Jump to content

DRAGONMOUNT

A WHEEL OF TIME COMMUNITY

Amazon Prime Video released the first trailer for the upcoming the Wheel of Time Television series.  The trailer also announced the official release date of Friday, November 19th 2021. Amazon will premiere the first three episodes together, then weekly release each Friday until the season finale on Friday, December 24th, 2021. The countdown begins! Only 77 days until we see the first season premiere.       Yesterday, Rosamund Pike and the official Twitter account for The Wheel of Time announced that we would see a trailer this morning. They also released a photo of Moiraine standing at the top of the White Tower looking over the city of Tar Valon.   This is the moment so many of us fans have been waiting years to see. It’s actually happening!   Updated: here's our reaction video!     Who’s organizing a watch party for November 19th? What do you think of the trailer? Let us know in the comments or on our forums!   Dragonmount wants to see your reaction to the trailer! If you’ve recorded yourself, send it over here.  

By Katy Sedai, in TV Show,

Adam Whitehead is Dragonmount's TV blogger. Adam has been writing about film and television, The Wheel of Time, and other genre fiction for over fifteen years, and was a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer in 2020. Be sure to check out his websites, The Wertzone and Atlas of Ice and Fire (including The Wheel of Time Atlas!) as well as his Patreon.   As the release date for The Wheel of Time moves closer, Amazon have started ramping up their marketing by releasing several images from the series.   We’re going to discuss what the images may signify, and how that relates to the books. Note that spoilers for the books and The Eye of the World especially will be present here.       The first image is a “hero shot” featuring the seven regular actors from the first series walking towards the camera. This is a publicity still taken to market the show, not an actual shot from the series (though if there was a cool explosion behind them, it’d probably work fine). From left to right, Zoë Robins as Nynaeve al’Meara, Barney Harris as Mat Cauthon, Daniel Henney as al’Lan Mandragoran, Rosamund Pike as Moiraine Damodred, Madeleine Madden as Egwene al’Vere, Marcus Rutherford as Perrin Aybara and Josha Stradowski as Rand al’Thor.   Other actors will recur in the first season (such as Hammed Animashaun as Loial, Alexandre Willaume as Thom Merrilin and Kae Alexander as Min Farshaw) but these seven will presumably be in every episode, or almost.   Weekly Wheel News, doing the Creator’s work, unearthed the metadata for the shot, confirming it comes from the sixth episode (of eight in total in the first season) and depicts the gang journeying to the Waygate, where they meet Loial (either out-of-shot in this picture, or lacking the CGI needed to insert him in the frame). The metadata asks the question “who is the Dragon?”, confirming that one goal for the TV show is to make the identity of the Dragon Reborn far less obvious than it is in the books, where it’s fairly obvious from the first page.       The second shot takes us to the ruined city of Shadar Logoth, once known as Aridhol, and depicts Lan and Moiraine taking refuge in an ill-advised location. This shot also features Mandarb, Lan’s horse (fear not! Bela is cast and will also be in the series!).   The metadata tells us this is indeed Shadar Logoth, featuring Lan escaping “a temple” with a wounded or exhausted Moiraine in his arms. Interestingly, it appears from the data that a dummy is used in this scene for Moiraine, although whether that’s a dummy or the real Rosamund Pike in the actual picture is unclear (good dummy work, if so).       The third shot features Egwene and Rand enjoying a quiet moment on their journey. It looks like this is part of a sequence for the early episodes filmed in Slovenia, depicting the countryside in the Two Rivers and western Andor.   The metadata for this shot states that it is from the very first episode and features the keywords “couple,” “mountains,”, “Soca River,” “Slovenia,” and “jump,” as well as saying that Egwene is going to do something and Rand knows what it is (jump?). It is possible this scene is from later in the episode when the gang are on their way to Taren Ferry. The word “couple” is interesting, as in the book Rand and Egwene seem to consider themselves, if not betrothed, then at least likely to become betrothed by their families, but they’re not actually together romantically. This may factor into the subplot in the books, as Rand and Egwene become aware they’re not actually going to hook up, or might indicate a change that Rand and Egwene are already together when the story opens and perhaps break up later on (since Rafe Judkins has confirmed that Rand will have his relationships with Elayne, Min and Aviendha in the show as in the books). This would be a subtle shift in the book dynamic, but might also avoid early viewers “shipping” Rand and Egwene and getting disappointed when that never comes to pass. Having them already together and then break up gets that idea out of the way. It sounds minor, but the popularity of “ships” on a show can substantially drive discussion about a show (not always for the better, but still).       The final shot is from the biggest change from the books to the TV series, a new storyline that follows the misadventures of Logain Ablar, a false Dragon. This story is referred to in the books and takes place off-page, but will be front-and-centre in the TV series. In this shot, Logain (Álvaro Morte) is held prisoner by sisters of the Aes Sedai, most notably Alanna Mosvani (Priyanka Bose) on the left and Kerene Nagashi (Clare Perkins) on the right, both sisters of the Green Ajah. In the background are two sisters of the Red Ajah. Eagle-eyed book fans will note that Kerene only appears in the prequel novel New Spring and dies long before the events of the series proper; it’ll be interesting to theorise and then see what purpose is saved by moving Kerene’s story into the main saga.   The metadata for this shot, amusingly, is incorrect and points to a shot from the third episode with Egwene and Perrin on Caralain Grass. We don’t know when the Logain shot is from, but based on other information it might be from the fourth episode.   We’re now three months or less from The Wheel of Time hitting the air, and we’ll be likely to see a trailer in the near(ish) future. As usual, follow our casting and news pages, and let us know what you think of the latest developments.  

