10 minutes ago, Elder_Haman said:

Unless it was to make people observing think exactly that. 

But I don't believe Liandrin wanted Nyn dead. I believe she wanted to turn her over to the DO.

A slight variation might be true.   Ishy (or the black) ordered Liandrin to work on Nynaeve's block to help set in motion future book events.

6 hours ago, Elder_Haman said:

I don’t think she ever speaks to him. He speaks while standing next to her, but Suroth never acknowledges his presence. 
 

So in my mind it’s an open question whether or not Ishy is visible. 

For all the talk that they are changing the lore, it was a nice callback to some of the lore (whether intentional or not) to have him there.

On 6/26/2023 at 10:39 AM, expat said:

Sea Folks plot seems an obvious place to cut.  They didn't accomplish anything and they seem to be a pale imitation of the Aiel (channelers not under the White Tower control, outsiders who support Rand under a different rubric than the Dragon etc.).

 

 

Depending on how they structured it, the Sea Folk / Bowl of Winds arc could be accomplished in just one to three episodes.  1 episode to introduce it.  1 episode to look for it.   And, 1 episode to find/use it.   You don't need to introduce a lot of information about them in order for them to appear and hit their plot points.   

The same applies to the kin and a bunch of other things.  

34 minutes ago, notpropaganda73 said:

 

I'm sorry, but it's a consistent issue in S1 where they just show things that book readers know without any in-show context for it. Imo it doesn't function as a good tease because there is no context. If the tease is just to leave everyone going "Wtf" then it works, but why should anyone care? Who are they? It reminds me of when Thanos appears as a tease in the MCU, I think after Age of Ultron, and says "alright, I'll do it myself". That's an exciting tease for comic book fans, but I had no idea who he was, and the line itself implies he was in the background controlling everything, which just wasn't the case later on. That tease didn't work for me either because I didn't care about this randomer I had no connection to or context for (at the time). 

MCU does a teaser scene.  The MCU fandom then does a bunch of videos talking about the teaser scene.   It becomes part of the hype cycle.   It a basic part marketing series/films these days.

34 minutes ago, notpropaganda73 said:

I'm sure it worked for some people but really I just think it's a bad attempt at even teasing the Seanchan.

To me that is like complaining that a teaser trailer is not a narratively complete story.  It isn't designed to be nor is it expected to be.

34 minutes ago, notpropaganda73 said:

Why are they creating a tsunami with the OP? It makes zero sense.

You can spend five minutes thinking about it and come up with a few logical explanations.  

I've already said that to me it looks to be a magical equivalent of doing a naval bombardment before conducting a landing.  It takes only a few minutes to think about the effects of that wave would be on the shoreline and how that might be leveraged. 

I saw another possible explanation on twitter last night where they were suggesting that maybe the wave was designed to carry the ships to the top of the cliffs to create a burn the ships kind of moment. Personally, I don't see that.... but it is another quick logical explanation for why they would set up a wave like that.

So, possible logical explanations exist.  The fact that they exist are evidence that the "teasing" function worked in part.

Whether you like those explanations is a different question than whether it makes sense or not.

34 minutes ago, notpropaganda73 said:

 

 

Why not reduce the budget for this weird display and use it instead for getting the actress playing Maigan in for another scene, seeing as we're so concerned about the pennies here. 

Why incur the costs of bringing in a minor role that may never be seen again in this scene?

It's a teaser.  It is not a entire narrative arc.  It can fit into a narrative arc but as it is presented at this time it is not yet one.

34 minutes ago, notpropaganda73 said:

There are too many legit criticisms of S1 that get waved away as "that can be addressed later".

There certainly are legit criticisms.  But, not all criticisms make equal sense.  Sometimes, you have to view the scene in question based what it is functionally trying to do.   In this case, teasing the Seanchan is directly implying "this will be addressed later" and it will be important.

8 minutes ago, SingleMort said:

That's true it can, but then they could have pushed the whole Seanchan introduction to season 2 as well. It wasn't exactly needed this season and didn't really connect to anything else. Think that's why people keep referring to it as a "post credit scene" even though it's not. I actually wonder if it might have worked better as bonus material or part of a teaser for season 2.

They haven't introduced the Seanchan.   They teased the Seanchan.  

3 hours ago, notpropaganda73 said:

My issue with this scene really sums up the whole first series - it's a gaping missed opportunity. They had already set up Maigan going west in episode 6 to investigate the rumours. Why not use her viewpoint to then introduce the Seanchan? Maigan being captured by the Seanchan, or even just witnessing the (completely random) display of the One Power, would have added much more to the scene.

