New GQ article about the show.

[DojoToad]

11 minutes ago, TheDreadReader said:

One benefit that WOT has over GOT is they are not going to run into the Daenerys problem where the popularity of the character in the minds of a lot of fans made the showrunners afraid to lay the plot foundations for Martin's planned end to her story.  (I can see this creating some risks for Egwene's storyline if they chase a similar level of popularity for her.)

I don't know Martin's plan for Daenerys - was he going to kill her off earlier than the show did?

 

Not sure that would impact Egwene - she was there until the end...

[Rose]

I don't really understand the fears here. WoT IS a story with a lot of "girl power" in it compared to other popular high fantasy series. It has as many if not more female protagonists than male. It's full of powerful women with strong storylines. They don't need to change or add anything to the books to deliver on that promise in the show. It's already there. Maybe RJ is such a good writer he tricked you into enjoying a story full of "girl power" without you noticing.

Edited October 21, 2021 by Rose

[TheDreadReader]

2 minutes ago, DojoToad said:

I don't know Martin's plan for Daenerys - was he going to kill her off earlier than the show did?

 

Not sure that would impact Egwene - she was there until the end...

 

It isn't so much when (or if) he planned on killing Daenerys it is that the plot/character foundations that led to the characters deciding to kill her based on her actions are laid already in A Dance with Dragons.  Equally, Martin could easily modify her story in a way in Winds if he decided to.  Given that Martin already went over his plans for the end of the series it is reasonable to assume that the Dany's actions in the show are consistent with the characterization elements in Dance.

 

In terms of Egwene, there's already plenty of criticism of her storyline from some fans.   I generally think that her early arcs could use a lot of improvement, so that her later storylines have a better plot foundation and she's less open to the Mary Sue type criticism.

 

Popularity can work against that though. 

 

 

 

[Elder_Haman]

30 minutes ago, Beidomon said:

 

The danger of going too Woke is that the showrunners forget that this matriarchal system isn’t the context for the main story, and instead the “girl power” becomes the primary thrust of the story itself. And it ain’t. At least not the books I read. Maybe other people took something different away from WOT - sounds like maybe Rafe did! - but if they did, that’s not the story I want to watch.

I honestly don’t understand why people are so worried that they will change the story so dramatically that it won’t be about the Dragon Reborn.
 

Nor is there any reason to believe they intend to change the show into a weekly lecture about current day politics. 
 

The fact that people are worried about this is entirely rooted in the divisiveness of our modern politics. Wheel of Time was “woke” before anyone knew what “woke” was. Relax, it’s going to be fine. 

[DojoToad]

8 minutes ago, Elder_Haman said:

I honestly don’t understand why people are so worried that they will change the story so dramatically that it won’t be about the Dragon Reborn.
 

Nor is there any reason to believe they intend to change the show into a weekly lecture about current day politics. 
 

The fact that people are worried about this is entirely rooted in the divisiveness of our modern politics. Wheel of Time was “woke” before anyone knew what “woke” was. Relax, it’s going to be fine. 

I'm not worried about lectures.  We'll all know when the first 3 episodes drop.  Until then it is just speculation.  If I don't like the first 3 episodes, I'm done.  But chatter on DM won't make me miss the drop - sometimes makes me worried (or hopeful) but I'm a big boy now and will make up my own mind after the first 3.

[Beidomon]

58 minutes ago, SinisterDeath said:

Somehow, you missed the whole "3 wonder girls" taking on the Black Ajah in the first 6? Books?, That a significant portion of the first half of this series, followed them around while putting Mat, Perrin, or Rand's stories on the backburner?

 

No. I didn’t say that, and I have in fact acknowledged just the opposite in several threads. 
 

58 minutes ago, SinisterDeath said:

"Going Woke", doesn't mean what you think it means. It's been twisted into this meaningless catch phrase by political pundits to say: "I don't like this content, because it has concepts or peoples I don't agree with, and I feel like I can't tell people why I don't like it without being called things that make me look bad".

  

You're selling a product to two people.
One's wearing a red hat, the other's wearing a blue. Are you going to use the same sales pitch to convince them to buy the same product? Or will you be like an Aes Sedai, and change the wording into something they find palatable? 

