DRAGONMOUNT

Amazon's official WoTonPrime social media accounts revealed today a brief video showcasing Tam al'Thor's iconic heron-marked sword. The video showed how the sword went through its design phase to becoming an actual prop seen in the show.       This is the first official glimpse of a notable prop seen in the show.    The sword seen here is almost certainly the heron-marked sword that's prominently featured in the books.   About Tam's sword (spoilers for books 1-2) In the Wheel of Time books, Tam al'Thor, Rand's adoptive father, received a heron-marked sword during his time as a soldier. Tam al'Thor is played by Game of Thrones alumni actor Michael McElhatton. (View all of the announced cast here.)   The heron marking on the blade indicates that he reached the rank of a blade master. At the beginning of the book series, which takes place approximately 20 years after he earned the sword, Tam has long retired the blade to his attic. He gives it to Rand on Winternight because he fears ominous danger lurking near their remote home. Rand keeps the sword for the duration of his adventures in the first two novels. The sword is ultimately destroyed during his battle with Ba'alzamon over the city of Falme.    The sword seen in this video is likely to feature a prominent role in season 1 of Amazon's Wheel of Time TV show.       

The following is a message from Wilson Grooms, Robert Jordan's cousin ("Brother/Cousin"). For those unfamiliar with Wilson, he plays an essential role in the family, most especially back in 2007 when he provided regular updates to fans regarding Robert Jordan's illness.    Wilson Grooms:   This tale began almost a year ago, thinking I might have a sinus issue. Wrong!  It took a while, but in February of 2020 it was determined that I have a cancer on the extreme rear of my tongue.  The cause, HPV, Human Papilloma Virus. You see Television ads urging you to get your kids inoculated against this. Do it please. There was no such vaccine back in the day.   The cancer was a squamous cell.  Doctors called it a “garden variety” and were all confident that with radiation and chemo they could render me cancer free. For the next seven weeks our daughter Marisa picked me up at 8 am Monday through Friday for radiation.  Chemotherapy was once a week for the same seven weeks. The doctors were honest that the treatments are intense. The last two weeks of treatments and the first two weeks of “healing” I spent curled up in a ball.   We had to wait months to repeat the tests that would let us know whether the bad actor had be eradicated. Waiting isn’t my strong suit.   In late August a PET scan indicated “something” was still there. Doctors were divided as to what it was. It could be residual cancer.  Most thought it to be inflammation as part of the healing process. But I wasn’t feeling better. In fact I had been suffering intense headaches which began in late June. The site was visually scoped (also not fun) frequently to monitor any changes. Nothing. So in November we repeated the biopsy.   It’s still there. Worse, it has compromised my tongue and larynx. And it has mutated. It is now a very rare and aggressive Sarcomatoid spindle cell tumor.  The only option offered was a drastic surgery to remove all the tongue and voice box. Before making that life altering decision a full Tumor Board of specialists reviewed my case.   Because of the type of cancer it has become, the drastic surgery proposed by my Surgical Oncologist is no longer a viable option.  Surgery would make day to day life difficult, would not reduce the pain I am dealing with and would not extend life.  Studies show that with a sarcomatoid cancer and this surgery, patients do not live beyond 12 months. And a painful 12 months at that.   The treatment deemed to give me the best chance is chemotherapy combined with immunotherapy. I will have my first infusion on the 30th of November. The regime is two weeks on, one week off for as long as the treatments are working. I am not certain as of now how often I will be taking the immunotherapy drug.   This specific treatment for this type of cancer has been only used for about four years. There are patients who were in the study when it began and are still doing well. Thus it has not been determined what an average life expectancy may be. If my cancer does not respond, I am looking at six months to perhaps a year. Please pray that I see positive results. Even if results are positive, this cancer will never be eradicated by the treatments.  The best I can hope for is that it goes into remission and that the treatments keep it there. But if God wants to work a miracle, I’m okay with that too. I know it’s selfish, but that’s what I pray for.   I ask for your prayers for my family that they have the strength to help me in this fight.   This is being posted by my daughter/cousin Melanie Murray. I have asked her to be my point of contact. I ask you please, do not contact any other family members. Melanie will post any updates as needed. But remember, no news is wonderful news.   Every day is a blessing. Make sure that those who are important in your life know it. Tell them. And set goals. One of mine is that I plan to see all of you at JordanCon in April. In lieu of that, I hope God will excuse Jim, aka RJ, of his storytelling duties so that we can go fishing.    Onward.   Wilson Brother/Cousin 4th of 3   Photo, from left to right: Elaine, Jonathan, Janet, Wilson, Major Miles Grooms,Marisa.

