Season 3 Sneak Peek

[king of nowhere]

  On 2/24/2025 at 8:14 AM, Mailman said:

If you could explain to me how exactly they would identify a man who never channels the power that would be great.

 

The only way the Reds can find a man who channels is by tracking down signs of his use of the power. Since the only men to do this would be those with ability inborn that is a small % and then 75% of those would die after only a few uses of the power.

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i don't know, the books don't clarify it either. 

but cadsuane alone found more male channelers than any four red combined. this means she was doing something right, and the rest of the reds were not.

as a rule of thumb, i think staying in the tower playing politics wasn't helping in their goal.

  On 2/24/2025 at 2:54 AM, Mailman said:

The tower was arrogant and isolationist and made mistakes yes. But when you are viewed basically worldwide as the puppet master behind every decision then claiming they suck is probably going too far.

 

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the tower was viewed as such, yes, but how much was it reality? we're talking the same tower that let everyone think they let malkier fall to hide the fact that they were unable to help.

 

also, their suckiness has to be put in perspective. the tower was immensely strong, because it held one thousand channelers. it had monopoly on channelers. a single channeler can destroy hundreds on a battlefield, can reach kings and queens. so the tower was really the biggest power on randland, but only because of the lack of competition.

which also ties into the tower suckiness. they never had to try. they were so strong, being the only ones with the power, that they never needed to use the power. the threat was enough. so they stopped using the power for anything practical, and they lost training and capacity for it. no aes sedai was trained for fighting over channelers, because there was nobody else for them to fight - except some hapless male channeler, completely untrained, half mad, and outnumbered five to one.

they went into decay, but since they were still so strong that nobody could challenge them, they never had to reform. and the black ajah was sabotaging them all the time, of course.

[Ithillian Turambar]

Moiraine was able to front it out, even when she'd been shielded.

 

What they lack in actual power, these days, they've more than made up for in attitude lol

[Mailman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 6:22 PM, expat said:

Moving the goal post here.  Your claim was that there were very few natural male channelers.  I replied that the number of Ashamen showed that there were a reasonable number of natural channelers and you moved to how were the Reds supposed to find these men.  That was always an issue in the book where the Red Ajah never really made much sense.  Once a male channeler was known, any sister could shield them, you didn't need a special Ajah for that. The books never even attempted to explain the mechanics of how the Red Ajah found the men.

 

While I am speculating since there is no book cannon, my imagined mechanics would be the Red sisters traveling the land trying to sniff out rumors of male channelers.  Even if a natural male channeler tried not to use the power, there would be local clues (some inexplicitable events, men going insane) that might indicate channeling which wouldn't reach the Tower.  If the channeler wasn't trying to be a false Dragon, the clues might stay local.  The Red sisters would be looking for these local rumors, investigating the area to see if potential channeling events are happening, and finally investigate the rumored man.  This is a highly inefficient method and would require the Red sister to be spread out across the land to hear the rumors.  Sitting in the Tower until an obvious channeler is shown to them would miss most of the natural male channelers.

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Absolutely no moving of the goalposts from me.

 

Your claim was that the Red Ajah was rubbish because look 1000 Ashman.

I pointed out the facts that the

Only men with the ability inborn would ever manifest use of the power.

Of that small number 75% of those would die because they had no teacher.

Red Ajah can only react to reports of that small number using those powers.

Ashman actively recruited those with the ability to learn as well as those with the spark inborn and had access to travelling. All abilities that the Red could not possibly have.

 

Absolutely no moving of goalposts and the suggestion is disingenuous.

 

[Mailman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 8:47 PM, king of nowhere said:

i don't know, the books don't clarify it either. 

but cadsuane alone found more male channelers than any four red combined. this means she was doing something right, and the rest of the reds were not.

as a rule of thumb, i think staying in the tower playing politics wasn't helping in their goal.

the tower was viewed as such, yes, but how much was it reality? we're talking the same tower that let everyone think they let malkier fall to hide the fact that they were unable to help.

