Season 1 Discussion (Full Book Spoilers) v2.1

[ThroneofTime]

1 minute ago, CaddySedai said:

 

I mean ... if Anakin was about looks its all good. 

 

Its that part when he started opening his mouth in acting that it fell apart.

 

So far Josha has not had that issue, when he acts he is fine and dandy.

 

Then again they are hiding him more than a disgraced politician right now to keep up this "Oh it cant possibly be Rand" illusion lmao.

LOL No kidding. If I didn't know better I'd say the Dragon was either Egwene or Perrin since Rand hasn't really done anything besides fawn over her or be moody. Which is valid but I found him annoying until like the 3rd book so I kinda like him better here, at least in the beginning.  They're doing a pretty good job for newbies on that front. 

[CaddySedai]

Just now, ThroneofTime said:

LOL No kidding. If I didn't know better I'd say the Dragon was either Egwene or Perrin since Rand hasn't really done anything besides fawn over her or be moody. Which is valid but I found him annoying until like the 3rd book so I kinda like him better here, at least in the beginning.  They're doing a pretty good job for newbies on that front. 

 

Truth. Honestly none of the mains are "dislikable"

 

Even the ones we know are evil. lol. 

[ThroneofTime]

1 minute ago, CaddySedai said:

 

Truth. Honestly none of the mains are "dislikable"

 

Even the ones we know are evil. lol. 

Might even invite one of those trollocs out for tea. They look like they know a good time?

[CaddySedai]

1 minute ago, ThroneofTime said:

Might even invite one of those trollocs out for tea. They look like they know a good time?

 

Only if there will also be Biscuits.

[ThroneofTime]

7 minutes ago, CaddySedai said:

 

Only if there will also be Biscuits.

It'll be a whole breakfast, first and the second. Maybe even a third. (Yes I am typing this on an empty stomach)

[themann1086]

8 minutes ago, CaddySedai said:

 

Only if there will also be Biscuits.

Biscuits of course being the name of the Trolloc that gets eaten by the other Trolloc in the E3 open

[TheDreadReader]

1 hour ago, CaddySedai said:

Then again they are hiding him more than a disgraced politician right now to keep up this "Oh it cant possibly be Rand" illusion lmao.

 

On the bright side, at least they haven't put him in a box.

 

 

[ArrylT]

1 hour ago, CaddySedai said:

 

Only if there will also be Biscuits.

 

Trollocs probably call Horses Biscuits.   

 

Sea Biscuit

 

Sea Biscuit run.

[LordyLord]

13 hours ago, AusLeviathan said:

 

I'm fairly confident they'll just go with there being a threat to the Eye and that's how they end up at Fal Dara.

Agreed.I think the Threat to the eye will be as follows

 

The First seal is being kept at the Eye of the world.

 

Siuan finds out that the First seal is weakening. They know that if it breaks all other seals will soon follow.And the Dark one will be free

 

Siaun believes the Dragon can restore the First seal.

So Morainne takes the Dragon candidates to the Eye itself with the hope whichever one who is the Dragon is able to fix the seal.

[Scarloc99]

4 hours ago, ThroneofTime said:

LOL No kidding. If I didn't know better I'd say the Dragon was either Egwene or Perrin since Rand hasn't really done anything besides fawn over her or be moody. Which is valid but I found him annoying until like the 3rd book so I kinda like him better here, at least in the beginning.  They're doing a pretty good job for newbies on that front. 

My next door neighbour and her husband have been nagging me to tell them who the dragon is, my wife has twigged, she thinks it is Rand, because as she said he showed he has power when he knocked the door down. 

 

[Scarloc99]

Ok somewhere I saw someone complain that Nyn tracked Lan down in the TV series, can't find the comment or thread it was on, but am re reading the books and when Nyn catches up to the party in Baerlon she tells Lan she followed his tracks, he and morraine are very impressed by this. She tells how her father taught her when she was a young girl. 

 

It is a throwaway couple of sentences that then gets overwhelmed by her interactions with the group and then the attack by the Shade but another little subtle link to the books in the TV show. 

[Mailman]

1 hour ago, Sir_Charrid said:

Ok somewhere I saw someone complain that Nyn tracked Lan down in the TV series, can't find the comment or thread it was on, but am re reading the books and when Nyn catches up to the party in Baerlon she tells Lan she followed his tracks, he and morraine are very impressed by this. She tells how her father taught her when she was a young girl. 

 

It is a throwaway couple of sentences that then gets overwhelmed by her interactions with the group and then the attack by the Shade but another little subtle link to the books in the TV show. 

I had no problem with her tracking him (she does also point out that Baerlon was the only real next place they could go).

 

The real issue was her being able to get close enough to Lan unaware to put a sword to his throat.

[dwn]

3 minutes ago, Mailman said:

I had no problem with her tracking him (she does also point out that Baerlon was the only real next place they could go).