By Werthead, in TV Show,

We finally have our first extensive look at Amazon Prime upcoming TV show, The Wheel of Time. The Entertainment Weekly September issue features an exclusive article with photos of the main cast in costume. This is our first peek at many of the main characters we all know and love.   Inside the article, showrunner Rafe Judkins describes the process of bringing the book series to life, and the article compares the book length against other popular fantasy series.     The photos are all stunning and have us fans swooning all over social media.   The shot of the Emond’s Field Five, includes Zoë Robins as Nynaeve, Barney Harris as Mat, Daniel Henney as Lan, Rosamund Pike as Moiraine, Madeleine Madden as Egwene, Marcus Rutherford as Perrin, and Josha Stradowski as Rand. The magnificent seven look travel worn and their costumes look lived in.   We also see a photo of Moiraine and Lan entering the city of Shadar Logoth, with the city feeling especially creepy.   The article includes a shot of Rand and Egwene sitting in the mountains giving us a hint at their complex relationship.   And an incredible shot of Priyanka Bose as Alanna with Álvaro Morte as Logain locked in an elaborate cage.   You can read the article here and the magazine will be on newsstands August 20th, 2021.   These photos are gorgeous and give us just a hint of what to expect from the TV show this November! For more about the upcoming TV show, visit our TV info page.   What do you think of the EW article and the images they shared? Let us know in the comments or on our forums!