 

also, their suckiness has to be put in perspective. the tower was immensely strong, because it held one thousand channelers. it had monopoly on channelers. a single channeler can destroy hundreds on a battlefield, can reach kings and queens. so the tower was really the biggest power on randland, but only because of the lack of competition.

which also ties into the tower suckiness. they never had to try. they were so strong, being the only ones with the power, that they never needed to use the power. the threat was enough. so they stopped using the power for anything practical, and they lost training and capacity for it. no aes sedai was trained for fighting over channelers, because there was nobody else for them to fight - except some hapless male channeler, completely untrained, half mad, and outnumbered five to one.

they went into decay, but since they were still so strong that nobody could challenge them, they never had to reform. and the black ajah was sabotaging them all the time, of course.

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Cadsuane had Ter'angreal that could detect male channelers and the use of the power as well as detecting the direction.

 

1000 channelers cannot attack an army unless it is in self-defence or they are shadowsworn. This is well known. The towers power is almost entirely political at the start of the books.

Edited February 24 by Mailman

[Mailman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 3:06 PM, Elder_Haman said:

No, it isn't. This is disingenuous. 

The point being made is that in fantasy/sci-fi/action genres, there are many things happening that are 'unrealistic' or where characters have plot armor or they get rewarded (or fail to be punished) for foolish decisions. As a general rule, we as viewers suspend disbelief.

 

I'll take "Reacher" as an example, since I just watched it last night. Reacher sneaks out of his window on the third story of a mansion, scampers across the roof, shimmies down a drain pipe and manages to make his way off of a well-guarded property without being seen, then manages to get back in the same way, racing the head of security who is coming to check on him.

 

The whole premise is ridiculous. A house full of people will certainly notice a huge man running on the roof and climbing down gutters. Roof tiles would be damaged, storm drains would be bent and would not hold the weight of a 250+ pound giant human. 

 

And that's just a single scene in the show. It is silly? Yes. Is it believable? Not if you spend more than 2 seconds thinking about it. Is it entertaining? Yes. And the same can be said for nearly every show that fits into one of these genres. 

 

 

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Lol I actually wrote a review on Reacher s3 on another site that praised the guttering for holding up a man of his size repeatedly. I also thought the bad guys must think Reacher has an incontinence issue at this point.

 

Using Reacher as an example it has turned into absolute rubbish since they made the bad guys into morons, this occurred about s01ep5. If you want to enjoy the action thats fine but you have to completely turn your brain off to enjoy the story. If you believe that a tight run criminal syndicate with a small group of members would not suspect the new guy and actually promote him to number 2 with a bullet after 5 of them are killed in 3 days then i have a bridge to sell you.

[Elder_Haman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 9:59 PM, Mailman said:

Lol I actually wrote a review on Reacher s3 on another site that praised the guttering for holding up a man of his size repeatedly. I also thought the bad guys must think Reacher has an incontinence issue at this point.

 

Using Reacher as an example it has turned into absolute rubbish since they made the bad guys into morons, this occurred about s01ep5. If you want to enjoy the action thats fine but you have to completely turn your brain off to enjoy the story. If you believe that a tight run criminal syndicate with a small group of members would not suspect the new guy and actually promote him to number 2 with a bullet after 5 of them are killed in 3 days then i have a bridge to sell you.

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Please name a show in the sci-fi/fantasy/action genre that gives us 100% realistic action scenes and requires no suspension of disbelief. Just one.

[DaddyFinn]

  On 2/24/2025 at 10:03 PM, Elder_Haman said:

Please name a show in the sci-fi/fantasy/action genre that gives us 100% realistic action scenes and requires no suspension of disbelief. Just one.

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Jackie Chan's movies

[Mailman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 10:03 PM, Elder_Haman said:

Please name a show in the sci-fi/fantasy/action genre that gives us 100% realistic action scenes and requires no suspension of disbelief. Just one.

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No.

 

All shows to varying degrees of success or intent fall all over this definition. I have no objection to people enjoying shows purely for the spectacle or action sequences. But if your aim is good storytelling and world building you need to aim higher than making your characters dumb or incompetent to facilitate it, unless that is their character for the entire series.

