WoT Season 2 Episode 2: Strangers and Friends

[Pandemonium]

Nobody has talked about Min's vision of Matt stabbing Rand yet.  That is definitely odd.  Is Matt going to get the dagger back and take the place of Fain leaving an evil wound on Rand?

[SinisterDeath]

5 minutes ago, Pandemonium said:

Nobody has talked about Min's vision of Matt stabbing Rand yet.  That is definitely odd.  Is Matt going to get the dagger back and take the place of Fain leaving an evil wound on Rand?

That's going to be a WAFO, because I'd rather not get worked up over speculation. lol

[Skipp]

16 minutes ago, Pandemonium said:

Nobody has talked about Min's vision of Matt stabbing Rand yet.  That is definitely odd.  Is Matt going to get the dagger back and take the place of Fain leaving an evil wound on Rand?

It was certainly shocking to see on screen and I am sure Min was went immediately from "this guy is silly but fun" to "whom am I really getting to know" especially since she seemed to recognize Rand.

 

Upon thinking it over my wild theory  is that Mat and Fain have been "entangled"(for the lack of a better word) due to the dagger.  And that is what Min was seeing.

 

I am probably wildly off base though.

[Irvyne]

The episode was fine, but... seriously, what the hell are they doing here? Apart from the fade being nailed to the door, I feel like there wasn't a single scene or story thread in this episode that actually comes from the source material! Like, seriously, what the hell are they doing?? Why even bother getting the license to adapt a book if you're just going to make a completely new story anyway? It's so weird. It's like fan-fiction.

[DigificWriter]

27 minutes ago, Irvyne said:

Why even bother getting the license to adapt a book if you're just going to make a completely new story anyway? It's so weird. It's like fan-fiction.

 

Following this logic, you must think that West Side Story, 10 Things I Hate About You, Kiss Me Kate, Ex Machina, and The Lion King, all of which are films that wildly and diversely diverge from the William Shakespeare plays from which they were adapted, are also fanfiction, right?

[Elder_Haman]

My $0.02 on Episode 2:

 

Rand and Selene are banging. Okay, I guess. I do like the fact that what Selene is offering him (you can let me use you while pretending you're someone else) seems to bother him a little bit. I also think it was an interesting juxtaposition of his aggressiveness after just killing with the power. Excited to see where they take Rand this season - we got to see all of his humanity and also his dark side. And we can question to what extent the killing of the orderly was planned. How far is he already gone.

 

Kate Fleetwood is amazing.

 

Really enjoyed Verin's gut punch to Moiraine. Yeah, I know about the Dragon and the girls and your plans. They've set it up well for Verin to meet Mat and get him "on the board". 

 

Elayne does not look like I wanted her to. But she does act like Elayne. Perfect combination of snooty and approachable. I love the way they brought her little brewing experiment. Great foundation for her later discoveries. Also, Eggy and Elayne clearly have good on screen chemistry.

 

Donal Finn as Mat is seamless and he hasn't had that much screentime yet. Not sure what's going on with Min's vision, but it is fairly obvious to me that Mat isn't stabbing Rand, but someone near him. Min is growing on me, though she's still not at all what Min looks like in my head canon.

 

Keep on eye on Masema. He kicked ass and the actor (Arnas Fedaravicius, Sithric from The Last Kingdom) is a really good actor. There's potential for that to be a more fleshed out storyline.

 

I love, love, love the look of the Seanchan. Love the damane. Love the pacifiers. Love the facepaint. Love the nails. Love it. And they are absolutely terrifying.

 

Are they ever going to address how everyone (*cough* Loial *cough*) is still alive after Fal Dara? It's the one thing that is really bothering me.

 

Great episode. I'm super invested.

 

8.5/10

[Skipp]

1 hour ago, Elder_Haman said:

 

Keep on eye on Masema. He kicked ass and the actor (Arnas Fedaravicius, Sithric from The Last Kingdom) is a really good actor. There's potential for that to be a more fleshed out storyline.

 

 

I loved the battle scene at the end of the 2nd episode.  I preferred it immensely more than the fade fight in the first.  Although credit where its due, Lan took on 3 fades and killed 2.  But the action was too many quick cuts to be enjoyable.

 

But yeah Masema kicked some ass and seeing Loial toss people around like sacks was fantastic.