By Katy Sedai, in TV Show,

Rajiv Moté is Dragonmount’s book blogger with a lens on the craft of fiction writing. When he’s not directing software engineers, he writes fiction of his own, which can be found catalogued at his website.   I love metafiction: stories that say something about the nature of stories. Stories that are aware of themselves as stories, but still manage to pull us into their reality. Recently in Marvel Studios’ Loki on Disney+, the Norse god of mischief was yanked outside of space and time by the mysterious Time Variance Authority, an organization that made sure characters don’t stray beyond a preordained plot called “The Sacred Timeline.” The TVA bureaucrats and stormtroopers violently edited the story when characters tried to deviate. The ensuing metafictional adventure explored the virtues of predestination versus free will, order versus chaos, a universe versus a multiverse--and who gets to control the narrative.   It reminded me of The Wheel of Time. Robert Jordan’s epic builds a universe of cyclic history, without beginning or end, that encompasses all the stories that were and could be, and sets the parameters for how its characters must behave.   All Stories Are Part of the Pattern     In Umberto Eco’s novel about a conspiracy theory that took on a life of its own, syncretic thinking drives the impulse to see similarities in stories and legends as proof of an occult, underlying connection. It is fuel for cork boards of evidence joined by colored string and push-pins, and the rapturous feeling that one is delving into arcana to find the true, hidden source of what the uninitiated see as coincidence. Syncretism is meta-storytelling: an irresistible urge to see cohesion in unconnected stories.     The Wheel of Time’s ambitious conceit is that its story is in conversation with all stories. History, legends, and mythology are echoes of each other in a great cycle. Comparing elements of the story with other myths, legends, history, or current events feeds the notion that it’s all one big pattern of recurring motifs--history that rhymes, as Mark Twain supposedly said.     Ann Landers, John Glenn, Sally Ride, nuclear annihilation, climate catastrophe, Moscow and its ICBMs, Queen Elizabeth, Mother Theresa--they all become Gleeman’s tales in the Third Age, where the legend of King Arthur is historical fact. The land abounds with ancient artifacts, from a Mercedes hood ornament to a radioactive spire, pointing to continuity between our real world and the story world. With enough turnings of the Wheel of Time, all stories are real.   The Wheel Is the Storyteller   In Robert Jordan’s cosmology, the Wheel is the ultimate storyteller. It spins out character threads to weave the Pattern of the plot in recurring motifs. And while Jordan created no multiversal bureaucracy to manage his Sacred Timeline, he does have the concept of ta’veren.     Just as the author puts the main characters on a journey, pulling a widening blast radius of other characters and events in their wake, the Wheel spins ta’veren to set the story in motion. The protagonists seem to have an awareness of entering the plot of a story. They contrast what “real life” is, compared with stories. They self-deprecatingly chide themselves for playing the hero in some gleeman’s tale right before doing exactly that.     The Dharma of the Wheel   But what of free will, in a universe where a cosmic author is spinning out the plot? As Loial’s description implies, the Wheel tolerates minor variations, but prevents large deviations. Those who are ta’veren have less freedom than others, and we see characters like Cadsuane and Tuon resisting ta’veren effects with great effort. But predestination abounds in The Wheel of Time. There are prophecies, Foretellings, prophetic dreams, true answers from dangerous fae-folk, and of course Min’s visions. All are glimmers of the Pattern, and none can be averted.   Many of the character arcs revolve around the characters’ struggle with predestination. Rand, Mat, and Perrin each rail in their own way against what they must become. Min is a Cassandra, who can see the approach of doom, but can do nothing to avert it. Aviendha resists first a personal destiny to love Rand, and later the ultimate, tragic fate of her entire people. Moiraine is the heroic exemplar of someone who courageously faces whatever fate decrees, no matter the personal cost, and Lan is an example of someone who resigns himself to what he believes is his doom, but should really have more faith in the benevolence of the Wheel. Nynaeve is someone who cannot reach her potential while she resists the role spun for her, but once she surrenders to it, becomes one of the most powerful characters in the epic.   While there is no “religion” in The Wheel of Time, there is a moral law to the universe: align thyself to the Pattern. This is similar to the Hindu concept of dharma, where the cosmic Truth is made manifest through proper behavior in the social order.     There are echoes in these scenes of the Bhagavad Gita, where just before the great battle against kin and former teachers, the warrior Arjun despairs of his purpose. The Lord Krishna reveals his divinity to Arjun, and teaches him to align himself to his dharma, which is both duty and fate, through which he will know both peace of mind and singularity of purpose. Those who submit to the will of the Wheel become aligned with a benevolent cosmos. Ta’veren who do so become unstoppable.   There is a delightful parallel between Mat embracing his ta’veren-hood and Lloyd Alexander’s character Taran, who learns a lesson from Llonio, the luckiest man in Prydain.     On the other side, the Dark One seeks to corrupt the Pattern and break the Wheel of Time. The Darkfriends see the Wheel's predestination as tyranny, and believe the Dark One will weave them new fates of power and stature. To the servants of the Shadow, the Pattern can be rewritten if their master wins.     The Hands on the Wheel   Understanding the cosmology of The Wheel of Time as both metafiction and a benevolent force in the story world, gives us insight into one of the epic’s most mysterious characters. Nakomi appears as a middle-aged Aiel woman who has two scenes in the entire story. The first time, she shares Aviendha’s fire and tea as the younger woman makes her way to Rhuidean for her final test as a Wise One. She asks seemingly innocent questions about the fate of the Aiel in this new, changed world, something Aviendha ponders deeply when Rhuidean reveals that clinging to the old ways leads the Aiel to ignominy and extinction. The second time Nakomi appears is to make sure that Rand carries Moridin’s body down from Shayol Ghul, the act that allows Rand to live on beyond the Last Battle.   Both of Nakomi’s appearances involve decisions pivotal to the Fourth Age, the Age after the Dark One is locked safely away until the Age of Legends comes again. The Pattern is not threatened by the Fourth Age fates of the Aiel or Rand al’Thor. But there is a point of decision between suffering or grace, and Nakomi tips the balance to the latter. If the Creator set everything in motion, but takes no part in the events of the world, and the Wheel spins an endlessly rhyming Pattern, then perhaps Nakomi is the compassionate principle in this divine trinity. Perhaps Nakomi is the lone Norn at the spinning wheel, who makes sure the story has a happy ending.  

