Why not follow the books more closely?

[Rsmithboeing]

On 8/20/2023 at 4:21 AM, Scarloc99 said:

It has been confirmed that men and women can’t see each others half of the power, just because we can see it on screen does not mean the characters can. 

Logain SAW Ninive holding the power when she healed all the people he hurt.

Or is that just something I'm assuming I about the series?

I haven't ONCE said anything incorrectly. And, I'm not just slammed the show or overblowing the facts.

 

You like the series and that's fine I don't like it and, that's fine too.

 

This subject is why not follow the books. People are just arguing for or against it. The fact is that Rafe could have easily followed the books and, do it in budget. 

[Scarloc99]

2 minutes ago, Rsmithboeing said:

Logain SAW Ninive holding the power when she healed all the people he hurt.

Or is that just something I'm assuming I about the series?

I haven't ONCE said anything incorrectly. And, I'm not just slammed the show or overblowing the facts.

 

You like the series and that's fine I don't like it and, that's fine too.

 

This subject is why not follow the books. People are just arguing for or against it. The fact is that Rafe could have easily followed the books and, do it in budget. 

No Logain saw light, when Nyn did the healing bomb she also gave off an intense light which everyone, even non channelers could see. 
 

Books 1-3 would make for a rubbish tv show if they were adapted as is, lots of traveling from A to B to chase a person, thing or escape something. I am not saying he has done a perfect job but I understand the need for every change he made and think the tv show is better for it then it would have been had it been closer to the book. I also see the need to change seasons 2 and 3 as there is a lot of characters going there and back again. End book 3 and Book 4 is where the story really gets going so let’s get there asap. 

[Samt]

17 minutes ago, DigificWriter said:

 

Yes, TV Tropes has a 'sliding scale of adaptation', but said scale is functionally meaningless because the quality of an adaptation is not determined by how closely it does or does not match its source material.

 

There is also no objective standard for how closely an adaptation has to match its source material in order to still be considered an adaptation, nor should there be.

To be clear, I think what you mean is that the quality of a show is not directly correlated to the degree to which it is a faithful adaptation of the original source material.  And I would agree.  There are lots of good shows and movies that deviate widely from the source material that they are adapting.  That is a valid artistic choice.  

 

However, the claim that is being made in the original post in this thread is that most WoT book fans were hoping for a more faithful adaptation of the book series and that many believe that would have been a better show.  It's fair to disagree with that claim and present evidence or arguments as to why the changes that the showrunners chose to make were necessary to make a coherent show or just made the show better than it would have been if it had been more faithful.  It's even reasonable to make arguments that the changes are rather minor and that the show is a highly faithful adaptation.  

 

But what I feel you and some others have done is to pretend that there isn't a meaningful concept of faithfulness to the book material (while simultaneously actually implicitly acknowledging that this concept exists).  That is what I am objecting to.  

 

It's like if I say this purple shirt would look better if it was more of a blue shade.  You can argue that you think it actually looks good as is. Or that it needs more red. Or maybe that it is already really is as blue as it could be.  But if you simply say that color doesn't exist and that all shirts are the same color, I'm going to object to your dismissal of reality.  

[DigificWriter]

My argument can be summed up thusly:

Judging the quality of an adaptation based solely on whether it matches its source material only has limited merit because there is no objective standard for determining the quality of an adaptation relative to how closely it does or does not match its source material and because no adaptation is ever going to be 100% faithful to its source material because the very nature of adaptation as a concept necessitates that changes be made.

 

I used the steakhouse analogy to try and illustrate a further point that no-one should ever go into watching an adaptation expecting that said adaptation will be 100% faithful to its source material and that it is therefore futile to express outrage based solely on that expectation not being met because it ought to have been obvious going in that said expectation was not going to be met.

[Samt]

57 minutes ago, DigificWriter said:

My argument can be summed up thusly:

Judging the quality of an adaptation based solely on whether it matches its source material only has limited merit because there is no objective standard for determining the quality of an adaptation relative to how closely it does or does not match its source material and because no adaptation is ever going to be 100% faithful to its source material because the very nature of adaptation as a concept necessitates that changes be made.

