tv show spoilers S1E6: The Flame of Tar Valon

[Ralph]

16 minutes ago, FanofKnotai said:

Ok. But I don’t think he says anything about hers either. The only main character lesbian is Elaida. And she’s not a man hater. She’s a people hater. She treats everybody like crap. ?

Does very much about Galina

[Scarloc99]

54 minutes ago, jh557 said:

So they were able to confuse the whole world on the prison not being Shayol Ghul? Because it was common knowledge and there was a catechism in the books about it. 

 

The Dark One and all the Forsaken are bound in Shayol Ghul, bound by the Creator in the moment of creation. The hand of the Creator shelters us all, and the Light protects us from the Shadow.

 

If this is how you feel and its helps justify it for you, I'm good with that. You could be right. I just think it was a possible miss by the writers or attempt at misdirection that have rubbed people like myself the wrong way   

Someone has been taking to Siuan in her dreams giving her false information leading her on a false path in order to get them to bring the DR to the dark one early. 
 

2 episodes we foreshadowed Alanna and Rands bond risking everything at the last battle, now we foreshadow the great generals being Mis directed leading to Matt taking over the whole army at the last battle. 
 

Rafe is subtly putting in things that can be fed through the show leading to the big moments in the last battle. This is one of them, a misdirection about the eye of the world. 

[Scarloc99]

58 minutes ago, jh557 said:

So they were able to confuse the whole world on the prison not being Shayol Ghul? Because it was common knowledge and there was a catechism in the books about it. 

 

The Dark One and all the Forsaken are bound in Shayol Ghul, bound by the Creator in the moment of creation. The hand of the Creator shelters us all, and the Light protects us from the Shadow.

 

If this is how you feel and its helps justify it for you, I'm good with that. You could be right. I just think it was a possible miss by the writers or attempt at misdirection that have rubbed people like myself the wrong way   

Also regarding the BA as soon as I learnt about them existing in the books I debated with my friends why they didn’t just confuse all the prophesies and make sure no one knew anything about what was going on. 

[ilovezam]

3 hours ago, Windigo said:

LoTR movies were quite different from the books in many ways.   
From changing ages, Frodo from being in his 50's for most of the books,  to being much younger, Sam from an employee to a friend!  Many other changes to personalities, cutting and changing many of the story arcs, adding new ones, I think that so many have not read the Tolkien books ( or even ASoiaF) as often as they have series like WoT, so did not notice how many changed there were. 
I am an big re-reader, but while I re-read WoT, along with other series I enjoy every year, I only re-read ASoiaF before a new book came out, and Tolkien a dozen or so times. 

LoTR changes:  https://www.theonering.com/complete-list-of-film-changes/the-fellowship-of-the-ring/   

I think a key difference is that

 

1. If you were to summarize the Fellowship of the Ring movie it would be very similar to a slightly abridged version of a summary of the book, even if there are differences.

2. Book fans can easily understand the purpose of the more major changes like cutting out Tom Bombadil, even if they might have still wanted to see him on screen.

 

I am not sure the same can be said for the WoT show. Loosely speaking, about half the episodes we got so far follow mostly new plotlines. This doesn't mean they are bad (Ep4 was amazing!), but Rafe is obviously taking a lot of liberty with the book lore/plot at this point, and when these new storylines take precedence over the development of core characters it rubs the wrong way. When they don't work, they really don't work.

 

Example: By inserting esoteric real-world funeral rites for the Warders (wailing, shirt rending), it led to a perception that Lan was mischaracterized. Why was this necessary? Is there not enough world-building from the original franchise that we needed to have these additional elements? 

[melsnitker]

3 hours ago, Agitel said:

The first oath doesn't mean an Aes Sedai will keep her oath. It just requires that the Aes Sedai truly mean the oath at the time she makes it. She can't intend at that time to be duplicitous. But she can later have a change of heart and renege.

 

I believe this is displayed in the Beonin storyline. She swears to Egwene, then once Egwene is captured decides the oath doesn't hold because Egwene is not Amyrlin anymore.

Edited December 13, 2021 by melsnitker
Misspelling

[Windigo]

23 minutes ago, ilovezam said:

I think a key difference is that

 

1. If you were to summarize the Fellowship of the Ring movie it would be very similar to a slightly abridged version of a summary of the book, even if there are differences.