By MahaRaj, in Books and eBooks,

Katy is a news contributor for Dragonmount. You can follow her as she shares her thoughts on The Wheel of Time TV Show on Instagram and Twitter @KatySedai     Orbit Books revealed the newest UK covers for The Wheel of Time book series to be published ahead of Amazon Prime's The Wheel of Time TV show. The new covers feature a variety of stunning landscapes from forested mountains to stormy seas. Each book has a prominent seal that announces the book series is now an original series on prime video. Duncan Spilling from @studio_of_ideas designed the covers.     The books go on sale September 16th 2021 in the UK, just in time for folks to read The Eye of the World before the TV show is released in November. These book covers seem like they are made to appeal to a wider audience who might not pick up a book with a traditional fantasy cover. Can’t wait to see folks reading these books on the tube. There's another version of the Eye of the World from Orbit expected November 4th 2021. It’s possible that version will have art directly pulled from the new TV show.   To celebrate the new covers Orbit released a promotional video to Instagram with music from heavy metal band Blind Guardian. It’s always fun to see different parts of the fandom combine forces! Definitely go check out their fantasy book inspired music.      Who’s planning to pick up the set!? Which cover is your favorite? Let us know in the comments below.

By Katy Sedai, in Books and eBooks,

Amazon Prime announced today, as part of the Comic-Con at Home online event, that The Wheel of Time TV show will debut in November of this year. This comes in the wake of last week's announcement at JordanCon where show runner Rafe Judkins assured us that a full trailer would be coming "by the end of summer."   The poster for the show was also revealed. It features Moiraine, played by Rosamund Pike, standing in front a waygate. The poster declares the show will be released "Nov 2021."     The full Comic-Con event consisted of a pre-recorded interview with Rafe. He spoke of his personal connection to the Wheel of Time books, why they mattered to him, and what sets the series apart. He also said that when he began the process of adapting the books, he "mapped out" 8 seasons worth of material.  It's important to realize that this is not an assurance that he will get 8 seasons, or that it's even still the plan.  That simply shows Rafe's thinking at the start of the process.    Here's the full video:     So who's ready for November?  What do you think of the poster?  Be sure to follow us on social media for all our updates.  