 

 

[Kaleb]

  On 2/24/2025 at 9:47 PM, Mailman said:

The towers power is almost entirely political at the start of the books.

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This is exactly the point that expat and king of nowhere are making in support of the position that the sneak peek battle is believable in the context of what we know about Aes Sedai. As an institution - and particularly among the individuals that are based in the White Tower - they are A+++ Mean Girls and mostly pretty big dunces at using the power in a situation like that.

[Elder_Haman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 10:13 PM, Mailman said:

No.

 

All shows to varying degrees of success or intent fall all over this definition. I have no objection to people enjoying shows purely for the spectacle or action sequences. But if your aim is good storytelling and world building you need to aim higher than making your characters dumb or incompetent to facilitate it, unless that is their character for the entire series.

 

 

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You're correct. And there is plenty to criticize as regards the writing on this show. But this ain't it.

[Turin Turambar]

  On 2/24/2025 at 9:47 PM, Mailman said:

Cadsuane had Ter'angreal that could detect male channelers and the use of the power as well as detecting the direction.

 

1000 channelers cannot attack an army unless it is in self-defence or they are shadowsworn. This is well known. The towers power is almost entirely political at the start of the books.

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Yes. I was gonna mention her deeleebobs o' magicfulness. 

 

I assume you mean 1000 Aes Sedai couldn't attack because  damane or Asha'man could just fine. Aes Sedai could as well they would just have to "believe" they were in mortal danger. Which one could argue is a slippery slope, but an entire different conversation. 

[Samt]

I imagine the tower as a team of 20 foot tall basketball players.  They win every game without training because they are so tall.  But once they meet another group of 20 foot tall basketball players, they realize that they are bad a dribbling, passing, guarding, or shooting.  They just never bothered to practice before.  

[Mailman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 11:40 PM, Samt said:

I imagine the tower as a team of 20 foot tall basketball players.  They win every game without training because they are so tall.  But once they meet another group of 20 foot tall basketball players, they realize that they are bad a dribbling, passing, guarding, or shooting.  They just never bothered to practice before.  

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Not exactly. In your analogy they are 20 ft because of the power but they would not be able to play any offence with their height unless they are attacked because of the oaths.

 

The Tower Aes Sedai at Dumai wells held their own against a vastly larger number of wise ones.

 

The Seachan channelers did absolutely nothing except use the power for battle they had no other objective in life other than preperation for fighting. And again we never have a direct head to head between the Aes Sedai and the Damane that was not heavily tilted in one sides favour or individual captures. (minimal sky lights and such I am not counting).

 

When in the books are the Aes Sedai useless in battle and humiliated. 

 

The Seachan attack on the Tower is a surprise attack from a completely unexpected enemy from a completely unexpected vector designed to use overwhelming force to simply capture channelers and then flee.

The Sharan attack was an ambush against a tired force behind the lines. They acquitted themselves well in the final battle against the same force only being backed down when Demandred in a full circle using a Sa'Angreal used balefire to break them.

 

This assertion that seems to have crept into the argument that the Aes Sedai in the books were completely useless i find confusing.

Edited February 25 by Mailman

[Mailman]

  On 2/24/2025 at 10:18 PM, Elder_Haman said:

You're correct. And there is plenty to criticize as regards the writing on this show. But this ain't it.

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It's getting a big airing because it's a large chunk of content in a barren new season landscape.

 

Its not the worst thing I have ever seen. It's much better than the end of season1 for a start. But it's got issues a lot of which could have been addressed with very little effort to tighten it up.

Don't make it so overwhelmingly outnumbered.

Don't have all the good guys except the major characters being absolutely useless. If this remains the level of the average (sitter above average i would think) Aes Sedai going forward in the show I will accept that as the showrunners vision (wont like but accept) but my gut feeling is this is not what will happen. I believe we will see the competence of the Aes Sedai vary to suit the script rather than the character.

 

 

Edited February 25 by Mailman

[DreadLord31]

  On 2/25/2025 at 12:43 AM, Mailman said:

I believe we will see the competence of the Aes Sedai vary to suit the script rather than the character.

