Rewatching season 1 before season 2 starts

[Wassup]

I am planning on watching it again to recall the show specific things. The first watch through had me a bit angry with the deviations from the book. A subsequent watch through was much more palatable. 
 

Anyone else watching it again?

 

My daughter wants to watch it with me, but she wants to wait until Season 2 releases so she can binge them and not have to wait week to week. I will probably watch without her first to get the angry part over with and enjoy it more watching with her afterward. 

[Kaleb]

I'm watching it again (4th time), did E1 last night. r/WoT is hosting rewatch threads this month, they're on E2 today.

https://www.reddit.com/r/WoT/wiki/index/episode_discussions/#wiki_season_1_.5Bre-watch.5D

Edited August 7, 2023 by Kaleb

[Elglin]

Well, you've asked, now you get an answer 🙂.

 

I've tried re-watching it a couple of weeks ago. I found out that I managed to watch the, um, "palatable" parts, of which there were fewer than I would've liked. Scrolled through the rest.

I think I've found Ishamael's scenes more acceptable on this re-watch, but nothing else.

One very unhealthy advice is to re-watch with the daughter, but arm yourself with some popcorn or (if the daughter approves) a beer. I got through a pair of really dumb kid shows this way :).

[Lightfriendsocialmistress]

10 hours ago, Elglin said:

Well, you've asked, now you get an answer 🙂.

 

I've tried re-watching it a couple of weeks ago. I found out that I managed to watch the, um, "palatable" parts, of which there were fewer than I would've liked. Scrolled through the rest.

I think I've found Ishamael's scenes more acceptable on this re-watch, but nothing else.

One very unhealthy advice is to re-watch with the daughter, but arm yourself with some popcorn or (if the daughter approves) a beer. I got through a pair of really dumb kid shows this way :).

I love your style. Beer and popcorn is going to improve a situation every time 😂

[DaddyFinn]

One final rewatch before S2. I watched S1 10+ times in 2021-2022

[DojoToad]

1 hour ago, DaddyFinn said:

One final rewatch before S2. I watched S1 10+ times in 2021-2022

And my wife makes fun of me for re-reading the books multiple times...

[DaddyFinn]

4 hours ago, DojoToad said:

And my wife makes fun of me for re-reading the books multiple times...

My wife watched every time with me 😉

[DojoToad]

22 minutes ago, DaddyFinn said:

My wife watched every time with me 😉

Always nice to have a co-conspirator.

[DigificWriter]

I started my rewatch last month, and as of posting this will be rewatching The Flame of Tar-Valon on Friday 

[Seaine's eyebrows]

I rewatched it for the first time about three weeks ago, and I found I enjoyed it more than the first time around 😊 although Lan's... scene... (and really that whole episode) still hasn't grown on me, to say the least 🤮😆

[Pandemonium]

Rewatching again, made it through the first 6 episodes.  For the most part, I liked this  show.  Yes it had pacing issues, spending too much time on the wrong character issues, CGI issues, and a few stupid decisions-- but I still enjoyed most of the show.  Egwene still shines as one of my favorite characters from the Two Rivers 5.   

 

One thing I still don't understand is what is going to happen with Matt.  It appears his connection was severed to the dagger,  but I honestly have no idea what his role will be in season 2.  Season 1 needed a major infusion of charm, sex appeal, and humor to help lighten it up at times.  Matt is the perfect antidote for the darkness, so I hope we don't have to watch him get connected to the dagger in season 2.   Perhaps his bond to the dagger was never fully severed? I think season 2 should start featuring lots of flirtations and romantic feelings buzzing for some of the younger characters, which didn't really happen much in season 1 other than Nynaeve and Lan.  

 

Overall still excited for season 2.  Really hoping they can overcome some of the problems that plagued season 1.  

[Elder_Haman]

I’m about to start my 3rd watch. First since right after the show was finished. (Watched as it came out, then binged again afterwards.)