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 been two years since Amazon ordered The Wheel of Time to series, ending a long wait for fans who'd been wanting to see their favourite series picked up for the screen. That wait began on 15 January 1990 when the very first readers to finish The Eye of the World put the book down and said, “This would make a good movie, wouldn’t it?”   Such a long wait for such a hugely popular property to be adapted is unusual. The first Harry Potter film hit screens barely four and a half years after the first novel was published, and The Lord of the Rings got a BBC radio adaptation just two years after the book came out (and “only” twenty-three years for the first animated film version). Game of Thrones was optioned by HBO only ten years after the first book was published, although actually getting it on screen turned out to be an arduous task taking another five years after that point. Fans may be forgiven for asking why it took so long - thirty-one years by the time it airs - for someone to adapt what was, for most of its lifespan, the biggest-selling epic fantasy series since Tolkien.   The answer is that there’s actually been several attempts to bring the books to the screen before, some of them getting quite far and having quite a lot of money spent on them before the plug was pulled. Here’s the lowdown on a few of those attempts:   NBC The American network NBC optioned The Wheel of Time for adaptation in 1999. Several network executives were fans of the books and – more to the point – of their massive runaway sales success which had already seen it score a New York Times #1 bestseller position (the first of six) and over 40 million sales by that point. The executives were enthusiastic and – for the time – highly ambitious, envisaging adapting each novel or perhaps several novels as mini-series in their own right, adapting the entire saga across several years. The initial plan was for a six-hour adaptation of The Eye of the World.   Their model was the 1998 mini-series Merlin starring Sam Neill (no relation to the 2008-12 BBC TV series), which adapted the Arthurian legend across three hour-long episodes costing more than $10 million each. The mini-series had concept art from legendary Tolkien artist Alan Lee (who would decamp to New Zealand the following year to help Peter Jackson shoot The Lord of the Rings) and a surprising degree of historical fidelity to the likely post-Roman, pre-Saxon setting of the stories. The casting director even tipped his hat to other Arthurian adaptations, by reusing castmembers from John Boorman’s 1981 film Excalibur. The mini-series also had an exemplary cast, including Miranda Richardson, Isabella Rossellini, Helena Bonham Carter, Rutger Hauer, James Earl Jones and Sir John Gielgud. NBC even tapped some of the writers of Merlin to possibly work on Wheel of Time.   Here's an audio clip of Robert Jordan talking about this adaptation effort, saying, “If what I get is what they did in Merlin, I’ll be perfectly satisfied.”   In a similar vein to the Merlin project was Dune, a mini-series which aired on the Sci-Fi Channel (about to return to NBC’s ownership at the time) to great success in 2000.   Alas, the Wheel of Time project at NBC was not to be. It foundered for several reasons (one imagines the sheer cost, the huge scale of the project and the fact that the books were not complete were all contributory factors), but the main one was that the executives backing it moved on from NBC by the end of 2000 and interest at the network dried up. They allowed the rights to revert to Robert Jordan.     Anime Around the same time, a Japanese animation company – the identity of which has never been disclosed – contacted Robert Jordan to discuss the rights. Although Jordan had always envisaged a live-action adaptation, he was certainly not opposed to the idea and entered into discussions. Japanese animation studios are not unused to long-running adaptations and the use of animation would allow them to overcome the budgetary problems with effects and prosthetics that were daunting those interested in a live-action project.   Japanese animation studios are also well-used to the problem of adapting incomplete works. Bones Inc. produced a 51-episode adaptation of Hiromu Arakawa’s manga Fullmetal Alchemist in 2003-04, but the manga was not yet complete, so they made up their own ending. Five years later, after the manga was finished, Bones made a completely new adaptation from scratch called Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood which adapted the entire manga very faithfully.   