Episode structure if you where showrunner.

[Mailman]

I thought it would interesting to try and jot down a rough idea on how I would have gone about setting out the first season.

 

I will start by saying that I don't think 8 1 hour episodes is enough. Really 10 would be the least I can imagine to tell the story in any way properly.

 

Open with Prologue establish taint/madness on saidin and stakes. Allows you to set a tone on what violence levels are going to be shown. Gory or Disney.

 

• EP1 Finish with attack at farm
• EP2 Trip down Quarry Rd exit Of Emonds field to the ferry scene.
• EP3 Fleeing towards Camelyn give Moiraine her fight scene to break hole in trolloc lines arrive at Shadar Logoth
• EP4 Dagger meet mordeth and split group Nynaeve joins Moiraine group at end.
• EP5,6 Group split majority time on Rand,Mat and Egwene,Perrin
• EP7 Camelyn Loial Min and the ways
• EP8 Fal Dara Fain and the Eye 1 forsaken at eye Enter dreams room to fight Ishy

 

 

I'm not showing the fight at the Village just the aftermath and moving the destructive use of Moiraines power to ep3.
I'm having Thom with the group out of EF and losing Rand and Mat at the end of Eps 5. Thom is a great source of information for unworldly farm folk and thus the viewer as well.
And finishing ep6 with the rescue of Perrin and Egwene
No Barleon moved Min to Camelyn

 

Sections are simply too rushed with only 8 episodes.

 

Ideally id like extra runtime on EP1 just 30 minutes to allow us to get to know our characters before the horse apples hit the fan.

Then another episode while they are split to give a little extra time to  Moraine, Lan and Nynaeve and further develop the Wolf and Dagger storylines.

Then around another 30 minutes to flesh out the finale give more time to the eye confrontation and Fain.

 

 

So maybe going for a 9 Episode season bookended by 90 minute opening and finale specials.

 

The more episodes the better of course.

 

What do you think or do you have a idea that you think would improve it.

 

 

[TheDreadReader]

This is kind of a hard question with eight episodes. 

 

But, basically..

 

Episode 1 - mostly the same but end at the moment that Rand arrives at the village to see the destruction.

Episode 2 - Build out the departure a little, lose the ferry scene, and have the trollocs chase them directly into SL.

Everything between 3 and 5 is okay with me

Episode 6 - Switch the focus from the Siaun/Moiraine stuff to the B plot of Moiraine handling the arrival of the EF5 in TV.  Have the EF5 all be at the same location before going to the waygate and end with them arriving in the middle of the night/wee hours of the morning.  

Episode 7 and 8 - keep everything much the same.

 

I'd rather lay it out with 9 to 12 episodes.

 

With 9, I'd split either episode 1 or episode 6 into two episodes.

With 12, I'd split both episodes 1 and 6 into two and add some of the things you mention back in. 

 

[Pandemonium]

If Amazon won't give them more episode time they should take out the wheel of time pattern intro and use that for more storyline.

 

No reason to waste valuable episode time when it is already so limited

[TheMountain]

Speaking of the intro... I would include famous male channelers as well. Perhaps a tapestry that includes bad guys, like the Forsaken.

[DaddyFinn]

1 hour ago, TheMountain said:

Speaking of the intro... I would include famous male channelers as well. Perhaps a tapestry that includes bad guys, like the Forsaken.

I hope the intro will change from season to season. Season 1 was Aes Sedai obviously, what could season 2 be?

[Skipp]

2 minutes ago, DaddyFinn said:

I hope the intro will change from season to season. Season 1 was Aes Sedai obviously, what could season 2 be?

Hero's of the horn!

[WhiteVeils]

Or cultures.

[Vambram]

4 hours ago, Skipp said:

Hero's of the horn!

 

I think that would be very cool to see. 

[SingleMort]

I think 13 episodes is reasonable. It's what GoT had and allows the story to move at a steady pace and the characters to be fully fleshed out.

 

Episode 1: I would make this either an extra long episode (like a mini movie) or a 2 parter. I would open a brief overview of the breaking and LTT plan to defeat the Dark One and his subsequent madness. This would be visually depicted but narrated Gitara Moroso and the narration would switch to foretelling the rebirth of the Dragon as we look over the battlefield where the Aiel are at the foot of Dragonmount. 

