WoT Season 2 Episode 4: Daughter of the Night

[DreadLord31]

Y’all are proving my point. You don’t know, we don’t know, the characters don’t seem to know… whether Moiraine is stilled or shielded or just ditching Lan & what’s going on with the Warder bond because of that. And I’m arguing A) I think they’re doing this to keep Pike central to the story & B) that’s a bad choice because it’s the least interesting plot-line in the show so far

[Rhaze]

6 minutes ago, DreadLord31 said:

Y’all are proving my point. You don’t know, we don’t know, the characters don’t seem to know… whether Moiraine is stilled or shielded or just ditching Lan & what’s going on with the Warder bond because of that. And I’m arguing A) I think they’re doing this to keep Pike central to the story & B) that’s a bad choice because it’s the least interesting plot-line in the show so far

 Interestingly enough, I thought Moiraine's thread was the only decent one in episode 4. Perrin and Hopper was cool also, but only for a few minutes.

[Ralph]

44 minutes ago, DreadLord31 said:

Y’all are proving my point. You don’t know, we don’t know, the characters don’t seem to know… whether Moiraine is stilled or shielded or just ditching Lan & what’s going on with the Warder bond because of that. And I’m arguing A) I think they’re doing this to keep Pike central to the story & B) that’s a bad choice because it’s the least interesting plot-line in the show so far

whereas I think each of the characters think they know, but they all "know" different things. I suspect M knows she isn't stilled, Verin and Adeleas and possibly Lan may think she is, and Alanna knows nothing about it and thinks it was just released (which M mentioned to her in S1). 

 

I find it intriguing

[BookMattBetterThanShow]

23 minutes ago, Ralph said:

whereas I think each of the characters think they know, but they all "know" different things. I suspect M knows she isn't stilled, Verin and Adeleas and possibly Lan may think she is, and Alanna knows nothing about it and thinks it was just released (which M mentioned to her in S1). 

 

I find it intriguing

I think this will be solve in episode 5, I watch the preview several times, I think the person riding the horse is Moraine?

[EmreY]

3 hours ago, DreadLord31 said:

It’s writing on a level as bad as Arrow. 

 

No, no, nothing could be that bad. 😛 

 

3 hours ago, DreadLord31 said:

4. With that being said, I’d change the ending to this episode. Moiraine seems to “know” that Lanfear can’t be killed. Have her club Lanfear over the head with a board, then, Rand/Moiriane have their scene…blah, blah, blah, she’s Lanfear. Lanfear wakes up and tries to kill Moiriaine. Then Rand (with LTT’s help/in his head screaming) stops Lanfear from killing Moiraine by pinning her to the wall with the power & shielding her (reminiscent of Nyn/Liandrin). Rand/Moiraine run. Then Lanfear breaks the shield. That, my friend, is much better decision making.

 

Me likey. 🙂 Though perhaps they want to hold off on the LTT screams for a bit.

[EmreY]

58 minutes ago, Ralph said:

whereas I think each of the characters think they know, but they all "know" different things. I suspect M knows she isn't stilled, Verin and Adeleas and possibly Lan may think she is, and Alanna knows nothing about it and thinks it was just released (which M mentioned to her in S1). 

 

I find it intriguing

 

I think I agree, but I also think it is much ado about very little.

Edited September 10, 2023 by EmreY

[Ralph]

39 minutes ago, BookMattBetterThanShow said:

I think this will be solve in episode 5, I watch the preview several times, I think the person riding the horse is Moraine?

yes me too. it looks like her. but it doesn't look like normal  channeling - a whip of fire? 

 

wafo I suppose

[Ralph]

3 hours ago, DreadLord31 said:

Elaida is in S3, but I find the theory that Liandrin & Alviarian have been condensed fairly convincing. 
 