[Agitel]

14 hours ago, Pandemonium said:

Nobody has talked about Min's vision of Matt stabbing Rand yet.  That is definitely odd.  Is Matt going to get the dagger back and take the place of Fain leaving an evil wound on Rand?

 

Her visions might not always be so literal or complete. I'm betting it's metaphor, at the least.

[Elder_Haman]

2 hours ago, Agitel said:

 

Her visions might not always be so literal or complete. I'm betting it's metaphor, at the least.

Also it wasn't clear that he was stabbing Rand. Because of the angle, he could have been stabbing something just behind Rand.

[Agitel]

19 minutes ago, Elder_Haman said:

Also it wasn't clear that he was stabbing Rand. Because of the angle, he could have been stabbing something just behind Rand.

 

True. And it would be fitting if that was his redeeming moment. Him being there for his friend(s), probably after a moment where he has the chance to run away.

[A Memory Of Why]

8 hours ago, Elder_Haman said:

11 hours ago, Agitel said:

Her visions might not always be so literal or complete. I'm betting it's metaphor, at the least.

Also it wasn't clear that he was stabbing Rand. Because of the angle, he could have been stabbing something just behind Rand.

 

It was obscure, based on her reaction it feels like Rand got stabbed. Though she might not know what this vision means so that could be for the audience.

 

Was it that dagger? I couldn't really tell but I noticed golden filigree on the hilt. Maybe  Matt gives him the wound?

 

Someone suggested this could be a vision of a vision, as in what she saw was what Mat lived during his flicker lives..

 

I like this idea, keen for some flickering 😉

 

A huge missed opportunity to not include the flickering concept in a trailer, regardless if it makes it in the show.

[Scarloc99]

On 9/1/2023 at 6:19 AM, DaddyFinn said:

Hurin's powers combined with wolf powers?

I think it is linked to the wolf dream, Perrin is seeing the echos of what was much as someone walking in the dreamworld can see echos of what is? 
 

But also in the books Characters have visions like this all the time, it is the start of the breaking down of the walls so maybe this is the writers way of getting that into the show a different way. 

[Scarloc99]

On 9/1/2023 at 6:03 AM, A Memory Of Why said:

 

He found a horn alright, poor bugger.

 

Isn't Elayne lovely, quite liking her so far. I scoffed when she brought her bedroom with he and gave a satisfied nod when she got in trouble for it. 

 

So we're humanising Liandrin now.. if I didn't know better I'd think she's not evil and just a B.

 

Not sure how I feel about Perins "I can smell the past" vissions. Last episode made me think he was getting sent the visions from wolves..

 

Liked this episode better than the first but over all looking good.

Modern writing likes to humanise villains, and, it helps the bait and switch for non book readers who have no idea who she is, she is sympathetic and not that bad a person, the red are not all bad and then Bam, she turns on everyone and it makes the betrayal that much more shocking.  
 

I am loving the little foreshadowing of other darkfriends though, I am sure there were some nods to it in the interactions between the mistress of the novices and Alanna, and I am seeing links between Verin and other characters and stories in the books. She has a sister now, which might link to the Vandene and Adeleas story from the books, possibly Verins sister is going to meet a sticky end, possibly to help Verin cover up something? 
 

Smelling the past I see more as the start of him feeling his way to the wolf dream in some way, but throughout the books there are also instances of characters seeing the dead living. This might be a way for the writers to get that phenomenon into the story in a way that ties to Perrin. 

[Scarloc99]

On 9/1/2023 at 9:13 AM, Pandemonium said:

Pretty good episode... the Shienarians were pretty great in combat too and we finally got to see the power of Loail too.  Perrin is definitely becoming more interesting.  I thought maybe he could only see events that wolves saw, but maybe it is something deeper with the dreamworld he is able to see.

 

The Seanchan soldiers look fantastic but I don't really like that the damane have baby pacifiers.  

 

Seeing the fade on the wall was a great callback to the books.  

We are getting references to blademasters in the insane asylum with Errol, but Tand is going to need more that for his fight with Turok.

 

Verin is spot on and loved her confrontation with Moiraine and references of the dragon.  

 

Liandrin's forbidden son is quite interesting as well. I'm glad they are referencing the anti aging effects of channeling. I wonder what man knocked her up and made her hate the male race so much.  

 

Also, how we forget the reference to Cadsuane?