2. Book fans can easily understand the purpose of the more major changes like cutting out Tom Bombadil, even if they might have still wanted to see him on screen.

 

I am not sure the same can be said for the WoT show. Loosely speaking, about half the episodes we got so far follow mostly new plotlines. This doesn't mean they are bad (Ep4 was amazing!), but Rafe is obviously taking a lot of liberty with the book lore/plot at this point, and when these new storylines take precedence over the development of core characters it rubs the wrong way. When they don't work, they really don't work.

 

Example: By inserting esoteric real-world funeral rites for the Warders (wailing, shirt rending), it led to a perception that Lan was mischaracterized. Why was this necessary? Is there not enough world-building from the original franchise that we needed to have these additional elements? 

I agree that while I am enjoying the show, they are making major changes that have no relation to the books, other than gimmicks to push a characters motivations or arc (fridging Perrins wife). 

To me the LoTr movies were a far cry from the books the entire Frodo Sam friendship is  a major change in the characters and the story it tells,  and many of the characters have some major changes to who they are. 

WoT for most of them I feel the characters are true to the books, (though as they are in later books after growth)  while they have made major additions and story plots that while most feel WoT they are not needed (Egwene river scene, funeral scenes) or overdone like the bad ass pyro channeling Nynaeve. 

[JaimAybara]

5 hours ago, TheChief said:

So my point was that people seem to be really torn apart by a work of fiction being changed for tv. That seems odd to me- not “who I am”, if you will, and difficult to relate to.

Oh I see what you’re saying  now, yeah, I get changes for tv due to time. Some have already mentioned the cut of Bombadil as an example for LotR etc. a lot of that made sense to me, but there are cuts they’ve made and bizarre injections into character development for multiple characters I still can’t get behind in WoT. I’m trying to, but it’s so frustrating. So now the lore is different to accommodate and extend the mystery element they’ve created, nevertheless, in doing so it’s cutting a ton from one character in particular and so they are really shortchanged so far, and the other two male leads have borderline character assassination in their set up for no reason other than to do what showrunners think “makes it edgy.” I mean, the ladies for the most part have been faithful renditions in my eyes, with a few changes that only elevate their character even more (sometimes at the expense of the men) but all the guys have been given glaringly abysmal additions or have plot points entirely removed. 
 

I feel if the situation were reversed and all the men were done faithfully with beneficial additions and they randomly injected major character flaws into the female leads and cut their plot points making them useless, we would have an equally large backlash, but people would actually acknowledge it as a serious issue and potentially call the showrunners sexist as well. Imagine telling those fans “it’s a new turning”. But because it happened to the guys it’s okay.

9 minutes ago, Windigo said:

 while they have made major additions and story plots that while most feel WoT they are not needed (Egwene river scene, funeral scenes) or overdone like the bad ass pyro channeling Nynaeve. 

This is what I think the show runners consider positive additions, but this paired with the truly horrible additions to the men just leaves a bitter taste in my mouth, and it really bothers me. They will not only go out of their way to elevate female members, they go out of their way to diminish male members at the exact same time. And it isn’t even just the male leads it’s many of the secondary roles too. 

[Tom alapostropheThor]

Sorry if someone's already mentioned this, but the White Tower looks at two such powerful channelers as Nynaeve and Egwene and they're like, "Totally dudes. Take off to parts unknown for no good reason. Have fun." 

 

They'd be in novice white so fast it'd make their heads spin. 

 

This series cares exactly zero for established lore. The writers wanted to tell their own story but also capitalize on someone else's success. They must get their moral compass from Jeff Bezos.

[WhiskeyJim]

On 12/10/2021 at 12:23 AM, jh557 said:

I just want to say that I am throwing out these thoughts not in "hating" on the show. I have liked the show, but I have not loved it so far. It is still early and I will continue to watch.  

I'm with you. They have 14 books and they must cut. But then they are adding their own content when they could have just sequenced part of the books differently and gave us more world and character building at the same time. I believe making DR a mystery for so long has been for a purpose I will explain below. We spent half of 8 episodes exploring the warder bond when a well illustrated scene would have done it. But that is on purpose as well.

