16 hours ago, Sabio said:

I think it was meant to be the dust from all the horses, but makes you wonder how they got so close to the city in the first place.  

It was incense. You saw the child soldiers walking ahead and waving them, with the fog being generated out of the containers. 
 

Combined with the whitecloak charge, was probably the most cinematic sequence from the entire series. 

16 hours ago, Sabio said:

The episode just seems poorly thought out, with many holes and head scratching moments.  

 

The Ishy vs Rand fight had to be the worst, most anti-climatic fight ever.  I was like, that was it, Ishy just stands there as Rand just walks up and stabs him in the chest?  Maybe he was like ohh I can't beat this poorly trained girl, I deserve to die.

 

They are trying too hard to make everyone equally important.  It seems forced, like ohh what to do with Mat, ok make him a hero of the horn.  

 

Uno is a hero and Mat is a hero?  Seriously Uno?

 

I think it would have been better had they kept Ingtar arc, with him trying to get redemption.  I mean why even care about the character, he's now just some noble who sacrificed himself.  Who lasted like 5 seconds.

 

I didn't mind the Rand vs Turak fight, it was actually pretty funny, but the Ishy fighting and not able to get past some poorly trained novices was just dumb.  Not to mention Moiriane has the power to conjure a giant fire dragon?  Shouldn't the three oaths of stopped her from attacking the ships?  They weren't shadowspawn and Lan and her weren't in any danger.   Ishy couldn't think of any better weaves to use and some-one who has a few months of training can hold him off?

 

I loved the ending with Moghi putting Lanfear in her place.  

 

Shouldn't the Egwene vs her Suldam fight have been a standoff, with neither being able to hurt the other?  If you can't hurt your Suldam how can you choke her?  Egwene went from crippling pain if she tried to hurt a Suldam to, being choked isn't so bad.  

 

The dagger is now a lightsaber able to cut through anything.   Yet if cuts flesh it just kills instantly unless it stabs an important character, then it just leaves normal wounds.  Seems a bit odd.

 

I assume Ishy death is setting him up for Moridin.  Curious if they will use the same actor.

 

My only issue with Perrin really killing the dudes father, is it ruins any chance later of a truce between them since Perin can no longer claim he didn't do it.  Now we know that change is coming.  

UNO and I saw someone else mention Steppin and Lady Amalisa in there?? So there are around 20 heroes in all of history and 3 of them are just some random idiots from the last 6 months. 
 

Mat being one is try and short circuit the Finn storyline, which I understand but it still seems odd that he knows he’s a hero, does a matrix download and then gets to fighting. 
 

I hadn’t even picked up on Moiraine breaking one of the 3 oaths during that scene… I really don’t understand what they were thinking and why they couldn’t just allow Rand to kill them all ffs.

Agreed on the Egwene moment, the position would’ve been better allowing her to be saved and the others witnessing her killing the suldam in revenge. Now it can just be glossed over and any time two damane feel like not being one, can just pick up the bracelets left in their room and set each other free. 
 

I really don’t understand why the Whitecloaks tried to kill Perrin, watched a wolf save him, killed the wolf and then were just like ‘nah lads fine who we just tried to kill, there can be no consequences if we leave him here’. 

Thoughts collected whilst watching. 
 

- Aiel spears look like they’re made of tinfoil for a kids play. 
- the channeling for the bond to be unmasked…

- just randomly appearing with the Horn…

- dummy’s in the mouth continue to be a truly horrendous acting choice

- what a pointless thing in having Turak say the line from the book but good to see Rand actually do something. 
- ‘I’ll hold them’ doesn’t even last 5 seconds and the soldiers should be no further behind the others. 
- Lanfear gives Domon what looks to be equivalent of £10 to give up a fortune worth thousands. 
- dagger can melt locks???

- dagger now kills immediately…

- whitecloaks all speak as though they are reading an autocue that they don’t really trust. 
- why did taking the suldam wrist off open the collar this time but not the other times?

- Rand’s whisper acting continues to be frustrating. 
- shielding without being able to see, distance and not bonding. So annoying. 
- Valda just leaving Perrin on the floor…

- the horn looks like cheap tat

- why is Uno a hero?

- ‘I remember’ as though he’s been plugged into the matrix training programme. 

- ‘oh no no’ I’ve never heard anything funnier!!