Heres some things I would have done differently: 

1) don’t write that Moiraine can kill one Fade alone with a knife, and then edit Lan’s fighting two Fades down to make him look incompetent, so you can make Fades movements look superhuman. 
If you go to the behind the scenes, Daniel Henney worked really hard on that scene & it was originally longer and better than what they gave us. Majorly bad choice both for the books & for Tv. At this point Tv viewers should be in agreement with Liandrin “Warders are glorified dogs.” And also believe that Lan isn’t at all special among Warders. 

 

 

 

3. Knock it off with the “fake-out” deaths. You’ve done this over and over again in S1 & you’re doing it again in S2. What it does is make the audience not trust you; it’s a cheap gimmick. GoT was unique in American fantasy lit/Tv in that they actually killed their Main Characters. That’s interesting. This is not. At this point, what I think they should do is: 

  Hide contents

Have Moiraine tackle Lanfear through an archway This Season and not return for at least 2 seasons.

Trust would be restored. And despite their fears and their false belief they need to keep Pike central - I’d bet you ratings would soar. Now that you’ve done so many fake-out deaths though, the payoff to a Huge WoT moment is next to nothing because: 

  Hide contents

People will expect Moiraine to just be back with no explanation. 

It’s writing on a level as bad as Arrow. 
 

4. With that being said, I’d change the ending to this episode. Moiraine seems to “know” that Lanfear can’t be killed. Have her club Lanfear over the head with a board, then, Rand/Moiriane have their scene…blah, blah, blah, she’s Lanfear. Lanfear wakes up and tries to kill Moiriaine. Then Rand (with LTT’s help/in his head screaming) stops Lanfear from killing Moiraine by pinning her to the wall with the power & shielding her (reminiscent of Nyn/Liandrin). Rand/Moiraine run. Then Lanfear breaks the shield. That, my friend, is much better decision making. 

1. I don't agree with this. true they could have done Lan better, but M outwitted the Fade, didn't out fight it, and anyone can find it difficult against two skilled opponents. 

 

3. I have blotted s1 e8 out of my memory so not as many 🤔

 

4. I suspect Rand doesn't fully believe M

[Ralph]

3 hours ago, Ralph said:

1. I don't agree with this. true they could have done Lan better, but M outwitted the Fade, didn't out fight it, and anyone can find it difficult against two skilled opponents. 

 

isn't there a piece in aMoL where Lan defeats two and everyone is very impressed? 

 

Talmanes is one after the other not simultaneous. I don't recall anywhere else when two fight in unison, and I think RJ once said they are not good at coordinating

[Scarloc99]

On 9/9/2023 at 3:57 AM, Samt said:

I'm also coming to the conclusion that it's just not worth it anymore to worry about the changes from the book.  This isn't that story.  It's not useful to try to understand them in each other's context.  

 

Your two concerns quoted above are my exact questions.  

 

Every scene with the warders or Aes Sedai discussing the implications of the bond serves only the confuse me more.  And nobody really seems to be confused, just worred about Lan.  Is Lan still bonded to Moiraine and the bond is just inactive?  Do the characters themselves not know?  Is Lan's state presently distinguishable from the state that led to Stepin's suicide?  If Lan is effectively unbonded, what does it mean for Alanna to forcibly take his bond?  Would that be distinct from Alanna just forcibly bonding an unbonded person?  

 

And in regards to Lanfear regenerating?, a big point of the forsaken is that they are ultimately regular mortals in mortal bodies once you get past all the crazy things they can do with the one power.  But leaving the book lore aside, it also raises serious questions for the show.  We're going to need some serious explanations as to how shrugging off impalement and throat slitting is not universe breaking.  Can anyone do it?  What are the limits?  If you don't have good and consistent answers for these questions, you are going to undercut a lot of tension in the show.  I question whether the creators really learned anything from the problems that superhealing created, if they are just repeating the same thing.  

In the books we see the Forsaken get pretty badly cut up with swords and come back fighting, but also RJ had extra forsaken to sacrifice to weed out the chaff (and he kept bringing them back again anyway). I am happy if we switch out Forsaken can be resurrected in a new body for Forsaken are really really hard to kill and so need to be Balefired, or pushed through a magical doorway to actually finish them off. 