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Oh for sure. There is a lot of precedence already that that is what they’re doing: Nynaeve mass healing (because she might be the dragon?) the Damane incompetence in S2 finale (how else are they gonna beat them and Egwene free herself?), Moiraine being superpowered taking down Seanchan ships (are we suppose to believe the 14 damane on the ships wouldn’t see/feel Moiraine’s channeling and do anything?), Egwene apparently being able to shield off Isha’mael. Rand continues to be - pretty much useless? 
 

Whereas, I was just re-reading the Shadow Rising and when Egwene and Elayne try to teach Rand to use Saidin, they find that even though “they are two of the most powerful female channelers in a 1000 years” that “Rand handled them like a couple kittens” (in particular his strength was shown in that he could split and maintain multiple different kinds of weaves at once). Isha’mael is the other half, the Dragons counter-balance, in the pattern. 
 

Writers do not care that much about magic-mechanics & power levels & what Aes Sedai competence or lack there of should be. And even “book experts” like Sarah Nakamura and (presumably) Rafe aren’t going to know or care about everything. I think they care more about certain relational dynamics. 
 

So “Rule of Cool” wins the day! 
And that was a cool fight scene. So I want some more of that and less of “well, we wanted to get it exactly right to please the hardcore fans…”

Nope. I need them to make it to… S6? At least… to get Dumai’s Wells. And then I’ll be happy. 
More cool please for me!! 🙂 

 

 

Edited February 25 by DreadLord31

[expat]

  On 2/24/2025 at 9:39 PM, Mailman said:

Absolutely no moving of the goalposts from me.

 

Your claim was that the Red Ajah was rubbish because look 1000 Ashman.

I pointed out the facts that the

Only men with the ability inborn would ever manifest use of the power.

Of that small number 75% of those would die because they had no teacher.

Red Ajah can only react to reports of that small number using those powers.

Ashman actively recruited those with the ability to learn as well as those with the spark inborn and had access to travelling. All abilities that the Red could not possibly have.

 

Absolutely no moving of goalposts and the suggestion is disingenuous.

 

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My claim that the Red Ajah was rubbish was because there were dozens of male channelers* in Randland and they were sitting on the butts in TV.  Now add the time it took to identify the channeler, the news of the channeler to travel to TV, the time it takes to organize a mission, and the travel time to the location of the channeler, it might be months or years between when someone started channeling and when the Red sisters arrived to gentle them.  So no, they weren't very good at their prime mission.

 

Also in the books, there was no protocol on how to separate the unlucky men who could channel and eventually go mad and the prophesied Dragon Reborn who was necessary to save the world. Every dragon was a false dragon by definition and they treated them all the same. How could any competent organization not have thought through the issue of identifying the one male who couldn't under any circumstances be gentled.

 

In 3000 years, they hadn't figured out how to do their job. That is the definition of rubbish.

 

*IIRC, the Seanchan, who found all female channelers, ratio of sul'dam/damane was about 4-1.  The ratio for men who could learn vs natural channelers would be higher because of the number of men who died when first starting channeling.  If there were 1000 male channelers in the BT at the time of the final battle, then there must have been something like 50/75/100 natural male channelers when the BT formed. 

[expat]

  On 2/24/2025 at 10:13 PM, Mailman said:

No.

 

All shows to varying degrees of success or intent fall all over this definition. I have no objection to people enjoying shows purely for the spectacle or action sequences. But if your aim is good storytelling and world building you need to aim higher than making your characters dumb or incompetent to facilitate it, unless that is their character for the entire series.

 

 

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I think that you have this completely backwards.  Exciting action sequences don't make a good series if that's all there is.  Acting and writing are important.  However, how many action-adventure series are considered good when the action sequences fall flat.  Trying to be too realistic is antithetical to most action sequences because real life just isn't spectacular enough for film.  Look the car's gas tank didn't explode when hit with 3 bullets, boring.

 

You can judge WOT by the same standards you use to judge all the great character driven entertainment available, but in the end, it is an action-adventure series and is expected to generally conform to the rules of the genre.  

