He made some group appearances, and was in league with Mesaana and Semirhage throughout the series. But it wasn't until he showed up with the Sharans that we knew what he was up to. There were a couple of hints, but can't recall if they were in Brandon books or RJ books. While I'm concerned about a number of the directions they might take, one big one is that in Tarmon Gaidon, there are really 4 Channeler armies on the light side (AS, Seanchan, Wise Ones, Kin) , and just 1 on the dark (Shara) with one split - the Black Tower. Without introducing Shara and Demandred, then TG will boil down to girls against the boys, the Egwene/ Taim piece will happen, but we lose Mat & Lan vs / Demandred, and they get to show girl power triumphant instead of the balance.

The other thing I expect it to do is make it more of an impact if / when it does happen. I'm leaning more and more towards Moraine is Cadsuane, so I don't know if they'll play it as a fake out, or if they go through the Mayene Door in Tear late next season, and they move Mat's rescue up in order to get Moraine back in time to be Caddy, plus break the bond and send Lan to Nynaeve.

I second that the politics is important; it shows that even in the face of armaggeddon, people will not align as a single force for good. People - good and evil - will still politic for personal advantage, and it's way harder to overcome that any old Dark One. It's fundamental to the story to show all these conflicts, because it's fundamental to being a human being (which ties into the free will discussion in AMOL) Now, does it have to be Siuan? Nah...Leanne can fill part of the role after she's stilled, and Verin can fill the counselor role, which will have another big advantage later on. Or Leanne can do both. Or Sheriam's still around, I think.

um. based on what Moggy did to Sammael, in this case the cutting room floor was in the episode.

The thing for me with the Fox is that the room should have been so much less bright - not only would shadow and darkness added to the creepy vibe and helped give it the feel of a fox's den, but it also would have helped tone down the bright cartoony feel. I guess, similar to my overall opinion of the show, it was nowhere near as good as I'd hoped, but could have been worse. But unlike the show, I knew this was going to need to be an accept it and move past it, and pray it wasn't laughably bad, which it wasn't

I had to give that up thanks to Lord of the Rings; when even the best fantasy adaptation makes hollywood adjustments to comply with modern audience sensibilities and expectations, I would lose all ability to enjoy any adaptation because I don't agree with the modern viewing public on most of this stuff. Dune is a stunning visual masterpiece, deserving of the oscar nominations it got, and a wonderfully acted and plotted story. But as good as it is, 2 small changes completely undermined, and almost inverted, the books key theme of free will versus predestination, blind obedience versus truth to power, and freedom versus commitment. Because in the book, Paul was a slave to his fate, Stilgar was the voice of peace and the old ways, and Chani stuck by her man as a concubine - all completed subverted in the movies ending.

oops - you're right; they weren't the 3 prophecies, they were prophecies 4-6 on the first visit. I don't think he's had the die / live moment - I think that is the Camelyn death, not the hanging. Because in the books, it's not the hanging that separates him from the Horn, and that live again moment also serves the purpose of removing Rahvin from the board. In the immortal words of miracle Max, Mat was only mostly dead from the hanging and i guess here's a way to get rid of Tuon - the Seanchan replace the Sharans, with Semirhage taking Demandred's place with them. After all, we need an army of Dreadlords from somewhere. But I still think Mat / Tuon happens more or less as in the books; I'd be quite pissed if they don't introduce the moral quandary of "these people own slaves, but serve the light", and simply make all of Seanchan dark friends.

Obviously, the WoT team got the original scripts for GoT, which were all labelled "The Art of Penetration', and thought they meant actual swords. Because no one in the WoT writer's room understands euphemism, nuance, or subtlety.