 

The real issue was her being able to get close enough to Lan unaware to put a sword to his throat.

 

Sure it's exaggerated for the show, but Nynaeve does sneak up on him and Moiraine in the books after they flee Shadar Logoth. She's also shown to be skilled at tracking when scouting the area before they use the Bowl of the Winds.

[grayavatar]

Robert Jordan described outfits in the books in such detail that some readers found it painful to read. However I feel the costume people didn't read the books at all.

I saw a documentary on the show and I think the designer said something about avoiding things that look medieval. What a nightmare for fans of Robert Jordan's world building.

 

The whitecloak armor is almost as bad as the armor the knights of the round table wore in First Knight. It is not even armor but just some metallic decoration on one arm. It would appear acceptable on the Questioners ...maybe (and what happened to the red shepherd's crook?) but I remember the whitecloak soldiers sitting around polishing their armor while Trollocs are attacking and now they have no armor to polish. At least give them some helmets.

 

Also it would be great if the whitecloaks actually had white cloaks. I'm sure it is affordable, just tear up some bedsheets or something.

 

We see many Aes Sedai wearing yoga pants in the show instead of "divided riding skirts" and as far as I can remember when Min is first shown she is wearing pants and it is scandalous whenever someone meets her for the first time. This is because initially only Min and the Aiel maidens are the only females in the world wearing pants. I think it would have been very cool to see these skirts made for riding.

 

Aes Sedai are wearing all of one color. I mean all Red Ajah are fully red from head to toe. In the books they wear all sorts of colors with their Ajah color in highlights here and there. If I were a whitecloak I would be looking for women wearing all of one color, a group of them together would be very obvious.

 

Edited December 2, 2021 by CaddySedai
Moved to this thread.

[mogi68]

Here's my fringe theory: the crystal that the caged Aiel had was from the Eye of the World. Young men sometimes travel into the blight thinking that they are called to kill the Dark One. Moiraine, having been to the Eye of the World before, will find this crystal on Mat and see it as evidence that the pattern is leading them towards the Eye.

 

As in the book, Loial will tell his story of a man at Stedding Shangtai who said that the DO "means to blind the Eye of the World". This man had intended to carry the message to Tar Valon, but died in the Stedding (perhaps the message is even why Loial is in Tar Valon). 

 

The message + the crystal + the ba'alzamon dreams (even if he doesn't speak) will lead Moiraine to the Eye

 

Edited December 2, 2021 by mogi68

[KakitaOCU]

16 hours ago, dwn said:

 

There's no mention of that in the books. The closest is that Rand sometimes senses black wires extending away from the male FS (Ishy and Asmodean), but that only happens in close proximity and in extreme situations.

Close proximity appears to be near each other while battling.   Either way, that doesn't take away my point because there's no other good guy male channelers around at that point to establish if Rand was special or not.

The only time there are good male channelers to potentially see the black wires is during Book 9 and after that, well, it's not super important, the DO might have dropped the protection.

 

 

15 hours ago, Tim said:

I think if it were up to me, I would avoid making Elaida end up so ridiculous and incompetent by the end. It was unnecessary, and I think slightly overdone by BS in TGS especially - and just made the AS as an organisation look even worse than they needed to given they failed to do anything about a leader who was so obviously useless.

Sadly real life tells another story.  Remember, Elaida was only in power for less than 3 years (as I recall the entire series is about 3 years long).

We've had real life examples of people in power that shouldn't have been and while efforts were made to try to not have them be there the system doesn't like change, not until it's forced.  Also, Elaida downslid in sanity and played on a lot of fears.  

She started off competent and somewhat reasonable if you didn't have outside of context knowledge like we did as readers.  Then she's influenced by Moridin and starts a downward spiral.  She spends her time trying to bully everyone and force them into compliance and people end up letting her and trying to avoid or work around instead of oppose.  She ignores the threat of the Seanchan because she can't handle the concept of that type of threat, better to dismiss it as a hoax or rumor than to shake her power base.  

[Deviations]

4 hours ago, grayavatar said:

We see many Aes Sedai wearing yoga pants in the show instead of "divided riding skirts"

That was my first heads up that we weren't in Kansas anymore.  Moraine getting dressed and putting pants on.  I think I said "WTF (not the acronym)!"  "Moraine doesn't wear pants!  Min wears pants!" 

 

It went south from there.

 

As far as dislikable mains, I agree.  They aren't dislikable.  Nor are they yet likeable.  Where is trickster Mat with his best wining smile?  Mat was nothing but a trickster until Siuan told him the story about someone going back into a fire and thinking he may be like that too, with a big question mark on the may.  Here, we've already been beaten about the head with how far he'll go to try and protect his helpless young sisters.

 

Nynave is one of my favorite book characters because she's a bit like Donald Duck.  It's fun to see him get mad and flustered.  TV Nynave isn't charmingly mad, or overprotective, or defending her capability and experience.  She's just mad.

