S1E8: The Eye of the World v2

[CaddySedai]

Resume topic here.

 

Stay on target. Don't be personal. 

[Mirefox]

Did we ever get any confirmation what, exactly, it was that Rand went to?  They kept calling it the Eye of the World but Moiraine also called it the Dark One’s prison.  We didn’t have a pool of Saidin, no Green Man, no horn, no banner, etc.  I kind of assumed Moiraine was just wrong but the show Eye wasn’t really recognizable as the book Eye.  

Edited December 29, 2021 by Mirefox

[CaddySedai]

2 minutes ago, Mirefox said:

I kind of assumed Moiraine was just wrong but the story Eye wasn’t really recognizable as the book Eye.  

 

Well she's likely definitely wrong. Since there WAS a seal to the prison there (and if that seal is palm sized I'm terrified which Palm it is meant to fit lmao) it somewhat served the same purpose. 

 

I would LOVE to find that the Horn was found there, then moved to Malkier for safety, then maybe Fal Dara when Malkier fell. At least then we get some fidelity to the original plot.

 

I also would wager the whole "We don't know its purpose" will come back to be relevant somehow. 

[Mirefox]

1 minute ago, CaddySedai said:

 

Well she's likely definitely wrong. Since there WAS a seal to the prison there (and if that seal is palm sized I'm terrified which Palm it is meant to fit lmao) it somewhat served the same purpose. 

 

I would LOVE to find that the Horn was found there, then moved to Malkier for safety, then maybe Fal Dara when Malkier fell. At least then we get some fidelity to the original plot.

 

I also would wager the whole "We don't know its purpose" will come back to be relevant somehow. 

Haha, yeah, the size of that seal was surprising but that is one of the changes I was ok with.  It always struck me as a little weird in the books that such unfathomably important things were so small.  I know being “indestructible” was a sort of protection but they struck me as the kind of things that would show up on some Randland Antiques Roadshow after someone found one in their great grandmother’s vase or something.

 

Of course, having them as big as they are in the snow ties them to a physical location so there may be a little more globetrotting ahead.

[Skipp]

Lezbi Nerdy pointed out that the room kinda resembled the Hall of the White Tower.  She theorized it is the Hall of the Servants from the AoL.  Certainly an interesting thought.

[KakitaOCU]

16 minutes ago, Mirefox said:

Did we ever get any confirmation what, exactly, it was that Rand went to?  They kept calling it the Eye of the World but Moiraine also called it the Dark One’s prison.  We didn’t have a pool of Saidin, no Green Man, no horn, no banner, etc.  I kind of assumed Moiraine was just wrong but the show Eye wasn’t really recognizable as the book Eye.  

Misunderstanding over 3000 years.  I very much think the floor platform is meant to be one of the seals.  Rand was in a position where he could have strengthened it or broke it is the narrative.

I think Ishamael spread those rumors throughout his not fully trapped time.  In reality Rand could have left the Seal alone or broken it and so he made the wrong choice.

 

  

4 minutes ago, Mirefox said:

Of course, having them as big as they are in the snow ties them to a physical location so there may be a little more globetrotting ahead.

Honestly, I don't think it'll be a huge issue.  As I recall there's only a few real issues to deal with them not being mobile.

The one Elayne and Nynaeve break on accident.  But that could just break to start and avoid the whole issue.

The one Taim gives to Rand.  Not sure how to approach that one, maybe he has a map instead of the actual object.

Or maybe different ones are different sizes?  Like the Eye was the Main seal and the others are almost like anchor points or keystones?

Edited December 29, 2021 by KakitaOCU

[CaddySedai]

7 minutes ago, Mirefox said:

Haha, yeah, the size of that seal was surprising but that is one of the changes I was ok with.  It always struck me as a little weird in the books that such unfathomably important things were so small.  I know being “indestructible” was a sort of protection but they struck me as the kind of things that would show up on some Randland Antiques Roadshow after someone found one in their great grandmother’s vase or something.

 

Of course, having them as big as they are in the snow ties them to a physical location so there may be a little more globetrotting ahead.

 

Well that was always the thing about the seals. Being small they could be hidden. Being small they could be lost.