- Egwene saves Rand, Rans lies down like a weak baby as always. 
- Moiraine somehow has the power to destroy a ship from a mile away.

- Lan actually has one scene of being competent. Don’t understand why they didn’t just run to the side of him to kill Moiraine. 
- Egwene can hold off the second most powerful channeler on the planet without too many issues. 
- Perrin holds him off with some random shield. 
- Elayne heals/closes the wound…

- the stab under the heart might be the most anticlimactic thing I’ve ever seen on a tv show. 
- oh not just one ship, all the ships. 
- why is Lan doing some random crouch behind Moiraine whilst she sends the ridiculously massive fire dragon. All anyone else could do was the fireball equivalent of a water balloon. 
- now it’s a physical dragon monster ffs.

On 10/2/2023 at 4:06 AM, Guire said:

Its being pretty nit picky but the show just got the green fields and spring dress by Siuan and Moraine wrong.  I assume because they wanted a light mood while they flirted.

 

Aiel war ended in winter.  Rand was born in roughly December.  Tar Valon is fairly far north in Westlands.  Sure there may not be snow in lowlands but that grass would be almost all brown.  At top of White Tower it would be quite chilly even on a sunny day.  In New Spring Lan's last battle before Aiel withdrew it was very cold.  When Mo and Siuan went out to collect birth info it was very cold.  Not a big deal but an error.

Probably already been said but:

- Aes Sedai maintain the grass around the Tower and in the city via the One Power. 
- Aes Sedai ignore/don’t feel the cold so don’t need to be wrapped up if they don’t want to. 

23 minutes ago, king of nowhere said:

by the way, I know they want to make egwene look badass by spitting in the face of torturers, but am I the only who think she comes across as stupid instead?

I'm talking specifically of her refusing to give her name at first, both to renna and to valde before her.

the fact is, they are obviously serious about hurting you, and they are asking for nothing special. as long as they don't ask you to do anything against your core values - like betraying your friends, or submitting to elaida - it seems to me the smart thing would be to go along with it. valda may just be satisfied with the answers you give and let you go. renna wants to train you to fight with the one power, which would be useful training to be had anyway once your friends - who you know are about - will free you.

at least try to assess the situation. she doesn't even know what valda or the seanchan want from her. 

she only marks herself for special treatment this way. letting the enemy think you cowed while you bide your time seem a better way to escape. it's what loial is doing.

I disagree on the fine point of being "broken". sure, she cannot escape on her own, that does not mean she is broken. she cannot hurt the suldam, but she can still disobey.

if I were in that situation, i would do all the suldam ask of me, until i am brought to battle. then in battle I would try to cause some "accidental" friendly fire accidents. or possibly try to kill myself by using weaves that make a lot of shrapnel close to me. if it's not possible, just refuse to channel at a critical moment; i can't resist torture forever, but i may resist it long enough to alter the outcome of a fight. iirc about the adam, the leash holder could force the prisoner to channel, but the suldam don't train to channel, don't even know they can channel themselves, and therefore wouldn't be able to do it.

even if none of that is possible, one can avoid being broken by staying themselves. most damane reached the point where they didn't want to be freed, even when actually rescued. you can be a prisoner with no ability to help yourself, but you can still hope for rescue, you can keep resenting your captors.

None of the second half of your post is possible with the adam. The suldam decides when the damane embraces the source, decides exactly what happens once the source is embraced and decides once the damane is to pull away from the source. 
 

There is no possibility of self rescue, resistance or causing accidents. The domination is whole and complete at all times. 

2 hours ago, EmreY said:

 

I agree that so far the only big deal seems to be that he can channel.  But I'm stuck trying to figure out what could have been shown so far.

 

I did like the earth hiccups at the start of The Dragon Reborn.  Maybe something like that?

Maybe if they had opened with Moiraine hearing the prophecy 20 years earlier, before panning to a shot of all the EF5, to allow for the nonsense ‘anyone can be the Dragon’ season 1 plot. Once you get to season 2, the prophecy then becomes focussed on Rand and starts the process of him actually looking like a main character, rather than some mopey lad who sort of grunts through two seasons worth of dialogue. 

Without having read the books I couldn’t see how you would understand that Rand is meant to be a big deal. 
 

His lack of characterisation in favour of wasting time on Steppin, Lan and whatever is going on with Moiraine is pretty frustrating. 
 