I’m not interested in getting into a debate over semantics. My point stands. It is a concerned echoed by many here. I understand that you disagree. 

[SinisterDeath]

10 minutes ago, Beidomon said:

I’m not interested in getting into a debate over semantics.

Clearly it's easier to regurgitate the word "Woke" to virtue signal, than it is to actually know what it is.

 

22 minutes ago, Beidomon said:

It is a concerned echoed by many here.

People echo (regurgitate) a lot of dumb things, Doesn't mean they're correct.
 

25 minutes ago, Beidomon said:

I understand that you disagree. 

Obviously.

18 minutes ago, Beidomon said:

No. I didn’t say that, and I have in fact acknowledged just the opposite in several threads. 

Yet, you dismiss the very prominent main story line by saying:

1 hour ago, SinisterDeath said:

The danger of going too Woke is that the showrunners forget that this matriarchal system isn’t the context for the main story, and instead the “girl power” becomes the primary thrust of the story itself.

I read this as "If they even have the wonder girls plotline, it's evidence the show's gone Woke".


Let me put it this way.

You're worried this is going to turn into Season 11 of Doctor Who, where they kept going back to various points in American History & European history hammering home on how bad you should feel over this or that injustice.

That's not going to happen. 
The most you'll get is some subtext in the show, that right-wing youtubers will hyper focus on, and whine that the show is "Woke", and everyone should use their same arguments as to why it's trash. 
 

[TheMountain]

The main "woke" things that pull me out of a story are not so much the themes, but the execution. Examples of bad execution:

 

1. When you feel as if the writers are trying to teach you lecture you with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer, through the voice of the actors.

2. The main beefy male character who's supposed to be the "best and strongest" gets into some sort of contrived fight with a female heroine, and she pins him down with her superior strength or something. A big beefy male in a bar/tavern arm wrestles a slender female and loses. You get the idea lol. The equivalent would be Lan practicing sword fighting with Nynaeve/Egwene/Min/etc and getting his ass handed to him.

[DaddyFinn]

1 hour ago, Elder_Haman said:

I honestly don’t understand why people are so worried that they will change the story so dramatically that it won’t be about the Dragon Reborn.

"It's not about me. It was never about me."

[SinisterDeath]

6 minutes ago, TheMountain said:

1. When you feel as if the writers are trying to teach you lecture you with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer, through the voice of the actors.

(See Season 11 of Doctor Who)
But as far as "lecturing", I don't know what they'd even lecture on in the first season?

The closest you're probably going to get is in the first few episode where we have a Men's "Village Council" and the "Women's Circle" and it's questionable who's really in charge. This is in the books. RJ would have probably told you, the women's circle was in charge, and they just let the men think they were.

Depending on when the WT scenes happen in the show, you'll get that political drama.. which is more than enough of what's already in the books. 

 

 

12 minutes ago, TheMountain said:

2. The main beefy male character who's supposed to be the "best and strongest" gets into some sort of contrived fight with a female heroine, and she pins him down with her superior strength or something. A big beefy male in a bar/tavern arm wrestles a slender female and loses. You get the idea lol. The equivalent would be Lan practicing sword fighting with Nynaeve/Egwene/Min/etc and getting his ass handed to him.

I somehow doubt we'll see Nynaeve/Egwene try to manhandle Lan like he was a toddler....

Remember though, plot wise we should see Nynaeve track Lan, and act like a fierce mamma bear, and when they learn the OP? They could absolutely tear Lan into ribbons with it if they felt like it.

[WhiteVeils]

40 minutes ago, TheMountain said:

The main "woke" things that pull me out of a story are not so much the themes, but the execution. Examples of bad execution:

 

2. The main beefy male character who's supposed to be the "best and strongest" gets into some sort of contrived fight with a female heroine, and she pins him down with her superior strength or something. A big beefy male in a bar/tavern arm wrestles a slender female and loses. You get the idea lol. The equivalent would be Lan practicing sword fighting with Nynaeve/Egwene/Min/etc and getting his ass handed to him.