 

While true - bigger means defending it is still on the table - and that its harder to lose. It will be interesting how they will be broken in upcoming episodes. 

 

If the series goes yard, will the sealbreaker be now a cool scene where Logain gateways from one seal to the other smashing them both?

 

3 minutes ago, KakitaOCU said:

I think Ishamael spread those rumors throughout his not fully trapped time.  In reality Rand could have left the Seal alone or broken it and so he made the wrong choice.

 

Which would be in line with many of our views in the Books that he screwed up royally at the Eye. Though he was somewhat backed into the corner between bad option A and Bad option B lol.

[Ralph]

10 minutes ago, Mirefox said:

Haha, yeah, the size of that seal was surprising but that is one of the changes I was ok with.  It always struck me as a little weird in the books that such unfathomably important things were so small.  I know being “indestructible” was a sort of protection but they struck me as the kind of things that would show up on some Randland Antiques Roadshow after someone found one in their great grandmother’s vase or something.

 

 

This is basically what happened - Bayle Domon!! 

[JaimAybara]

Does this completely remove the Hunt for the Horn then? How long has it been there? / how does this impact Faile and even Lord Luc? Does the rest of the world think it’s still missing? Interesting to see how this will play out.

[gibbons]

1 minute ago, CaddySedai said:

 

 

I also would wager the whole "We don't know its purpose" will come back to be relevant somehow. 

 

I am starting to suspect that this is the case, and perhaps that Moiraines examination of the broken seal will prompt her to either discover the dragon banner and either fragments of the karaethon cycle or hints about some of the forsaken.

 

I do wonder if we will discover that another Aes Sedai had arrived at the eye much earlier, then decided to hide the horn in what would normally be a fairly secure location. I would feel a little better about the uncharacteristic depiction of Agelmar (rude to Aes Sedai, poor strategy and preperation etc) if we do infact discover that he knew the horn was there but had sworn to safeguard it for the Dragon. Potential for a hint at the existance of the black ajah infact, assuming that an Aes Sedai hid the horn and also warned Agelmar not to trust any other Aes Sedai with it's location. 

[CaddySedai]

Something of intrigue:

 

The Aes Sedai have either forgotten, or have erased the duality of the Power.

 

Why? Notice in the series we see the Dragons fang used. So the negative aspect lives on. 

 

But where is the Flame? The Aes Sedai do not use the symbol at all. Not even in TV.

 

The first time we see it...and the Duality - in the Eye. A remnant of the AS of old.

[Skipp]

2 minutes ago, CaddySedai said:

But where is the Flame? The Aes Sedai do not use the symbol at all. Not even in TV.

 

We see the flame in one of the trailers.  It was a shot of the Two Rivers women walking to the sacred cave.  So the production originally planned on having that shot but there seems to have been a fair amount cut from episode one.

[Ralph]

1 hour ago, CaddySedai said:

Something of intrigue:

 

The Aes Sedai have either forgotten, or have erased the duality of the Power.

 

Why? Notice in the series we see the Dragons fang used. So the negative aspect lives on. 

 

But where is the Flame? The Aes Sedai do not use the symbol at all. Not even in TV.

 

The first time we see it...and the Duality - in the Eye. A remnant of the AS of old.

 

Min's vision of the Flame. And one of LPD's titles

Edited December 30, 2021 by Ralph

[gibbons]

Was the flame of tar valon not a symbol specificly tied to the amyrlin seat? rather than Aes Sedai in general? up until we see it's more literal use in the last book anyway.

In regards to the size of the seal, it may well be possible that we still get to see palm sized seals later on. If we are to assume that there are more seals (and the dark one hasn't started flaying everyone yet so it stands to reason there are) then we could start to see smaller seals that are tied into a larger one. Maybe Rand damaging the Eye of the world weakens the others, allowing them to be damaged more easily and to let everyone's favourite villains slip out and wreak havoc on the world.  

[notpropaganda73]

13 minutes ago, CaddySedai said:

Something of intrigue:

 

The Aes Sedai have either forgotten, or have erased the duality of the Power.

