20 hours ago, DigificWriter said:

 

All of the scenes in the Ways were shot before the COVID shutdown (thanks go to WoTTuber LezbiNerdy for figuring this out), and that fact alone is enough to cast doubt on the certainty of the prevailing point of view that Mat not entering the Ways was a 'patch' to cover for Barney not coming back, at least for me.

They may have shot those scenes, they may have shot lots of scenes during those days of shooting that they could use or tweak to remove Barney from, they might have reshot stuff and put a wig on Perrin to keep the continuity up for those reshoots. I am still not convinced by that YouTubers work because we have not had anyone from the show confirm or deny it and saying, he had dreads here but not here, proves nothing, especially when those dreads where probably a wig anyway. 

On 9/1/2023 at 8:01 PM, Samt said:

Do you really dislike him that much?  

I mean I have pointed out in much the same way that RJ’s villains are generally far less fleshed out in the books than his hero’s. Liandrin is an example of this in the books she is evil because she does bad things and she does bad things because she is evil. We see very little motivation, especially with darkfriends. 

On 9/1/2023 at 3:01 PM, king of nowhere said:

that accepted test was brutal.

and it conveied the perfect feeling of the one in the books. i'd say it surpasses its book equivalent. in the books we only see her with lan for a few lines. here we actually see them getting a life together.

it's great that she also finds her motivation to leave. while she hates the tower, deep down she knows she must use her power to protect people from the shadow.

also, trying to carry back her daughter. earlier she said that the tower wants her to abandon all the people she loves, and she won't do it. and through all the books, she becomes an aes sedai but she does not abandon the people. just like in her last weave in the aes sedai test later in the books

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she carries lan with her

so here she's bringing her baby back. yes, she's not real, but it's the point that matters.

 

also regarding revelations that those who didn't read the books will probably get in a few weeks, BIG SPOILER HERE if you didn't read the books,

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liandrin is clearly trying to get nynaeve killed as per black ajah orders. and it's an absolutely fantastic way to go about it. she almost succeeded, with absolutely zero suspicion involved

 

so sad for uno, he was a great character. good way to go, though. we could always have used more uno.

 

elayne is perfect. I was unsure at first. but when she reasoned egwene out of doing something stupid, she got me. I always loved elayne because she was more rational. in a saga full of people doing dumb stuff out of pride or mule-headedness, elayne was one of the few who could solve things by talking.

 

i'm definitely liking it a lot more than S1

 

Ok controversial I know, but in the books Uno is a one trick pony character who really doesn’t develop much at all and makes up some comic relief, here we got the full essence of who he is and he got to go out on his feet refusing to bow to a lord. My only regret is we don’t get to see any interaction between him and Elayne but I don’t think Elaynes story is going to track the same anyway. 

On 9/1/2023 at 9:24 AM, Pandemonium said:

This episode was a 9.5 for me.  Probably the best episode for yet in the show.  Nynaeve was definitely the star.  

 

Rand and Selene's party was fun, and I loved seeing him burn the letter. I wouldn't have minded seeing a little more debauchery at that party, kid of like a Roman party.  The Ghealdean bottle of red was a very apt metaphor for male channeling so I really liked that addition.  Seeing Rand lose control of the flames and lose himself to lust with Selene didn't feel out of character.  Rand is always going to test the limits of his power along with his conscious before he find his way back to the light.

 

Matt's scenes are still pretty meh, but that might be the only main character falling a little flat so far.  I'm kind of bummed if he never gets his scene with Gawyn and Galad.  maybe season 3

Matt’s story is pretty meh in books 1 and 2, it really doesn’t get going properly until he gets out of Tar Valon although like you I want to see him school the brothers with a quarterstaff, 

On 9/1/2023 at 6:49 AM, A Memory Of Why said:

Yep, loved Nyns test. End to end was amazing, I don't even care she broke the rules and did the impossible to get out, it feels more believable and in line with the books as she does something similar for her AS test.

 

I know it's disturbing but I'm liking Selene and Rands relationship, she seems happy 😉

 

Their last scenes where she pins him and says "walk away from me again and I'll kill you", I pointed at the screen and said "there she is!" Litterally lol'd a couple seconds later when she wanted him to keep the Dragon coat on.