Tbf though, the book did also have this issue, spending huge detours on things like Morgase, that are completely unimportant in the wider scheme of things. 
 

I do think they would’ve been better off trimming everything away to just Rand, Mat, Nynaeve / The Last Battle / Forsaken. Deciding what is absolutely key to keep for the correct markers to be hit. Then fleshing out Egwene and Perrin in their overall plot, before settling on Moiraine, Elayne and Aviendha with whatever is left. 
 

They obviously drop the right names and characters in as they go along but entire episodes are not wasted on someone that has no impact or influence on the Last Battle. If they were going to do the Steppin type episode, I would’ve preferred an episode getting to know darkfiends in this world, as they’ve definitely done Darkfriends and potentially the Forsaken on the series compared to the books up to this point. 
 

The amount the series has been compressed with the 8 episode series means that anything that is not key can go, whereas the focus seems to be on inventing new scenes and beats that weren’t needed. 

Quality of writing, cgi, directing and acting has increased significantly this season, just a pity that the base was so low last season. 
 

I still feel the choice of making Moiraine the singular main character is holding the series back, as for those who aren’t book readers Rand is just some random man who can do magic like the women. Rosamund Pike was not famous enough to actually re-write an entire series for and 100% would not have drawn casual viewers in. 
 

This then leads in to whatever the hell has gone on with Lan for the past two seasons. It just feels shoehorned, unnecessary and really dragged out. If this is what they want to do with him, I feel it would’ve been better off just killing him off and having that being the shock death to book readers. 
 

There are many minor changes that whilst taken individually wouldn’t be frustrating, are becoming more frustrating, especially as I struggle to see the benefit in the change. Whereas changes like Uno being killed are fine, as he was basically just some generic soldier that was an easy reference point in the books. On a tv show literally any soldier can do the job fine. 

On 9/2/2023 at 1:20 AM, DigificWriter said:

 

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

Are any of those titled the play they are based on? No?

They are adaptations of a play done in their own way, not just picking taming of the shrew, calling it taming of the shrewd but having Neo run in and drop kick some bishes. 
 

What people want is for a show named literally after the book to be a relatively close adaptation of the book, hitting key points. Otherwise just use WOT as a foundation, similar to what you have mentioned above, and you can then add your own spin with no moaning. 

Just watched the latest RoP episode and actually forgot that I hadn’t watched this weeks one until my wife pointed it out. 
 

It doesn’t look like it stacks up for the amount of money spent on it but some thoughts:

- doesn’t seem sure of what it is trying to be. Ranges from horror, to children’s humour, to bland intrigue sometimes across a single scene. Needs to settle down on what it wants to be. 
- the Harfoots are incredibly annoying. The scents, the culture, Lenny Henry, just annoying. 
- Isildur just feels pointless and I don’t see how he is meant to become a great king of men. 
- Galadriel is an angry teenage girl despite being thousands of years old. 
- I feel that the storylines are too disparate, it doesn’t feel like there is something driving them all together.

- timeline feels pretty wild. Harfoots go on a huge migration, that looks to take weeks, as a minimum, but everything else appears to be happening within a day or two. 

Would be happy with the wonder twins multiple plots of ‘men are idiots, we can do it ourselves, ah stupid man use him and nearly get him killed but don’t say thanks for him actually completing the task’ being reduced down to one, maximum of two storylines. 

That is one of the most ridiculous things I’ve read!

I know that they have to change certain things for tv but they should at least try and keep the essence of the book world. 

8 minutes ago, DojoToad said:

Why not?  Several discussions here about Rafe updating (gender, sexuality, relationships, whatever) for the show from when the source material was written way back in the Dark Ages of the 1990's.

 

I would not be surprised if Rafe addresses trans-channelers.  Can a trans-woman channel saidar?  Would a trans-man suffer from taint-induced madness?

I suppose that depends on if in wot universe the soul is aligned to someone’s born sex or gender. 
 

It’s been established that channeling is linked to the soul, which allows Halima to channel Saidin, so would just need the above defining. 
 

It does become confusing if based on gender, as some people define as non-binary so would they be able to channel both or just the True Power?

If none of the powers, is the Creator then exclusionary against those who don’t fit into a pre-programmed package?

The first law, that’s the other one I had read recently. Really enjoyed that so at least I can trust the recommendations!

thanks everyone, will have a look and make a start. 

Just finished probably my 15th re-read of WOT and as always, leaves me feeling a bit bereft at the end. 
 