 

You see, there's a reason Moiraine and Lan dominate the whole first season.  They only have 5 seasons at the most. They will need to cut 4 or 5, maybe 6 books to get this story done. There is no way around it.

 

If I had to predict how the series will develop, they are heading to an Aes Sedai themed story along with their splits and politics, leaving out most of Mat and Perrin's stories, and much of the middle books. Maybe no black tower at all, just a healed Logain, and only a minimal look at the Forsaken, if at all. As for Rand, perhaps he's still the DR, but as a secondary character with the real story being the Aes Sedai guiding him to success. Which is not untrue:) 

 

We almost finished season 1 and we don't care about Mat, or Perrin or Rand other than as secondary support cast. And it's getting much too late to switch the prevalence of the cast around. We're invested now.

 

Either that or they've made a grave error in plotting. But can't imagine a TV series where the main characters are not introduced until season 2. Asking what they hope are millions of viewers to re-engage is too much to ask.

 

Then again, I've been wrong before.

[Sabio]

13 minutes ago, Tom alapostropheThor said:

Sorry if someone's already mentioned this, but the White Tower looks at two such powerful channelers as Nynaeve and Egwene and they're like, "Totally dudes. Take off to parts unknown for no good reason. Have fun." 

 

They'd be in novice white so fast it'd make their heads spin. 

 

This series cares exactly zero for established lore. The writers wanted to tell their own story but also capitalize on someone else's success. They must get their moral compass from Jeff Bezos.

The downside to having them go to Tar Valon so quickly is it's now hard to explain why the tower didn't do more to enroll the super girls.  I understand Moiraine was having them keep low profiles but Nyn was widly known.

[FanofKnotai]

14 minutes ago, JaimAybara said:

I feel if the situation were reversed and all the men were done faithfully with beneficial additions and they randomly injected major character flaws into the female leads and cut their plot points making them useless, we would have an equally large backlash, but people would actually acknowledge it as a serious issue and potentially call the showrunners sexist as well. Imagine telling those fans “it’s a new turning”. But because it happened to the guys it’s okay.

I’m so glad you said this. I think his female characters were totally awesome the way he wrote them. And like you said if they had been lessened instead of the men, I feel there would have been riot level backlash. 
 

[Mailman]

53 minutes ago, melsnitker said:

 

I believe this is displayed in the Beonin storyline. She swears to Egwene, then once Egwene is captured decides the oath doesn't hold because Egwene is not Amyrlin anymore.

I think she swears to the Amyrlin if she specifically swore to Egwene Al'vere then the oath would not be affected its only through her belief that Egwene is no longer a Amyrlin that she can disregard the oath.

 

The first oath holds in all situations but it is subjective in that if you believe something to be true you can say it regardless the truth in fact.

Edited December 13, 2021 by Mailman

[FanofKnotai]

4 hours ago, Windigo said:

The Tower and the Sisters. Which is why, as Jordan explains in his Aes Sedai notes:
 

Between one-third and one-half of all Aes Sedai (possibly somewhat more) are either gay or (mainly) bisexual to one degree or another. This is in large part because relationships with men are exceedingly difficult: men age and die, many men find a relationship with a woman so powerful difficult. Lesbian relationships between Aes Sedai and non-Aes Sedai are not unknown, but they are not highly common; the same difficulties engendered with men by hugely differing life-spans also works against these, at least as more than dalliances.

... 
 The proportions of gay women to heterosexual among Aes Sedai is roughly the same as in the general population, but the fact that any sister who loves a man must watch him grow old and die while she changes not at all lead some Aes Sedai to invest a strong emotional, and sometimes sexual, component in their long-term friendships with other sisters. 

http://13depository.blogspot.com/2002/03/everything-you-ever-wanted-to-know.html

@TheChief I hope you read this. Does this sound like he sees lesbians as sexually immature evil man haters? I hope this makes you rethink his “treatment of gay women” in the books. Maybe you are too young to realize how progressive he actually was when these books were written. And that’s ok (seriously. this is not sarcasm). It would explain why you are viewing it with the lens that you are. But I believe you will see you are wrong if you look at it objectively. 

[FanofKnotai]

On 12/9/2021 at 11:53 PM, Wolfbrother31 said:

 

Hm. I do think we'll probably be lead to think as the audience that Ishy is the DO and it's he who they actually fight at the Eye.

