Aren’t there some accompanying vignettes that cover some of this stuff? I haven’t watched them myself but I gather from the online discourse that at least some viewers are engaging with them.
Just started the second season...
While so many of the details are changed, these episodes feel like they have much more of the spirit of the books.
Agree wholeheartedly. While S1 still felt "good enough" to feel like the WoT world to me, S2 is swimming in it. The right mix of Rand starting to get into his own head, Perrin being confused and conflicted about where he's headed, and tower intrigue (with a dose of Mat).
And my god, ep3... I felt that more than I ever did reading it in the book. The actors are really nailing it, and in the end that's what's going to make or break this thing.
I'm feeling really hopeful as long as they can keep this up; sure tons of stuff is getting moved around, but it's all in service to the overarching themes, and I feel like they're weaving them (hah) well.
An interesting thing that made a bunch of the changes click for me is that seeing it on screen makes both the Seanchean and Forsaken feel more like "point-of-view" characters, even though they're ostensibly showing the same kinds of stuff that happened in the books from the character PoV. It takes away a little of the sense of confusion you empathetically feel along with the characters, but it gives you more of a narrative to follow as a watcher to keep track of all the disparate parts.
Also I really liked the way the "trust" dialog played out between Verin and Moiraine, it's a delicious bit of foreshadowing.
Verin = GOAT Aes Sedai
They seem to be humanizing Liandrin quite a bit.
Needs more Suian Sanche 
I may as well be a non book reading viewer. I hardly remember any of this.
The moment to moment interaction between a lot of the characters is really good.
Rand and Logaine, Moirane and Verin, Elyas and Perrin, the leader of those chasing after Paidan with Perrin and Loial, even Liandrin and Matt or Nynaeve
I really should know that guys name. He is crushing it! (Ingtar)
episode 4 spoilers:
Are they already revealing Liandrin to be black ajah? That seems way early and I thought that didn't happen until after Suiane Sanche is deposed?
Also Lanfear the most powerful/dangerous forsaken... um?
edit: I guess she is but I didn't get that from her from the books. She was just in it for herself and schemed for the long game no matter who won.
Powerful episode though.
Liandrin lied to Mat in episode two about the contents of Perrin's letter, so they had already been hinting at it strongly.
Ishy is strongest, but Lanfear is up there in power and cunning.
Yeah, so far this feels wayyy better than the first season. I'm not a huge fan of all the "Moiraine got stilled" drama but getting everyone out into the world and away from the cringey contrived love triangle is the best thing they could have done to salvage the muddled mess at the end of S1.
While most of the adaptation-related decisions in S1 felt poorly conceived and sometimes not even in the spirit of the source material (no pun intended)...
...I think the treatment of Selene is really smart and feels much more believable than Rand accidentally warping himself into the multiverse and conveniently encountering a beautiful stranger who throws herself at him, and it never occuring to him that she might not be trustworthy. Also, the way Elyas is folded into the Great Hunt storyline feels natural and efficient.
Bummer about Uno, though. I do wish they'd stop killing off the coolest Sheinarans.
Episode 4 ended with a bang, but it was more than a bit of a slog to get there. The Wonder Girls, Moraine, and especially Lan / Alanna / Alanna's Himbos plots seemed to meander about doing a lot of nothing, with only the former two finally getting to a point eventually. I suppose you could say that giving us a slog where nothing really happens for extended periods is only being true to the books, ha ha.
On the other hand, the Perrin / Elyas and Rand / Selene stuff was pitch perfect.
I've watched the first three episodes of Season 2 and am enjoying it well enough. I don't have as strong a negative reaction as I did to the pilot last season.
I think they did some smart character-merging (Hurin and Elyas, Verin and Vandene) to slim down the cast and storylines. Moving the Seanchan earlier too seems like a fine idea.
I don't like what's going on with Rand. Unless I'm mistaken, he seems to have assaulted a guy in order to take his job. That's not what Rand would do.
He crippled a bully.
Still not very Rand-like.
I think they're trying to accelerate the "Rand is feeling out of control" timeline a bit with some desperation, but yeah I can see that.
I don't like what's going on with Rand. Unless I'm mistaken, he seems to have assaulted a guy in order to take his job. That's not what Rand would do.
In Book 3, after a rematch with Ba'alzamon but before fully embracing being the Dragon Reborn and declaring himself, book!Rand goes a little off the deep end, peaces out from his friends and Moraine, and goes on a little journey of self-discovery / existential despair, and the show very much seems to be skipping ahead to that version of Rand. During that journey, he meets up with a group of strangers on the road:
A merchant, she seemed to him; he had seen her sort among those who came to buy tabac and wool in the Two Rivers. A merchant and her guards.
I have to be careful, he thought as he stood. No mistakes.
“You have chosen a good campsite, young man,” she said. “I have often used it on my way to Remen. There is a small spring nearby. I trust you have no objection to my sharing it?” Her guards were already dismounting, hitching at their sword belts and loosening saddle girths.