I think we the viewer are meant to be as confused as the characters as to what is happening with the bond. Morraine seems convinced she is stilled, and because her bond was shielded when she was shielded then something odd has happened. For me I am not even going to try overthinking it, I am loving this arc, in the books Morraine has no arc, there is no real story about her she is just there, pissing people off, pushing Rand away, losing control of everything and then having her moment to shine. Her character here is actually developed and evolving and we are learning to care about her as more then just "Gandalf in a dress". That means that the impact will be harder when she goes away. 

[Scarloc99]

On 9/9/2023 at 4:27 AM, Elder_Haman said:

Perhaps the regenerative properties of the Forsaken are a change made to facilitate a different change: 

 

Balefire’s time-bending, reality undoing is going to be really hard to film. Perhaps instead, Balefire simply burns a soul from the pattern. So it will be the solve to the immortality piece. 

I don't see them changing this, as long as they have the budget the time affecting effects of Balefire will look brilliant on screen, especially at the last battle. That is the kind of thing that writers and effects people drool over making work. 

[Scarloc99]

Suddenly Liandrin getting Nyn to follow her makes a lot more sense, as does her pushing her to become accepted. 

Accepted Nyn can be coherced to try and leave the tower (because she can leave), and Liandrin has shown her a nifty route out of the tower to escape so knows where she will be when she ignores Liandrin and "does something stupid". Whats more it makes more sense then in the books where Liandrin told them she would take them and so opened herself up to the girls telling someone before they left, this way it was all the girls idea. 

So when Nyn went missing presumed dead in the tower Liandrin was pissed because her plan for how to get the girls to Falme went out the window, and maybe Sheriam was angry at Liandrin because her plan had failed. 

[Scarloc99]

On 9/9/2023 at 12:42 PM, king of nowhere said:

Some good and some bad. I'm not passing judgment on lanfear recovery until we see where it goes, but her reveal was kinda underwhelming. Moiraine with her knife, good introduction.

Didn't like lan. His bond drama is not clear; worse, it undermines the stepin arc - that would have worked with moiraine dead, but at this moment it is just confusing.

And didn't like nynaeve leaving just like that. "I am an accepted, i can leave"? And for what, she spends months traveling with only a vague direction of where perrin might be? Especially disappointed in elayne; earlier episodes she was the coolheaded one, talking egwrne out of stupid decisions. In the books she came because an aes sedai authorized the trip; what's her plan now? Best case scenario she'll disappear for months, throwing andor in a political crysis. Which sort of happened in the books too, but she had better motivations.

 

Moiraine sister was great cahirien plotting. Perrin was great. Min was great

Elayne didn't have a chance to try and talk them out of it, or argue with them, or be sent away, Liandrin appeared far to quickly for that which is clever writing because it means Elayne's character is not leaving for just no reason she followed the girls to try and talk them out of trouble, and got caught up in that trouble instead. 

As for Nynaeve, Liandrin has obviously been plotting this for ages, she allowed Nynaeve to follow her through the "secret" passageway out of the tower so she would know where to find the girls after she had planted enough seeds in Nynaeve to get her to act on her own and recklessly head off. I am still not convinced that is actually her son and not just some random old guy she planted to get Nyn to trust her more. The girls have been played and come out of it looking far better then the books because we all have screamed at the girls in the early books "Its a Trap" in our best admiral ackbar impressions long before the girls realise it. At least here they where properly manipulated. 

[Scarloc99]

On 9/9/2023 at 1:08 PM, DreadLord31 said:

I bet you they hand-wave away the fact that there’s no chance Moiraine could get away against Zombiefear if she resurrects in about 10 sec. 
 

Im guessing next we’ll see Rand/Moiraine they’ll be “hiding” in Cairhein with Moiraine’s family, and they’ll be … just fine?? 