 

Does anybody think we'll get the Forsaken of the books at the Eye? 

Do you think we'll get the Green Man?

I hope they do the Green Man. And I hope he’s at least taller than Loial. But I don’t have high hopes with all the changes they’ve made.

[jh557]

12 minutes ago, Sir_Charrid said:

Someone has been taking to Siuan in her dreams giving her false information leading her on a false path in order to get them to bring the DR to the dark one early. 
 

2 episodes we foreshadowed Alanna and Rands bond risking everything at the last battle, now we foreshadow the great generals being Mis directed leading to Matt taking over the whole army at the last battle. 
 

Rafe is subtly putting in things that can be fed through the show leading to the big moments in the last battle. This is one of them, a misdirection about the eye of the world.

 

We have no information on this point whether Siuan's dreams were Forsaken relate/messed with or if she has the Talent of Dreaming and was seeing dreams that way.  I think that are alluding that she has the Talent as they can use that again later if needed. I would assume that she would ward here dreams but those are just my opinions. 

 

If you think that the last couple of episodes have been that deep that's fine. I think they have just been trying to build up characters. And to maybe combine Alanna and Myrelle together for the later passed bond of Lan. But I can understand you looking for more foreshadowing. We also do not know that the forced bond is going to happen in the show. 

 

And like I said if you think its a misdirection that fine. I also think it was supposed to be a misdirection but was worded poorly and is thus a mistake in writing which is bound to happen with the show.   

10 minutes ago, Sir_Charrid said:

Also regarding the BA as soon as I learnt about them existing in the books I debated with my friends why they didn’t just confuse all the prophesies and make sure no one knew anything about what was going on. 

We have differing opinions on the competence of the BA. I found them to be rather incompetent in the books. But I'm sure that they did try and hide and corrupt things where possible to sow some confusion.    

[TheChief]

27 minutes ago, FanofKnotai said:

@TheChief I hope you read this. Does this sound like he sees lesbians as sexually immature evil man haters? I hope this makes you rethink his “treatment of gay women” in the books. Maybe you are too young to realize how progressive he actually was when these books were written. And that’s ok (seriously. this is not sarcasm). It would explain why you are viewing it with the lens that you are. But I believe you will see you are wrong if you look at it objectively. 

I’m most definitely not at all young by any standard, and not narrowly read. I’ve read everything from Gilgamesh to Olga Tokarczuk. I also am very sure about my feelings about this topic, which i feel I’ve explained already. 

[sidcarton2]

I think overall I am finding the series very uneven and unfocused, and Episode 6 only confirms it for me. I watch with non-book-readers and I spend a lot of the time pausing and explaining what's happening, and the persistent complaint seems to be that they are using small throwaway lines to stand in for a lot of detail rather than take the time to lay out the details. More than once someone has said "exposition is not a four letter word!". 

 

Just a few examples off the top of my head:

* The warder bond is not described well. No one I watched with seemed to get that it was a thing of the One Power. No one understood that Stepin's suicide was not just him being really depressed over Kerene's death but something deeper caused by the bond breaking. If the writers were hoping to foreshadow Lan's madness later, at least for this group it didn't work -- none of them tied Moiraine's question to Alanna about releasing the bond to this possibility.

* The ter'angreal that Moiraine used to transport herself to T'AR was very confusing. `Most of the people I watched with thought it was some sort of teleportation device to get to Suian's chambers that she had decorated in that fashion because of her childhood memories -- i.e. they didn't get that this was not the waking world. Even I have to admit it wasn't entirely clear to me either. The show to-date has not done a very good job of differentiating the Dreaming World from the Waking World. Phaw, just something as simple as adding a color filter to indicate that "we're not in Kansas anymore" would do wonders.

 

* As book readers we are well aware of Aes Sedai politicking and the level of detail that was in the books, especially during the Tower split, that brought that politicking to the forefront. The show-only watchers found focusing so much on Aes Sedai internal politics, when we have almost no information on them to this point, to be very confusing and a waste of time. The most common refrains were "why exactly does everyone hate the Aes Sedai?" and "Do the Aes Sedai just spend most of their time wandering around the same couple of rooms all day talking smack about each other?"
 