Maigain would have cost more money and may not have added much value.

3 hours ago, notpropaganda73 said:

My preference would have been to show the Seanchan taking a town, capturing a female channeler/chaining them with an a'dam (preferably Maigan), and the camera panning out to show the ships in the harbour. 

All of which can either be shown or implied in season 2.

3 hours ago, notpropaganda73 said:

As it is, everyone is left going "what?" There isn't even any real suspense or dread from the scene, they just look sort of exotic and used the OP to create a tsunami for some reason. So what? 

There doesn't have to be any suspense or dread from the scene.  It is just teasing something to come later.

Sometimes less is more.  

10 hours ago, Jackdaw_Fool said:

This. Or that simply there is only the one power and it is tainted when used by men. There is certainly nothing there that proves there are separate components to the one power or that saidin or saidar exist.

 

Saidin is explicitly mentioned in the show as is the phrase "the male half of the one power".   

16 minutes ago, TheMountain said:

For those who like the show, I have good news: once people like myself are done grieving, they will likely leave... and the forums once again will be populated by a majority that is optimistic and excited about the show... and then all will be rainbows and unicorns... at least until Season 2 ?

Personally, I like the negative takes on the show.  It gives us stuff to discuss and consider.

I just wish some of the negative takes were less emotional and more analytical.   

41 minutes ago, flinn said:

 Yep, calling him the Dragon Reborn was a major F-up though. I have heard it was a mistake in editing but I dont think so. I dont think the writers have a clue.

Yet, they mentioned saidin and that it may be tainted by LTT's action.  Hence, my post.

As for calling LTT the dragon reborn, that is kind of a small one.

30 minutes ago, RhienneAgain said:

Amalisa and the two random female channelers weren't bound by the three oaths so any tactical planning wouldn't need to consider them.

Yes.   Which brings it back to my original observation about their ability/skills being appropriate considerations for how they are deployed.

Are they trained well enough to be effective in that situation?   My assumption is that they are not.

1 hour ago, flinn said:

 In the big picture.. tainting Saidin is a major part. It is the taint that drives men insane and more importantly breaks down the barriers so that Rand can remember his past life. Without the ability to remember his past life, Rand would not succeed. Also, to repair the seal perfectly it requires the use of saidin/saidar/true power. That is also a major plot point that is necessary for the physics and logics to make sense. The main point of the Wheel of Time is balance, that is why the yin/yang symbol is so important.

Good thing they introduced some of those concepts in the prologue to episode 8.

11 hours ago, Brytac said:

They all got hooked on GOT.

Some might say that shows poor taste.  ?

58 minutes ago, Brytac said:

The 2 I know who are none book readers arnt talking about it.  They kinda shrugged and said whats all that about. 

 

Indifference as it meant nothing. 

 

It had no context, no clue about it...anything at all.  It just didnt do anything for them, it was irrelevant as part of WOTs1 and certainly nothing to say to a friend..'omg go watch WOT...the end is amazing'.

 

 

 

Then it didn't work for those two particular individuals.   The indifference of two individuals is just the indifference of two individuals.  

2 non-reader friends of mine were interested and asking questions about them.

2 indiiferent & 2 interested = zero net impact on the big picture.

Regardless, tv writers tend to know their business.  And, a simple teaser at the end of an episode is one of the common tools of the trade.  That's pretty much all it is.

47 minutes ago, MasterAblar said:

"But the messy ending, some inexplicable changes to the backstory and the feeling that the show is making changes where they're not needed and not making changes where they are needed continue to make the series feel uneven."

 

Pretty accurate.

Part of me wonders if this is why season 2 got greenlit early with the runtime/number of episodes being a clear point for them to consider.

1 hour ago, MasterAblar said:

 

 

Oaths don’t concern shadowspawn and darkfriends. Or are we just talking theoretical scenarios agains regular people?

The show changed the wording of the oaths so the shadowspawn exception may require more explanation from the show.

Books, for sure, the oaths don't matter in that case.

12 minutes ago, Testeria said:

 

I'd say it is the other way around.

 

You put channelers on the wall because they are artillery like: they move slowly, they are vulnerable to attack and they do best damage to the packed enemies in narrow spaces.

Doesn't solve the problem of the three oaths.

12 minutes ago, Testeria said:

On the other hand, You put cavalry on the plains where they have more space for maneuvers to use their supreme speed and shock power, useless on the wall.

Yes.  There are three places (generally) you can put heavy cavalry in the terrain as laid out in the scene each have their advantages and disadvantages.