 

Bad writing/bad acting = bad series

flat action sequence = boring (bad) series

 

I don't like the F&R franchise because of the bad writing/acting, not because of the nature of the car chases.  They are ludicrous, but exciting.

 

I don't think anyone is saying that if we consider this fight sequence thrilling (even if not totally logical) that the series is automatically good.  We agree with you that it will also need consistently good acting and writing going forward (not to rehash series 1 and 2 now).

[Mailman]

  On 2/25/2025 at 4:11 AM, expat said:

I think that you have this completely backwards.  Exciting action sequences don't make a good series if that's all there is.  Acting and writing are important.  However, how many action-adventure series are considered good when the action sequences fall flat.  Trying to be too realistic is antithetical to most action sequences because real life just isn't spectacular enough for film.  Look the car's gas tank didn't explode when hit with 3 bullets, boring.

 

You can judge WOT by the same standards you use to judge all the great character driven entertainment available, but in the end, it is an action-adventure series and is expected to generally conform to the rules of the genre.  

 

Bad writing/bad acting = bad series

flat action sequence = boring (bad) series

 

I don't like the F&R franchise because of the bad writing/acting, not because of the nature of the car chases.  They are ludicrous, but exciting.

 

I don't think anyone is saying that if we consider this fight sequence thrilling (even if not totally logical) that the series is automatically good.  We agree with you that it will also need consistently good acting and writing going forward (not to rehash series 1 and 2 now).

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You do realise that you are agreeing almost point for point the things I have been arguing for while you claim I have it backwards.

[DigificWriter]

The back and forth over this one scene proves that some people have forgotten how to just enjoy things.

[Mailman]

  On 2/25/2025 at 3:51 AM, expat said:

*IIRC, the Seanchan, who found all female channelers, ratio of sul'dam/damane was about 4-1.  The ratio for men who could learn vs natural channelers would be higher because of the number of men who died when first starting channeling.  If there were 1000 male channelers in the BT at the time of the final battle, then there must have been something like 50/75/100 natural male channelers when the BT formed. 

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Okay thats just not right.

The trainable channelers can be drawn from every single age group from approx  14 years old till death.

You can only draw inborn spark users from around 14 to maybe 20 to 21 age group at a stretch.

So out of 1000 Ashman you have maybe 100 to 150  at most who are in the target age group and only 20% of those would have the spark inborn. So the true number is maybe 20 to 30. 

 

So if those 30 say had not gone to the Black Tower 22 of those would have died from power complications leaving only 8 to be neutralized by the Reds.

Edited February 25 by Mailman

[RextheDog]

around 8:40 

 

is that meant to be a few di ...might be an interesting twist on mats luck

[LTL]

I really enjoyed the sneak peek and very excited for the new season. It's a miracle that you ever enjoyed the books Mailman. I don't think they would hold up too well to the level of scrutiny that you are determined to give the show. Or perhaps the book forum is full of you saying how much you hate the books too, I haven't checked!! 

[Mailman]

  On 2/25/2025 at 10:59 AM, LTL said:

I really enjoyed the sneak peek and very excited for the new season. It's a miracle that you ever enjoyed the books Mailman. I don't think they would hold up too well to the level of scrutiny that you are determined to give the show. Or perhaps the book forum is full of you saying how much you hate the books too, I haven't checked!! 

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As I have said many time I love the books ( i have probably reread the entire series nearly every year since its release) and I was incredibly excited when it was announced that it was coming to the screen. That excitement soon evaporated when confronted with the quality of the show delivered.

 

I don't remember the scene in the books where 13 Aes Sedai basically stood useless while three of their sisters battled 5 black sisters.

Edited February 25 by Mailman

[LTL]

  On 2/25/2025 at 11:15 AM, Mailman said:

As I have said many time I love the books ( i have probably read the entire series every year since its release) and I was incredibly excited when it was announced that it was coming to the screen. That excitement soon evaporated when confronted with the quality of the show delivered.

 

I don't remember the scene in the books where 13 Aes Sedai basically stood useless while three of their sisters battled 5 black sisters.

