing to inhabit the land. More quotes from the books have him claim he was “here before the river and the trees” and that he “remembers the first raindrop and the first acorn.”

Where is he from?

Tom is an enigma, so his true origins remain unknown. What we do know thanks to Episode 4 is that he spent time during the Second Age living in Rhǔn. He also lived much closer to the hobbits in the Third Age.

In “Fellowship of the Ring,” Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin come across Tom in the Old Forest to the east of The Shire. He wasn’t living alone at that point either. He had a wife named Goldberry living with him.

What are his powers?

Tom’s powers are seemingly limitless. There’s the obvious immortality, for one. He can also bend his surroundings to his will. One of his biggest strengths, though, lies in the affect – or how little affect, more like – the One Ring has on Tom. He’s able to completely reject the pull of the Ring and he does it without a second thought.

In the book, Tom asks Frodo to see the Ring after they meet and unlike his hesitance with anyone else who asks the hobbit, he hands it over easily. Tom plays with the Ring and even puts it on at one point. The Ring famously turns the wearer invisible, but when Tom wore it, nothing happened. He easily handed the Ring back to Frodo after possessing it, making him one of only three characters to ever do that.