 

I used the steakhouse analogy to try and illustrate a further point that no-one should ever go into watching an adaptation expecting that said adaptation will be 100% faithful to its source material and that it is therefore futile to express outrage based solely on that expectation not being met because it ought to have been obvious going in that said expectation was not going to be met.

You're correct that a lot of this is about expectations.  I and many others expected a more faithful adaptation and were disappointed that we didn't get it.  And we still don't understand why the creative choice was made to change so much.  

 

But your continued assertion that it wouldn't be possible (or at least that we shouldn't have expected) to have a more faithful adaptation simply because a 100% faithful adaptation is not possible is perplexing.  That's like saying water always has impurities so drinking sewage is fine.  Yes, some changes were required by the medium.  Many of them were not.  Those changes were made because the creators of the show placed a low priority on faithfulness to the details of the lore and plot as contained in the books.  Maybe the changes can pay off in interesting and fulfilling ways.  I have my doubts.  But continuing to insist that it was not possible to make an adaptation without those changes is silly.  

[Scarloc99]

2 hours ago, Samt said:

To be clear, I think what you mean is that the quality of a show is not directly correlated to the degree to which it is a faithful adaptation of the original source material.  And I would agree.  There are lots of good shows and movies that deviate widely from the source material that they are adapting.  That is a valid artistic choice.  

 

However, the claim that is being made in the original post in this thread is that most WoT book fans were hoping for a more faithful adaptation of the book series and that many believe that would have been a better show.  It's fair to disagree with that claim and present evidence or arguments as to why the changes that the showrunners chose to make were necessary to make a coherent show or just made the show better than it would have been if it had been more faithful.  It's even reasonable to make arguments that the changes are rather minor and that the show is a highly faithful adaptation.  

 

But what I feel you and some others have done is to pretend that there isn't a meaningful concept of faithfulness to the book material (while simultaneously actually implicitly acknowledging that this concept exists).  That is what I am objecting to.  

 

It's like if I say this purple shirt would look better if it was more of a blue shade.  You can argue that you think it actually looks good as is. Or that it needs more red. Or maybe that it is already really is as blue as it could be.  But if you simply say that color doesn't exist and that all shirts are the same color, I'm going to object to your dismissal of reality.  

This is the one point I disagree with, most WOT fans think this is a poor adaptation. No a minority are very vocal about disliking it, but even on this forum it is a tiny % that voice that opinion on the message boards but they tend to make their voice heard on every thread like this. I have yet to see any true independent metrics of the real WOT fanbase regarding how they feel about the show. Maybe a poll should be done at the next WOT convention, although that will only cover americans. 
 

Anecdotally amongst the friends I have who have read the books they feel the same as me, overall a good job was done some room for improvement but in no way is it a poor adaptation. The changes all made sense they just didn’t always stick the landing with execution. Which is a production issue not a story issue. A very good friend of mine who works in TV spent a good bit of time walking through why all the various changes make sense from a scripting and filming perspective, and the tweaks he might have made and the things down he would never have thought of but really liked (Steppin is a fav of both of us). As he said, that storyline is not in the book, but, we can’t say it isn’t in the lore because RJ has never described an aes sedai funeral so we can’t say it shouldn’t be there. 
 

You will always get the vocal minority speaking out against a thing and then thinking they are in the majority when we have no real evidence one way or the other. Don’t get me wrong you might be right but, I have yet to see any proof of that given the vast number of people on this website who don’t voice that opinion. 

Edited August 25, 2023 by Scarloc99

[Guire]

23 minutes ago, Scarloc99 said:

This is the one point I disagree with, most WOT fans think this is a poor adaptation. No a minority are very vocal about disliking it, but even on this forum it is a tiny % that voice that opinion on the message boards but they tend to make their voice heard on every thread like this. I have yet to see any true independent metrics of the real WOT fanbase regarding how they feel about the show. Maybe a poll should be done at the next WOT convention, although that will only cover americans. 
 