Like a tiny Seanchen princess beating up a young hero that could defeat two of the best fighters in the whole land with nothing but a stick?

[TheMountain]

Just to be clear, I'm not saying the WoT show will be like that. I want to be clear that I agree that the world of WoT could be considered "Woke." I'm just describing what I generally consider as distracting and poorly executed.

Edited October 21, 2021 by TheMountain

[TheMountain]

58 minutes ago, DaddyFinn said:

"It's not about me. It was never about me."

This is something that Sarah said as well, and it is a good soundbite, but it's more nuanced than that. The ironic thing is that it's Rand and ourselves as readers that come to that realization through the culmination of his "Hero's Journey." It's a realization he has as a person IN the story.

[DojoToad]

23 minutes ago, WhiteVeils said:

Like a tiny Seanchen princess beating up a young hero that could defeat two of the best fighters in the whole land with nothing but a stick?

Gawyn and Galad were fighting within a framework of rules - Tuon was not.

 

Mat had his stick and was prepared for combat in the first one.  He was not so armed with Tuon and was not expecting to be attacked by a badger.

 

Plus he was defending himself from a very slight young woman that he did not want to injure vs. a fight against two accomplished swordsmen as big as him that he had to put out of commission to win the fight.

Edited October 21, 2021 by DojoToad

[WhiteVeils]

Just saying that if you pop into the series and see a woman beating up a man and declaring it bad, it doesn't mean anything by itself. There can be reasons and context, and, frankly, I can think of quite a few women who could beat up men in the story, and do, a time or two.  

 

I just want people to wait and see, I guess, and not assume something showing such a thing is automatically bad.  Or 'overly woke'.

[DaddyFinn]

I admit that at the beginning I was a bit afraid because Rafe and several actors are very openly feminist/anti-racist/blm etc. and I feared they let their strong ideologies affect changes to the original story. I've grown past that. I trust them to be professional.

[Katherine]

5 hours ago, TheDreadReader said:

 

One of the things that amuses me about this conversation is that you can take Rafe's pitch, transport it back to the mid-nighties, clean up the corporate speak, and the substance of it would be sound a lot like things fans would say to describe the premise of the series.

 

The books were "progressive" in the way RJ already deconstructed gender roles, norms, etc in his worldbuilding.   There are ways that he did it well, ways that he didn't do it so well, but the basic deconstructions were already baked into the cake.

 

One benefit that WOT has over GOT is they are not going to run into the Daenerys problem where the popularity of the character in the minds of a lot of fans made the showrunners afraid to lay the plot foundations for Martin's planned end to her story.  (I can see this creating some risks for Egwene's storyline if they chase a similar level of popularity for her.)

 

 

 

 

 

I think the brilliance of Jordan was his inversion of the Gender norms.... good and bad. Nynaeve was incredibly powerful and essential to the plot. She also spent the majority of the series being insufferably full of herself  and had to learn humility. Behind her? A very capable man who kept her grounded, but (while sooooo important) saw it as his duty to support her so that she could effect change. 

Traditionally, those gender roles would have been reversed. 

Could give 1000 examples of this from Emond's Field alone. 

What people seem to be worried COULD happen.... is that we get very powerful, amazing, women with NO flaws and bumbling men who can't control themselves. I don't want that story.  I will say this thread and the comments about how you need to pitch a series makes me feel a little better ? .

 

 

 

 

[Katherine]

21 hours ago, WhiteVeils said:

Like a tiny Seanchen princess beating up a young hero that could defeat two of the best fighters in the whole land with nothing but a stick?

 

TO be fair..... by the time she did that, it had been well established that Tuon was incredibly capable, survived multiple assassination attempts, and had trained. 

 

And Matt, Rand, and Perrin each wrestled with hurting women... even black ajah and foresaken. 

 

So was he really fighting her? 

 

I am turning a little from your point, but I think these details and nuances matter. 

 

All of that to end with this thought.... 

 

I CAN'T WAIT TO SEE TUON ON SCREEN. 

 

She was one of my favorites and one of the least predictable which will make her soo fun on screen. 

Edited October 22, 2021 by Katherine

[Agitel]

If the Seanchan don't talk like Texans, I'm out. ?