Unfortunately, the Japanese animation studio involved did not propose anything so ambitious. In fact, their proposal was that they would adapt only the first three books – The Eye of the World, The Great Hunt and The Dragon Reborn – and then adapt the ending of the third book into an ending for the entire story (so presumably the battle at the Stone of Tear would become the Last Battle, with Rand’s defeat of Ba’alzamon becoming the final defeat of the Dark One). They also seemed to be envisaging a single feature film to tell this story rather than a full TV series. Robert Jordan was rather bemused by this notion and turned the project down.     Red Eagle & Warner Brothers In 2003 Robert Jordan sold an option for the books to Forsaken Films, who wanted to get the books on screen at either HBO or the Sci-Fi Channel. This was moving to capitalise on Sci-Fi’s success with the Children of Dune and Battlestar Galactica mini-series that aired that year (the latter leading to a long-running regular series). However, after a risible response to Sci-Fi’s (absolutely awful) Earthsea mini-series the following year, Sci-Fi’s interest in adapting original SF or fantasy novels dried up.   Forsaken Films was founded by Wheel of Time fan and budding film producer and director Eben McGarr specifically to adapt the Wheel of Time property. They partnered with DZYNZ Inc., a visual effects company who were working on Team America: World Police, to produce possible ideas for a mini-series project (presumably not using puppets!). DZYNZ’s owner, John Naulin (an industry veteran who’d worked on the Star Wars franchise, as well as Honey, I Shrunk the Kids) brought on board Larry Mondragon and Rick Selvage to advise on the project. After some months developing the property there was a re-organisation, with Naulin, Mondragon and Selvage founding Manetheren LLC to develop the film and then a parent company, Red Eagle Entertainment, to oversee a wider rights-handling project.   In March 2004, Red Eagle struck a larger deal with Jordan that superseded the deal with Forsaken (who promptly left the picture altogether). This was for rights-handling rights, including comic books and video games, for The Eye of the World alone. The price paid was $35,000 which, given the popularity of the series, was an incredible deal. This deal was extended several times until early 2008, by which time Red Eagle had paid an additional $130,000 to secure an option on the entire series. Then in May 2008 Red Eagle exercised the option, purchasing the film rights to the entire series for $465,000 on a deal that required them to have a project released by 11 February 2015.   Almost immediately Red Eagle ran into problems by pairing with redoubtable comic book company Dabel Brothers in producing first a limited series based on New Spring and then a longer comic series based on The Eye of the World. Both projects were beset by unexpected delays, controversies and unrealistic timescales (Dabel Brothers had form for this on several earlier projects, it has to be said).   The comic book furore was so notable that Robert Jordan took time out of his medical treatment to make his displeasure with the situation clear. Unfortunately, just a month later, Robert Jordan passed away.   As early as 2004 Warner Brothers showed an interest in a film project based on the books, possibly to bolster their fantasy film portfolio which also included the Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings franchises. However, after some speculative development work was done, Warners passed on the project. It was around this time that they began spinning up the work that later led to the Hobbit movie trilogy, and may have chosen not pursue that and not muddy the waters with a superficially similar fantasy project. This Wheel of Time project was dead by 2006.   Universal Studios Red Eagle continued to develop the property and in August 2008 it was announced that Universal Studios had bought an option with a plan to develop the first book in the series, The Eye of the World, as a high-budget feature film. Film producer Jeff Kirschenbaum was put in charge of the project and spent time developing it with writer Chris Morgan (the Fast and the Furious franchise, as well as 47 Ronin, Wanted and the long-gestating Legend of Conan movie with Arnold Schwarzenegger), but they were sidetracked when the Fast and the Furious movies started blowing up in a big way and refocused on those. Other writers came on board, but no-one could get a script in place that they liked.  (Disclosure: Dragonmount founder Jason Denzel also contributed to the project at the time).   Kirschenbaum left Universal and Universal’s interest in the project dried up. Red Eagle noted the pivoting of the industry towards television and re-pitched the project as a TV series, which ironically brought the property back to the attention of NBC and the Sci-Fi Channel – now called SyFy – as they were owned by Universal. After a brief perusal of the idea, the two networks passed. Normally you’d expect the biggest post-Tolkien, non-Rowling fantasy series in the world to attract more interest (especially since the prices involved seemed to be pretty low), but this process was coinciding with the biggest economic downturn the world had seen in seventy years and the project fell foul of Universal’s sudden reticence to commit to anything other than proven franchises. Although there were flickers of renewed interest at the studio after Game of Thrones (which began airing in 2011) hit the big time, Universal’s film option had finally expired by February 2014.   In the meantime, Red Eagle continued to develop the video game project. In February 2010 they announced they were partnering with Obsidian Entertainment, the developers of Fallout: New Vegas, Neverwinter Nights 2 and Knights of the Old Republic II to partner with them in making a roleplaying game based on The Wheel of Time.   The game never materialised. Rather oddly, Red Eagle signed a distribution deal with publisher Electronic Arts, but did not want to sign over creative control of the game to them, as is standard in the industry. This meant that EA would not fund the video game, only distribute it. Red Eagle would have to find the budget for the game themselves. But with the budget for a video game of this nature being comfortably in the tens of millions of dollars (Skyrim, which was in development at this time, cost over $80 million to produce, not including marketing) and Red Eagle not having access to anything remotely approaching that figure, it was unclear where the money was going to come from, if not a publishing deal. In April 2014, Obsidian confirmed that the deal had fallen through because of a lack of funding and they’d moved on to other projects.   In the meantime, in 2012, Red Eagle set up a Kickstarter with Jet Set Games for a Wheel of Time mobile game called Banner of the Rising Sun. They asked for $450,000 to develop two games in the setting, and then failed to publicise the project. The Kickstarter was abandoned with under $3,000 raised. They would probably have had better luck with a Kickstarter for the proper CRPG, but had decided to focus on a mobile game as a smaller project to start with.   Sony & Amazon After such a series of high-profile failures, it’s unsurprising that Wheel of Time fans had lost faith in Red Eagle to achieve anything with their option. However, in early 2014, (almost the second the Universal deal expired) Red Eagle entered into discussions with Radar Pictures and Sony Television about a TV adaptation of The Wheel of Time, following the huge success of Game of Thrones at HBO. These early talks would eventually lead to Sony and Amazon Television joining forces to take on the project, resulting in the project currently shooting in the Czech Republic, with Red Eagle as consulting producers (but not with any decision-making power). Even that was a strange saga, with Red Eagle self-funding their own pilot called The Winter Dragon starring Billy Zane to hold onto the rights a bit longer so they could claim a share of the Sony deal. Harriet McDougal, Robert Jordan’s widow, took exception to this and expressed her displeasure publicly. A lawsuit followed, and Red Eagle counter-sued for slander, a move which obviously proved unpopular in the fandom. The two parties eventually settled out-of-court.   The saga of the previous not-to-be adaptations of The Wheel of Time is fascinating in its own right, and it’ll be interesting to see what the end result of this twenty-year journey is when Amazon finally brings the books to the screen next year.   As usual, let us know what you think and stay up to date with the latest news right here at Dragonmount.   Also, check out this video from our Wheel of Time Community Show team where they discuss the points I've made in this article.     