“None,” Rand told her. Careful. Two steps brought him close enough, and he leaped into the air, spinning - Thistledown Floats on the Whirlwind - heron-mark blade carved from fire coming into his hands to take her head off before surprise could even form on her face. She was the most dangerous.
He alighted as the woman’s head rolled from the crupper of her horse. The guards yelled and clawed for their swords, screamed as they realized his blade burned. He danced among them in the forms Lan had taught him, and knew he could have killed all ten with ordinary steel, but the blade he wielded was part of him. The last man fell, and it had been so like practicing the forms that he had already begun the sheathing called Folding the Fan before he remembered he wore no scabbard and this blade would have turned it to ash at a touch if he had.
Letting the sword vanish, he turned to examine the horses. Most had run away, but some not far, and the woman’s tall gelding stood with rolling eyes, whickering uneasily. Her headless corpse, lying on the ground, had maintained its grip on the reins, and held the animal’s head down.
Rand pulled them free, pausing only to gather his few belongings before swinging into the saddle. I have to be careful, he thought as he looked over the dead. No mistakes.
The Power still filled him, the flow from saidin sweeter than honey, ranker than rotted meat. Abruptly he channeled - not really understanding what it was he did, or how, only that it seemed right; and it worked, lifting the corpses. He set them in a line, facing him, kneeling, faces in the dirt. For those who had faces left.
Kneeling to him.
“If I am the Dragon Reborn,” he told them, “that is the way it is supposed to be, isn’t it?” Letting go of saidin was hard, but he did it. If I hold it too much, how will I keep the madness away? He laughed bitterly. Or is it too late for that?
So tell me again about what Rand will and won't do? (-:
Math wrote:I don't like what's going on with Rand. Unless I'm mistaken, he seems to have assaulted a guy in order to take his job. That's not what Rand would do.
In Book 3, after a rematch with Ba'alzamon but before fully embracing being the Dragon Reborn and declaring himself, book!Rand goes a little off the deep end, peaces out from his friends and Moraine, and goes on a little journey of self-discovery / existential despair, and the show very much seems to be skipping ahead to that version of Rand. During that journey, he meets up with a group of strangers on the road:
The Wheel of Time Book 3: The Dragon Reborn wrote:Spoiler:A merchant, she seemed to him; he had seen her sort among those who came to buy tabac and wool in the Two Rivers. A merchant and her guards.
I have to be careful, he thought as he stood. No mistakes.
“You have chosen a good campsite, young man,” she said. “I have often used it on my way to Remen. There is a small spring nearby. I trust you have no objection to my sharing it?” Her guards were already dismounting, hitching at their sword belts and loosening saddle girths.
“None,” Rand told her. Careful. Two steps brought him close enough, and he leaped into the air, spinning - Thistledown Floats on the Whirlwind - heron-mark blade carved from fire coming into his hands to take her head off before surprise could even form on her face. She was the most dangerous.
He alighted as the woman’s head rolled from the crupper of her horse. The guards yelled and clawed for their swords, screamed as they realized his blade burned. He danced among them in the forms Lan had taught him, and knew he could have killed all ten with ordinary steel, but the blade he wielded was part of him. The last man fell, and it had been so like practicing the forms that he had already begun the sheathing called Folding the Fan before he remembered he wore no scabbard and this blade would have turned it to ash at a touch if he had.
Letting the sword vanish, he turned to examine the horses. Most had run away, but some not far, and the woman’s tall gelding stood with rolling eyes, whickering uneasily. Her headless corpse, lying on the ground, had maintained its grip on the reins, and held the animal’s head down.
Rand pulled them free, pausing only to gather his few belongings before swinging into the saddle. I have to be careful, he thought as he looked over the dead. No mistakes.
The Power still filled him, the flow from saidin sweeter than honey, ranker than rotted meat. Abruptly he channeled - not really understanding what it was he did, or how, only that it seemed right; and it worked, lifting the corpses. He set them in a line, facing him, kneeling, faces in the dirt. For those who had faces left.
Kneeling to him.
“If I am the Dragon Reborn,” he told them, “that is the way it is supposed to be, isn’t it?” Letting go of saidin was hard, but he did it. If I hold it too much, how will I keep the madness away? He laughed bitterly. Or is it too late for that?
So tell me again about what Rand will and won't do? (-:
I've always read that as the Merchant and guards were darkfriends. Rand & co are jumped by random darkfriends often enough that I think it's a perfectly reasonable interpretation.
I am excited. I think they teased Aviendha in the trailer for tomorrow's episode.
I've always read that as the Merchant and guards were darkfriends. Rand & co are jumped by random darkfriends often enough that I think it's a perfectly reasonable interpretation.
It's entirely possible that they were, but I don't know that the leap straight from "strangers on the road, better be careful" to "slaughter them all and then do a funny impromptu puppet show with their corpses" is quite justified. I think we are meant to read it that the paranoia and madness is getting to him.
And while we seldom see him quite that bloodthirsty until much later, he is capable of being quite ruthless if he thinks it's necessary. Nothing that I saw him do in the show feels out of character to me.