By Jason Denzel, in TV Show,

Amazon announced today via their official Wheel of Time Twitter account that production has begun on Season 2 of their upcoming TV show.        Season 1 of the show has not aired but a specific release date is expected soon, perhaps as early as this weekend when showrunner Rafe Judkins will be part of the 2021 Comic-Con@Home convention.   No additional details about Season 2 are known yet other than the title of the season's first episode ("A Taste of Solitude"). That episode is written by Amanda Kate Shuman and directed by Thomas Napper.    It's not uncommon for modern TV shows to begin filming their second seasons before the first airs. Like season 1, season 2 is expected to have a long-running production and lengthy post process in order to accomodate the large number of visual effects.  But the fact that season 2 is now underway shows that Amazon and Sony are confident in what they've seen so far from season 1.    Are you excited for the show? Tell us in the comments, join us on social media, or start up a discussion in our forums! 

By Jason Denzel, in TV Show,

Adam Whitehead is Dragonmount's TV blogger. Adam has been writing about film and television, The Wheel of Time, and other genre fiction for over fifteen years, and was a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer in 2020. Be sure to check out his websites, The Wertzone and Atlas of Ice and Fire (including The Wheel of Time Atlas!) as well as his Patreon.   It’s now been confirmed that Amazon’s Wheel of Time TV series is coming in 2021, which means the show should launch in well under six months from now. Excitement is building among the books’ immense global fanbase, but, as discussed previously, Amazon are going to need to get new viewers to watch the show as well. So far all of the teasers, logo reveals and casting information has been aimed at book fans and those already invested rather than complete newcomers to the franchise.   A big moment will come when the show unveils its first, proper trailer for the series. Some are hoping that will come at this year’s virtual Comic-Con event where Wheel of Time showrunner (or “shadowrunner”) Rafe Judkins will be appearing on a panel with several other writers and creatives. This is the only Wheel of Time-related event at Comic-Con currently scheduled. The panel takes place at 11am PT on 23 July.   However, it appears doubtful that this will actually be the case. The panel is a sequential series of relatively brief discussions, first with Judkins and then Evengelion 3.0 showrunner Hideaki Anno, followed by segments on Leverage: Redemption, S.O.Z. Soldiers or Zombies and the I Know What You Did Last Summer reboot. The event is relatively low-key. I think if Amazon were planning a launch for the TV show as soon as September or maybe early October, they’d go all-in with a full (virtual) Comic-Con panel with as much of the cast as possible, a trailer launch and so forth. The fact they are not doing that, in a year when the absence of big-hitters DC and Marvel means they’d get more publicity than normal, is telling.   There’s also been a change at Amazon in how they approach marketing, in contrast to competitors Netflix and HBO. Amazon used to tease shows very early in development, sometimes whilst filming was underway or even before it had begun. The earliest marketing teasers for Good Omens and The Boys aired almost a year before the shows aired, and The Man in the High Castle and The Marvellous Mrs. Maisel both benefited from having their first episodes shot and released separately as pilots before the rest of the season was filmed. However, from Carnival Row onwards, Amazon originals have switched to a much more focused campaigns, described by some in the business as “global saturation marketing campaigns,” or for those familiar with movie Aliens, “nuke the site from orbit, it’s the only way to be sure.” The idea is to not get people to watch at trailer six or twelve months from release and then they forget about it until the week before the show airs, which they might miss (a common Netflix mistake), but instead to bombard audiences and viewers with trailers, teasers and information in a much more concentrated time period, lasting from six to twelve weeks before the release date.   Even with shows where they did show early teasers, Amazon adopted this policy in the lead-up to release with great success (especially for The Boys). Whether Amazon break from this for their vastly more expensive Lord of the Rings show (which appears to have between two and three times Wheel of Time’s already-generous budget, maybe even more), rumoured to launch in the first few months of 2022, is a bigger question.   What that means for The Wheel of Time is that a trailer during Comic-Con is highly unlikely unless they plan to release the show relatively quickly afterwards. We know the show is airing in 2021, so it will start in December at the latest (which Amazon might be trying to avoid, as it will end up going head-to-head with Season 2 of The Witcher), and the recent movements of the publishing dates for the tie-in novels suggest it might start in October or (as long has been rumoured) November. To me that makes a marketing blitz starting in late August or even September is more likely than July.   Hopefully we will get some more information from Rafe’s panel and it’d be great if he could confirm a release date there, but the feeling of myself and the rest of the Dragonmount team is that those hoping for a full-length trailer will likely be disappointed, unless Amazon decide to shift the marketing strategy they have been using for the last three years.   As usual, let us know your thoughts and keep checking our TV news and casting pages for updates.