 

Others have pointed out that a not only details about the EF 5 but what the Shadow is actually doing have been sidelined or not explored in any depth to work through Aes Sedai politics and the mechanics of the warder bond. This makes it really hard to understand what is actually at stake. Early on we had some dreams in which someone with glowing eyes jump-scared out heroes. The show-only crowd didn't know who that was, and it was not referenced again. I think there was a missed opportunity to flesh out Ishamael -- especially since we've had a Dark Friend and a Warder mention him and the show-only crowd still has no details on him. I think at this point unless you know the story, you could be forgiven for thinking that the good guys are Moiraine and the EF5 while the bad guys are Whitecloaks and the other Aes Sedai. The stakes seem to be very small and petty in the grand scheme of things instead of laying down building blocks for an existential battle for survival of humanity. 

I really thought early on that the focus on 4-5 potential Dragons was a ruse on Moiraine's part to keep the EF 5 in line. But here we are told plainly that the DR could be man or a woman, that s/he could channel or maybe not, maybe they're a wolfbrother, we just don't know. I never got the impression from reading the books that the Aes Sedai ever believed that the DR was going to be non-channeler, that he wasn't going to be Lews Therin reborn, that reincarnated souls would switch gender. Why would the Moiraine and Siuan be so concerned, for example, that the Reds might accidentally gentle the DR if they didn't also realize that the DR would, as a reincarnation of a channeler, also have to channel. Which should rule out Mat. Once upon a time I would have thought that was Moiraine obfuscating on purpose, but I'm not willing to give the writers that much credit now.

I was willing to go with it early on, but I'm no longer sure that there is any particular reason to have kept the DR a mystery. I get why you wouldn't want to delve too much into the backgrounds of the EF 5, because once you start filling in details it becomes much harder to keep the identify of the DR under wraps. For example, bringing up Tam's fever dream and Rand not being born of the Two Rivers early on would have been a big clue that one of these EF 5 was not like the others. They started to hint at that with Loial's Aielman comment from EP 5, but again it was a throwaway line that the show-readers I watched with had heard but didn't know what it meant because the show hasn't really gone into detail about who the Aiel are, beyond small tidbits -- e.g. "that guy in the cage is an Aielman", "the Aiel have been seen West of the Spine", "you have the look of an Aielman" -- but no other context to make show-watchers pay attention.

 

The one persistent complaint from the show-watchers that they still knew next to nothing about the EF 5. One of the show-only folk kept calling Rand "Anikan" (i.e. Anakin Skywalker from Star Wars) because it was the only way they could describe him and differentiate him from the other boys. They couldn't even remember his name. When you know so little about your main characters, it's really really hard to care what happens to them.

Further to that point, keeping the DR a mystery is, in retrospect, not a good idea. The DR is, in many ways, the first among equals in terms of important, meaningful characters. Mat is the rogue turned Battle Lord, Perrin is the wolf-brother Lord of the TR, Egwene's story arc from humble innkeeper's daughter to a powerful Amyrlin who gets a stunningly heroic storyline and a moving and meaningful death at the end is every bit as powerful and moving as Rand's, Nynaeve as the woman who heals stilling among many other major accomplishments.

 

Each of our main characters are heroes in their own right, but the show writers seem to have fixated on the DR and thereby doing a disservice to the other characters, who are just as important. I now think it might have been a better to just flesh out the EF 5 and their backstories early on, so it becomes clear that the DR was one of Rand, Mat, or Perrin and then quickly narrow it down to Rand, while at the same time start to build up how powerful the others would become in
their own right. 

 

I will continue to watch the show of course, and I hope the remaining episodes in the season prove me wrong, but I am really starting to question some of the storytelling choices that were made and I am much less willing to give the writers much credit for what I thought was clever foreshadowing and attention to detail looks like it's not the case. 

[FanofKnotai]

5 minutes ago, TheChief said:

I’m most definitely not at all young by any standard, and not narrowly read. I’ve read everything from Gilgamesh to Olga Tokarczuk. I also am very sure about my feelings about this topic, which i feel I’ve explained already. 

??‍♂️??