 

 

[DojoToad]

4 hours ago, Elder_Haman said:

I’m about to start my 3rd watch. First since right after the show was finished. (Watched as it came out, then binged again afterwards.)

 

 

Let us know how it works for you.  Do you like it more or less then on 1st and 2nd watch...?

[Elder_Haman]

19 minutes ago, DojoToad said:

Let us know how it works for you.  Do you like it more or less then on 1st and 2nd watch...?

I will!

[LTL]

As a book reader and long-time lurker, I have finally been inspired to post in case my experience with a re-watch helps encourage anyone else to go for it. I had mixed feelings watching the show the first time round. Before the opening credits of Episode 1 we'd already had Moiraine say that the Dragon could be a woman (I'm glad they released that scene before episode 1 aired so I didn't have to digest that as I sat down to watch Ep1) and Liandrin say that the power "isn't meant" for men. I think all the reviews saying that the writers clearly haven't read the books were pretty inevitable given the choice to really slam it in viewers faces that there would be large changes from the first second of the show and then try to win them back. If they wanted to expand the possible dragons, I think a better choice would have been to start with everyone assuming the dragon would be a man and then a couple of episodes in have Egwene ask Moiraine how we can be sure that the Dragon will be reborn a man and Moiraine reply that as people don't remember past lives, it's not really possible to be sure if people are always reborn with the same gender. You'd still have some complaints but I think most book readers would agree that it makes a lot of sense that characters in world would not have much idea about how re-incarnation works exactly. That would feel like better writing to me than to shoehorn in Moiraine stressing in a show opening speech that that they don't know if it'll be a man or woman.

 

The show then continues and I loved winternight, thought the end of Episode 1 was a bit ridiculous with everyone happy to let Moiraine take the 5 of them with trollocs descending on the village with no dissenting voices. The pacing didn't feel great for the first few episodes but I enjoyed parts. Loved Episode 4 and hoped the series had finally hit it's stride. Brought back down to earth with Episode 5. Didn't love the Steppin arc, especially Lan at the end of the episode.

 

I rewatched each episode before the next one was out and always enjoyed it more the second time when the shock of some of the bits I didn't like had passed a little but I couldn't stomach a second viewing of episode 8. Overall, I would have rated the show at 6-7 out of 10. It was great to see the characters brought to life (loved the casting) and to see some of the story on screen, which it seemed like may never happen. However, it seemed like a missed opportunity to do better. Had it been 6-7 out of 10 and really close to the books I'd have loved it, or had it been 8-9 out of 10 with a lot of changes I'd have loved it, but to make so many changes and not really knock it out the park seemed a bit of a shame.

 

Anyway, fast forward 18 months or so and I finally got round to watching ROP. It was no GOT but I quite enjoyed it, thought it was better than WOT although I don't have any real allegiance to the source material for it. When a friend said they thought the two shows were of similar quality it got me thinking that maybe I was being too harsh on the WOT due to the changes made so I gave it another re-watch, going into it with the pain from the bad bits and changes faded over time and I enjoyed it a lot more. Some of it still seemed pretty bad but I did find that some of my complaints were probably not really valid or were at least overblown and I wouldn't have given them a second thought in any other show.

 

I recently gave it a final re-watch before series 2 came out and I mostly really enjoyed it. Focusing on the positives and letting the negatives wash over me made me appreciate that I was actually getting to watch some version of my favourite book series from a couple of decades ago. If you really hated it then I imagine a re-watch will do nothing but anger you more but if you find yourself somewhat on the fence like I was then I'd recommend watching it with the mindset of just enjoying the bits you found to be positives and maybe you can find yourself enjoying it more and looking forward to season 2!

[BookMattBetterThanShow]

I have rewatch the show 3 times and each time I have like it a little more except for episode 8 which to me was just horrible. I plan on watching it again this week since it has been a while and I want to refresher before season 2. I have decided to just accept this is not going to be the books and hope I can just enjoy it. My biggest disappoint is that all the people that I ask to watch season 1 have told me they are not sure they are going to watch season 2. Maybe I just got their hopes up too much. I hope season 2 is better and I can convince them to try it again.