Master of Poisons by Andrea Hairston   The world we are living in is rife with crisis and bubbling with change. This novel landed in my lap at the perfect time. As I read, I drew many parallels to our unpredictable lives in 2020. The standalone novel, Master of Poisons written by Andrea Hairston is a richly diverse epic fantasy saga. The story is filled with familiar fantasy accoutrement that is woven together with African influences.  The book raised many poignant questions for me that are resonant with our lives today. What are you willing to give up in order to change the future? How do you stand up to corruption? How long can our planet withstand our blatant disregard for the warnings it's presenting to us?    The African-inspired world Hairston created stands on the precipice of destruction. A poisoned desert is destroying their physical world and the world found in dreams and hearts, the Smokeland. The leaders who are supposed to be looking out for their people’s best interests only seem to care about their own gain. Djola, The Master of Poisons and the right hand of the Emperor is willing to give up everything to save their world. The rest of the council is unwilling to see past their own self-interests and limiting beliefs. Djola sets off alone in search of the cure for the poisoned desert but discovers so much more.    In another part of the world there is a young garden Sprite Awa, who is trying to find where she belongs after being abandoned by everyone she ever loved. Her journey with the griots expands her knowledge of the world and its stories, but it also shows her the measure of her own inner strength. The epic journey of these characters was enough to pull me through to the end of the novel. Yet, at times I found myself referring back to the glossary, and rereading passages to gain further understanding. The world building was an immensely impressive feat that at times borders on overly complex. There were moments of brilliant prose that kept me aching for more. The chapters written from the view of the animals were always captivating, and the songs and spells woven into the text were beautiful.    Master of Poisons is a novel that is worth a second read to fully gain an understanding of the layers of subtext. The magic system used is unique and unlike anything I have ever read. It gives me hope for the continued creativity of the fantasy genre. I truly appreciated the subtle way in which Hairston integrated issues of today without feeling as if I was being taught a lesson. Her ability to construct such a detailed world was inspiring to me as both a reader and a writer. I am looking forward to exploring her other works.   Master of Poisons by Andrea Hairston is available from Dragonmount's store as a DRM-free ebook. You can also purchase it on Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and your local independent bookseller. 

Rajiv Moté is Dragonmount's book blogger with a lens on the craft of fiction writing. When he's not managing software engineers, he writes fiction of his own, which can be found cataloged at his website.   For the son to rise, the father must fall. From mythology to Marvel Comics, from Shakespeare to Star Wars, and in almost every Disney story, the parental figure must die before the heir can fulfill their role. The trope is so familiar that participants of Amazon Prime’s book club for new readers of The Eye of the World were sure that Tamlin al’Thor was a goner after Winternight, when Rand was torn between leaving with Moiraine for Tar Valon and staying to take care of his father. Narratively speaking, good parents are obstacles to children facing real danger. They prevent the story from getting started. Clearly, Tam should have gone the way of Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru, following convention.   Happily, Robert Jordan had a different story in mind. Tam al’Thor is no obstacle to his son. While the plot contrived to keep Tam and Rand separated until a pivotal encounter in The Gathering Storm, Tam had more interesting things to do than opening the farm gate for Rand by succumbing to his wounds.   I started reading The Wheel of Time in college, as a young man preparing to set out into the world to make something of himself. I read about Rand and Mat playing for their supper, surviving by their wits, and getting out of scrapes with a sense of romance. Everything was potential. What could be. The open road, man. When I finished reading The Wheel of Time, I was a dad. I started looking at Tam with the sense of association I once had for his son. Strong. Solid. Stable. A man whose job was to raise a hero, but had some heroics of his own left to do. Tam was the kind of dad I wanted to be. I’d become a supporting character in a story that belonged to my daughter, but my own story wasn’t yet done. The two facts were not at odds. Tam al’Thor embodied that truth.   Tam's “N-shaped” story arc has two volumes. The first, told through flashback and exposition, took him from the Two Rivers seeking adventure, and then back again with a wife and child. The second unfolded in the 14 books of the main series, taking him out of retirement and back into military life, as a warrior and leader of men. But still--most importantly--as a father.   Tam left the Two Rivers as a youth, and joined the army in Illian. He fought in the Whitecloak War, two wars against Tear, and the Aiel War, learning a blademaster’s skill under a mentor named Kimtin. He received a Power-wrought, heron-marked sword from King Mattin Steppaneos himself, and rose to the distinguished rank of Second Captain of the Illianer Companions. But the Aiel War was a turning point for Tam in his career.      