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You may however remember the fact that Moiraine visited the Two Rivers in book 1 looking for someone born on Dragonmount during the Aiel war and was unable to work out for most of the book that it was probably the guy who looks like an Aielman rather than the 2 guys who look like regular Two Rivers folk.

 

Or you may remember that it is apparently possible for Egwene to keep up running with the Aiel day after day, who are basically all ultra marathon runners trained since birth, with no running training, as long as you are stubborn and determined enough.

 

Or you may wonder why the Queen of Manetheren didn't sacrifice herself to destroy the trolloc army before all of Manetheren's army was destroyed, rather than waiting until afterwards, if it is indeed possible to draw too much of the power and do orders of magnitude more damage than you otherwise could. Etc etc etc.

 

It is a fantasy series and you need to be ok with turning a blind eye to some unrealistic aspects if you are going to enjoy it. You must have done this while reading the books but you are clearly totally unwilling to look past anything with even remotely questionable realism in the show. 

 

I imagine that you would have happily read right on past if this scene was written in the book with some accompanying sentences such as "Person X was so shocked that their lifelong friend Person Y was a darkfriend that they didn't even embrace the source, simply staring with unbelieving eyes as Person Y sliced them in half." "Person Y had been preparing for a moment like this for so many years that they had a selection of nasty weaves ready to go, taking out 3 other sitters before they could even react." "As the dust settled, on top of the horror of the situation, Person Z was overwhelmed by a feeling of humiliation that just 5 members of the Black Ajah had been able to deal so comfortably with the rest of the sitters. Had they grown soft over all the years of politicking?" etc.

 

In TV format, you can't have the explanatory sentences surrounding a scene like this that would perhaps allow you to enjoy it when it's in book format, so you need to fill in the explanation yourself. Still though, as others have said, this would have been unbelievably shocking for the other sitters and I'm more than happy to give it the benefit of the doubt that this shock was enough to make up for the numerical disadvantage for the Black Ajah. You could certainly argue either way whether this is the case (and you are!) but it's nowhere near unrealistic enough to ruin the enjoyment of a great action scene for me. Of course, we all have different thresholds for how much disbelief we are prepared to suspend in different situations.

 

 

[Mailman]

  On 2/25/2025 at 11:44 AM, LTL said:

You may however remember the fact that Moiraine visited the Two Rivers in book 1 looking for someone born on Dragonmount during the Aiel war and was unable to work out for most of the book that it was probably the guy who looks like an Aielman rather than the 2 guys who look like regular Two Rivers folk.

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Nothing said that the Dragon had to be Aiel. That is why she questioned Nynaeve on if any of the boys were born outside the Two Rivers. You have 3 boys born at nearly the exact same time (when because of Gitaras foretelling the date is your best bit of concrete knowledge) why would you risk leaving 2 of them behind. Especially after all three are targeted by the shadowspawn. He is also only half Aiel the other half is Andoran.

 

  On 2/25/2025 at 11:44 AM, LTL said:

Or you may remember that it is apparently possible for Egwene to keep up running with the Aiel day after day, who are basically all ultra marathon runners trained since birth, with no running training, as long as you are stubborn and determined enough

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Egwene initially travels alongside Moiraine with the Aiel and also during the initial stages they have Kaderes wagons with them. The Aiel also do not travel at maximum speed all the time. They then always travel with the wagons until they return to the wetlands. I think there are always horses with them as Moiraine and Lan are either walking with the wise ones or mounted.

 

  On 2/25/2025 at 11:44 AM, LTL said:

Or you may wonder why the Queen of Manetheren didn't sacrifice herself to destroy the trolloc army before all of Manetheren's army was destroyed, rather than waiting until afterwards, if it is indeed possible to draw too much of the power and do orders of magnitude more damage than you otherwise could. Etc etc etc.

 

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I never liked the OP death channeler moments sure maybe you could draw a little too much and could do an extra kick but to wipe out every enemy channeler across an army was bad. The only thing that could explain it is the unreliable narrator. It's possible in the 1000 years since that her counterattack has been exaggerated in handed down stories.

Edited February 25 by Mailman