I normally look to run through a couple of new series straight after and I’m looking for any recommendations. 
 

Ones I can remember I’ve completed are

- all of the Mark Chadbourn books

- Mistborn

- assassins apprentice 

I like a series with a consistent in-world rule-set and with some jeopardy to the whole thing. 

Any recommendations would be appreciated. 

1 hour ago, VooDooNut said:

Maybe I'm completely misremembering, but wasn't the Dark One able to lash out and taint the male-half of the Source precisely because LTT and the 100 companions weren't using a circle of male and female channelers, and were limited in how they could attack (LTT was forced to touch Saidin to the Bore directly)?

 

As a counter-example, when the EOTW was made, a full circle of female and male channelers were able to create a pool of cleansed Saidin, so there must be some protective benefit to having both halves of the Source used against the taint.

 

 

In short, I think the opposite is true. If a circle was used at the Bore, the taint would not have happened.

I always took that as the implication I.e. the bore would have been sealed perfectly fine if the female AS had assisted. 
 

The ‘breaking’ to me was both the physical breaking of the land and the moment the female AS said no, as the beginning of the break between male and female in the wider culture. 

8 hours ago, WhiteVeils said:

Yeah.  Like, y'all are talking here like it's anything other than the /texture/ of her hair you have a problem with.  It's naturally red, it's almost the exact same hue as Rand's hair if you look at it in photographs that are properly lit, and that's her natural hair color.  Her skin is lighter than many tanned caucasians, by far, including several members of my family. Jordan says parts of her under her clothes are paler than other parts of her, but are folks really complaining about what they think she'll look like naked? No.  She has brown eyes, but so does the actress who plays Elayne and nobody complained about her casting. The only thing that is not what people thought is her hair texture, and Jordan never mentions Aviendha's hair texture at all.

 

And as for the whole complaining about fight choreography, it is clear from reading the notes here, that all these 'back seat directors' don't know anything about fight choreography for film and screen.  Your cheap martial artist doesn't know anything about camera angles, repetitive stress injuries for actors, accident mitigation, and a ton of other things.  It just sounds foolish.

 

Rather than trying to feel superior with a long winded post, just say that you think people are racist because they request in world consistency. 
 

As I have said, I don’t care what race the Aiel are but more than any other in Randland, they should be a single discernible race so that they can be picked out as an Aiel regardless of what they are wearing. 
 

Same as the Seafolk should all be very dark black skinned by the descriptions in the book. If they are recast as white or Asian it doesn’t feel like it would make sense but provided they were a single race I’m happy to go with it. 
 

There is a strong place for diversity and I have come round to accepting mainland diversity due to explanations like the Breaking but certain closed off races should be homogenous.  

51 minutes ago, Skipp said:

 

Not exactly how I pictured Aviendha but I can get behind this casting.  While in the books the Aiel are generally paler they are described as having "Sun-dark" faces and her skin tone certainly matches that.  Her hair has enough of a red tinge for that to work out as well.

 

But even the show mentioned that hair colour and dress are going to be the big factors in determining where someone is from more than other features. 

 

It will be interesting to see what they do with the Madiens hairstyle.  As described they have short hair with rat tails but that never seemed to take root in my head.

 

While I haven't seen anything she has been in Jon from Wot up seems to think she has the chops.  Honestly the biggest strength of the show has been the casting, aside from some side chaaracters(looking at you Bran), so I don't have any worry there.

Sun dark I took to mean as incredibly pale but with a tan from being in the sun all the time. The Irish/Scottish farmer colouring. 
 

With the other cultures I can definitely get on board with the idea that it’s clothing and mannerisms but the Aiel physical characteristics are a huge determining factor throughout the books. The whole point is that random people believe they can tell an Aiel from a persons physical characteristics i.e. Rand, regardless of what they are wearing at the time. 
 

For consistency it doesn’t really bother me if Rand was white, black, Asian etc as long as he was abnormally tall and red haired, with the rest of the Aiel race having a similar look. 
 

I appreciate that showrunners want to include diversity in modern shows, even when I think the implementation isn’t how I would have interpreted it, but there still should be a thought for in world consistency. 

Almost forgot the series existed. Started rereading the series and got to the point where Egwene starts getting headaches and haven’t touched the books in about 5 weeks. 