 

That's totally her messing with his dreams right? Than he wakes up and burns the house down..

 

You know boys on occasion wake up with a mess but.. Dragon problems, am my right 🤭

I mean it is similar to the books, she channels and is told she shouldn’t be able to, the door starts to disappear but she makes it return (if I remember that right), so it took all those elements but dialed them up to 11 to make the TV show more compelling, and it worked my wife a non book reader was shouting at the TV and genuinely worried for Nyn during that episode. 

On 9/1/2023 at 9:13 AM, Pandemonium said:

Pretty good episode... the Shienarians were pretty great in combat too and we finally got to see the power of Loail too.  Perrin is definitely becoming more interesting.  I thought maybe he could only see events that wolves saw, but maybe it is something deeper with the dreamworld he is able to see.

 

The Seanchan soldiers look fantastic but I don't really like that the damane have baby pacifiers.  

 

Seeing the fade on the wall was a great callback to the books.  

We are getting references to blademasters in the insane asylum with Errol, but Tand is going to need more that for his fight with Turok.

 

Verin is spot on and loved her confrontation with Moiraine and references of the dragon.  

 

Liandrin's forbidden son is quite interesting as well. I'm glad they are referencing the anti aging effects of channeling. I wonder what man knocked her up and made her hate the male race so much.  

 

Also, how we forget the reference to Cadsuane?

Verin has a sister now, which is a nice callback to a different story later on in the books. 

On 9/1/2023 at 6:03 AM, A Memory Of Why said:

 

He found a horn alright, poor bugger.

 

Isn't Elayne lovely, quite liking her so far. I scoffed when she brought her bedroom with he and gave a satisfied nod when she got in trouble for it. 

 

So we're humanising Liandrin now.. if I didn't know better I'd think she's not evil and just a B.

 

Not sure how I feel about Perins "I can smell the past" vissions. Last episode made me think he was getting sent the visions from wolves..

 

Liked this episode better than the first but over all looking good.

Modern writing likes to humanise villains, and, it helps the bait and switch for non book readers who have no idea who she is, she is sympathetic and not that bad a person, the red are not all bad and then Bam, she turns on everyone and it makes the betrayal that much more shocking.  
 

I am loving the little foreshadowing of other darkfriends though, I am sure there were some nods to it in the interactions between the mistress of the novices and Alanna, and I am seeing links between Verin and other characters and stories in the books. She has a sister now, which might link to the Vandene and Adeleas story from the books, possibly Verins sister is going to meet a sticky end, possibly to help Verin cover up something? 
 

Smelling the past I see more as the start of him feeling his way to the wolf dream in some way, but throughout the books there are also instances of characters seeing the dead living. This might be a way for the writers to get that phenomenon into the story in a way that ties to Perrin. 

On 9/1/2023 at 6:19 AM, DaddyFinn said:

Hurin's powers combined with wolf powers?

I think it is linked to the wolf dream, Perrin is seeing the echos of what was much as someone walking in the dreamworld can see echos of what is? 
 

But also in the books Characters have visions like this all the time, it is the start of the breaking down of the walls so maybe this is the writers way of getting that into the show a different way. 

1 hour ago, Agitel said:

I'm almost assuming that the show-Forsaken know more complex weaves that go beyond a "basic" shielding, mask the spiritual bond, etc... That this shield goes beyond anything Moiraine's ever experienced or heard about. Or maybe it's as simple as the bond being disrupted in the show system when shielded.

I mean the book forsaken knowledge of weaves changed as RJ fleshed out the rules more and more. Compulsion for instance would have come in really useful in the eye of the world. This is the one thing with book vs series. During much of the early books RJ was figuring it all out as he wrote it, creating situations and then coming up with t he magic rules to allow it. He did not flesh out everything before he wrote EOTW, in fact I would guess when he wrote book 1 he knew very very little of what was to come. Now with the TV show the writers have all of the bag of tricks, plus all that other stuff the forsaken do that we never see “on screen” or is just hinted at. So Forsaken can do remarkable things, but, if a single forsaken could genuinely still any other channeler that easily then it changes all the rules of the game in a way that makes no sense. Suddenly every other forsaken is at risk if they are caught out sleeping. 