[NinjaPowers975]

5 hours ago, FanofKnotai said:

How was it rushed when the Eye was mentioned throughout almost the entire book? Rand’s dream in Baerlon. Rand’s dream on Domon’s boat. Rand’s dream after Four Kings. Perrin’s dream with the Tinkers. The story the Tinkers told Perrin and Elyas…once Moiraine FINALLY heard all these things on top of the story Loial told, she knew the Eye should have been their destination all along. How is that rushed? 

 

The way it comes about felt very rushed to me because the whole decision is arrived at due to an avalanche of coincidences that pop up at the 3/4 mark of the book. Yes, some of the seeds had been planted earlier, but none of the EF5 even knew what The Eye was. It was not the focus of the story at all for the majority of the book.

 

With nothing more than a series of coincidences to go on, Moiraine suddenly decides to drag a bunch of young, inexperienced people into the ways, which are incredibly dangerous, and then take them all the way to the blight. It is a total shot in the dark and makes no tactical sense at all. 

 

The only reason it works at all on the page is because Moiraine is so secretive that the reader assumes she knows exactly what she's doing. And also because the book had just introduced the concept of Ta'veren, which made it seem marginally more plausible for her to make such a sudden, rash decision based on nothing more than reading the tea leaves.

 

Don't get me wrong, I love EOTW. I think I actually like it more than a lot of WOT fans. The book never fails to entertain me. But every time I read the scene in Caemlyn where they decide to go to The Eye, I have to kind of shut off my brain for a few pages to stop myself from thinking too hard about the logic of it.

 

What they did in the show honestly seems to have the exact same problems, which surprises me. I figured they'd go out of their way to make the decision feel more logical, but it seems like they just kind of threw something together.

Edited December 13, 2021 by NinjaPowers975

[ilovezam]

43 minutes ago, sidcarton2 said:

The show to-date has not done a very good job of differentiating the Dreaming World from the Waking World. Phaw, just something as simple as adding a color filter to indicate that "we're not in Kansas anymore" would do wonders.

 

This was super weird to me too. Amazon stated in bonus material that it was a Travelling ter'angreal to a shack in Tear, not TAR, which I think present even more problems 

 

There's a thread about it on reddit here.

 

https://reddit.com/r/WoT/comments/reg14e/bonus_content_on_amazons_page_confirms_the/

Edited December 13, 2021 by ilovezam

[Padmehlc]

On 12/10/2021 at 12:24 AM, Arthellion said:

Rafe has said Egwene is his favorite character. This is troublesome to me because I don’t think you he understands the nuance of the character.

 

At the end of the day Egwene is a powerful and strong woman…but ultimately a very flawed individual who believes her way is the best way.

 

I don’t really know where I’m going with this other than to say that anecdotally I’ve found people who loved Egwene really didn’t read WoT the way I did and don’t remember major points the way I do.

 

I dont think you can definitively say that just because she is his favorite character means he doesnt see those flaws in her. She was my favorite in the beginning BECAUSE of her belief that her way was the only right way.  I was the same age as she was supposed to be when I started reading it, and I felt the exact same way about everything myself but add Nynaeve's temper when anyone dared disagree with me. So she was my favorite because I could identify with her the most. (Same reason Hermione was my favorite in HP). Then meeting Faile and she was what I wished I could be and she became my favorite but aspirationally. I feel that the reason why she is his favorite character is/will be much more significant than just that she is. 

[bringbackthomsmoustache]

1 hour ago, Sabio said:

The downside to having them go to Tar Valon so quickly is it's now hard to explain why the tower didn't do more to enroll the super girls.  I understand Moiraine was having them keep low profiles but Nyn was widly known.

Widely known but officially "too old to be entered in the novice book".

[Whittle]

Honestly this episode sucked. I really liked episodes 4 and 5 despite some major departures from the books. This just seemed like a waste of time. 

[FanofKnotai]

On 12/10/2021 at 7:10 AM, fra85uk said:

 

Because essentially all fathers need to be awful in Rafe of Time.

Mat father--> womenizer

Steppin father---> Beated his son

Father of Alanna's warder---> tried to kill his son

etc. etc.

Rafe of time ??. Classic. And sadly true

[FanofKnotai]

On 12/10/2021 at 9:59 AM, Yojimbo said:

As Harry from Resident Alien would say, "This is some bullshit".

This made me cry laughing ?. Harry would totally say that. And sadly I agree.