Tam understood that the political machinations of King Laman of Cairhien caused the Aiel to invade, and the bloodshed was prolonged by the nations slow in their arrogance to unite. In the war’s final battle, Tam sought escape from the heat of battle and stink of death on the slopes of Dragonmount, where the Wheel would have him find the newborn baby Rand. Tam was at the pinnacle of his career, but disillusionment, weariness, and fatherhood led him to quit the Companions and take his wife and child to the obscurity and pastoral life of the Two Rivers.   Back home, Tam became a man of secrets and silence. None but his wife knew the story of their son, nor did he talk much of his career. His heron-marked sword remained locked in a chest under the bed until a Winternight 19 years later, when the Trollocs attacked Emond’s Field. Teaching Rand the “flame and the void” exercise, rescuing him from the Trollocs, and giving him his sword would have been enough of an ending for most epic fantasy dads. But The Wheel of Time is vast, and can accommodate the rise of many characters, including a comeback for a veteren sword master who retired to raise his son.   When Tam recovered from his injuries at Winternight, he and Abell Cauthon journeyed to Tar Valon to find their sons, where they were stonewalled by the Aes Sedai. They returned to the Two Rivers to find that the Whitecloaks used the Trollocs as an excuse to occupy their land and abuse their people. Tam coordinated the underground resistance until Perrin Aybarra returned. Then, something remarkable happened. He ceded leadership to the younger man. (This does indeed seem a fantasy to Americans looking to choose new blood for leadership.) Tam not only stepped aside, but he remained a part of Perrin’s active resistance, training village men to be soldiers and lending experienced advice. Call it ta’veren, or call it character, but there was no power struggle, no internal conflict. Tam, a military man, knew when to lead and when to follow. Under Lord Perrin, Tam became the First Captain of the Two Rivers army, leading them to defeat the Shaido Aiel at the battle of Malden. Tam folded in and trained refugees, amassing a mighty Two Rivers army that fought in the Last Battle. Tam enters the Fourth Age the military leader of a large and powerful nation.     In DC Comics, Superman has the power of a demigod, but was raised by good parents with humble, Midwestern values. Superman’s moral upbringing makes him the incorruptible hero he is. Since leaving the Two Rivers, Rand al’Thor shouldered the weight of the world’s hope, as the Dark One sought to tear down that hope with tragedy and pain. Tam al’Thor’s most critical contribution came as Rand was nearly consumed by a darkness born of the need to be hard, at the expense of his humanity. Tam reminded Rand of who he was, and though he nearly died at his son’s hand in that confrontation, he triggered a crisis that reached down through the suspicion and hurt, allowing the good son underneath to climb out. When Rand returned from Dragonmount, he was healed, whole, and an avatar of the Light. He was the man who, remembering who he once was, could win the battle of wills against the Dark One.   On his return, when Rand introduced Min to Tam, it was not just the loving rite between a father and his adult son. It was a healing of the wound that had opened back in the Westwood, so long before, when Rand believed that he didn’t have a real father. He had one in every way that mattered. Tam did more than just set the hero on his journey. He kept him true.

We're elated to announce that our November special guest will be Wheel of Time editor Harriet McDougal! This LIVE EVENT will be held on Saturday, November 7, 2020 at 1 PM U.S. Eastern Time.    Attendees will be able to chat directly with Harriet and ask questions.   Learn more and sign up here.   About Harriet Harriet McDougal is Robert Jordan's wife as well as the editor for the entire Wheel of Time book series. In addition to playing a key rollin the development of the series, she also guided Brandon Sanderson when he completed the final three novels in the series. She is the co-author (along with Maria Simons and Alan Romanczuk) of The Wheel of Time Companion. In addition to her work on WoT, she is a notable editor in the field of SF/F having edited notable titles such as Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. About the Event This will be a LIVE virtual event, held over Zoom.   All Patreon supporters at the Heron-Marked ($10) level and higher are invited.  If you are a not yet a Patreon supporter, or if you are a supporter at a lower tier, you are welcome to sign up or "upgrade" to the Heron-Marked level for a single month to gain access to this event.    More information about signing up is available on our Patreon page.    The event will begin with a moderated discussion with our guest, followed by an open Q&A where you can freely ask questions and chat.   This is expected to be a small, intimate event, but if the number of attendees grows, we will moderate accordingly. But no matter what happens, everyone will have a chance to ask questions and be involved.   We hope you'll join us for this exciting event!  If you can't make it this time, that's OK. This event will be recorded and made available to Heron-Marked patrons and above.    Learn more and sign up here.  