By Werthead, in TV Show,

Katy is a news contributor for Dragonmount. You can follow her as she shares her thoughts on The Wheel of Time TV Show on Instagram and Twitter @KatySedai   The news broke early this morning that Zack Stentz has begun working on the scripts for three The Wheel of Time movies set in the Age of Legends.  The Age of Legend movies are independent of Amazon Prime Video’s The Wheel of Time TV show currently in production.   Zack Stentz was a co-writer for Thor and X-Men First Class. He has also written for TV shows like The Flash, and Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous.     Rick Selvage and Larry Mondragon of iwot productions are producers on the new movies. Rick Selvage and Larry Mondragon also produced the Winter Dragon pilot and are producers for the Amazon TV show.   There’s currently no studio or distributor attached to the Age of Legends movies yet. Amazon and The Wheel of Time Showrunner, Rafe Judkins, are not involved in the movie adaptation of the book material.   If you are curious about the history of The Wheel of Time media rights, check out Adam’s deep dive.   The Wheel of Time fans will have plenty to talk about at JordanCon this weekend. We are also hoping for more TV show news from Showrunner Rafe Judkins at ComicCon next week.    Zack Stentz confirmed his involvement this morning on Twitter.  Dragonmount founder, Jason Denzel, provided a bit of context for today's announcement in a Twitter thread. Click through to the first tweet in the series: 

By Katy Sedai, in TV Show,

Showrunner Rafe Judkins of Amazon Prime's The Wheel of Time will be on a virtual panel at Comic-Con@Home 2021. The Amazon panel will take place on July 23rd at 11am PT and will stream to the San Diego Comic-Con's YouTube. Check back here for the link once we get closer.    TV presenter Tim Kash will have a conversation with each Showrunner on the panel, and we might even see some announcements or content drops! We are keeping our fingers crossed for some great photos or another teaser, but seems unlikely we will see a trailer quite yet.       

By Katy Sedai, in TV Show,

In 2019, a group project was put forward in the JordanCon Costumers Facebook group.  The idea--suggested by Christine Wessling--was to create a quilt.  Each block of the quilt would represent one of the books with The Wheel of Time, and each block would be created by a different crafter.  The idea was quickly embraced by many in the group and the books were snagged!   Here are the details from JordanCon:   I feel so fortunate that I was able to contribute to this project!  I knew I wanted to make my love of Lan and Nynaeve apparent, so I picked Knife of Dreams.  There are so many wonderful Lan and Nynaeve moments--when Nynaeve breaks her block, her first confession to him in The Eye of the World, Lan giving her his ring and her Accepted testing in The Great Hunt--but the ultimate has to be Nynaeve's trek through the borderlands gathering her husband an army.  "The Golden Crane flies for Tarmon Gai'don!" is the best line of the book.  I tried to capture that theme with a golden crane, crown, and lance on a field of blue.   I envy the lucky winner of this quilt!  It will be an amazing addition to any fan's collection!   You can read more from each of the contributors on JordanCon's website.