One thing the show is doing better than the books is that darkfriends are not an after thought. Darkfriends seemed like menacing gosips IIRC in the books. In the show they have a lot more agency. (the innkeeper in the first season for example)
Rand and Selene in the show is so much better than what was in the books. Also, I thought it was ridiculous that he went off by himself at the end of season one because he surely wouldn’t last on his own so early in the journey. Well apparently he had someone to take him under her wing :). Logan is a lot of fun too, the whole Cairhein storyline clocks for me.
Oh and then there is that...
I thought it was pronounced "car hane"
But everyone in the show pronounces it "cah ree ehn"?
Oh and then there is that...
I thought it was pronounced "car hane"
But everyone in the show pronounces it "cah ree ehn"?
Huh. I always pronounced it “care heen.”
fangblackbone wrote:Oh and then there is that...
I thought it was pronounced "car hane"
But everyone in the show pronounces it "cah ree ehn"?Huh. I always pronounced it “care heen.”
“ care hine” for me.
It's always bee Cah Ree Ehn, but to know this you had to look in the glossary. It's definitely not an intuitive spelling.
Rand always championed the downtrodden, so when the asylum worker bullied the old sword master, he squarely put himself on the wrong side of Rand's sense of justice.
Then when Rand confronted/attacked the bully, he lost control, likely from some combination of not knowing how to control his powers, or a whee bit of early onset madness, or even;
the influence of Lanfear's compulsion.
The scene between Rand and the sword master was really touching I thought.
Rand always championed the downtrodden, so when the asylum worker bullied the old sword master, he squarely put himself on the wrong side of Rand's sense of justice.
Then when Rand confronted/attacked the bully, he lost control, likely from some combination of not knowing how to control his powers, or a whee bit of early onset madness, or even;
Spoiler:the influence of Lanfear's compulsion.
I viewed it as a preview of what Logain told him, that trying to hold it in only makes it spill out uncontrollably. He didn't even want to use the Power during his attack, just his fists, but it burst out of him like it did when he set the inn on fire.
I wasn't as down on S1 as some were, but I do agree that they're doing a much better job of things in S2 so far.
Regarding Lanfear, the books ranked her ability as being the strongest a female channeler can possibly be. She was still weaker than all of the male Foresaken in terms of raw power, but that was due to how Jordan defined the differences between male and female channelers. Men had more raw strength, women had more control over their weaves, so in the end male and female channelers were roughly equal in terms of what they could do with the power. With that taken into account, plus her mastery of dreamwalking, she was always considered to be one of the most powerful and dangerous Forsaken, second only to Ishamael.
She was still weaker than all of the male Foresaken in terms of raw power, but that was due to how Jordan defined the differences between male and female channelers. Men had more raw strength, women had more control over their weaves, so in the end male and female channelers were roughly equal in terms of what they could do with the power.
I don't recall it ever being said that women had "more control over their weaves." The big advantage that women had was that men could not form a link without a woman, and any thirteen linked women (the most that could be linked without at least one man to extend it) could overpower any single man who had ever lived (and most male channelers required fewer than that). That's how the Aes Sedai are able to relatively easily overpower and gentle false Dragons, despite the fact that the average false Dragon is going to be head and shoulders stronger than the average individual Aes Sedai.
I don't known if it was ever explicitly stated in the books (but it tracks with how male and female channelers described how they channeled their side of the One Power), but it was stated that way in the Wheel of Time Companion, which was written by Jordan's wife and based on the notes he kept. Your average man could hold more raw power, but your average woman was more deft with her weaves, so they were roughly equal in terms of what they could do with the force except for things where only raw power was needed.
Speaking as a relative lay person, this season is night and day better than the previous season, I'll give it that.
They are doing a very impressive job for me compressing everything down to the critical storybeats, and aren't afraid to leave some of the main characters either not in episodes at all, or only having a very brief cameo. I think they are handling it really well.
Episode 5 has me completely bought into TV Randland.
Ishy and Lanfear in Tel'aran'rhiod.
Aviendha's casting.
The hunt for Black Ajah.
The collar.
I have toh, Rafe. (or whomever is responsible for this massive leap in quality.)
Aviendha ftw!!!!!!!!
heart emoji (x100)
Also have to say it was a gut punch the way it ended. (in the vein of aw they're gonna end it there?) But what a set piece!!!!
I cannot remember jack shit from the books but Dain was way cool too. I am frequently jumping to wikis "who is that guy again? Oh yeah right."
Having finished S2E4 I think I'm enjoying this season more because the changes they've made now seem to be in service of telling the story in a different medium (condensing plotlines, combining characters, etc) rather than in the service of making WoT into Gritty'n'Sexy Fantasy Television.
Also in a couple instances I think the show does a better job than the books.
Rand and Selene being one. (Though I'm unsure about Lanfear being some sorta undead?) How Liandrin tricked Nynaeve et al into leaving the tower being the other. In both cases the books made the protagonists look pretty credulous.
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