Anecdotally amongst the friends I have who have read the books they feel the same as me, overall a good job was done some room for improvement but in no way is it a poor adaptation. The changes all made sense they just didn’t always stick the landing with execution. Which is a production issue not a story issue. A very good friend of mine who works in TV spent a good bit of time walking through why all the various changes make sense from a scripting and filming perspective, and the tweaks he might have made and the things down he would never have thought of but really liked (Steppin is a fav of both of us). As he said, that storyline is not in the book, but, we can’t say it isn’t in the lore because RJ has never described an aes sedai funeral so we can’t say it shouldn’t be there. 
 

You will always get the vocal minority speaking out against a thing and then thinking they are in the majority when we have no real evidence one way or the other. Don’t get me wrong you might be right but, I have yet to see any proof of that given the vast number of people on this website who don’t voice that opinion. 

There are no reliable metrics so its all suppostion.  Both of 2 other book readers I know irl who watched show thought it wasn't good. Both said very average.  Same from non book readers I encouraged to watch show. My feeling that show wasnt great comes from online presence.  I have seen very few non book reader youtube sites blowing up with praise for show and engagement by fans.  There are some but it is very far from widespread in Americas or Europe that I have seen.  Reddit seems to have engaged show thread but it appears heavily modded to keep a positive tone.  Across most platforms I have seen, its mostly book fans that are engaged and reception to show is very mixed. If there are places that aren't basically marketing arms for Amazon that are really enjoying show let me know what they are.  Seeing how fans are enjoying show has helped temper my early dissapointment quite a bit.

[Cipher]

On 8/23/2023 at 12:28 PM, nsmallw said:

Yep, I checked. I believe 3 new episode writers for season two(according to Collider-Updated today)

Rafe, Katherine McKenna and Dave Hill return from season one. That's two short but Id guess as before Rafe will have written two episodes as in season one. We'll see in 8 days 😄

Rafe is still at the top and wants it to have his current progressive sensibilities as a guiding light.  I can see Nynaeve action hero using a short sword in that trailer. ?!

Edited August 25, 2023 by Cipher

[Scarloc99]

1 hour ago, Guire said:

There are no reliable metrics so its all suppostion.  Both of 2 other book readers I know irl who watched show thought it wasn't good. Both said very average.  Same from non book readers I encouraged to watch show. My feeling that show wasnt great comes from online presence.  I have seen very few non book reader youtube sites blowing up with praise for show and engagement by fans.  There are some but it is very far from widespread in Americas or Europe that I have seen.  Reddit seems to have engaged show thread but it appears heavily modded to keep a positive tone.  Across most platforms I have seen, its mostly book fans that are engaged and reception to show is very mixed. If there are places that aren't basically marketing arms for Amazon that are really enjoying show let me know what they are.  Seeing how fans are enjoying show has helped temper my early dissapointment quite a bit.

I am always just wary about that kind of supposition. Generally Negative YouTube videos get far more views, and therefore make more money then positive videos. I am not saying your wrong, like is say it is just hard to put a metric on it if Amazon don’t give us numbers for people who stick with season 2. 

[Guire]

26 minutes ago, Scarloc99 said:

I am always just wary about that kind of supposition. Generally Negative YouTube videos get far more views, and therefore make more money then positive videos. I am not saying your wrong, like is say it is just hard to put a metric on it if Amazon don’t give us numbers for people who stick with season 2. 

Inside WoT specific videos I am seeing a lot less pure negative than mixed to purely positive videos.  Its more the low engagement in general.  Maybe a good season will make the engagement ratchet way up.  I doubt any channel that is mostly WoT is making any real money unless they are possibly subsidized by Amazon to keep some interest.  And yes the culture war channels definately create that pile on effect.  I try to take that into account when looking at the show.