[Gary Again]

Just finished my rewatch and they had a nice teaser for season 2 with the dark friend social and I thought it was good. I hadn't seen it anywhere (but I haven't been keeping up with everything) but it's pretty great Ishy and this rewatch made me realize how much I liked him. I like how just casually dismissive he is and I think the peak of it is the part where he goes ooh a heron mark blade I wonder where you found that and just pinches the blade and pushed it away. Just dismissed it completely as a threat, dismissed Rand's right to carry it and then to top it off dismissed his connection to his father and delivered it like he was proud of a picture a kid made. Also really liked his line about the 100 companions and the lack of a real plan but the line about the sword and the way he says it is just pretty great on the rewatch. I could actually see that line being what pushes Rand to learn how to use the sword.

 

Another thing I noticed on the rewatch was that it always bothered people that the Aes Sedai and specifically the Green Aja were not really involved with the borderlands and it never really made sense that they wouldn't be involved with protecting the blight but the show had I think a good explanation for this in that the borderlands were too proud to ask for help and if you tie in the whole Malkier/Aes Sedai story that can make a compelling reason why and why all of the borderlands may feel the similarly. This makes sense to me and I don't feel like we got a good explanation for this in the books.

 

There is also a lot of foreshadowing in the books that is done well and I liked how well Agelmar basically pegged the entire situation and how quickly he came to it. I missed it the first time because it is similar to some things that Ingar says in the books but I liked that they used this here with Agelmar because I thought it was a good nod to him as a general that once he saw the attack he saw basically the whole progression of events. Like Fain said at this point it's really only Moiraine and the Dark One that really see what is going on (another line I really liked on rewatch) and Agelmar kind of picked up on it instantly and where things were going. If they follow the books it's a pretty accurate picture of what's coming and I don't think many people in the world realize this at this point so I thought it spoke well to Agelmar's ability as a general how quick and thoroughly he picked up on what was happening and his place in it.

 

Something else that I thought was interesting in the books was the similarity between Rands experience with the portal stones and the Accepted test so I thought it was kind of cool that the last episode mirrored the novice test. I like the idea of Rand unintentionally taking his versions of the Aes Sedai tests as he progresses and mirroring that path I think there was some of this in the book so I thought this was a nice touch.

 

Also I never realized it reading but on the rewatch I just realized that Joiya is just a cool name for a girl in the real world. It doesn't sound like any name out there but it doesn't sound really strange either and has a nice ring to it. If there is any name in the book I would actually name a child I think it would be Joiya, or I guess Mat lol. 

Edited August 17, 2023 by Gary Again

[BookMattBetterThanShow]

Started my rewatch, finished the first 2 episode. I have read the books 4 times and this will be my 4 watch of the series. Decide I would treat this rewatch as a different story from the books to see if I liked it better or not. I did look at by previous ratings of the series and the first two episodes got a solid B/B+ from me. Somethings that I didn't notice from my previous watch. The pacing in episode 1 seem bad to me this time around, wondering if others thought that way. The pacing was a lot better in episode 2. I thought the pushing of Egwene of the cliff seem kind of cruel and wonder if any previous member ever die from that tradition? Also besides Rand, Tam and Perrin are all the other men in two rivers cowards. I see the women fighting trollocs , but most of the men seems to be just running away. The scene when Moiraine enters the tavern and Nynaeve reaches for her knife seems silly to me. Since no one else really did anything. Overall this time I thought episode 1 was a C+ at best. I didn't like Perrin killing his wife or Matts story line but that may be my book bias.

 

Episode 2 pacing was much better and in fact I really liked most of this episode. Now still have some book issues but ignoring those for now. I thought the wolf scene could have been done better, just think they went cheap. Some of the dialog was pretty poor, special the whole dream sequence. I really like the whole scene when Moiraine explains the song of  Manetheren, thought that was one of the best part of the episode. Overall I think this episode should have gotten an A- from me. So I guess B for both makes some sense.