 

The rest of episode 1 would be devoted to the Two Rivers being very light and jolly establishing the council, the relationships with our main characters and preparing for BT I think I would end it with the arrival of Moiraine and the fade in the mist (if it was normal length)

 

Episode 2 or part 2 of Episode 1 I would do the attack on the village spending more time on the aftermath and then the exodus of our heroes.

 

Episode 3 the chase and the Ferry and end with the arrival at Shadar Logoth

 

Episode 4 in dead city I would really play up the ghost town elements and maybe even have a few flashbacks showing the city before it's fall. Have the Rand and Mat exploring scene the finding of the dagger and the escape.

 

Episodes 4, 5 and 6 (now 5,6 and 7 in my version) were my favourite parts of the series so I'd keep them for the most part. This is also where I would have Perrin and Elayne meet the travelling people and Mat and Rand meet Thom. I would end the sequence with Thom's sacrifice. I was okay with the Perrin and Egwene captured by Whitecloaks scene but I would end it with Perrin killing some of them as that will set things up nicely for the future.

 

Episode 8 and 9

Replace Camelyn with Tar Valon. Have everyone meet there eventually and introduce Elayne and her brothers and mother also would be a good opportunity to introduce Elaida. I would have Moiraines reunited party betrayed by someone like Liandrin (although maybe not reveal that until later) and they basically have to escape through the way gate in a similar fashion to the books.

 

Episode 10 the journey through the ways and show someone following them.

 

Episode 11 arrival in Fal Dara this is where I would introduce Siuan have her waiting for them because she's guessed Moiraines plan then I would do the similar scenes to the series when Moiraine and her met and also introduce her to the characters. I'd cut the exile part though as it would be irrelevant in this context.

 

Episode 12 have all the Two Rivers characters go into the Blight minus Nyneave and Egwene and have Suian and the Shieneran prepare for the attack. 

 

Episode 13 have the Two Rivers characters in the Blight have a bit of the skirmish at the eye while Rand fights Ishamael and have Suian replace Amalisa's part doing a linking to support the defenders at the wall. I'd also put them with the defenders not one their own. 

 

I would end with Rand unfurling the Dragon banner.

 

Sorry for very long reply and there are things I missed out and I'm just an armchair expert with no skills in making a TV series whatsoever but as a thought experiment that's roughly what I'd have done.

[EduardoEnriqueGonzalez]

8 episodes makes it tight indeed. Especially when you use up about half of one episode on the extensive grieving, dramatic suicide, and elaborate funeral of some random warder. But hey there's no time for the events and characters that actually matter.

[Mailman]

14 hours ago, TheDreadReader said:

This is kind of a hard question with eight episodes. 

 

But, basically..

 

Episode 1 - mostly the same but end at the moment that Rand arrives at the village to see the destruction.

Episode 2 - Build out the departure a little, lose the ferry scene, and have the trollocs chase them directly into SL.

Everything between 3 and 5 is okay with me

Episode 6 - Switch the focus from the Siaun/Moiraine stuff to the B plot of Moiraine handling the arrival of the EF5 in TV.  Have the EF5 all be at the same location before going to the waygate and end with them arriving in the middle of the night/wee hours of the morning.  

Episode 7 and 8 - keep everything much the same.

 

I'd rather lay it out with 9 to 12 episodes.

 

With 9, I'd split either episode 1 or episode 6 into two episodes.

With 12, I'd split both episodes 1 and 6 into two and add some of the things you mention back in. 

From a end of Eps 1 point I like either the Tam grabbing Rand or the destruction of the village as the close to build suspense, timing is the issue.

 

Always liked the ferry scene showed how committed Moiraine was (Not killing the ferrymen of course.)

 

Still prefer to stay with Camelyn instead of Tar Valon as the regroup point. With only 8 episodes theres no time to engage with anyone in the Tower.

 

[Mailman]

7 hours ago, SingleMort said:

I think 13 episodes is reasonable. It's what GoT had and allows the story to move at a steady pace and the characters to be fully fleshed out.

 

Episode 1: I would make this either an extra long episode (like a mini movie) or a 2 parter. I would open a brief overview of the breaking and LTT plan to defeat the Dark One and his subsequent madness. This would be visually depicted but narrated Gitara Moroso and the narration would switch to foretelling the rebirth of the Dragon as we look over the battlefield where the Aiel are at the foot of Dragonmount. 