[Scarloc99]

14 minutes ago, Guire said:

Inside WoT specific videos I am seeing a lot less pure negative than mixed to purely positive videos.  Its more the low engagement in general.  Maybe a good season will make the engagement ratchet way up.  I doubt any channel that is mostly WoT is making any real money unless they are possibly subsidized by Amazon to keep some interest.  And yes the culture war channels definately create that pile on effect.  I try to take that into account when looking at the show.

I mean to be fair GOT was considered fairly niche when it first aired. I think it was season 2 when it really kicked off and people got into it going back and watching season 1 to catch up. For me the key thing is the production values, I think if it had been a better show in terms of dialogue, effects and acting then more people would have ignored more of the changes to the story. I think we are roughly in agreement bit maybe slightly different sides of the good, not good line. 

[SinisterDeath]

52 minutes ago, Scarloc99 said:

I am always just wary about that kind of supposition. Generally Negative YouTube videos get far more views, and therefore make more money then positive videos. I am not saying your wrong, like is say it is just hard to put a metric on it if Amazon don’t give us numbers for people who stick with season 2. 

Rage bait generates more engagement, more clicks and comments, than inspiring and uplifting content.

 

If I say something as benign as Lord of the Rings was a great movie, especially that scene were Aragorn tries to strike the ring with his axe, that'll generate a ton of rage clicks from fans shouting  YOUR WRONG! That was GIMLI! 
And then other's will chime in that THEY'RE ALSO WRONG because that never HAPPENED in the books! Which will then also spiral out of control because who gives a flying shit because it was a great scene!

So what I'm getting at is... If you're looking at reviews, you really can't go off of just the negatives. 
If I look at a product online, and I see a lot of 5 stars, I'm going to read the 1 stars to see what their issues were, because that's going to let me know what could go wrong, but these are generally non-typical.
Then I'm going to read the 5 stars. Then I'll read the star reviews with the most stars.. (this could also be 5 stars), and get a sense of what the average idea of the product is.

But a show like this... isn't a product you "research" online before "buying".  The comments we read online for a show... are the bottom of the barrel. They don't quantify a meaningful sample of people who have watched the show... or even read the books.

Yesterday I was talking to a used book store clerk about the WoT books, and they were talking about there kids being obsessed with the books and how they weren't impressed with the show, and how it was nothing like the show. I wasn't surprised in the least.
They were surprised when I told them that the 2nd season is coming out on the 1st.
They didn't know that Mat left the show, which required them to rewrite the last 2 episodes... or the covid restrictions, and a few other things. 

They were open to watching season 2 even before mentioning these things.

[DreadLord31]

11 minutes ago, Scarloc99 said:

For me the key thing is the production values, I think if it had been a better show in terms of dialogue, effects and acting then more people would have ignored more of the changes to the story. I think we are roughly in agreement bit maybe slightly different sides of the good, not good line. 

 

Oh I agree. Even as a 20-year reader and huge fan of the source material, if it was simply good TV - I would, for the most part, ignore the changes. For example, I was a huge LotR fan before Peter Jackson adapted it. Was I still a little peeved that he cut Glorfindel to give Arwen something to do and a little ticked that he cut Tom Bombadil because he's not necessary ... YES! But overall, it was good. So I let it go. 

 

If S2 can up their production value so that the whole season is as good as the Ep7 cold open ... I'll be singing the praises of the show (even though I hate it that they couldn't do something as simple as, Tigraine kicks butt with her veil on -- lowers it as she's having labor pains -- we see the actresses face and emotions -- she gets stabbed trying to put her veil on rather than fight (introduces us to the Aiel and has the audience asking "Why would a badass, pregnant warrior rather than get stabbed than fight with her veil down). But ... the scene was good, so I let it go. 

 

S1 was not just a bad adaptation - about half of it was also bad TV: the finale fell majorly flat and had horrible CGI, the characters were all underdeveloped because Rafe wanted more time and they didn't give it to him, none of the male characters DID anything, and the whole "Rand's the Dragon" reveal that the whole season was centered around fell flat because the audience didn't actually care about Rand cause he didn't really DO anything the whole season. Soooo here's to hoping that S2 is simply better TV!