I mean Lanfer might also be instructed to let them escape, which matches up with the books. She leaves Rand alone to become LTT telling him constantly that he is hers. The fact he told her he loved her means she can really play up the crazy ex vibe now on screen which I am really looking forward to, I do hope Rand doesn't own a pet rabbit :). 

[Scarloc99]

On 9/9/2023 at 2:39 PM, Rhand said:

 

Unfortunately I need wolves to share their name before I know who they are. But to be honest I was referring more to the interaction between them rather than just seing a wolf.

Now that's just Wolfish, are you saying walves all look the same to you 🙂 but I agree with you, we finally have hopper properly, playful but serious, both a wise teacher but also a friend who likes to just play and hunt and run and gets bored of two leg things. 

[king of nowhere]

23 minutes ago, Scarloc99 said:

Elayne didn't have a chance to try and talk them out of it, or argue with them, or be sent away, Liandrin appeared far to quickly for that which is clever writing because it means Elayne's character is not leaving for just no reason she followed the girls to try and talk them out of trouble, and got caught up in that trouble instead.

maybe. i would have liked her to voice at least the start of an objection. but you are right, it could work with some proper explanation afterward.

 

just in the same way that the giant seanchan wave could have worked wonderfully if it was shown to be used for intimidation, but it was never mentioned again.

so i'm not holding my breath waiting for it

[Scarloc99]

So episode 4 and I am still loving it, yes things are different from the books but this is still WOT all the key things are still there and we are getting stuff we didn't get in the books which is really good. My key takeaways. 

Liandrin is far far more of a schemer then in the books, she has played a very long con with Nyn, getting her to trust her, "Showing her" a way to sneak out of the tower ( I am still convinced the man is not her son and was simply a tool to allow her a reason to be sneaking around that Nyn would believe and so Nyn would trust her), getting her made accepted early so she has permission to leave the tower (although I imagine not leave the Island), and then getting the word from Ishy so she could tell Nyn that that Perrin had been captured so making sure they would try and escape for her to meet them. 

The bond, people are getting very very angry about this story but again I love it, it is clear to me that Lan and Morraine have made assumptions that are wrong, that we are being shown on screen what really happens off the page in the books (Lans change of character and personality), and Morraine in the TV show is more then just a "female gandalf" which is what she is in the books. Book Morraine has no real arc, she exists as a reason to make the story happen, she is there to rescue or push things forward, but herself as a character stays fairly static until book 5, and then when she comes back. This Morraine we are getting to see she has vulnerabilities, she does not know it all (her sister shows her that emphatically), and more importantly the viewers are being taken on a journey that will lead, I guess in season 4, to her going away for a while. 

Min and Ishy, I am in 2 minds here, on the one hand I like that the show forsaken are a lot more dangerous and conniving then the book foresaken, where the main excuse given for the keystone cops like "plans" they put in place, only to see them ripped apart very easily by a bunch of teenagers, is that they keep underestimating everyone. Ishy is showing himself to be a genuine threat, he has plans inside plans and is manipulating everyone. But, as much as it made sense to have the Min Ishy scene in there to really hammer home that Liandrin is black Ajah, I am not so sure on having Ishy pulling so many threads all at once like this. It feels like one of the other forsaken should have taken this master manipulator role. But I did love what they did with the camera and editing in the dream world, making Ishy jump around a bit and the background look a bit disjointed was brilliant. 

Lanfer, oh this was brilliant on several levels. First the crazy ex girlfriend vibes are very strong with this one, fatal attraction meets basic instinct meets my super crazy ex gf. Rand telling her he loved her, while initially I was unsure about that (he never says that in the books after all), it just all makes sense. Rand has told her that now, so she is going to hold onto that and remind him over and over, it is going to make him less likely to use those words in future and will feed into his discomfort at falling in love ever again, let alone 3 times. This is a better character development then book rand who just sits there and effectively sys "I'm a dirty dog for loving 3 women, but, well, I will do it anyway". Her dying, was great as well, in the books the Forsaken survive a lot of battles and damage that would kill a normal human, but also the father of lies, the master of death it makes sense that something as mundane a a sword would not kill a forsaken, because it doesn't in the books. Ishy is walking around with a half melted face in the books, and he gets stabbed and "killed" multiple times only to keep coming back. 