 

The rest of episode 1 would be devoted to the Two Rivers being very light and jolly establishing the council, the relationships with our main characters and preparing for BT I think I would end it with the arrival of Moiraine and the fade in the mist (if it was normal length)

 

Episode 2 or part 2 of Episode 1 I would do the attack on the village spending more time on the aftermath and then the exodus of our heroes.

 

Episode 3 the chase and the Ferry and end with the arrival at Shadar Logoth

 

Episode 4 in dead city I would really play up the ghost town elements and maybe even have a few flashbacks showing the city before it's fall. Have the Rand and Mat exploring scene the finding of the dagger and the escape.

 

Episodes 4, 5 and 6 (now 5,6 and 7 in my version) were my favourite parts of the series so I'd keep them for the most part. This is also where I would have Perrin and Elayne meet the travelling people and Mat and Rand meet Thom. I would end the sequence with Thom's sacrifice. I was okay with the Perrin and Egwene captured by Whitecloaks scene but I would end it with Perrin killing some of them as that will set things up nicely for the future.

 

Episode 8 and 9

Replace Camelyn with Tar Valon. Have everyone meet there eventually and introduce Elayne and her brothers and mother also would be a good opportunity to introduce Elaida. I would have Moiraines reunited party betrayed by someone like Liandrin (although maybe not reveal that until later) and they basically have to escape through the way gate in a similar fashion to the books.

 

Episode 10 the journey through the ways and show someone following them.

 

Episode 11 arrival in Fal Dara this is where I would introduce Siuan have her waiting for them because she's guessed Moiraines plan then I would do the similar scenes to the series when Moiraine and her met and also introduce her to the characters. I'd cut the exile part though as it would be irrelevant in this context.

 

Episode 12 have all the Two Rivers characters go into the Blight minus Nyneave and Egwene and have Suian and the Shieneran prepare for the attack. 

 

Episode 13 have the Two Rivers characters in the Blight have a bit of the skirmish at the eye while Rand fights Ishamael and have Suian replace Amalisa's part doing a linking to support the defenders at the wall. I'd also put them with the defenders not one their own. 

 

I would end with Rand unfurling the Dragon banner.

 

Sorry for very long reply and there are things I missed out and I'm just an armchair expert with no skills in making a TV series whatsoever but as a thought experiment that's roughly what I'd have done.

I'm very much on the side of having around 90 minute episodes to bookend the season. Added time and gives the episodes a special feel.

 

The only issue I can see is if you have Moiraine betrayed and using the waygate as escape it is hard to have Siuan guessing that as her plan and being in Fal Dara before her.

[Mailman]

11 hours ago, DaddyFinn said:

I hope the intro will change from season to season. Season 1 was Aes Sedai obviously, what could season 2 be?

The problem I see is that you have the 2 bigger name actors as Moiraine and Lan. And you already have Judkins basically saying theres no way they are going to be a small role in the upcoming season. When in fact they are hardly in the 2nd book.

 

So im guessing it going to be them as leads again.

[SingleMort]

3 hours ago, Mailman said:

The problem I see is that you have the 2 bigger name actors as Moiraine and Lan. And you already have Judkins basically saying theres no way they are going to be a small role in the upcoming season. When in fact they are hardly in the 2nd book.

 

So im guessing it going to be them as leads again.

Someone should tell Rafe that sometimes less is more. Moiraine was a very enigmatic character in the books and very much into spying and secrets and was always making plans. If you put her front and center the whole time and show so many intimate moments  she has then it strips away the enigma and mystique she has and actually makes her a weaker character. Part of the fun of Moiraine was trying to guess what she was up. I imagine we will also have to cut down characters who actually have a big part in book 2 to fit such things in. Apologies, I digress.

[expat]

Quote

Especially when you use up about half of one episode on the extensive grieving, dramatic suicide, and elaborate funeral of some random warder. But hey there's no time for the events and characters that actually matter.