 

I'm hoping these things come in later episodes.

[Skipp]

9 minutes ago, Deviations said:

That was my first heads up that we weren't in Kansas anymore.  Moraine getting dressed and putting pants on.  I think I said "WTF (not the acronym)!"  "Moraine doesn't wear pants!  Min wears pants!"

This is a change I have approved of since I first saw it.  The Aes Sedai wear practical outfits while traveling the Wilderness for Months at a time(often without servants).  But they do wear their fancy gowns when at the Whitetower, which I am certain we will see in the next episode or two.  But the idea of Moiraine search for the DR for 20 years wearing a silk dress was always a little ludicrous.

[KakitaOCU]

7 hours ago, Mailman said:

I had no problem with her tracking him (she does also point out that Baerlon was the only real next place they could go).

 

The real issue was her being able to get close enough to Lan unaware to put a sword to his throat.

I feel like it's not as much of an issue as people think.

Look at the book scene again.  Nynaeve creeps up on them and eavesdrops on their conversation for a while before Moraine senses the spark in her and calls her out.  Lan is startled at this and never noticed she was there.

In the show Moraine is injured and down and not there to point out Nynaeve.  

[Yojimbo]

11 minutes ago, KakitaOCU said:

I feel like it's not as much of an issue as people think.

Look at the book scene again.  Nynaeve creeps up on them and eavesdrops on their conversation for a while before Moraine senses the spark in her and calls her out.  Lan is startled at this and never noticed she was there.

In the show Moraine is injured and down and not there to point out Nynaeve.  

There is a world of difference between Nyn being able to sneak up to within 20 feet of so and being able to sneak up to the point of putting a sword to Lan's neck without him noticing.  It diminishes him.

 

I am re-reading TGH at this time, and this actually comes up:

 

"So intent was Lan that he did not, for once, seem to hear her.  She hated the fact that she could never sneak up on him, however softly she stepped.  She had been accounted good at woodcraft back in Emond's Field, though it was not a skill in which many women took any interest."

Edited December 2, 2021 by Yojimbo

[KakitaOCU]

9 minutes ago, Yojimbo said:

There is a world of difference between Nyn being able to sneak up to within 20 feet of so and being able to sneak up to the point of putting a sword to Lan's neck without him noticing.  It diminishes him.

 

I am re-reading TGH at this time, and this actually comes up:

 

"So intent was Lan that he did not, for once, seem to hear her.  She hated the fact that she could never sneak up on him, however softly she stepped.  She had been accounted good at woodcraft back in Emond's Field, though it was not a skill in which many women took any interest."

Lan was intent on something else and didn't notice.   Like maybe tending to his injured Aes Sedai who is likely feeding off his strength some and who knows what else with the bond.  

You're not wrong, but I don't think it's as much a leap as people are making it.

I've mentioned it before, but in general if I toss out what I feel is a plausible answer it's because I could find it in a few seconds.  If I can come up with a plausible reason in a few seconds then I have trouble believing the writers didn't as well.

[DojoToad]

30 minutes ago, KakitaOCU said:

I feel like it's not as much of an issue as people think.

Look at the book scene again.  Nynaeve creeps up on them and eavesdrops on their conversation for a while before Moraine senses the spark in her and calls her out.  Lan is startled at this and never noticed she was there.

In the show Moraine is injured and down and not there to point out Nynaeve.  

Yes, he was startled in the book but she was also not within touching distance.

 

That said - he was worried and distracted by his injured Aes Sedai in the show.  Maybe that made a difference?

 

I'm fine with her tracking him, still split on knife to the neck.

[Yojimbo]

10 minutes ago, DojoToad said:

Yes, he was startled in the book but she was also not within touching distance.

 

That said - he was worried and distracted by his injured Aes Sedai in the show.  Maybe that made a difference?

 

I'm fine with her tracking him, still split on knife to the neck.

To be clear, I have no issue with her tracking him.   It's the knife to the neck that I find wrong.  It makes him less than he is, which is supposedly the best of the best.  A man who has spent more years than Nyn has been alive training himself to NOT let stuff like that happen.  

[Harad the White]

16 minutes ago, Yojimbo said:

 A man who has spent more years than Nyn has been alive training himself to NOT let stuff like that happen.

His karma admitted her dogma, knowing they would soon be making googly eyes at each other.

[Elder_Haman]

20 minutes ago, Yojimbo said:

It's the knife to the neck that I find wrong.  It makes him less than he is, which is supposedly the best of the best.

I agree. I would really have preferred that he said something to her as she was approaching and sort of calmly stand and turn. It would still have given them the reveal they were wanting and would have made Lan a little more awesome without taking anything away from Nynaeve.

 

TBH, Lan is my biggest disappointment about the show (which, to be clear, I really like). They've not made it clear how skillful he is outside of the context of the Winternight battle. He comes across as steady and capable, but not as one of the most dangerous swordsmen in the world.