Exciting news dropped this past Wednesday: The official @WoTonPrime social media account released the first audio trailer from the Amazon Prime Wheel of Time television show.  You can watch/listen to the clip below:   audio_trailer_Oct_2020.mp4   There’s already a plethora of speculation about what scene and characters this can be.  Madeleine Madden (who plays Egwene al’Vere) confirmed on Instagram that the voices do belong to Egwene and Perrin.   But when does the scene take place?  The battle noises in the back suggest Winternight (or during Bel Tine as showrunner Rafe Judkins suggested last month).  We also know in the novels that Egwene and Perrin spend a large chunk of the book together, so it could be their flight from Shadar Logoth or in the Whitecloak campe.  Either way, we'll have to "WAFO" (Watch And Find Out)!   For more information on the Wheel of Time show, visit our TV page or follow the links below.    Additionally, check out our reaction to the video on this episode of The Wheel of Time Community 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.   On 1 February 2013, Netflix changed the conversation about how TV shows are released when they dropped all thirteen episodes of political drama House of Cards on the same day. Since then, every Netflix original scripted show has done exactly the same thing. Rival streamer Amazon Prime adopted the same strategy, whilst Hulu adopted a mixed strategy, releasing some shows on the same time and others weekly.   It was a bold and innovative move, and for more than three years was wildly successful. Of Netflix’s first ten original dramas, six were massive hits, driving huge boosts in subscriptions and almost dominating the cultural conversation: House of Cards, Orange is the New Black, Daredevil, Narcos, Jessica Jones and Stranger Things. Netflix seemed to be onto a winning strategy.   However, some rivals were not convinced. The two biggest shows of the 2010s were HBO’s Game of Thrones and AMC’s The Walking Dead, launched with regular, weekly release patterns and were rewarded with dozens of new articles and hundreds of thousands or even millions of Tweets every single week a new episode was released. It’s arguable if Game of Thrones’ Red Wedding would have had the same nuclear impact it did on TV discussion if it had dropped as part of a one-day release of the entire third season.   When Hulu released The Handmaid’s Tale in 2017, conscious they had a show that spoke to the cultural moment and also was awards-fodder, they opted for a weekly release schedule (after dropping the first three episodes at once), reversing the decision to release some of their prior shows all at once. Likewise, they were rewarded with eight weeks’ worth of constant coverage. CBS All Access launched its service almost at the same time, again favouring weekly release schedules for their first two dramas, The Good Fight and, a few months later, Star Trek: Discovery.   The Boys is the first Amazon Prime original to switch to a weekly release schedule, with strong results.   During this time period Netflix began to flounder. The rate of production of critically-acclaimed, conversation-starting shows dropped off sharply. Their constant drive of content and the need to produce a whole season of television for almost every Friday of the year saw them releasing shows with next to no marketing and then cancelling them: the high-budget second season of Sense8 was a notable casualty when its launch buzz and marketing was instead swamped by adverts for the already-concluded first season of 13 Reasons Why (which Netflix believed was a stronger show to generate new subscriptions). Netflix also appeared to reach its English-language subscription ceiling much earlier than expected, leaving it deeply in debt and unclear where future new customers were going to come from.   Both Apple TV+ and Disney+, perhaps seeing Netflix’s struggles, both launched with weekly release schedules for their shows and profited from them, with the Star Wars show The Mandalorian particularly benefitting from weekly discussion over the adventures of Pedro Pascal’s bounty hunter hero and his animatronic, Yoda-like friend.   Which brings us to Amazon Prime, and The Wheel of Time.   Amazon have been looking to differentiate their TV offerings from Netflix for some years. Although they had some hit shows – The Man in the High Castle was a modest success, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel a somewhat bigger one – they were still batting way behind Netflix, which was frustrating given how widely available Amazon Prime Television was (free for all Amazon Prime subscribers, a fact that surprisingly large numbers of them were unaware of). In 2016 they switched to a weekly release schedule for their hit car programme The Grand Tour, which was successful, and in 2018 extended the idea to drama with The Romanoffs. The latter bombed, but Amazon eventually decided this was more down to the quality of the show than problems with a weekly release schedule. They next decided to roll the dice with a show that already had a successful first season: The Boys. Showrunner Eric Kripke had already been lobbying for a weekly release schedule for the second season and Amazon agreed to give the format a go.   