re: The Wheel of Time -- Season 2 coming in September -- Wise Ones Thread (Book Spoilers)

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Glad you were able to pick up such a flooding of details alluding to this.

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The key is to having read the books a few times....or maybe more than ten....

Not that I've read the series more than ten times.

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His style and R Jordan’s style are noticeably different to me. I feel Sanderson is better at crafting a story, but lacks on character development. Inversely, Jordan seemed to get lost in his story sometimes, especially as his health wained, but he was a master at character development. And, imo, that is why The Wheel of Time is so beloved. The novels aren’t perfect, but I came to know and love the characters.

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Nailed it. Sanderson tells the story in an interesting and engaging way, but his character dialogue and inner monologue is very flat and standard. You are spot on about Jordan. He's a master at writing these characters and making them jump off the pages, but his actual telling of the story often does not translate well from head to page. He even admits to this in an interview they included at the end of the audiobook of his final novel.

I, personally, thought The Eye of the World was very well written, though it follows more traditional LOTR tropes than later books, that is, right up until the finale. The action and pacing were fine and had me glued to the final page.

It was later, thinking about and rereading the last few chapters that I became puzzled. And after 4 full series reads and numerous times listening to the audio books, the thing I still don’t understand is the point of the Eye of the World, the physical pool of pure Saidin.

Maybe it is explained in some of the companion material. I haven’t read much of that. But by the time the band reaches the Eye, we know Rand is the Dragon. It is explained that men and women worked together to make it pure, free of the taint, for the greatest need in the world.

But what was the point? Was it like a super power-up. You have now reached full Dragon power. And yes, Rand used it to burn Ishmael and defeat the Trolloc horde in Tarwins Gap, and it was an exciting end to book one. Rand was the Dragon, so he was able to channel all that immense power. But did he use it up or did it become a part of who he was?

Something I still think and wonder about after all these years.

It certainly didn't resolve any conflict that had been created during the course of the first book, at least not overtly. Very little later in the series directly clarify the significance.

On many rereads, and possibly with the influence of the internet, I came to see the Eye as a taint–free reservoir of power that allowed Rand to enormously level jump without going insane.

A cheat code left by the last remnants of the age of Legends

ETA: and give him the Horn, and fulfil prophecy

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The only solution is to stop watching. As long as people keep giving ratings to bad shows that intentionally mishandle source material then these shithead producers will continue to do so. Watching in the hopes that it one day gets better is not the correct path. At some point fans need to start outright rejecting disrespectful treatment of our stories, characters and worlds.

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Thats what I did with Foundation on Apple +. Thats tough to do though. But Foundation was like WoT in that it was so far off that it didnt even feel like it was based on the source material AT ALL. I will probably give S2 of WoT a shot just to see how they can even attempt to rebound back to the source material, although I think they are too far gone. I should be a number of books in by then and have a better grasp on the story. But I wont have a problem stopping a few episodes in.

I cant really think of any other shows I just stopped mid watch because it booted up the source material. There are a number I didnt start because I knew it was going to be bad.

It may not be enough to save it overall, but hard to see how season 2 of WoT is not a massive improvement over season 1.

In general, shows improve from 1-2 the vast majority of the time, and isn't this Rafe's first real shot at actual showrunning? There should be improvement on these fronts without taking into account anything else.

But then you have the facts that season 1 dealt with 2 covid shutdowns that disrupted everything and also limited set stuff such as the Tarwin's Gap battle, plus the Barney Harris going AWOL which caused massive rewrites and necessary reshoots for 7 & 8. Season 2 filming has been going along smoothly and is almost finished, so the chance for the show to really make a leap is at least more than just wishful thinking.

I'll be watching all of season 2 at which point I think it will be clear where this show will end up and whether its worth following to the bitter end.

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It may not be enough to save it overall, but hard to see how season 2 of WoT is not a massive improvement over season 1.

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It very well could be and I hope it does. It's safe to say the bar is pretty low. But as far as being true to the source material/doing the authors story justice, its only going to get worse.

When you've already branched off this far through ust one season, it tells me they aren't really all that worried about following the books even semi close. Much less getting back on track.

I can see how someone can enjoy the show. Its a halfway decent fantasy series on it own. I'm not going to hate on someone liking it (unless they were saying it was a good adaptation). I cant however see how a book reader/big fan of Jordan could watch that and remotely think "O wow they did a really good job with this."

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But then you have the facts that season 1 dealt with 2 covid shutdowns that disrupted everything and also limited set stuff such as the Tarwin's Gap battle, plus the Barney Harris going AWOL which caused massive rewrites and necessary reshoots for 7 & 8. Season 2 filming has been going along smoothly and is almost finished, so the chance for the show to really make a leap is at least more than just wishful thinking.

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I didnt know about all of the difficulties in filming. I knew of some. So Harris went AWOL during season 1?

I dont know if filming issues can nullify writing issues though. The guys seem to like their own story better, that's why I dont think it will change.

I'm not some die hard Jordan defender, I might be by the time im done with the books. Hell I dont know if I even like the books yet though But im basing my thoughts mostly on quality of adaptation/writing. It just wasnt a good job at all. I think the show gets too much hate as far as quality of production and acting though. It certainly didnt feel like a CW show like so many liked to say.

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You are spot on about Jordan. He's a master at writing these characters and making them jump off the pages

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I agree. You can think about a WoT book character and they are associated with some characteristic.

The only problem Jordan had with characters was in dealing with male/female attraction/relationships. Every relationship began (and often continued onward) as if both parties had the emotional maturity of 13yr olds.

It was a weird ending that initially left me unsatisfied, but someone somewhere on the net said that after the body swap at the end of the age, the dragon could "see the matrix". Somehow that made sense of it for me