2 hours ago, Elder_Haman said:

This is Schroedinger's lore change. He is. He was always intended to be. And it's unclear whether the mechanics of the universe permit "the Dragon" to be a man, but we know that there were in fact women who were essentially the same as the Dragon, but not the "same soul". So are there female Dragons in which case, Moiraine is correct? Or is only one male soul "the Dragon" in which case she is wrong? Depends on which side of the coin you look.

 

Moreover, we don't know whether what Moiraine said was true, or based on her faulty understanding of the truth. She has demonstrated the capacity to be incredibly, horribly, undeniably wrong in her assessments. It's not a point worth fixating on anymore -- in my opinion.

This is one of my biggest issues with those who argue the Dragon can’t be male. 
 

LTT was the dragon for this turning, and the Dark Lord tells Rand that he has fought this battle an infinite amount of times. But, this does not tell us that there has always been “A Dragon”. Rand is not the Dragon of the next turning of the wheel, he is a continuation of the story started by LTT during this turning. This Turning ends when everything is reset, all memory of a dark lord, of the true power maybe even the one power all together is lost. Ogiers have left and all memory of snakes and foxes and Ter Angrel etc are gone. Humanity is reset, in some way and then starts on a journey that will eventually allow someone/some people to release the dark one from the prison and so restart the tale. It is why I always hoped that Rand would eventually kill the dark one only to have to lock up the being that used to be Fain to protect the world from the new darklord, knowing that in hundreds of thousands of years time that basing would seep out into the world with new evil. 
 

People really don’t seem to understand the very essence of the story and then get all angry at things that are not written down because they are completely unknown to all in universe. 

On 9/1/2023 at 6:50 PM, Mirefox said:

You dive deep into the books to give corollary and reasons why she might not be stilled.  The entire show began with Liandrin saying that every time a male channels he taints the One Power and then proceeded to play fast and loose with the rules governing it’s nature and it’s use.  Until the writers surprise me and prove me wrong, I’m going to go with Occam’s Razor and assume she’s stilled and further assume it was done to set up Nynaeve’s abilities.

Liandrin, a darkfriend red who is meant to be sowing disinformation. 

On 9/1/2023 at 6:18 PM, Mirefox said:

How so?  I’ve seen no hints she’s just shielded.  I think they’ve given her the worst fate possible outside death so that later they can have Nynaeve heal her.  That will resonate with viewers more that with a character like Siuan that viewers don’t know all that well.

She isn’t stilled, she is shielded and the shield is tied off. Lan has stated that it takes 8 Aes Sedai to still a channeler, Morraine not knowing the difference between being stilled and being cut off makes sense because she has never been stilled, what you are seeing is a Morraine who realises everything she thought she knew, was sure she knew is wrong. She is over estimating the power of the forsaken, much as the characters do in the books before they realise that they are fallible and not as strong as they make out. 
 

I imagine either Lanfer or Rand will break the shield, Lanfer to “show Morraine” how little she knows, or Rand will just look at her, see the weave of the block and remove it. 

On 9/1/2023 at 8:57 AM, Pandemonium said:

The quality of the show has majorly improved.  Yes it was a little slow, but that is a very good thing.  This show finally slowed down to develop the characters and the actors are finally allowed to let their talents shine.  I don't like seeing Lan take such a beating in a fight, and I felt like the lighting of that scene was too dark.  I would have also loved to have seen the dragkhar.  Otherwise very solid episode.  

 

I think the IGN review misses the mark

 

But this is Lan without the Bond, so he would be weaker and in many ways it makes it more impressive. “Mortal” Lan took on 2 Fades. 

On 9/1/2023 at 6:34 AM, Seaine's eyebrows said:

Verin 🤎🤎🤎

And calling back the Aes Sedai sisters one of which dies on the journey with the Kinswomen, my prediction is that Verins sister dies at the hands of a “darkfriend”. 

On 9/2/2023 at 12:16 AM, zacz1987 said:

I enjoyed it much more than I did with season 1. It seems to be much of an improvement. I did still have a few minor issues however.

 

I found that there did not seem to be enough Aes Sedai walking around the tower scenes. Other than the main 5 or 6 sisters we don't see anyone else, they should have have multiple extras walking around in colourful Aes Sedai dresses. At this point in the series before the major event happens the tower should be quite busy and lived in.