 

Why? Notice in the series we see the Dragons fang used. So the negative aspect lives on. 

 

But where is the Flame? The Aes Sedai do not use the symbol at all. Not even in TV.

 

The first time we see it...and the Duality - in the Eye. A remnant of the AS of old.

 

To tease that out a bit, in our world we have that phrase about history being written by the "winners". While you can argue whether there were any actual winners other than the DO's counterstrike from the War of Power, the female Aes Sedai would be in charge and write the history. In some ways it would make a lot of sense that the story of what actually happened became so corrupted as to erase/forget about the duality of the One Power. 

 

I know memory and history not being accurate after thousands of years is a staple of the books as well, but it is interesting to think that the show is leaning even more heavily into that idea. Especially if the Black Ajah are active and sabotaging records at the White Tower. 

 

It's something I feel the show hasn't necessarily justified so far, but if they explore this more in coming seasons it could really add a lot to the series.

[notpropaganda73]

I've just had another thought in relation to that^, full series spoilers for the books...

 

Spoiler

This idea of the accepted wisdom in the current day being completely wrong could really elevate Verin's role (not that she needs elevated all that much!). She is a Brown so would be an accepted source of knowledge in the show, but she is also Black Ajah so would have sources of knowledge beyond the standard for Browns. There is potential there for hints about her secret to be littered through the show. 

 

I really hope they get Verin right! 

 

[CaddySedai]

The flame was arguably used quite liberally. 

 

It was on each Mark issued out of TV. 

 

Everyone should know the flame as much as they should fear the fang. 

[Jackdaw_Fool]

Apologies if this doesn't belong here, but multiple people told me (I forget who, but TheDreadReader is one) in the previous thread that saidin and "the male half of the one power" were explicitly mentioned in the show. I had asked if someone could point me to where (I know it's in the bonus material, but they said it was in the show). Does anyone know?

 

Specifically for episode 8, based on Moraine's explanation to Rand as to why she could not teach him, how she described the making of the sa'angreal, and how the power was spoken of in the prologue, I'm presently thinking there is not a distinction in the show regarding there being male and female halves of the one power. If I've somehow missed that there was an explicit mention of it somewhere that would be really helpful in clarifying things. Thanks!

Edited December 29, 2021 by Jackdaw_Fool

[Skipp]

3 minutes ago, Jackdaw_Fool said:

Apologies if this doesn't belong here, but multiple people told me (I forget who, but TheDreadReader is one) in the previous thread that saidin and "the male half of the one power" were explicitly mentioned in the show. I had asked if someone could point me to where (I know it's in the bonus material, but they said it was in the show). Does anyone know?

 

Specifically for episode 8, based on Moraine's explanation to Rand as to why she could not teach him, how she described the making of the sa'angreal, and how the power was spoken of in the prologue, I'm presently thinking there is not a distinction in the show regarding there being male and female halves of the one power. If I've somehow missed that there was an explicit mention of it somewhere that would be really helpful in clarifying things. Thanks!

I don't necessarily know which example @TheDreadReader was referring to but I heard the term used in the episode 8 cold open between LTT and LDD.

 

The scene is subtitled and the subtitle translates Saidin simply as "The One power"  and some people have taken this to simply mean a translation error or some such.  But I remember an interview with either RJ2 or Sarah Nakamura where they were discussing the old tongue and the way it was constructed in terms of  gendered words.  Unfortunately I cannot remember exactly what was said about it.

[Jackdaw_Fool]

3 minutes ago, Skipp said:

The scene is subtitled and the subtitle translates Saidin simply as "The One power"

Thanks. Yeah, I mentioned that myself in the other thread so I don't think that is what was being referred to. I said I was thinking the speaking of "saidin" in the old tongue in that scene might actually have been used to mean "your power" which was spoken to LTT by LPD only a few words later, as in maybe a male possessive form of "the power" but that was just conjecture and I'm sure beyond the allowed scope of this discussion (I didn't myself hear saidin, it was all just gobbledeegook to me.)

[Yojimbo]

1 hour ago, CaddySedai said:

Resume topic here.

 

Stay on target. 