Isn't this the inherent dilemma of world building in such an elaborate setting as WOT?  There is a lot of lore that is either skipped or just dropped in without adequate explanation/emphisis throughout the shows.  This missing lore is quite rightly criticized as making the series much harder to understand and relate to.  OTOH, when you show the world building in episodes like 4 & 5, the time taken to explore the lore is criticized as wasted because the scenes aren't in the books and replace important book events.

 

At best, getting the balance right is a blindfold tightrope walk through a path of knives over a 20 foot pit without a net. 

Edited December 27, 2021 by expat

[WhiteVeils]

The part we as viewer/readers have to get over is the idea of opportunity cost.  If you can get over the idea that showing X means not showing Y, and instead thinking of them as separate paths towards the end goal (the /real/ last battle), it is quite freeing.  You aren't giving up lesser stories from the books to show the warder funeral. Those stories were always gone for many reasons (for example: building the set for the city of Caemlyn being cost-prohibitive).  Independently of that, showing the Warder suicide in funeral explains Moiraine passing the bond, Moridin's end-game play, the significance when Rand is bonded by various persons, Gawyn and Egwene's bond and what happens there...  That one scene and comments made around it can be set up as 'Previously on...' for many later scenes and will explain a ton.

[TheDreadReader]

4 hours ago, expat said:

Isn't this the inherent dilemma of world building in such an elaborate setting as WOT?  There is a lot of lore that is either skipped or just dropped in without adequate explanation/emphisis throughout the shows. 

 

TBH, a lot of this "missing lore" is meaningless within a TV show context.   That's just a functional difference between displaying things visually versus describing them in words.   

 

 

Another way of saying this might be, there is a lot of lore that is relevant in words but irrelevant in pictures (because the pictures allow you to see differences immediately).

 

 

[notpropaganda73]

Honestly, I wouldn't really change all that much with what they have done in terms of the over-arching structure. It is more little moments that I would change, where opportunities for character building have been missed. 

 

However one big change I would definitely include is more dream sequences in the build up to the episode 8 Rand vs. Flame Dude. I feel the season's biggest weakness is losing the focus on the EF5 and adding in another couple of dream sequences would have increased the creepiness, the suspense and also would probably have added to the "who is the DR" mystery that they wanted in S1, because the DO doesn't know which of them is the Dragon either. 

 

I would also tear up episode 8 and try again. 

[fra85uk]

On 12/27/2021 at 7:57 PM, WhiteVeils said:

The part we as viewer/readers have to get over is the idea of opportunity cost.  If you can get over the idea that showing X means not showing Y, and instead thinking of them as separate paths towards the end goal (the /real/ last battle), it is quite freeing.  You aren't giving up lesser stories from the books to show the warder funeral. Those stories were always gone for many reasons (for example: building the set for the city of Caemlyn being cost-prohibitive).  Independently of that, showing the Warder suicide in funeral explains Moiraine passing the bond, Moridin's end-game play, the significance when Rand is bonded by various persons, Gawyn and Egwene's bond and what happens there...  That one scene and comments made around it can be set up as 'Previously on...' for many later scenes and will explain a ton.

For Caemlyn they could Have used a real city (in the end Caemlyn is based on Camelot)

For the Bond thing not only that could Have been shown just in few seconds of Stepin going berserk and die vs Logain but the whole episode misses to underline that Stepin is not just depressed because he "was nothing before she gave the honour of being her warder"(!!!) but because there is a magical nature of the Bond. So, it does not serve to prepare in advance for the final Season but just blatantly robs the focus from the main characters.

[SingleMort]

On 12/29/2021 at 11:49 AM, fra85uk said:

For Caemlyn they could Have used a real city (in the end Caemlyn is based on Camelot)

For the Bond thing not only that could Have been shown just in few seconds of Stepin going berserk and die vs Logain but the whole episode misses to underline that Stepin is not just depressed because he "was nothing before she gave the honour of being her warder"(!!!) but because there is a magical nature of the Bond. So, it does not serve to prepare in advance for the final Season but just blatantly robs the focus from the main characters.

One thing that could have worked quite well is if the loss of being a warder drew Stepin into a murderous rage instead of suicidal depression and he tries to kill Logain and Lan is forced to fight him to stop him and ends up killing him. 

Edited December 30, 2021 by SingleMort

[Vambram]

13 hours ago, SingleMort said:

One thing that could have worked quite well is if the loss of the warder drew Stepin into a murderous rage instead of suicidal depression and he tries to kill Logain and Lan is forced to fight him to stop him and ends up killing him. 