[DojoToad]

1 hour ago, Cipher said:

Rafe is still at the top and wants it to have his current progressive sensibilities as a guiding light.  I can see Nynaeve action hero using a short sword in that trailer. ?!

At the top of what?

[Cipher]

1 minute ago, DojoToad said:

At the top of what?

At the top of the production.  I was responding to a remark about how may be new writers would improve the new season.  S2 is going to be just like S1 imo—-S2 will have changes I dislike as much as the changes as S1.

 

Biggest single misstep was making the EF5 less important to the story.  Focus moved to Moiraine might be a good call if you can give me a Ned Stark moment when she loses the power, but there was no drama in that event.  Her use of the OP would have to have been stepped over the course of the season may be for that to work.

 

Time given to Logain or Steppin is completely lame and a waste. Take that time and invest in Rand, Perrin, Egwene.  Make me care about them, but I didn’t.  BTW I didn’t really care about Mat until book 3 in Jordan’s WOT and he ended up as my favorite until he died at end of Knife of Dreams :p.

[Elglin]

4 minutes ago, Cipher said:

Take that time and invest in Rand, Perrin, Egwene.

One of the big problems of S1. Many characters central to the book and entire saga turn to be "Who the F is this guy and why should I care?" I feel like the decision to keep the ambiguity of the Dragon was altogether detrimental to developing the characters of Mat, Rand and Perrin; to a lesser extent, Nynaeve and Egwene as well.

6 minutes ago, Cipher said:

Time given to Logain or Steppin is completely lame and a waste.

With Steppin I would agree - while the storyline and the concept are quite decent, they could be told in different means using existing characters in less time.

As to Logain - I bear in mind the possibility that the TV character might be an amalgamation of also Taim and even possibly Asmodean. That, coupled with the terrific job Alvaro Morte does with the character, makes the time allotted to Logain potentially justifiable. Down the line, he also becomes pretty important to the plot and gets quite some page time, while Steppin just remains dead.

[Elder_Haman]

3 minutes ago, Cipher said:

Time given to Logain or Steppin is completely lame and a waste.

I agree with everything else you said. You're spot on about not focusing enough on the EFF, but the time given to Logain and Steppin wasn't wasted. The rest of the story wasn't told from the proper perspective. Have Steppin's melt down be witnessed by Mat or Perrin or Rand to set up the stakes of the bond in a way that will be personal to them later. Have Logain's capture be about Nynaeve's reaction to Logain's madness instead of yet another chance to show her being epic.

 

I still think Stepin's story was the best written part of the whole season.

[DojoToad]

5 minutes ago, Elder_Haman said:

I still think Stepin's story was the best written part of the whole season.

Having only watched the first 4 episodes of S1, I can't argue with you based on show knowledge.

 

But based on what I've read on the forums here - 🤮

[expat]

6 hours ago, Rsmithboeing said:

This subject is why not follow the books. People are just arguing for or against it. The fact is that Rafe could have easily followed the books and, do it in budget. 

The problem is that there is are a lot of people that believe that while he could have followed the books, he couldn't have made an interesting TV series while following the books closely for a myriad of reasons that have been discussed to death.  It comes down to the goal of the adaptation - put a faithful representation of the books on screen or make an interesting series, even if it deviates in details from the books.

 

Granted that there is a subset of viewers, like yourself, who believes that he didn't accomplish either goal, but when writing the adaptation, the showrunners must be crystal clear which goal is more important.  Since they want to make money, "faithfulness to the story" will almost always be sacrificed for better TV.

 

To beat the dead horse once more, here is a sample of reason that the TV series must deviate from the books:

1. show not tell.  The medium is different and scenes that play well in a book may not play well on screen. 

2. 160 pages an hour - if we get all 64 episodes, it will still be over 160 pages an episode meaning lots and lots of stuff must be cut.  When you cut things, you need to stich the resultant plot holes with new, non-faithful material for the series to make sense.

3. Filming issues - some things on paper are just not filmable (or at least no filmable within a reasonable budget) and if they are important plotpoints, you need to rewrite lots of things to get around the issue while saving the plot.

