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

I thought it was a pretty good start overall, and I really enjoyed it. Nothing will ever surpass the books of course, but I am pleased with the overall product they put out through three episodes.

Although it has lots of stuff I wouldn't necessarily do, that was always going to be the case and I've taken the position that I won't nitpick on individual events or characterization elements too much, and try to look at the the overall story on a season by season and entire series bases.

Definitely moved too fast in the first 2 episodes IMO - I had it mapped out as Episode 3 ending with Shadar Logoth escape. My hunch is that next episode or two we will get a ton of Logain introduction, see his capture, etc. and so they had to rush through the escape from two rivers stuff.

It certainly hurt the impact of some moments, such as shadar logoth not having quite the intensity I was hoping, Rand and Egwene's relationship, reactions to Moiraine at Taren Ferry, etc. didn't have much room to breathe given the pace. That said, I do think the trade off for what should be a very intriguing Logain story is a reasonable trade off.

Also, I wasn't too thrilled with Perrin killing his wife initially, but think it will make sense in the long run, his quiet brooding, his reaction to Faile, his extreme hesitency to take on a leadership role, etc.

Some characterizations that I could nitpick, but overall pretty minor. One thing I was disappointed in not seeing is Moiraine saying she would rather see them dead instead of in the Dark One's hands (or whatever that line is after Taren Ferry), which I think was an important moment in developing the early relationship between her and Rand.

I though episode 3 was great though, and they really seemed to find their footing with some time to develop the character relationships.

I've stopped watching youtube stuff and probably will probably post in here pretty sparingly for now - trying to just enjoy seeing a new version of Wheel of Time and not over-analyze too much yet.

Also, favorite parts were (1) Rand's reaction to the Darkfriend in episode 3 - really well done. The whole time I was a little weirded out at how nice this person was being and then the reveal of the darkfriend made so much sense. (2) Moiraine's Manetheren story, was really hoping to see that and it delivered.

There is no evidence to support that on screen yet.

And that would be very on brand for WoT for the AS to inflect that view point ie toxic masculinity, on the viewer, while showing their own toxicity etc.

Just to touch on this, his hesitancy yo embrace the wolf dream later in the series is that he loses himself in the dream and in battle. We saw when he killed his wife that he had just gone into a blood rage, so I think it does tie into the wolf dream as well as his character elements I mentioned in my prior post

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No Nyn braid tugging. Nuked the Egwene/Rand brother sister relationship.

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It’s probably said a dozen times that egwene was all but promised to rand in EotW. The brother/sister vibe does not come until later. Rand very clearly is romantically interested in her in the first book.

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it's why I've said, for months now, I view this as a new turning of the wheel. It's not an adaptation of the books to me; it's an adaptation of the NEXT time these people are living this story.

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I think this is the appropriate perspective to have. There are going to be changes.

I hate the line about the dragon being reborn a woman and diversity casting decisions for the sake of diversity, but I can understand why the other changes were made.

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Perrin’s wife is the change I like the least, but it makes sense within the context of his relationship with Faile.

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After seeing Sanderson's comments on episode 1, I'm better with the change. Perrin needed something to connect to the audience early before we get to the wolf stuff.

Though I agree with Sanderson that instead of the wife they should have used someone else like Master Luhan.

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Moiraine could simply be mistaken and not understand the prophecies, and there is some chatter of that from people that have seen the first 6 episodes

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RE: my post above and the Sanderson Q&A, this is exactly what he said. The Aes Sedai in the show just don’t understand the prophecies correctly. “They have their lore wrong” … in universe. That’s it.

People getting up in arms about an immaterial change that is clearly there to help get non book reading audiences engaged.

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The Aes Sedai in the show just don’t understand the prophecies correctly. “They have their lore wrong” … in universe. That’s it.

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The division between saidin and saidar is crucial to the story. Without the taint on saidin the Red Ajah have no reason for existing. The patch on the Dark One's prison is failing because it was made with only saidin. It's not just misunderstanding prophecy, in this scenario they're completely ignorant of their own history.

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which again, is almost completely immaterial for the story....but, do you boss..

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It's hard to believe that you've even read the books if you think the entire backstory is immaterial.