It says something about me I think that I actually heard these words in my head as the voice of Gold Five (Star Wars: A New Hope)

1 hour ago, CaddySedai said:

 

 I'm terrified which Palm it is meant to fit lmao.

 

 

Maybe whoever that statue in Tremalking was based on?  ?

[Ralph]

1 hour ago, CaddySedai said:

The flame was arguably used quite liberally. 

 

It was on each Mark issued out of TV. 

 

Everyone should know the flame as much as they should fear the fang. 

 

And every shawl

[7th age]

Not sure how to quote from the closed thread, so ill just post the quotes in italic, all quotes by KakitaOCU except my repost at the end

 

Quote

 

"I use "you" in a generic sense.  My apologies if it came off as an attack on you. "

 

"Also, I love that you watch the LTT where Latra calls him arrogant and prideful and assume that's all there is to the story."

 

 

Thats not a generic you unless you assume that the vast majority of nonreaders assume thats all there is to it and you love that?

Apology accepted anyway?? (and not really necessary, Im White Ajah enough to really  not care whether someone attacks or insults(which you didnt) me. In fact being (logically) attacked for my arguments is kinda why Im here?. How boring and useless would these forums be if we all had the same opinion from the start!)

 

Quote

"However if a person IS a book reader, then they know all these other details going on and that arrogance and hubris were one of LTT's primary failings to the point that Rand acknowledges them and then almost repeats them anyway."

 

My problem isnt showing LTTs arrogance and hubris. My problem is NOT showing the desperation of the act and the situation during the war and thereby making arrogance the so far only discernable motive for this. Idve also liked to see a (very short)repudiation of Latras plans, because once I realized the strength of the Choedan Kal in the books I thought to myself here is a plan thats even more crackbrained and dangerous then what the men did and thats without taking into consideration the acces keys were lost in shadow territory at this time or the possiblity the bore might widen under the shield. I mean having a device that can "crack the world like an egg" run FOREVER really seems designed to bring about the apocalypse. Also didnt like LPD predicting everything correctly even though this something thats never been done before.

 

Quote

" If you only read EotW with no knowledge going forward you'd get a similar view of Men=Stupid and arrogant and failures while Women have to pick up the pieces. "

 

I really dont think I felt this way, but to be fair it has been very long since I first read the EotW so I might not remember correctly

 

 

Quote

"But why you feel this is based on?"

and from a later post (seems we have enough disagreements to argue and debate for a while ?, thats why im here, respectful and constructive exchange of thoughts and ideas)

 

Quote

"In general, the idea that there's any deliberate attempt to undermine men for any agenda is an unrealistic fear with no real support regardless of what you call it. "

 

And in response Ill just repost myself from page 33 of the last thread:

 

Since this is a response to a response to a post of mine, but more importantly because this seems to be the main dividing point over which this fanbase splits I feel I should make myself very clear here.

 

For context let me first say that Im a lefty. I dont live in the USA but if I was Idve voted for Bernie. I also consider myself a first and second (but not third) wave feminist and I have attended anti-neonazi protests since I was 12. This is to dispell any notion that I am somehow "anti-woke". I wouldnt consider myself "woke" either (I hate that word, in part because it is used as a slur by people who often(but not always) are quite openly racist and misogynist, but mostly because it is imprecise)

Im also a trained physicist/scientist, meaning I was trained to seperate the analysis of a problem from the judgement that only follows after.

 

Now, when analyzing this one has to be very careful, because if you view something through a colored lens everything becomes monochromatic and most of the time, if you search for signs of something hard enough, you end up finding them and ignoring everything else. Certainly some of the "nerfing all the men"-crowd have fallen into this trap which amuses me greatly as it reminds me of the feminist complaint that female videogame characters (think LoL here) are often portrayed in a sexist way, scantily clad armor, big boobs etc. , which is true but completly ignores that the same is true for the men, i.e. giant muscles, chisseled chins etc...

 

 

 

That all being said, it is impossble for me to deny that modern feminist ideology has played a part in shaping this season. Whether or not I think that is good or bad in each individual case is immaterial to this at first.

 

 

Now there are plenty of other reasons that should be considered first when analysing this.