Perrin, the wolf speak is done really well I am more then happy with this, I also like Elyas, I always felt in the books he was a bit too civilised, the man spends almost all his time hanging out with wolves in the middle of nowhere, the guy is not going to be the best talker, or the life and soul of a party, especially not with a stranger he is still "sniffing out". 

Matt, in book 2 he does very very little for most of the book so I expected his role here to be smaller in season 2, I imagine something will happen in episode 5 or 6 to start us seeing the dice rolling, but I don't think his arc will really kick in until season 3, I think he is going to be the hero of Tear. 

So yes overall this was a great episode that stays true to the essence of RJ's books and the world of the WOT while crafting a story that makes sense given the challenges of time, and has all the individual bits there. 

[Scarloc99]

11 minutes ago, king of nowhere said:

maybe. i would have liked her to voice at least the start of an objection. but you are right, it could work with some proper explanation afterward.

 

just in the same way that the giant seanchan wave could have worked wonderfully if it was shown to be used for intimidation, but it was never mentioned again.

so i'm not holding my breath waiting for it

I am thinking the giant wave, like much of episode 8, can just be kind of ignored lol. 

I think it works well because it gives Elayne something to call back to in future when she tries to talk the girls out of doing something rash. Although Elayne gets more and more irrational as the books go on to the point of stupidity, she is the one character who never seems to want to lose the unique ability the girls have of strolling into a trap, I really hope that show Elayne does not become that irritating queen who doesn't realise that once she is on the throne she can get other people to do all that dangerous stuff. 

[king of nowhere]

11 hours ago, Scarloc99 said:

I think it works well because it gives Elayne something to call back to in future when she tries to talk the girls out of doing something rash. Although Elayne gets more and more irrational as the books go on to the point of stupidity, she is the one character who never seems to want to lose the unique ability the girls have of strolling into a trap, I really hope that show Elayne does not become that irritating queen who doesn't realise that once she is on the throne she can get other people to do all that dangerous stuff. 

elayne is foolhardy, not irrational.

nynaeve and egwene get into all kinds of conflicts based on emotions, often making problems with someone just because they got angry with that someone for futile reasons that may even be their own faults in the first place. I remember many scenes where nynaeve and egwene just struggle for power.

I don't remember elayne having none of that crap. she's always been one of the few people in the saga who does not pick petty grudges. aviendha said, her sister would try to make peace in a water-feud, and she would probably succeed. as for power, while she generally expects to lead in politics based on the sound argument that she's trained for it, she quickly defers to the other girls when it comes to things that are outside of her expertise.

elayne also takes lots of personal risks, even when it's not the best idea. Yes, she makes a lot of bad judgments there. However, she's not irrational. What she does has a logical goal. Yes, she is very optimistic on the risk-reward balance, and she does push bravery well past the point where it becomes recklessness. But it's never in a "I just didn't feel like it" way.

 

which is why it is perfectly appropriate for elayne to travel the ways and go fight seanchans with her friends, but it's not appropriate to not raise objections when nynaeve goes like "I have those very vague reports that could potentially hint perrin is in trouble somewhere and I must go" when you don't even know where he is with an approximation of hundreds of kilometers, and you will take months to even get there, and you're not even sure that party of shienarans is perrin's, and by the time you get there most likely perrin will have managed on his own or will be dead anyway.

actually, I would say jumping into that kind of odds is typical nynaeve.

Edited September 11, 2023 by king of nowhere

[DreadLord31]

You know, every time I rewatch and set my book brain aside; it’s not as bad as my knee-jerk reaction. This episode was pretty slow, but it wasn’t bad Tv. 
 

