“He’s a dark character, but he doesn’t see himself as a villain,” new actor Sam Hazeldine tells “Entertainment Weekly.”

In season 2 of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, the orcs of Mordor have a new face.

One of the interesting surprises from the first season of Amazon Prime Video’s massive fantasy series was that the orcs in the Southlands of Middle-earth did not recognize the dark lord Sauron, the ultimate villain of J.R.R. Tolkien’s epic fantasy novels, as their leader. Instead, they follow a fallen elf named Adar, who wants to protect the orcs from both Sauron and the elves. So far, Adar has a pretty good track record. He led his orc armies in a big battle against both elves and Numenoreans, and successfully transformed the Southlands into the dark land known as Mordor.

But there are changes in store. For one thing, the man in the makeup has changed, with Sam Hazeldine taking over the role of Adar from Joseph Mawle (who played the character in season 1). For another, viewers know something Adar doesn’t: Sauron is very much still alive.

“For me, the appeal was that he’s a dark character, but he doesn’t see himself as a villain. He’s just trying to protect his children, the Uruk,” Hazeldine tells Entertainment Weekly in his first official interview about the show since taking on the role. “So he’s doing what he feels he has to do to save them from the genocide, whether that would be from Sauron, who sees them as cannon fodder, or from the elves.”

Hazeldine continues, “at the beginning of the season, Adar is kind of in an existential crisis because he doesn’t really know what to do next. Sure, they’re going to have to deal with various attacks, but he’s finished what he set out to do. He took on the responsibility of caring for these children of his and finding them a home, and now he’s done that. This sets up his call to adventure in season 2.”

Sam Hazeldine.Ross Ferguson / Prime Video

Hazeldine actually knew Mawle before The Rings of Power, which helped with the behind-the-scenes transition.

“I know Joseph, I worked with him years ago. I think he’s a fantastic actor, and I really loved what he did in the first season,” Hazeldine says. “So it was actually a pleasure to take the baton from him. Obviously we don’t look the same, but the character is instantly recognizable.”

That familiarity is thanks to the tireless work of the makeup and prosthetics artists on The Rings of Power. When Hazeldine began working on The Rings of Power, it took seven hours to apply all the makeup needed to transform him into the orc leader. But they eventually got that timing down to five. It helps that he’s far from the only one on set who looks like that.

“There were like 200 orcs in the room there, and they were all kind of grunting,” Hazeldine recalls of his first day on set. “It’s quite unnerving to see that many all in one place, it’s quite intimidating. It was helpful to remind myself that I’m not insane, and they are just people.”

Sam Hazeldine as Adar, an orc.Ross Ferguson / Prime Video

But the hardest thing, Hazeldine says, was not the prosthetics or getting used to the sight of orcs all around him. It was learning to speak the ugliest of Tolkien’s languages.

“The hardest thing was I had to go straight into speaking Black Speech on day one,” the actor says. “It is hard on your throat, and it is hard to remember because it doesn’t really follow the elvish languages, which have roots in real languages like Welsh and Finnish. But he just didn’t write that many words in Black Speech.”

But Hazeldine took the challenge as an opportunity, and actually had the show’s Tolkien lore experts rewrite some of his lines from English into Black Speech, in order to give Adar the proper gravitas.

In addition to showing what’s next for Adar and the orcs of Mordor, season 2 will also show viewers where they came from — as in, how did he go from being an elf to an orc? Viewers will also see how previous confrontations between Adar and Sauron unfolded.

Sam Hazeldine.Charlie Gray / Prime Video

“There was an offer for power and for something else, which you’ll find out later on in the show, and Adar willingly took the deal,” Hazeldine says of Adar’s origin. “It’s kind of like he took a red pill and was duped. He was horrifically tortured and maimed.”

But before we learn about that, Hazeldine teases, “season 2 starts with a bang, and I was even surprised at how kind of bloodthirsty and violent it is.” Get ready for that when The Rings of Power season 2 premieres Aug. 29 on Prime Video.