 

For example, the downpowering of Logain (he gets held by 2 -3 AS instead of 6 if i remember correctly) has nothing to do with a desire to "nerf men" and everything to do with an episode that doesnt work so well if most of the scenes happen in an overcrowded cave. Could you avoid this by changing the setting? Yes, but thats a whole lot of cost (lets remember here that most ppl think ep 4 was the best or at least close) for not a lot of gain (Logains accurate strength beyond he is strong is irrelavant to the series).

 

Similarly you can argue that showing the womens circle is important for Nynaeve and Egwene and gives us the river scene which I think most bookies liked, whereas showing the Village Council would do nothing similar for the boys(though it would show balance, but time is scarce).

There are other examples.

 

 

When we want to actually understand whether or not ideology plays a part in this season or not we first need to define what exactly we are talking about. In the shortest way possible, the heart of modern (third wave) feminism /wokeness in general is the denial of biological sex as a relevant factor and instead explaining everything in terms of gender or sociological/psychological sex (which to me is just as absurd as most right wing positions that try to postulate the opposite, obviously both biology AND sociology play a role in forming humans).

It also includes a normalizing of non heteronormative sexual relations(which I personally think is a good thing so long as it means being tolerant towards those that get born with these inclinations but can become a bad thing if it is expected to be the new norm, i.e. just because Im in favor of viewing LGBT people in the same light as everyone else doesnt negate the fact that the large majority  are plain old heteros)

 

Now these two "tropes" can be found abundantly throughout the season and this is where it becomes clear that at the very least this worldview of the showrunners has influenced their decision making, at worst they are actively trying to rebuild parts of the world of WoT in this image. At this point I will remind you guys that Rafe said this before the season ever started, he thinks there are things that Jordan would have written differently if he were to write the books today and he hopes to implement this ...

 

But lets get more concrete. In no less then 4 episodes in a row we get told/shown how normal homo/bi sexual relations are. Dana mentions it at length in ep 3 . we get humorously shocked Nyn in ep4,  Lan and Steppin talk about it in ep5 (which is actually very offensive as they almost imply that being gay/bi is a choice, a notion the gay community has fought for decades) and then we get Moirain and Siuan.

None of these thing bother me on their own, I expected Siuan and M. and I found Nyn reaction funny, but together they start to paint a picture here, because after all screen time is very very valuable...

 

Lets get to the first "trope", the denial of biological differences. Obviously this is not to mean that men have Boobs or can carry babies etc..  Rather it goes into into denying/minimizing the differences that come with men being physically superior but less socially/emotionally adept.

This is why we have scenes like Egwenes father being super worried, Steppin moping about instead of going out in a rageinduced berserkersuicide and ofc Lans whole transformation from "stoneface" to crying at a funeral and being quite in touch with his feelings. Again, this isnt necessarily bad. I think it works when it comes to Lan/Nyn especially because being stoic doesnt mean you are emotionally inept, just that you arent prone to showing emotions in public. I really didnt like it at the funeral, because here it seems forced to me (but thats just opinion). 

This also seems part of the reason why we get to see a whole lot of tears and crying and whining from Rand and Perrin. Im not saying that this was done bad or without incharacter reasons, but  it was a choice to focus, especially Perrins arc, on this. They could have chosen to highlight other parts just as well but didnt.

 

Now for the minimizing of difference in physical strength.

This starts with the Emondsfield women being the only resistance to the trollocs, goes on to Dana trapping and chasing Rand with a sword and lands in the sacrifice of the core principals of the Borderlanders(for people who claim to admire the diversity of RJs cultures they sure didnt  care about this one). The Borderlander culture is based on chivalry. They would rather die then let a women take a wound. Throughout the series there are loads and loads of rules set by women that the men have to and do follow, remember what Agelmar tells rand when  he wants to say goodbye to Egwene, they do not necessarily understand the womens rules, but they abide by them. So it is not a matter of disrespect. The price for this chivalry is the (afaik)  ONLY rule ever imposed on women by men, that is they are not allowed to fight shadowspawn / join the men fighting in the blight(not even Tenobia, queen of Saldea could break this even though she manages to ignore it at the LB and promptly gets herself killed). I wrote about this earlier, this always made supreme sense to me, for one because women on average are physically much weaker then men (womens football/soccer nationalteam cant win against an average U16 mens club even though at that age there is almost no height difference, also Siuan Sanche agrees, see the TGH lection with Nyn/Eg), but more importantly because while you can ask people to die in a hopeless fight against the shadow in order to protect their loved ones and most will be willing to take on enormous risk, but if you ask them to die WITH their loved ones/wives and especially children any decent husband/father will take his family and run.