 

Loial looked worse than in season 1 and his personality etc seemed to have digressed. While I didn't agree with his look in season 1 they had his personality down pat but he no longer seems to be the long winded slow talking character any more. They also did a poor job making him look tall, In season 1 they managed to make him look larger using camera angles but in Season 2 they have scenes where he is standing next to Perrin and Perrin is taller.

 

I also found the time skip to be a bit too much. We don't see how Loial recovers from his stab wound - its like it never happened. We don't see how Rand and Selene meet or how Perrin ended up being recruited into the hunt for the horn. Hopefully they have a flashback in future episodes which links the seasons together but I'm not hopeful.

In the books even with the tower full RJ describes whole wings that sit empty, I always pictured the tower like this, Aes Sedai bumping into one or 2 while strolling but not 10-20 at once. Most are either out in the world or busy remember. 

On 9/2/2023 at 2:28 PM, swollymammoth said:

I just don't get it. I don't think I've ever seen a show that was as ashamed of its source material as Wheel of Prime. Even the Shannara Chronicles wasn't this bad. That show was just trying to aim its source material at teens. It wasn't constantly apologizing for its source material the way that Wheel of Prime does. 

 

It seems like every other decision Rafe made was to fix something that he considered morally objectionable about the books. Too much toxic masculinity? Not enough representation? Not enough sex? Gendered magic system? A prophecy specifically dealing with a man? Not enough focus on the female characters early in the series? Slightly outdated interactions between men and women? No problem. I'll fix that for ya. "I love the books, but you know what? They'd have been better if I could go back in time and write them myself," is Rafe's entire ethos. 

 

What Rafe has done to Wheel of Time is nothing short of blatant bowlderization for the 21st century, and like always there's a loyal audience of yuppies eager to lap up anything that reinforces their myopic worldview even if it doesn't have an ounce of artistic integrity. 

 

MEANWHILE Netflix's One Piece adaptation is based on a property that is 1091 Chapters long and has been running for over 20 years and yet somehow managed to do a mostly accurate adaptation of the first several arcs without resorting to Rafe's "We have to adapt the entire series" BS that he used to justify the massive deviations he made right off the bat. And fans love it! It has a 95% audience score based on over 5000 reviews on RottenTomatoes. Wheel of Prime Season 2 can't match that even after Season 1 alienated everyone who might leave a negative review on Season 2 anyway. 

Fundamentally disagree as a hardcore book fan I think the story being told here is in some ways better then the early books, which, let’s be fair are not RJ’s real voice and consist of the main characters going from A to B to do a thing then to C to do another thing, usually chasing down something, someone or trying to run away. 
 

The fundamental spirit of WOT is there and is being told in a way that works on the small screen with limited real time to tell the story. The main characters are all emotionally in the same place as they are in the books at this point and are on the starting point of journeys we can see and match up to the books. This is far superior to Shannara, it is also far better than rings of power, as a LOTR fan I hated what they did with the lore there, even as I understood the reasons. Non of the lore or main story themes in WOT have been drastically changed the way you seem to make out. 

Ok a die hard book fan who has read the series many many times since the the late 90’s and, I love the first 3 episodes of season 3. There is plenty of the original story there and, the way this story is being told in many ways I think is better than the original 3 books. The same themes are all there, the same character journeys are all going on with the same development. The production levels and effects are far far better than season 1, the acting and dialogue is better. I loved the Rand Logain scenes, the tower scenes, everything is just much crisper, the fight choreography is cleaner and it just feels like the show the books deserve instead of the Shannara fiasco the first season felt like. 
 

Now onto “canon” you might not like this but I have always said the first 3 books would make an awful tv series or movie if filmed as written. The story of books 1-3 is basically the main characters traveling from A to B chasing down some mcguffin, and then onto C after losing said Mcguffin. Really until the end of book 3 for me wheel of time was always a mediocre fantasy series that ripped off LOTR and other fantasy stories, and there are reasons for that. I really love the changes that are being made, and think some of them are better than choices RJ made in the books. The core of the WOT mythology is all there and if you consider a story to be the characters emotional journey then the same story is being told, in a format that makes it great for both TV and the limited time available. 
 