[JaimAybara]

1 hour ago, Katherine said:

I think the brilliance of Jordan was his inversion of the Gender norms.... good and bad. Nynaeve was incredibly powerful and essential to the plot. She also spent the majority of the series being insufferably full of herself  and had to learn humility. Behind her? A very capable man who kept her grounded, but (while sooooo important) saw it as his duty to support her so that she could effect change. 

Traditionally, those gender roles would have been reversed. 

Could give 1000 examples of this from Emond's Field alone. 

 

What people seem to be worried COULD happen.... is that we get very powerful, amazing, women with NO flaws and bumbling men who can't control themselves. I don't want that story.  I will say this thread and the comments about how you need to pitch a series makes me feel a little better ? .

 

 

 

 

 

Yes absolutely. Unfortunately I think the marketing team is playing this up accidentally because I think they are doing some red herring stuff for the start of the show and leaving out a lot of information.  And due to the stresses in OUR world people are simply seeing what they want to and then drawing knee jerk reactions. But it also comes down to the people writing articles on many different websites have very little knowledge or absolutely no clue what they are talking about. “Where only women can control the power.” This is either intentionally misleading or a purposefully inflammatory type of comment to get more clicks. What is the result?  

There are some some women who want to watch the show explicitly because women are in the ones in charge. Which later in the series they may feel “betrayed”, that they were mislead etc. 
 

There are some men who specifically say they won’t watch it at all because of “wokeness” etc. but they don’t know that men actually CAN use magic systems, they just read a comment that doesn’t really explain anything well. 
 

When at the end of the day it is all really about a Yin Yang balance that the world needed in many things. Robert Jordan in my opinion did a pretty good job of balancing things for men and women. If a dude said something sassy about ladies…you are darn right the ladies had something to say about the men. I honestly hope this is there, it’s pretty funny at times to be honest. But I want both sides to get good digs in, in the show. If it is just one sided the entire time that will be unfortunate. A good example I can think of is the dynamic of Vasquez and Hudson in  the movie Aliens.
 

The biggest irony of all the complaints on both sides of the fence is they just sound like the Women’s Circle and the Village Council from the books haha. And so I tip my hat once again to Robert Jordan. 

 

Edited October 21, 2021 by JaimAybara

[Pandemonium]

How about the nude bathtub scene and Lan?  I liked how he mentions being served a sausage before that scene.  ?

 

 

[Pandemonium]

Rosamund Pike is the new face of Wheel of Time even becoming the narrator of the audiobook 1.  It will be interesting to see how many seasons she lasts before she is killed off/disappeared into terangreal.   Maybe 3 or 4?  

Also will be interesting if they actually do the whole tower of Ghenji rescue scene.  Moirraine didn't really do too much after that in the books, nothing any other character couldn't have done.  

It would make sense to killer off permanently after a few seasons.  may be too hard to bring her back later on

[Tim]

On 10/20/2021 at 5:56 AM, Maximillion said:

I am a bit worried about how the pitch was described, TBH.

 

I just hope they don't overdo that and make it overtly modern day issue driven.

 

As has been discussed upthead, I'm inclined to see that as being a very sensible, strategic decision Rafe took early on so as to secure financial support. As the GQ article picks up, the general view of fantasy by non-fans is that it's a genre for shy and introverted teenage boys - escapist wish-fulfilment bildungsroman stories about a teenage boy who learns he's special somehow, a warrior or a wizard or a king. Whether this is a fair cliche is really beside the point if it's a belief widely held.

 

The first two books of WOT don't really distinguish themselves from the above cliche (one reason I loved them when I was 11 years old!), and in particular the first book reveals very little if any of the darker themes around Rand's development that start to emerge thereafter. At a high level, therefore, the question becomes "why adapt The Eye of the World and not the first few books of The Belgariad, or The Dragonbone Chair, or Magician? (or etc.)" 

It's difficult to describe the plot of the first book (remembering that if the show is to succeed it has to happen with the very first series) at a high level in a manner that seems particularly distinct from other possible vehicles for adaptation except by reference to the surrounding context of how social power and control is both gendered and (in some senses or contexts) female-aligned. It's by far the single most clear and easy-to-explain point of distinction. The GQ article refers to Rafe "emphasizing" this - not inserting something that wasn't already there.