1.) In front of the wall 

2.) Inside the wall as a counter-attacking force if the initial attack bounces off the wall's defenses

3.) Behind the wall (either inside Fal Dara or just in front of Fal Dara)

12 minutes ago, Testeria said:

Channelers should be on the front doing mass damage (preferably on the top of the wall if possible). Infantry should be on the TOP of the wall (with all the windows filled with stone) shooting. Cavalry should be on the plains to clean up whatever made it to the other side of the wall.

Possibly.  Trollocs are basically heavy cavalry/infantry.  Channellers would break their momentum but they are not very maneuverable and they can be fairly easily bypassed via simple momentum.

Also, take into account the channellers level of combat readiness.  Green sisters would work well in front of the wall.  Untrained or less trained channellers would be less effective.

12 minutes ago, Testeria said:

But again - remember the ancestral armor scene. Writers of this episode WANTED to show us how wrong Agelmar is. So I do not understand why people defend him if this is clearly what was served to us.

I 100% don't agree with this.  They wanted to show that Agelmar was confident but not completely wrong.  The defense worked even if it was costly.   The dramatic stakes were the driving element of the battle's construction.   They wanted a costly victory or a near defeat based on how the battle progressed.

There's no reason to assume anything other than story functionality as a motive for any decision they made in the show.

1 hour ago, Skipp said:

The one thing people are missing about the strategy of putting the channelers with the army.  Amalisa didn't have this grand plan of breaking the army.  It was her defiant last stand and she expected to die.  As Agelmar says, the Men guard the gap and the women hold the city.  The only reason the Amalisa's plan worked was because she suddenly found herself with 2 uncannily strong channelers to use as batteries.\

 

I don't think Amalisa ever worked out this strategy with Agelmar so even had their been time to move the 5 of them to the gap fortress there might not have been time to incorporate them into the general strategy.

 

The next point is that people want to put these channelers on the wall or in front of the army.  Did it look like Amalisa had control of what she did?  She brought a huge bolt down on herself and lashed out with a shockwave in ALL directions.  The only reason the city didn't take damage was because it was on a large cliff behind them.

 

Yes we know the entire sequence could have been better planned, shot etc....  But this was their last resort rewrite after having to deal with all the covid protocols.

Agree in a lot of ways. 

Just thinking in terms of "doctrine" or the standard ways of doings things in military terms.

Aes Sedai are bound by the three oaths.  One of their oaths limits their utility in a general sense because they have to be in defense in order to use the one power as a weapon.  Therefore to use them tactically you have to put them (generally) in an exposed position.  So, putting them in the front line makes sense.  But, there is a tradeoff for that.  If you put them in front of the wall and they are forced to retreat you risk compromising the integrity of the wall.  That can lead to bad results.  

Putting someone within the wall or on top of the wall who is not bound by the oaths would require a degree of skill and precision in order to use the one power there.  Does Amalisa have that skill and precision on her own?  That's unclear.   (Put in modern terms... anyone can squeeze the trigger on a machine gun.... but can they do it effectively without melting or warping the barrel over a long fight?)

Putting someone behind the wall but not in the fortress of Fal Dara itself fits in with the general method of using the one power in battle, may not have the same skill/precision requirements.  And, it sets up a killing ground if she does manage to do something (like summon lightning).  So, it does make a certain amount of sense.  The key "tactic" would be to speed bump the onrushing trollocs so they can't build up a ton of momentum and take advantage of their larger mass. 

Effectively, Agelmar is counting on the defense at the wall as being successful but if it is not completely successful to act as a speed bump to break up the trollocs momentum and mass and eliminate a percentage of their numbers.   The channeller layer is also set up to be a speed bump. 

If there are 20,000 trollocs hitting the wall then how many are taken out by the defenders on the wall?  5,000? 10,000? 15,000?  

Of the trollocs reaching beyond the wall, how many can be taken out by chanellers behind the wall?

And, lastly, how many are left over to be handled by the defenders on the walls of Fal Dara itself?

Basically, that is how you set up defenses in depth.  You don't assume that the front line will hold, you assume the ways that it will break, and try to create measures to account for how it breaks.

Overall, there are plenty of problems in how the battle was displayed but the basic tactics make sense.  

14 minutes ago, Sabio said:

The fact their last rewrite was to have five women destroy the entire army doesn't give me alot of hope for the future.  They have shown channeling to be way too powerful now, so nothing that happens in the future will be shocking or OMG how did that happen.  Look at what Moiraine did in the first episode.  We have seen mass healing, a shield saving everyone, Egwene looking like she saved Nyn, five people destroying 10000 trollocs, If they destroyed 10000 trollocs, what needs to be done to make people impressed later?