But instead of showing this as one of many cultures we get to see loads of women with swords and armor and Amalisa calls on all women and children to stay and fight/die(after all she doesnt expect to win here).

 

Now finally for the part that doesnt need any "trope". In ep.1 Moiraine clearly states that "the arrogance of men" was responsible for the breaking. At the time I wrote this of as unreliable narration which made sense to me in a world where the prophecies are muddled, but the cold open of season 8 flatout confirms this to be true. It is not arrogance and desperation, it is not due to the fact that the plan of the women /LPD for whom if I remember correctly LTT orignally postponed his plan at first and only came back to it later after the womens plan became untenable, it is purely due to the arrogance of men (whereas the women were wise enough to exactly forsee the consequences of something that has never been done before...).

It is those last 2 things, both happening in ep8 that broke the camels back for me.

 

Note that I am not going into a lot of the complaints voiced here before:

- Lan getting responsibility for the break up of the group (M. says your losses are my losses, but she is unconscious at the time and  warns against it before) but not getting his decapitating a Fade moment; 

the whole tracking thing;

-M. Eg. Nyn. and Shaiel getting their visually awesome moments, most if not all of which I liked (someone noted earlier that badass moments dont make strong characters which might be true for the poster but is at least only half true for the vast majority of viewers, Nyns explosion as well as the fight are  a big reason ep.4 was so well received, also lets not kid ourselves people watched GoT because of battles and dragons and smart intrigue not because they enjoyed cersei drinking wine and looking out of a window) but there being nothing remotly similar for the men up to them giving Rands power moment to the women;

-giving Mat and Perrin nasty backgrounds and nasty endings (ones a potential DF at this point the other just lets his friend bleed out and the Horn just taken away, heck even if he follows the Way of the Leaf he couldve tried to at least block them and then get knocked down or wounded, the tinkers did it earlier)

-etc.

 On their own all these things can be explained by other factors which is why I dint include them in my original argument, but the sheer number of them adds weight to the general argument.

 

There is also at least one (very minor yet still I hoped for this before the season) aspect to this that i think is 100% positive, they managed to show non-gratitious nudity (bathhouse scene with the first selector), something that could be very helpful in properly implementing various scenes later one as well as something that I would not trust a hetero, non-nudist, man to get right.

 

 

All in all I think it is fair for everyone to judge the success and extent of these influences for themselves and we can argue/debate the merits/faults of them to our hearts content afterwards, but to actually say that there simply are no such influences, even after watching the whole season and actually reflecting on it is absurd.

 

 

 

ps. Im new here and certainly dont feel  in a position to demand new threads plus Im aware that this discussion was raging (and probably getting out of control sometimes) even after the first 3 episodes were released and I think the mods shut down some threads due to repetetivness and maybe toxcicity of the debate, but as this seems to be one of the main topics and we can now discuss this with the full season watched maybe it would be appropriate to concentrate this topic in a new thread, should the mods choose to do so so certainly feel free to transfer this post.

 

pps. not sure why this needs to be approved by a mod, is it simply the length? If so, np. If there is something im doing wrong or maybe some words that automatically trigger this pls tell me so and i will try to change that in the future.

 

Edited December 30, 2021 by 7th age

[Chadouken]

Isn't Episode 6 called "The Flame of Tar Valon?"

[Vambram]

4 hours ago, KakitaOCU said:

Or maybe different ones are different sizes?  Like the Eye was the Main seal and the others are almost like anchor points or keystones?

 

I hope that this is the idea that they go with in the tv show. That would be different, but also very interesting.