The result has been hugely successful. Each week for six weeks (the first three episodes were released on the same day), the show attracted a large amount of online engagement. Weekly reviews, articles and recaps, and regular interviews with the showrunners and cast helped drive the show to the top of internet TV discussions. Over the course of the run Amazon saw a marked increase in subscriptions as people tuned in to catch up on the previous episodes and watch the new ones.   The Expanse is switching to a weekly release schedule on Amazon Prime with its forthcoming fifth season.   The success of the format saw Amazon make the decision to repeat the experiment for space opera show The Expanse. The Expanse had already aired three seasons released weekly on SyFy, but disappointing viewing figures saw the show cancelled. Amazon bought out the show and transferred it to Amazon Prime for a fourth season in 2019, released on the same day. It did well, but Amazon saw a chance to improve its standings by switching to a weekly release schedule for the fifth season. This was helped by the fact that the fifth season will be the most explosive of the nine they are hoping to make: the fifth book in the series features a Game of Thrones-style, “Red Wedding” level shocking event, and if the TV show delivers on it, it could propel the show to a new level of success and achievement. We will find out if Amazon’s gambit pays off between December and February, when they air the ten episodes of the fifth season.   With Amazon switching to a weekly release schedule for two of its biggest shows, it makes it much more likely that The Wheel of Time will follow suit when it launches on Amazon in 2021 (as well as the Second Age-set Lord of the Rings prequel later in the year, or in 2022). The move will be divisive – people have gotten used to sitting down on a Friday and dedicating a day or a weekend to watching a whole season of a show – but I think will be more successful. One of the reasons Netflix’s model seems to be increasingly flawed is because a binge-release is an all-or-nothing proposition. The show has to be a hit out of the gate because, if it isn’t, then three weeks later everyone’s forgotten about it and something else has come along to replace it in the conversation. A weekly release schedule gives five to eight weeks’ worth of coverage and discussion and raises the profile of a show to higher levels, and generates more viewers of the earlier episodes in the season. It gives the show more of a fighting chance to be successful and get a renewal for more seasons.   From a more cynical point of view, it is also more profitable: people wanting to stay up to date on a new, zeitgeist-defining show have to subscribe for two or more months rather than a single weekend, but if they prefer the binge experience, they can wait until the whole season is available. That does of course mean dodging spoilers for several weeks in a row, but ultimately it does give them more choice about how to consume a new series.   Of course, Amazon may change its mind and decide to release Wheel of Time in one go, but it feels less likely. Anything which helps Wheel of Time get more viewers and more critical discussion can only be a good thing if the show is to survive the long term, but what are your thoughts? What strategy do you think is the best approach? Let us know in the comments and as usual keep at eye on the Dragonmount TV News page for breaking stories.

Ebony shares some little known facts about the original U.S. book covers in the latest episode of the Wheel of Time Community Show.     For more information on the Wheel of Time books, visit our books section.  Tor.com tribute to Darrell K Sweet Michael Whelan’s website    

As is the trend this year, most conventions are going online.  For those of us who don’t have the resources to travel to all these amazing cons, this set up isn’t so bad.   Spoilercon—a convention celebrating the podcasts The Wheel of Time Spoilers, Mistborn Spoilers, and Broken Earth Spoilers—is hosting an online even next weekend, October 2nd and 3rd.  Registration for this event is free, though pre-registration is required.  You can sign up here.   Some notable guests for Spoilercon include our own Jason Denzel—Dragonmount’s founder and webmaster—and Thom DeSimone—host of The Wheel of Time Community Show.  Maria Simons from Team Jordan will also be making an appearance.  And a reoccurring event from last year, Michael Kramer and Kate Reading—who perform the audio books for The Wheel of Time and many other sci-fi/fantasy titles—will be doing a reading.   This convention offers a lot across the fandom board!  You can check out the complete schedule here.     EDITED: In case you missed this event, you can see all the recorded panels, including the reading by Michael Kramer and Kate Reading here!