Hey, I was right on this one...Alviarin took Siuan's head

The Rhuidean warning was his first trip - the second one was "to live, and die, and live again, to wed the daughter of the nine moons, and to the give up half the light of the world" And all 3 of those moments can easily be post Tear And I guarantee we get Tuon. They killed Turak and Renne, and broke Suroth. We're not with the Seanchan yet, and they need a new leader; hence, Tuon I have no complaints with the Fox - better than a lot of fantasy near humans, and he go the hunger right

Except...I am fairly sure I saw Melindhra's soul rip from her body, tinged in black, as she died, and Ishamel is currently dead, and we see later on in the episode that weaves don't outlive their weaver. So something else dark actually claimed her soul. And another name for the DO is the Lord of the Grave, and we see him bring back people who had sworn to him. So there is something else here, IMO.

I'm not judging it against Game of Thrones seasons 1-3, I'm judging it against Season 8 of GoT, the Shannara Chronicles, and Rings of Power. For big budget TV adaptations, WoT is above average. Not by alot, but enough.

Moraine knows in most visions, she dies in that dress at Lanfear's hands, and if she doesn't die, Rand loses. Hence, where the dress She is training with the Sarkanen for the same reason Lan trains with the sword. with the added bonus of building up a resistance to the euphoria, so she can think straight They'll give Moggy/Nyn the time it deserves. it would not have been done justice, similar to them moving Mat and the boys. Leanne hasn't been stilled yet, or killed. Where her story goes from here, I don't know. Maybe that red ferret who uses the oath rod later in the books, maybe Verin's arc, maybe Siuan's advisor role. Or, she could be carted off in ep 1 next season

On Melindhra - I get what they did with her character, and I was okay with it, but it is an aphorism in WoT - you heard it in the episode - that no one can walk so long in the dark and not come back to the light. So unless this DO soul claiming thing is paid off with a certain tea drinking brown or a honey blonde girl from Tanchico, I don't know why they bothered to introduce that topic I'm okay with the 3 people we lost - Dain is being given a much more prominent role, and I expect that we don't get Morgase's road trip with it's really questionable decisions in Amador; Loial was a really expensive exposition dump with a comic release subplot (can be Thom), and cutting Siuan (pardon the pun) and her subplot frees up a bunch of time Min being Jain Farstrider - especially if they keep the outcome - would actually be awesome. And removing her visions from Tarmon Gaidon would really up the uncertainty. And yes, time to push them through the door for a couple of seasons.

Assuming that they are even given the opportunity to finish the TV series, the major legacy of this adaptation is going to be what might have been. When this was announced, I did an exercise where I broke down exactly what 8 seasons of 8 episodes needed to cover. Not what would be nice; what was interesting subplots of backstory, but what is the absolute mission critical beats of each of the 6 main characters of the series, and what exposition needs to happen to make those stories make sense. And so what we're left with is the bare bones skeleton of the lengthiest single plotted fantasy ever written, held together with short vignettes of well loved moments from the series, all spackled together in slapdash fashion with not enough time, budget or art to hide holes. Add production issues that could overwhelm even a simple production (Covid, Writer's strike, Barney Leaving, Tam's absence), and creator's intent in the adaptation that is different than the creator's intent of the series, and it's surprising it's as good as it is. and as I noted - either here or elsewhere - the issue isn't really the number of episodes, or the number of seasons; it's the missing pieces of 15-30 seconds maybe 25 times (just 10 min) that would help the scenes makes sense, add depth and nuance to plots, and let the impact of moments be felt more deeply by the characters. And without implying anything political, allow people to prune the story not with a scalpel - no time for that - but at least not with a chainsaw. a perfect example from this episode in about 30 seconds of spectacular story telling, the scene with Thom, Elayne and Jeane Caide laid the foundation for the rest of Elayne's story, set up Thom as a bad ass, introduced a key concept for the absolute climax of the series ( the crescendo of Olver's story), and 3 major story beats for our heroes in the middle (Mat and Avi in Camelyn, Rand, the idiot and Graendal, the Tower against Shara). But how many of those 30 second moments are missing? How many of those could have saved the "why isn't this person dead" set up from happening? I've read the series a dozen times or more - the earlier books more than that. And there is enough of my WoT in the series to keep with it. But without the attchment to the series. I'm not sure I would care what happens to these people.