That scene would have been a LOT better than what we got instead.

[fra85uk]

I am not going to make an episode by episode but with 8 hours is absolutely possible fo follow the book faithfully

 

But one thing that I would have introduced to get a better parallel Dragon/Dragon reborn is to have a few minutes of LTT in every episode until the "meeting" that is going to happen eventually with Rand.

 

So in the first episode, you show LTT/Ishy confrontation ending with LTT going nuke

 

Then in each episode you go backwards and show some glimpse of the age of legends:

 

examples:

Ishmael turning to the dark side while explaining in the hall of servants his philosophy

Plans to close the Bore

LTT expedition and the taint of saidin

 

and going on when you introduce other Forsakens in the current timeline, i.e. Lanfear

Lanfear leading to the opening the bore

Lanfear/LTT romance 

 

 

 

[EduardoEnriqueGonzalez]

On 12/27/2021 at 10:58 AM, expat said:

Isn't this the inherent dilemma of world building in such an elaborate setting as WOT?  There is a lot of lore that is either skipped or just dropped in without adequate explanation/emphisis throughout the shows.  This missing lore is quite rightly criticized as making the series much harder to understand and relate to.  OTOH, when you show the world building in episodes like 4 & 5, the time taken to explore the lore is criticized as wasted because the scenes aren't in the books and replace important book events.

 

At best, getting the balance right is a blindfold tightrope walk through a path of knives over a 20 foot pit without a net. 

I'm with you on the big picture. It's tough. In this particular case though (the focus on the random warder), I see no dilema. For one thing, worldbuilding doesn't need focusing half of an episode on a meaningless character. You hint at what happens to the warder, creating some foreboding and foreshadowing, and later on bring it home with a character that the viewer actually cares about. 

[Guest Testeria]

I would surely remove episodes based on unimportant characters which are at least 4,5,8 (Logain, Stepin, Amalysa). We have three stories with big exposition with dead ends. I know that 4 was actually the best one - but it breaks construction and flow of the whole story. I remember a tv series where every episode started with action unrelated to main protagonists but relevant to the story of that episode, this would work very well in WoT.

I also do not understand why they needed like 200 people to write and direct episodes. Really for 100 mln $ show it could be written by one, mostly 2 people. Then it would have a chance to be coherent, engaging STORY, not bunch of contradicting stories with different pace and tone. Or if it is not possible at least made it that every episode is told by different of main characters - that at least would make differences into the presented world. ?

[AdamA]

I actually think 8 episodes was fine and they covered most of what they needed to. The changes I'd have made would be smaller. In the first episode, include more basic character development and just cut out the battle. Do it like the books where the main battle happens off screen. The upside is you save the money and can get a better battle at Tarwin's Gap. I think it was more important to end with a bang than to start with one. Also, the final confrontation between Rand and Ba'alzamon should have been much more spectacular than what we got. I'm fine with cutting the Green Man and other Forsaken, but the battle we got needed to be better. If they're going to give Egwene's initiation test to Rand, fine, but do that earlier in the dream sequences. The only reason they didn't was to preserve the "who is the dragon" mystery, but I would not have bothered with that. I think the story works fine knowing right off the bat that Rand is the dragon.

 

I'm not really concerned about cutting Caemlyn right now because personally I don't think they did. I think they moved those scenes to season two. So we'll see if that's right or not. Even if they just introduce Elayne and the brothers as already being at Tar Valon and defer introducing Morgase and Gareth Bryne to later, I'm not sure you lose a ton, except they need some way to explain why Elayne develops a crush on Rand since he isn't at Tar Valon and they wouldn't be able to meet that way.

 

On the other hand, though, I did have some complaints about the "one month later" jumpahead making the world feel pretty small compared to the vastness you feel in the books with how long it takes people to travel everywhere. Randland is supposed to be larger than the entire continental US. Moving the Logain capture and warder side story into cartoon extras could have enabled at least keeping in Baerlon and Whitebridge so the world feels larger and we get to spend more time with Thom. I feel like right now nobody will even care when he shows back up because he only had 5 minutes of screentime and his "death" is a lot more "so what" than it is in the books, where you have a reason to care about him.