 

Again, none of this is necessarily fair - fantasy actually has a large female fanbase, a lot of fantasy both predating and postdating the Wheel of Time features interesting and thoughtful gender politics, and even many of the more archetypal male bildungsroman stories still have strong and relatable female characters - but if you're asking a studio to stump up $10m per episode on a show that might run for a decade, these are the perceptions you need overcome or to manage. 

The framing also provides a neat answer to the GOT problem: GOT established a point of difference from "generic" fantasy by emphasising grittiness and sex, as well as featuring strong female characters. The sexualisation of GOT not only provided HBO-friendly visual titillation; it was also shorthand code for sceptical (non-fantasy-reading) viewers that, despite being a fantasy world, this was not a pre-pubescent story purpose-built for young men who have not even begun to think about gender relations (though I tend to think GOT was not entirely successful here: it's all very well and good to have strong female characters but when you're then repeatedly subjecting them to gross humiliation and sexual degradation entirely disproportionate to the level of social power you otherwise grant them, it's not exactly clear that your view of gender relations is mature or coherent). 

 

Compare this with LOTR, which had only three vaguely prominent female characters, none of whom feel particularly relatable, and in which the concept of "gender relations" doesn't even exist. 

 

(the need to establish a clear point of difference from LOTR becomes more acute in circumstances where Amazon is also funding a show premised on the LOTR world)

 

WOT can't really adopt the GOT approach without totally changing the whole feel of the story. But again, Rafe can point to something which is already there in the books, which is that every major plot point is shaped and coloured by gender relations at both a personal and whole-of-society level, because of the world-level direct and indirect ramifications of the taint on saidin, all the way down to villages being run by duelling gender-based authority groups. The question "how does the relationship between men and women impact on this character or this storyline?" isn't something Rafe has to insert; it's already incredibly prominent in the books.

If anything, I suspect the show has the opportunity to be a bit more subtle than RJ in this regard: think about in The Great Hunt, where Egwene and Nynaeve's decision to accompany Liandrin to Falme is premised on the assumption that Rand, as a wool-headed man, is totally unable to look after himself (and then, by contrast, when Egwene is captured by the Seanchan, Elayne wishes Rand or some other man with a sword was there to help). Or later, in The Dragon Reborn, when Mat tries to save the trio in Tear and they don't acknowledge it, this sets up a sub-plot of (rather silly) mutual resentment that doesn't get resolved for another... four books? 

In such scenes, RJ was grappling with the same kinds of questions that a more modern "progressive" storyline (thinking of something like The Force Awakens here) might: what do men and women, both individually and as groups, "owe" each other? Does a desire to save someone rob them of their independence as a social actor and imply a lack of respect? Does that still matter when someone is in danger, and if so, how do you negotiate the space between the answers to these questions?

But the execution was often clumsy, primarily at the interpersonal rather than social level - with key characters disbelieving that their other-gendered counterparts were entitled to social agency long past the point where that could be remotely justified, especially in circumstances where the broader world created tended to afford both men and women alike power and agency.

One hope I have for the show is that, by emphasising gender issues at the social level, it can ease off a bit on some of the clumsy interpersonal stuff in the books. 

[Elgee]

@TimThank you for that very informative and well-written post! I enjoyed reading that very much, as I learnt a lot of things from it.

[Katherine]

14 hours ago, Tim said:

 

As has been discussed upthead, I'm inclined to see that as being a very sensible, strategic decision Rafe took early on so as to secure financial support. As the GQ article picks up, the general view of fantasy by non-fans is that it's a genre for shy and introverted teenage boys - escapist wish-fulfilment bildungsroman stories about a teenage boy who learns he's special somehow, a warrior or a wizard or a king. Whether this is a fair cliche is really beside the point if it's a belief widely held.

 

The first two books of WOT don't really distinguish themselves from the above cliche (one reason I loved them when I was 11 years old!), and in particular the first book reveals very little if any of the darker themes around Rand's development that start to emerge thereafter. At a high level, therefore, the question becomes "why adapt The Eye of the World and not the first few books of The Belgariad, or The Dragonbone Chair, or Magician? (or etc.)" 