[DreadLord31]

I had been doing a re-watch like 3 months ago? And posting on here, trying to catalogue all the “changes” and speculate on why they might have decided to go the way they did… 

 

I ended up having a lot of sympathy for Rafe and the writers and enjoying it a bit more. There’s SO much material, and much of the material doesn’t translate that well to a TV medium (EotW is almost all in Rands head, for example), and they only get 8 hour-long episodes and have to figure out how to majorly fast track certain story-lines. An example of this would be: I was highly critical the first time around with having Perrin be married and fridging his wife; but it does actually fast-track his internal struggle with the violence within. 
 

Overall on the rewatch I would say that, other than episode 8 (which was bad no matter how you slice it), it was at least as good anything else that’s come out recently (other than perhaps some MCU stuff). But, my main complaint is still the writing … my brother, who wasn’t a reader, who I got to watch with me last year (but has said he won’t watch this year) said it like this, “Seems to me like this is just another ‘men suck and girls rule’ agenda driven story; none of these guys DO anything.”  On my rewatch that did stick out to me even more. Sooo y’all who watched a bunch more than I did, would you disagree? What was the big “man that guy is awesome” moment from S1 for you?? 
 

[LTL]

I agree that they pushed the women forwards in the show compared to TEOTW book in terms of giving them more big moments and the men less. I'd even agree they went a bit too far with it. Rand was relegated from being the main hero and narrator. Mat was made "darker". Perrin killed his wife and was a bit of an emotional mess as a result. Lan was less of an invincible superhero than he appeared through Rand's eyes in TEOTW. Meanwhile, Nynaeve and Egwene were made stronger than they were in the TEOTW and Moiraine was made the main character. Quite clearly, the direction of travel from the books was in favour of strong women and away from strong men.

 

I do think reactions to that can be overblown though and it's something I felt less on later rewatches than I did when the series first came out. Firstly, TEOTW is almost entirely told from Rand's POV and probably has a greater proportion of interesting/great things done by men compared to women than the rest of the book series. It probably makes sense for the show to move things more in line with the rest of the series on this point, as they have with various other things. I think part of my feeling about it came from direction of travel from the book rather than objectively women being portrayed as way better than men in the show.

 

Secondly, there were good moments for men, even if they did give Nynaeve the most extreme awesome moments in season 1. To name a few off the top of my head: Tam and Rand kill a Trolloc they weren't prepared for while the village falls apart until Moiraine and Lan's arrival. Lan takes down a bunch of Trollocs. Mat runs back into the carnage to find his sisters. Logain cold open of ep4 and then later melting his cage. Thom throws a dagger through a darkfriend's throat and then takes on a Fade to save Rand and Mat. There were also negative/less strong moments for the main women. For example, Nynaeve's pride having the potential to kill Mat by not getting Moiraine's help. Moiraine gets hit by a trolloc spear in ep1 and spends time out of action as a result. 

 

In general tv/film history you have a million things where the men are the clear heroes and it's just considered normal but anything where the balance may be tilted the other way and there will be a ton of debate, analysis and criticism of it from certain quarters. Cast your mind back to see if you can think of any examples in the history of knowing your brother when he said "Seems to me like this is just another 'men are the heroes, women do nothing' story, not gonna watch any more of that." I'd be prepared to wager he has never said it and I would also be prepared to wager that he has watched many things that would fit that description. 

 

Personally, I will find it very irritating if they go through the entire show with the women getting all the biggest moments and Rand's role getting cut back at every opportunity. I'm not watching it looking for an opportunity to get annoyed at each season where the balance swings towards cool moments for women if the balance varies season to season though so I'll just see how it plays out in Season 2 and beyond. Season 1 was one way but not to an absurd extreme when looking in absolute terms rather than comparing moments to TEOTW imho.