There was no bad CGI or ridiculous writing or poor acting. All my complaints are book related complaints. 
 

But as a book-reader, yeeeeah: 

 

[Lightfriendsocialmistress]

Not on current topic but regarding the episode, I have to just say….when nyneave says regarding her experience in the arches “I was in there for years” and clearing up the possibility that it was more of a dream like experience, it really struck me. Holy eff! She has lived years in her awareness of a life that actually happened and suddenly has to adjust to returning to a reality and world that she had probably lost all memory of. That’s mind blowing. 

[king of nowhere]

40 minutes ago, Lightfriendsocialmistress said:

Not on current topic but regarding the episode, I have to just say….when nyneave says regarding her experience in the arches “I was in there for years” and clearing up the possibility that it was more of a dream like experience, it really struck me. Holy eff! She has lived years in her awareness of a life that actually happened and suddenly has to adjust to returning to a reality and world that she had probably lost all memory of. That’s mind blowing. 

I don't think the arches accelerate time like that.

I think it was more of a dream like experience, where nyn felt like years passed when in reality she just skipped scenes.

I don't think it will be ever expanded upon, though

[Mailman]

Another disappointing episode.

 

Warders are just nothing compared to the books. The relentless talk about the bond is at a complete overkill level considering the dire state of the worldbuilding across the series considering we are now 50% through the 2nd season.

 

Distance and travel times are just irrelevant, we need to go here then next scene there we are with no recognition of time or distance involved. Alanna was in the tower teaching then had to go to Moiraine, bam shes there, then Moiraine leaves them and bam she is just in Cairhein. 

 

Looks like we are getting insta respawn forsaken. Not really sure how Moiraine followed them to the dagger it feels unlikely that the cabin would be part of any real story from the fake Selene. Making following them incredibly hard.

 

Why are the forsaken randomly imprisoned all over the world with individual seals it made sense in the books that they were trapped near the bore when the one seal was applied and they fell out of time I can see no sense why you would do it in a manner that appears deliberate for each one.

 

Be it realistic or not the size of the wolves makes them look like fairly small dogs, its hard to imagine them attacking in the manner in the books, hell even seeing hopper jump when giving his name to Perrin was very underwhelming that was meant to be an attempt to jump into the sky.

 

The departure from the books accelerates every episode.

[Lightfriendsocialmistress]

14 minutes ago, king of nowhere said:

I don't think the arches accelerate time like that.

I think it was more of a dream like experience, where nyn felt like years passed when in reality she just skipped scenes.

I don't think it will be ever expanded upon, though

I got the sense that it was similar to portal stones in the books or the ways, where time passes differently depending on which world you’re experiencing. Meaning that the experiencer feels the passage of time in a real way but it’s all relative and individual perspective doesn’t influence the fabric of the whole timeline. Just my take on it, and like you said it may not be expounded upon. As with certain elements of book lore, we can speculate but not always know everything. My main observation was that Nyneave experienced it as absolutely real and lasting for years of her experience. 

Edited September 11, 2023 by Lightfriendsocialmistress

[nsmallw]

On 9/9/2023 at 5:55 PM, Samt said:

I just don't buy into the show's story of Lan and Moiraine suddenly being unable to communicate or work together for whatever reason. Lan should see right through Moiraine's reasoning to push him away like this.

I too have had concerns re" the Lan arc and how Moiraine pushes him away, what is the real condition of their bond, why all the confusion around it and there doesn't seem to be a good answer. I hope Rafe will clarify this in the next couple episodes. I did have one crazy thought about why Moraine sent Lan to Alanna. Perhaps he's there to look into Alanna and her warders to verify that they aren't Black Ajah. I know it sounds crazy but it would explain why he's there and why he doesn't correct them when they declare that Moraine broke the bond. The whole why aren't you going crazy questions etc. What does everyone else think about this crazy notion of mine ?