It's difficult to describe the plot of the first book (remembering that if the show is to succeed it has to happen with the very first series) at a high level in a manner that seems particularly distinct from other possible vehicles for adaptation except by reference to the surrounding context of how social power and control is both gendered and (in some senses or contexts) female-aligned. It's by far the single most clear and easy-to-explain point of distinction. The GQ article refers to Rafe "emphasizing" this - not inserting something that wasn't already there.

 

Again, none of this is necessarily fair - fantasy actually has a large female fanbase, a lot of fantasy both predating and postdating the Wheel of Time features interesting and thoughtful gender politics, and even many of the more archetypal male bildungsroman stories still have strong and relatable female characters - but if you're asking a studio to stump up $10m per episode on a show that might run for a decade, these are the perceptions you need overcome or to manage. 

The framing also provides a neat answer to the GOT problem: GOT established a point of difference from "generic" fantasy by emphasising grittiness and sex, as well as featuring strong female characters. The sexualisation of GOT not only provided HBO-friendly visual titillation; it was also shorthand code for sceptical (non-fantasy-reading) viewers that, despite being a fantasy world, this was not a pre-pubescent story purpose-built for young men who have not even begun to think about gender relations (though I tend to think GOT was not entirely successful here: it's all very well and good to have strong female characters but when you're then repeatedly subjecting them to gross humiliation and sexual degradation entirely disproportionate to the level of social power you otherwise grant them, it's not exactly clear that your view of gender relations is mature or coherent). 

 

Compare this with LOTR, which had only three vaguely prominent female characters, none of whom feel particularly relatable, and in which the concept of "gender relations" doesn't even exist. 

 

(the need to establish a clear point of difference from LOTR becomes more acute in circumstances where Amazon is also funding a show premised on the LOTR world)

 

WOT can't really adopt the GOT approach without totally changing the whole feel of the story. But again, Rafe can point to something which is already there in the books, which is that every major plot point is shaped and coloured by gender relations at both a personal and whole-of-society level, because of the world-level direct and indirect ramifications of the taint on saidin, all the way down to villages being run by duelling gender-based authority groups. The question "how does the relationship between men and women impact on this character or this storyline?" isn't something Rafe has to insert; it's already incredibly prominent in the books.

If anything, I suspect the show has the opportunity to be a bit more subtle than RJ in this regard: think about in The Great Hunt, where Egwene and Nynaeve's decision to accompany Liandrin to Falme is premised on the assumption that Rand, as a wool-headed man, is totally unable to look after himself (and then, by contrast, when Egwene is captured by the Seanchan, Elayne wishes Rand or some other man with a sword was there to help). Or later, in The Dragon Reborn, when Mat tries to save the trio in Tear and they don't acknowledge it, this sets up a sub-plot of (rather silly) mutual resentment that doesn't get resolved for another... four books? 

In such scenes, RJ was grappling with the same kinds of questions that a more modern "progressive" storyline (thinking of something like The Force Awakens here) might: what do men and women, both individually and as groups, "owe" each other? Does a desire to save someone rob them of their independence as a social actor and imply a lack of respect? Does that still matter when someone is in danger, and if so, how do you negotiate the space between the answers to these questions?

But the execution was often clumsy, primarily at the interpersonal rather than social level - with key characters disbelieving that their other-gendered counterparts were entitled to social agency long past the point where that could be remotely justified, especially in circumstances where the broader world created tended to afford both men and women alike power and agency.

One hope I have for the show is that, by emphasising gender issues at the social level, it can ease off a bit on some of the clumsy interpersonal stuff in the books. 

I really enjoyed reading your perspective!

 

 As a reader, I love character interaction.  So those character interactions and struggles were always more interesting to me than how RJ's societies and cultures responded to those questions. 

 

For example, one of my favorite scenes is where Aviendha is flabbergasted over Elayne's dismissive attitude towards Mat after his rescue attempt. I found it hilarous and well written ... plus was so relieved that someone finally stood up for poor Mat.