[BookMattBetterThanShow]

Well I finished episode 3 & 4 and like both a lot better then my first watch. In fact the only negative I had for episode 3 was with the look of the wolf scene and I need more Rand and Matt, just like their story in both episode (that ignoring the books). I really like the Logan scene and thought they have nailed that casting, he is another of my favorite characters from the book. Nynaeve healing scene was cool, but as a book reading I don't like how they are not following the book magic system a very well, but for this review I am ignore the book. So I give episode 3 a solid A and episode 4 a A-, so the first four episode is sitting at a B+/A-. I am going to have to really fight by book bias for the next 4, but let see maybe I will see them differently.

[Scarloc99]

On 8/8/2023 at 9:25 AM, DaddyFinn said:

One final rewatch before S2. I watched S1 10+ times in 2021-2022

each to there own but even if I had enjoyed it massively I doubt I would watch it more then twice. I love the Boys, one of the best things on Amazon, but I have only watched each season once. I really don't get the appeal of watching a TV show over and over, a book I can re read because I paint and change the picture in my head. Now movies, some movies I have seen multiple times but I think for me wasting 100 hours of my life rewatching the same thing over and over, when instead I could use that time to watch 10 different series (and there is so much to watch what with Disney, Netflix, Amazon and Normal TV) just feel like hours of my life wasted. 

I did try rewatching season 1 but really cant get past the shoddy acting, script and special effects, it just feels more and more cheap the more I watch it. I am hoping that season 2 fixes those production issues otherwise I might have to step away all together. 

[Scarloc99]

On 8/16/2023 at 11:22 AM, LTL said:

As a book reader and long-time lurker, I have finally been inspired to post in case my experience with a re-watch helps encourage anyone else to go for it. I had mixed feelings watching the show the first time round. Before the opening credits of Episode 1 we'd already had Moiraine say that the Dragon could be a woman (I'm glad they released that scene before episode 1 aired so I didn't have to digest that as I sat down to watch Ep1) and Liandrin say that the power "isn't meant" for men. I think all the reviews saying that the writers clearly haven't read the books were pretty inevitable given the choice to really slam it in viewers faces that there would be large changes from the first second of the show and then try to win them back. If they wanted to expand the possible dragons, I think a better choice would have been to start with everyone assuming the dragon would be a man and then a couple of episodes in have Egwene ask Moiraine how we can be sure that the Dragon will be reborn a man and Moiraine reply that as people don't remember past lives, it's not really possible to be sure if people are always reborn with the same gender. You'd still have some complaints but I think most book readers would agree that it makes a lot of sense that characters in world would not have much idea about how re-incarnation works exactly. That would feel like better writing to me than to shoehorn in Moiraine stressing in a show opening speech that that they don't know if it'll be a man or woman.

 

The show then continues and I loved winternight, thought the end of Episode 1 was a bit ridiculous with everyone happy to let Moiraine take the 5 of them with trollocs descending on the village with no dissenting voices. The pacing didn't feel great for the first few episodes but I enjoyed parts. Loved Episode 4 and hoped the series had finally hit it's stride. Brought back down to earth with Episode 5. Didn't love the Steppin arc, especially Lan at the end of the episode.

 

I rewatched each episode before the next one was out and always enjoyed it more the second time when the shock of some of the bits I didn't like had passed a little but I couldn't stomach a second viewing of episode 8. Overall, I would have rated the show at 6-7 out of 10. It was great to see the characters brought to life (loved the casting) and to see some of the story on screen, which it seemed like may never happen. However, it seemed like a missed opportunity to do better. Had it been 6-7 out of 10 and really close to the books I'd have loved it, or had it been 8-9 out of 10 with a lot of changes I'd have loved it, but to make so many changes and not really knock it out the park seemed a bit of a shame.