By Mashiara Sedai, in JordanCon,

Adam Whitehead is Dragonmount's TV blogger. Adam has been writing about film and television, The Wheel of Time, and other genre fiction for over fifteen years, and was a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer in 2020. Be sure to check out his websites, The Wertzone and Atlas of Ice and Fire (including The Wheel of Time Atlas!) as well as his Patreon.   It’s a sign that Wheel of Time news has been a bit thin on the ground recently when fans get incredibly excited about the reveal of the TV show’s official logo.     Up until now, Amazon has been using a derivation of the logo from the novels. However, it was clear that they’d want to create their own logo to easily differentiate the TV series from the books, the tabletop RPG and other takes on the same franchise, and they could put on their own merchandise.   Intriguingly, they’ve decided not to include a literal Wheel in the image. Although they might be an obvious choice, it might also feel a little too on-the-nose. Instead, the primary image in the logo is a variation on the ouroboros symbol, of a snake eating its own tail. In mythology, the ouroboros is a serpent eating its own tail, a symbol for eternity. It is also used to depict alchemy and the cycle of life, death and rebirth. The symbol is Egyptian in origin (one adorns the tomb of Tutankhamun, dating from c. 1323 BC) before being picked up on by the ancient Greeks, who massively popularised its use. It also later appears in Norse mythology as the World Serpent, Jörmungandr, and in the Bible as the Leviathan. Variations on the image also appear in Hinduism. All of these sources were used by Robert Jordan during research for the Wheel of Time novels.     In The Wheel of Time novels, the ouroboros is depicted as the Great Serpent, a symbol of eternity even older than the Wheel itself. Aes Sedai wear a Great Serpent ring to depict their rank and status, and the Great Serpent is sometimes used as a metaphor for time in lieu of the more familiar Wheel.   More careful examination of the logo and its animated opening shows the scales initially being contrasted between light and shadow, forming a representation of the Aes Sedai symbol. The Aes Sedai symbol is, of course, the yin and yang symbol of Chinese philosophy. The yin and yang represent dualism, the idea of how opposite and contrary forces may actually be complementary and even interdependent. This is a key theme of the series where the dualism of male and female, order and chaos, and good and evil are core ideas. At the start of the books the two are separated out, with the white symbol being presented as the Flame of Tar Valon, standing for order, female power and good, and the black symbol being presented as the Dragon’s Fang, standing for chaos, male unpredictability and evil (a result of the male half of the One Power being cursed, dooming male channellers to insanity and death even as the fate of the world hinges on the success of one of them, the Dragon Reborn). This is actually the inversion of the traditional Chinese use of the symbol, where yang is white and yin is black. The traditional Chinese version of the symbol also has a tiny dot of white in the black half and vice versa, to show that nothing is entirely one way or the other; Jordan omitted this possibly to make the symbol less immediately obviously the same thing as the yin and yang.   The ring itself is also interesting, as it is made up of a serpent that coils downwards to infinity. This hints at the other worlds/dimensions that come to play a major role in the story. The surface of the ring is also rippled and coils back in on itself in unusual ways, like a Möbius strip. Such a strip is unusual in having only one side and one boundary, meaning that though it appears to have two sides, it only has one, the result of an elaborate optical illusion. The Möbius strip is sometimes used in science fiction and fantasy to represent matters related to non-linear time; Avengers: Endgame visualises its time travel technology with a 3D holographic version of a strip (which gives Tony Stark the clue he needs to make time travel possible).   Eagle-eyed fans also caught that the logo has messages in the Old Tongue – the language of the Age of Legends – hidden in the corners. “Kodome calichniye ga ni athan’an aman hei” means “here is always a welcome for the People of the Dragon.”     Amazon also revealed variations of the logo in Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, German, French and Japanese, as well as a scaled-down version of the logo using the major initials “WT” (rather than the more common fan-abbreviation “WoT”). The unveiling of the logo is possibly the start of a more concerted marketing push for the series, which as we speculated last time may launch in November (and the logo reveal does confirm a 2021 release date). In an intriguing development, the release of the TV tie-in editions for the Wheel of Time novels has moved up to 16 September in the UK, 28 September in the USA for the mass-market edition and 5 October for the trade paperback edition. Although these dates seem to be in flux and should be treated with caution, it may hint that Amazon is now considering an earlier launch for the show, in October or early November, rather than the previously-hinted late November/December launch date.     Hopefully in the next few weeks we’ll see a full trailer and start seeing things spooling up for the show’s long, long-delayed launch.   As usual, let us know your thoughts and keep checking our TV news and casting pages for updates.

By Werthead, in TV Show,

View More Articles

×
×
  • Create New...