4. actor availability - once you cast major characters, you need to have something for them to do because you can't have them skipping large periods of time like they do in the books.  So new plot points to keep them employed.

5. Structure - The books grew up over a large period of time so the introduction of foundational aspects such as lore, characters, world building are haphazard in the books.  For the series, you can logically introduce the foundational pieces according to the needs of the story.  Since many of these pieces will be out of order to the books, this is all new material (e.g., Steppin).

6. Costs - Lots of things are being done to reduce costs of actors, sets, costuming, CGI etc. These likely impact what can and will be filmed.

7. POV - the books are written through some action scenes, but loads of POVs from dozens of characters, including much of their character arcs.  You can't film POV, all you can do is figure out what is important in the POV and write new scenes to highlight them to the viewer.  Just having the characters talk about what they are thinking (to be closer to the books) is heavy exposition and really bad television. 

 

Perfectly acceptable opinion not to like the overall show or individual adaptation decisions, but it seems very simplistic to simply say that it is easy to follow the books and that Rafe is in some way evil or egotistical or incompetent because the show varies more from the books than you expected or wanted.  IT IS NOT EASY TO CREATE AN ENTERTAINING, BUT "FAITHFUL" RERESENTATION OF WOT. Could Rafe or someone else done a better job of combining the two objectives, probably. But you can say this about almost everything - it could have been better.

[Cipher]

23 minutes ago, Elder_Haman said:

 

I still think Stepin's story was the best written part of the whole season.

I actually sympathized with Steppin and felt sad when he died.  But I want that emotional connection with Perrin or Rand.

 

From S2 trailer it does indeed look like Logain is filling that Asmodean slot and can be Taim as well.  Yup it is not actually Logain from the books, just a character inspired by Logain with the same name.  That applies to a lot of the characters in Wheel of Amazon.

[Scarloc99]

44 minutes ago, Cipher said:

At the top of the production.  I was responding to a remark about how may be new writers would improve the new season.  S2 is going to be just like S1 imo—-S2 will have changes I dislike as much as the changes as S1.

 

Biggest single misstep was making the EF5 less important to the story.  Focus moved to Moiraine might be a good call if you can give me a Ned Stark moment when she loses the power, but there was no drama in that event.  Her use of the OP would have to have been stepped over the course of the season may be for that to work.

 

Time given to Logain or Steppin is completely lame and a waste. Take that time and invest in Rand, Perrin, Egwene.  Make me care about them, but I didn’t.  BTW I didn’t really care about Mat until book 3 in Jordan’s WOT and he ended up as my favorite until he died at end of Knife of Dreams :p.

In eye of the world you actually learn very little about the main characters other than Rand. And no one other than Rand really goes on any kind of a journey. 
 

The Logain stuff was brilliant, it is great that we get more of him early on given he is so key to the main story later. 
 

Steppin, while I understand those who disliked it I loved it, and many non books readers really liked it, it was the one story line that actually gave you a peek inside the culture of one of the key organisations, and, as a friend of mine pointed out, just because it isn’t taken from the books does not mean that is not how the Aes Sedai conduct funeral rights, or it is how some warders might go if there aes sedai does not die in the heart of battle. It is also a really key mechanic of the world given that when Morraine “dies” the audience will now understand something bad might happen to Lan, and, at the last battle it is a really key high tension moment that is Moridins last gasp attempt. 
 

I understand why people didn’t like it but it was actually some of the better produced and written material in the show. 

[Scarloc99]

28 minutes ago, expat said:

The problem is that there is are a lot of people that believe that while he could have followed the books, he couldn't have made an interesting TV series while following the books closely for a myriad of reasons that have been discussed to death.  It comes down to the goal of the adaptation - put a faithful representation of the books on screen or make an interesting series, even if it deviates in details from the books.

 

Granted that there is a subset of viewers, like yourself, who believes that he didn't accomplish either goal, but when writing the adaptation, the showrunners must be crystal clear which goal is more important.  Since they want to make money, "faithfulness to the story" will almost always be sacrificed for better TV.