 

Anyway, fast forward 18 months or so and I finally got round to watching ROP. It was no GOT but I quite enjoyed it, thought it was better than WOT although I don't have any real allegiance to the source material for it. When a friend said they thought the two shows were of similar quality it got me thinking that maybe I was being too harsh on the WOT due to the changes made so I gave it another re-watch, going into it with the pain from the bad bits and changes faded over time and I enjoyed it a lot more. Some of it still seemed pretty bad but I did find that some of my complaints were probably not really valid or were at least overblown and I wouldn't have given them a second thought in any other show.

 

I recently gave it a final re-watch before series 2 came out and I mostly really enjoyed it. Focusing on the positives and letting the negatives wash over me made me appreciate that I was actually getting to watch some version of my favourite book series from a couple of decades ago. If you really hated it then I imagine a re-watch will do nothing but anger you more but if you find yourself somewhat on the fence like I was then I'd recommend watching it with the mindset of just enjoying the bits you found to be positives and maybe you can find yourself enjoying it more and looking forward to season 2!

I assessed WOT and ROP as follows.

ROP had a far far better look, was generally better acted (I say generally there where some very cringe moments), had far better dialogue. The scenes between Elrond and Dain I felt where really good, and it had Adar, who was a fantastic bad guy who managed to make Orcs relatable. But the linking back to the IP was just awful, as far as I am concerned unforgivably so. The lore and history was just ignored and removed in a way that made WOT look like a page by page perfect adaptation. But ignoring the Lore the story wasn't awful, I mean I always think it is bad when the Bad guys plan is all reliant on something out of his control happening, if Galadrial had just kept her hands in her pockets instead of pulling him from the seas lol. 

WOT, a far closer adaptation and the changes that where made generally (not all) made sense, or at least I can understand why they where done even if I don't agree with them. But, it looked like a cheap CW tv show, not an Amazon prime production. The effects where sloppy, the trollocs looked hilarious at times, the dialogue was wooden and very stiff, the acting was meh at times and the fight scenes where poorly executed, but, we have covid to thank for that (no chance of 100 extras standing shoulder to shoulder lol). 

Both had massive flaws but ROP for me was the better product over all because it was shiny and pretty and that overrode the bad story and lore keeping. 

[Elder_Haman]

Upon rewatch:

 

Here's the metric I used to judge season one - I graded on a curve. So, A+ is the best grade. By definition very few shows are complete failures. Very few shows are massive successes. So...

 

What does an A+ fantasy show look like? I don't think we know the answer to that since GoT crashed so badly. But it is certainly the standard bearer. Let's call it an A-.

 

What does an F look like? Well, there are a few fantasy shows that are hot trash.  Shannara is always mentioned. Let's call that a D-.

 

Then let's look at stuff in the middle. Carnival Row, House of the Dragon, Rings of Power, The Witcher, His Dark Materials, Once Upon a Time, Cursed, Fate: the Winx Saga, Locke and Key, Shadow and Bone, etc. And Wheel of Time.

 

Wheel of Time matches up well against most of those other shows for me (and I've watched almost all of them). So they are doing some things very well. But the writing is not good enough to truly separate it the way Thrones did. So its hard to call it great. It's a C+/B- for me.

 

FWIW, the stuff I've seen from S2 makes me optimistic that it will improve.

[BookMattBetterThanShow]

Well I finished 5-8, I didn't remember that even the first time through I like episode 5 and gave it a B+. I really like the White Cloak scene, I still think they can do better with the wolves. The Wolves look more like dogs to me, its fantasy give me bad ass wolves. I still think the whole Steven/funeral scene could have been  done in half the time. Episode 6 was better than I thought the first couple of times. Taking away the books really help make this episode better. Using the oath rod to force Moraine to take a 4th oath seem strange to me and seems to be against what was explained early in the show. Now episodes 7 & 8 is when things really started going done hill and maybe those two episodes clouded my judgement on the series.  I understand COVID and loosing Matt hurt, but does not explain what I see as just bad writing. Now with that said, I am looking forward now to season 2 and hope we can just put the last two episodes behind us.