So far season 2 for me is a massive success and I will put my “hardcore book lover credentials” up against anyone (I won’t that is a really dumb badge to wear lol). 
 

3 hours ago, DreadLord31 said:

Todays the day…

Hopeful, but with extra girded loins.

No idea what time it is available here in the UK, all I keep seeing is 1st sept, is that midnight lol or a different time? 

https://winteriscoming.net/2023/08/08/the-wheel-of-time-star-barney-harris-issued-legal-complaints-quash-misinformation-about-why-he-left/
 

not seen this link anywhere on the forum yet, indications that the “Anti Vax” reasons given for Barney where false (I always through it strange that he could be anti vax before a vaccine was created). 

22 minutes ago, nsmallw said:

I'd say that Verin had already begun her redemptive arc when we meet her. By joining the Black Ajah, I'm sure she's had to do despicable things, so her entire quest to "out" the Black Ajah is her redemptive arc. 

But we as the reader have no idea, for me that scene with Egwene, as manufactured as it is by BS (there are so many holes in her not getting the oath rod), is still very emotional. 

Just on the adaptation piece and the size of the story and how many pages/words per episode. 
 

Lord of the rings has a lot of words describing the scenery. Tolkien paints a picture and that can be transcribed to the screen in a single sweeping wide angle shot. 
 

Robert Jordan tends to have a lot more dialogue and actual story being described as opposed to pages dedicated to telling you how then Aiel wastes look. In fact RJ was very good at painting a scene with minimal words when it came to describing a landscape or city, he lets the people in that environment speak for the surroundings. 
 

So you can’t just look at one adaptation and compare apples to apples, even if they are both fantasy the content of what is on the page makes it a very very different task to adapt one compared to the other. 
 

As an aside I have always wondered just how much longer WOT would be if it had the Tolkien levels of descriptors, how many pages would be given to describing a death gate killing trollocs  for instance lol. 

19 hours ago, DojoToad said:

Really?  Foreshadowing?  Good to know.  😁

I do wonder, with the book writing process, how much of the foreshadowing was fully intentional, and how much did RJ leave open ended threads that later on he decided how to tie off. For instance the rumour that for a while Taim was Demandred until RJ changed his mind, or what was in the letter to Thom from Morraine. 
 

I read an interview years ago with an author who said openly that his readers think he is far more clever then he appears, he writes his books one page at a time and while he has a rough idea in his head of a beginning middle and end he generally lets his characters react to the situations he puts them in and has stuff happen to them. Later on he might pick up that the gem in one key scene was green and so he can tie that back to the bad guy 2 books later to make them think he was behind it all along when, honestly, that bad guy wasn’t even thought of when the book was written. 
 

Tolkein did this as well, retconning the hobbit to make it fit the wider mythology so the ring went from a standard magic ring to becoming the ring of power. 

On 8/30/2023 at 9:34 AM, DojoToad said:

Very much how she acted in the books while trying to learn control of channeling.

 

Interesting cleansing drill they performed in the kitchens.  Looks like a possible change to a major upcoming event - or at least who came up with the idea of how to pull it off.

I mean Nyn remains an obstinate child right up until Egwene has the talk with her, about how as the youngest wisdom she had to earn the respect of the women’s circle and how she herself is undermining Egwene. Think that is book 12? So we have a long way to go of this if it is to stay true to the books. 

12 hours ago, Elder_Haman said:

 

E2 was a really good episode right up to the end when the VFX let us down in Shadar Logoth. Also, I hate how they did Lan dirty at the end. Nynaeve sneaking up on him was unnecessary and diminishes Lan's badassery.

I made this point a while back in the books Nyn sneaks up on Lan and surprises him. So this is a direct callback to the books. He gives her a massive nod of respect for both that, and being able to track him. It is the start of him seeing her as more then just another aes sedai apprentice. 

4 hours ago, Chivalry said:

One of my favorite parts in the entire series...incredibly moving. The show needs those kind of moments.

More so than Verin? 

Re reading TGH mats luck kicks in even as he slips into darkness as they chase the horn. Hurin remembers later on in MOL that he wouldn’t play dice against him. So it is not post healing but pre.