 

To beat the dead horse once more, here is a sample of reason that the TV series must deviate from the books:

1. show not tell.  The medium is different and scenes that play well in a book may not play well on screen. 

2. 160 pages an hour - if we get all 64 episodes, it will still be over 160 pages an episode meaning lots and lots of stuff must be cut.  When you cut things, you need to stich the resultant plot holes with new, non-faithful material for the series to make sense.

3. Filming issues - some things on paper are just not filmable (or at least no filmable within a reasonable budget) and if they are important plotpoints, you need to rewrite lots of things to get around the issue while saving the plot.

4. actor availability - once you cast major characters, you need to have something for them to do because you can't have them skipping large periods of time like they do in the books.  So new plot points to keep them employed.

5. Structure - The books grew up over a large period of time so the introduction of foundational aspects such as lore, characters, world building are haphazard in the books.  For the series, you can logically introduce the foundational pieces according to the needs of the story.  Since many of these pieces will be out of order to the books, this is all new material (e.g., Steppin).

6. Costs - Lots of things are being done to reduce costs of actors, sets, costuming, CGI etc. These likely impact what can and will be filmed.

7. POV - the books are written through some action scenes, but loads of POVs from dozens of characters, including much of their character arcs.  You can't film POV, all you can do is figure out what is important in the POV and write new scenes to highlight them to the viewer.  Just having the characters talk about what they are thinking (to be closer to the books) is heavy exposition and really bad television. 

 

Perfectly acceptable opinion not to like the overall show or individual adaptation decisions, but it seems very simplistic to simply say that it is easy to follow the books and that Rafe is in some way evil or egotistical or incompetent because the show varies more from the books than you expected or wanted.  IT IS NOT EASY TO CREATE AN ENTERTAINING, BUT "FAITHFUL" RERESENTATION OF WOT. Could Rafe or someone else done a better job of combining the two objectives, probably. But you can say this about almost everything - it could have been better.

I will just add as well that the key action sequences are generally given just a few paragraphs by RJ in the books, the battle for Emonds field should be a solid hour of TV akin to the battle of winter fell (only not as dark or as rubbish), yet in the book the battle itself is what, 2 pages, it is the build up that takes all the time. This means you lose more time for story and lore because those battle pages need far more time devoted to them. 

[Scarloc99]

13 minutes ago, Cipher said:

I actually sympathized with Steppin and felt sad when he died.  But I want that emotional connection with Perrin or Rand.

 

From S2 trailer it does indeed look like Logain is filling that Asmodean slot and can be Taim as well.  Yup it is not actually Logain from the books, just a character inspired by Logain with the same name.  That applies to a lot of the characters in Wheel of Amazon.

Logain can’t be Taim, how do you get that redemption arc with Logain at the very end after having been tortured. I think Taim will still be in it but the writers understand they need the audience to be invested in Logain for when he gets healed and then resists being turned before leading the faction against Taim in the black tower. Then right at the end the emotion of a mother telling Logain she will be sending her son to be tested at the black tower when he is of age. 

[Cipher]

35 minutes ago, Scarloc99 said:

Logain can’t be Taim, how do you get that redemption arc with Logain at the very end after having been tortured. I think Taim will still be in it but the writers understand they need the audience to be invested in Logain for when he gets healed and then resists being turned before leading the faction against Taim in the black tower. Then right at the end the emotion of a mother telling Logain she will be sending her son to be tested at the black tower when he is of age. 

I really like Logain from the books, but he is never a raving basket case and we have him like that in S1.  They could make Logain into Taim and Rand be the man to confront him in S7-S8. (If we make it that far).

[Scarloc99]

5 minutes ago, Cipher said:

I really like Logain from the books, but he is never a raving basket case and we have him like that in S1.  They could make Logain into Taim and Rand be the man to confront him in S7-S8. (If we make it that far).

Again how do we know? By the time we meet Logain properly it has been months since his stilling and the wasting has already set in.