Verin has a sister now, which is a nice callback to a different story later on in the books. 

[Samt]

26 minutes ago, Scarloc99 said:

Verin has a sister now, which is a nice callback to a different story later on in the books. 

I was trying to figure out if they are confirming that they are biological sisters or if it's just the fact that the Aes Sedai all call each other sister.  

[Scarloc99]

2 minutes ago, Samt said:

I was trying to figure out if they are confirming that they are biological sisters or if it's just the fact that the Aes Sedai all call each other sister.  

I take it as they are real sisters, but might be wrong, the way they interact and talk and the fact they look similar. 
 

I am also loving seeing some great actors from British small screen tv shows appearing, Meera Syal is one I have grown up with, but also Gary Beadle 

[Scarloc99]

Also, those who where unsure if he would be appearing, Taim gets mentioned so I think we will be seeing the split in the tower and Logain vs Taim :). 

[Agitel]

39 minutes ago, Samt said:

I was trying to figure out if they are confirming that they are biological sisters or if it's just the fact that the Aes Sedai all call each other sister.  

 

I'm pretty sure they replaced/merged Vandene with Verin, so Adeleas and Verin are now biological sisters.

[DigificWriter]

Verin specifically says "my sister" to Moiraine in reference to Adeleas during the episode. If she were referring to Adeleas with the Aes Sedai honorific of Sister, she would've used the adjective "our", not "my".

Edited September 3, 2023 by DigificWriter

[Samt]

33 minutes ago, DigificWriter said:

Verin specifically says "my sister" to Moiraine in reference to Adeleas during the episode. If she were referring to Adeleas with the Aes Sedai honorific of Sister, she would've used the adjective "our", not "my".

Good catch.  I initially got the impression she was talking about a biological sister  without thinking much about it, but then realized that maybe I had misunderstood.  "My sister" vs "our sister" is pretty telling.  

[DigificWriter]

This is a 'neither here nor there' thing, but I can't help but wonder if Show!Adeleas has the same surname (Mathwin) as Verin or if her surname is still what it was in the books (Namelle).

[Jaysen Gore]

And in something that's sure to annoy book fans to no end, the most faithful character to appear on screen to date is Elayne Flaming Trakand. the actress just nailed it. 

 

I like the way Rand and Selene is being portrayed, and I like that they're pulling the black tower character forward much earlier in the series.

 

I like them setting up the brother / sister dynamic between Matt and Min; as I type this, I remember how their story arcs end, so this is pretty cool. And shouldn't interfere with later developments.

 

I'm okay with Loial getting violent much earlier in the series.  We don't get a lot of it until the very end, and it's a little jarring at that point.

 

I don't like the "I'm trying to drive you away for your own good" story arc between Lan and Moiraine. They aren't in high school, and shouldn't be this childish. 

 

I don't like Perrin's wolf replay visions. I knew his wolf powers were going to be hard, but this isn't working for me. 

 

Since I'm commenting in order, this might be the single strongest episode of the entire series to date, and kind of feels like "okay, now we can get started" kind of episode, and everything that has come before it has been a bad fever dream.

 

 

[Scarloc99]

6 hours ago, Agitel said:

 

I'm pretty sure they replaced/merged Vandene with Verin, so Adeleas and Verin are now biological sisters.

My only hope here is that her sisters death isn’t what send Verin to the black ajah and instead we get to see that Verin had to do some really messed up stuff in her pursuit of the truth. In the books Verin is sanitised and we get to imagine she was a “good darkfriend” who never once killed a child. 

[Elder_Haman]

5 hours ago, Scarloc99 said:

My only hope here is that her sisters death isn’t what send Verin to the black ajah and instead we get to see that Verin had to do some really messed up stuff in her pursuit of the truth. In the books Verin is sanitised and we get to imagine she was a “good darkfriend” who never once killed a child. 

Pretty sure she's already deep in the Black by this point. How do you think she knew what she knew about Moiraine's business?

[Guire]

7 minutes ago, Elder_Haman said:

Pretty sure she's already deep in the Black by this point. How do you think she knew what she knew about Moiraine's business?

Wonder if Adeleas will also be involved in Verin and Tomas alternative lifestyle?  If not we may have a familial killing.  Also a majority of sisters with spoken lines this season are likely walking in the shadow.