On 4/1/2022 at 1:02 AM, Skipp said:

Rumors that these 4 actors have been cast for WoT season 2. Speculation that they might be playing Brigitte, Aviendha, Gawyn and possibly Alviarin.

https://www.wotseries.com/2022/03/30/morocco-updates-and-cast-speculation/

 

 

Ragga looks so much like my head cannon Brigitte it's not even funny.  Especially if you have seen her with the braid she sported in Vikings.

 

Ayoola wouldn't be exactly as how I pictured Avi but looks close enough. Especially if they are focusing on the Red Hair being a defining feature of the Aiel like Thom mentioned.  Funnily enough she is Irish so she should fit right into being an Aiel.

 

Jay could certainly pull off Gawyn just from his looks, don't have much else to say.

 

Xelia as Alviarin could certainly look but I must admit when I first saw the picture of her with her short dark hair my mind immediately came up with a wild, WILD theory, Galad.  Whether they gender flip the character, have him be a trans character or just have a Woman play him as Male to represent his described nearly Feminine features that headshot is nearly exactly how I pictured Galad in my head.

 

Of course this is all speculation, nothing has been confirmed.  It is possible that none of these actors have actually been cast for the show.

Aviendha now confirmed as above. 
 

Really not how I pictured any of the Aiel and considering they are meant to have a single consistent look across the entire race, to the extent that it is constantly commented upon by many people about some random lad in a village, it makes the consistency and believability a bit off. 
 

It’s not even like the Aiel had a melting pot effect brought about by the breaking, they were described as a homogenous race before the Breaking and haven’t had any immigration for 3,000 years, so would remain very homogenous. 

The way channeling is portrayed in this is very similar to The Magicians series. Just have a quick look at any magic between the two and I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a link between choreographers or similar on both shows. 

Got to bump it as it took 4 hours to be approved. 

Why does the forum take so long to sign off on new threads made?

I know a lot of people were frustrated by Egwene during the book series but she was one of my favourite characters. I only say this to preface the below…

I have significant reservations about the actress and her ability to hold scenes throughout the proposed 8 seasons. Whilst she started ok and looks the part, the longer it has gone the more her acting has deteriorated. 
 

Her accent keeps dropping, she is very much chewing the scenery when she has any emotional moments but the part that really hit home for me was when she was crying next to Perrin in Fal Dara and did the telegraphed her to the side lurch and then launch onto the man’s shoulder move. You see this in amateur dramatics quite a bit because people can’t sell subtlety but a professional actor should be beyond this. 
 

Secondly, through no fault of the actor, the character arc has been completely obliterated. I’m not too bothered that Egwene and Nynaeve have been made TV’s, as they basically were in the books, but making Egwene a TV removed her power and agency as an individual. 
 

In the books she makes decisions, is independent, strong willed, determined and just an all round dominating and powerful personality. If she hits the same beats but it is all explained away as being TV, it removes some of her power in being able to choose to be who she is. 
 

The other side is that she is now pushing with her One Power ability so early that it makes it almost irrelevant for her to bother with training / being forced by the Seanchan. She can already do miracles, such as either healing the dead or bringing someone back from the being of death.

The growth from precocious idealist to a woman of power and independent thought appears to have been decimated to show that she can do whatever Nynaeve can e.g. be a Wisdom and super healer. 

The portrayal of Perrin is lacking when viewed as he is meant to be one of the main characters. 
 

He essentially has no agency outside of what the others are allowing/offering to him. His only part at the moment is to act as device for Egwene to channel / attack the whitecloaks and for Rand and Egwene to have an argument. 
 

Outside of that, he doesn’t really have anything particularly significant at the moment. 
 

He killed his wife but neither he, nor any of the other characters actually seemed to care beyond using her as a weapon to say that he only got engaged to her because Rand / Egwene became official. 
 

The above, when allied to the real lack of acting ability of the main actor, renders him a pointless character. The two main issues I have with the actor are holding his mouth open at all times (BREATHE THROUGH YOUR NOSE) and that when he does speak, it is like he is using those words for the first time in his life, whilst suffering through a significant concussion. 
 

I think the latter is meant to be the actor portraying ‘deliberate’ but it’s done in such a way that I would assume the character is meant to have learning difficulties of some description, except he doesn’t have any in the book. 

That is some genuinely terrible merch. Looks like it was knocked up by the jaded 50 year old with a clothing printer/stamp at home.