At the expense of 3 out of 5 of the channellers involved.  Not exactly the most effective use of your resources.

In the modern world, it is the equivalent of calling in artillery or air strikes on your perimeter because you're about to get overrun.  It happens from time to time to even the best prepared and capable combat forces.

In terms of comparative power level, it does track back to Moiraines Winespring Shotgun weave in episode one.   The audience has seen what one channneller can do against trollocs and now they've seen what a linked group of channellers can do against trollocs.  Naturally, the later would be more than the former.

It wasn't entirely executed well but I don't see any big conceptual problems with it.

1 hour ago, SingleMort said:

Much as it pains me I'm forced to agree. There was not really any indication that this was a foreign invading army. They should have probably drawn out the scene some more and had it from the perspective of someone from the shore with dialogue and showing panic or alternatively a good place to introduce Bayle Domon from his ship seeing this oncoming armada and reacting to it.

One of the great things about doing things visually is the way that criticism of a scene like that is actually evidence that it worked as intended. 

If you're talking about it then it worked. ?

Sometimes, how you withhold information is more effective than how you communicate information.  

3 hours ago, Sabio said:

Last time we saw Rand try to use his sword, Lan ended that quickly and well only a few days have passed since then.  If you think about Season 1, Rand has spent almost no time with Lan.  Now Rand has gone off alone.

Rand used his sword in Episode 8 to sheath it in himself in a way that may foreshadow a rather significant plot element later.

1 hour ago, Brytac said:

 

Wouldnt a better season ending sequence be better if they showed something that meant something to people watching?

 

[...]

 

 The ships meant absolutely nothing to most people watching.

 

The ships don't have to "mean" anything in that context beyond getting a baseline average viewer to ask "what are those ships?"   

It is the equivalent of a Marvel post-credit scene.   Or, a movie teaser with a few pictures and a coming soon.

One does not have to overthink the simple stuff.  ?

4 minutes ago, Sabio said:

Doing a warning were hardly anyone will see it isn't much of a warning since no one saw it.  Well I guess the little girl saw it and I assume she was intimidated.  But a warning isn't very useful when no one is about to see it.

Just because we were not shown someone other than the girl in the frame it doesn't mean that others outside of frame did not exist.  We just don't know.

To be honest, it was just a money shot from the CGI budget.  I find it amusing that people focus on the little girl so much.  My first thought watching it was to remember this shot from an older tv show.

14 minutes ago, Yojimbo said:

Yeah, but they don't explicitly state that this is a specific item tied to a specific place, do they?  (Honestly, I may have just missed it, so if I did, my bad).   Viewers saw her transported from one place to another.   Maybe they get that it was done using the Ter'Agnreal, but since he is supposed to be the most powerful channeler alive why couldn't he just do it without the Ter'Angreal?  It wouldn't be any worse than them showing Nynaeve healing dozens of people strewn about a cave with superhuman abilities, would it?

Why would they have to explicitly state it?  Some information can be implied by the visual context.  Take the concept of chekhov's gun.  If you show a gun over the fireplace and then show the flash of a gunshot while never showing another gun then the implication allows you to make the connection between the two things.  But, if you also show a gun on the coffee table that same implication isn't as allowable.

That said.  If you wanted to show Rand travelling then they could have included someone leaving via gateway in the cold open and that would be a way to introduce traveling in a way that would make sense to the viewer.

(Adding this)

Nyneave's "healing" is built off the fact that they showed healing several times earlier.  It's the same basic concept.

8 minutes ago, Testeria said:

 

I can assure You that he failed miserably with that. For someone who do not read the books this is hot mess of randomness, I can't even tell what is part of the world but not explained and what is just sloppy writing.

 

 

Perhaps for some.

The majority of non-readers that I've experienced the show with at this point have good questions but little in the way of confusion.

Mileages naturally vary.

1 minute ago, flinn said:

 But they had Lan and Steppin training. Made sure they had time for that.

Not sure exactly what your point is?

Two "professional" characters doing forms together while talking is significant how?  They could have had that conversation sitting at the fire roasting marshmellows and it fits with the episode structure.  Was there a natural place to include Lan giving the boys lessons? Keep in mind that you would have to lose another scene where something else might have been accomplished.

I can think of only or two places where it would have reasonably taken place and you would have to lose some of Rand's reveal to probably make it work.