Always fun to see someone arguing against the law of noncontradiction. Syllogism is not subjective.

My argument is simply that nobody can sensibly make the argument that certain elements had to be cut from the IP, whether they be storylines, characters, etc. because of time/episode limitations whilst simultaneously defending storylines, characters, etc. completely made up by Rafe Judkins. Those are two wholly incompatible arguments.

It always reminds me of the Hardy Boys books I grew up on as a kid; every chapter ended with some mini-cliffhanger. That worked to keep kids engaged but it would be ridiculous in a competent adult novel.

These are the kind of statements that make no sense to me. If they are finding it necessary to “prune” characters in order to fit this story into a more time-constrained medium, how do they justify that while at the same time giving inordinate amounts of time to secondary, tertiary, and even barely-mentioned characters like Maksim? People tried to use this same style of argument when they claimed certain story beats needed to be changed or eliminated in order to adapt the material to television but at the same time tried to justify made-up arcs like the whole wardrobe funeral episode or Moiraine’s journey that overwhelmed the beginning of season 2.

The difference being that Ned was a strong leader, beloved character, seemingly the main character, etc., etc. Susan was horribly realized in the show. She wasn’t likable, she wasn’t all that politically astute, and her role hardly mattered. Talk an out pulling punches with major character deaths. They couldn’t have killed a more inconsequential “main” character as far as the show goes.

No body, no crime. I think there are ways he can be rescued if the show wanted.

I never considered compulsion, which would be plausible except didn’t Moggy kind of wipe that at the end of their talk? But otherwise, her just standing there was monumentally stupid.

I’m sorry, but I still can’t get over Thom yelling “Hey!” before throwing his dagger at the black sister. /facepalm

They distracted him…for some reason? Especially odd considering the cards were from Lanfear and the gray man from Moggy but they played as linked in the episode and the spell over Mat seemed to disparate when the gray man was killed. But anything for a few style points, huh?

Call this the cynic in me, but since there seems to be some uncertainty about the renewal status of this show, is it possible that certain story arcs were crafted in a way that would present to the executives in charge of these decisions that the show needs more season? Take Moiraine/Lanfear, for example. We all thought they should have died this season, and we were all wrong. Could they have been kept around as a way to sell another season to the executives?

Lanfear was gushing from the jugular, so I’d add that to the list of fake outs, even though it it obvious she didn’t die.

Wheel of Time: Chekhov’s Armory Remember the Azor Ahai prophecy in Game of Thrones? If you do, well goo on you, because the showrunners certainly didn’t. If this show continues, and if it does so under a time crunch, I expect many things to go unresolved or changed to fit the narrative.

I’m also not convinced that Moiraine means enough to Rand that we should spend story “killing” her and retrieving her. They tried to clean that up in this episode with the talk that Rand had with her, but I thought it was sketchy reasoning at best. I think I’m more in the camp that Moiraine would become Caddy, who is part protagonist, part mentor.

I haven’t been following this conversation at all; I don’t know the argument. That said, given that the term “Finn” is usually used by fans to group both species, it follows that they use it in the show as shorthand for both. If there were only one Finn species in the show, it would make most sense for a character to refer to it by name.

Yes, my point was more directed at the way it is written/introduced than that it happened. When you show - at least twice - a man being actively shielded and then just casually drop “tying it off” later, you need to connect that discrepancy. I think it’s a stretch for her to have “learned” it when she was shielded because she couldn’t see the weaves, but she could have said something like “I was shielded once. The weaves were tied off. I’ve been practicing. It’s a neat trick, isn’t it?” I’ve beaten this dead horse plenty, but my criticism was of the writing. One line, half a second of dialogue, works as connective tissue for two disparate handlings of an ability but they dropped the ball on it.

Nope. Just a back and forth of ideas. All good.

Didn’t say you specifically.

@DigificWriter didn’t read the books, right? I want to hear more about what he thought of the Finn. That scene must have been absolutely bonkers for some people.

I’ve tried to never attack anyone’s feeling about the show. I’ve never said anyone can’t like it, or shouldn’t. I would love to have straight objective discussions but from my background I could probably write a treatise on literary and rational missteps this show has taken from the opening scenes and when I bring them up I am summarily dismissed by a handful who don’t differentiate between opinion and concern about rational, logical story structuring. Wanting the show to demonstrate a level of craftsmanship that I would hope for with such a compelling source should be a desire absolutely everyone here has but some are as unwilling to check their positive feelings at the door as those who have a vehement dislike.

Regarding the Finn, I know opinions are all over the place. As I’ve said, I totally agree that he looked like a Seuss character or a reject from the Cats adaptation, but I also always thought they would look weird. That said, you know how we sometimes get images stuck in our head in spite of how they are written? I always pictured the Finn more human-like, but with some uncanny resemblances to the creatures they represent. Now, in spite of having read multiple times, I can’t remember their exact descriptions. I know the foxes were “fox-like,” but did they have muzzles in the book? Were they covered in hair? I don’t remember at all. I assumed they were more human, just with certain features that gave them an uncanny look. It was easier to picture with the snakes because I kind of thought of them as Voldemort-esque, maybe with rougher or scalier skin, but still human. I could be way off and I don’t know how I would have done it differently. It was always going to be wild.

I don’t believe I ever said that, and if I did I was wrong. I want this show to be incredible, which is why I’m so highly critical of it. This show wallows in mediocrity and so much objectively poorly-structured writing that could be fixed but that hasn’t been. If you want to call it irrational or dismiss it as my opinion, fine, but it is equally irrational and dismissible as opinion to champion the show and to dismiss the myriad writing issues in lieu of entertainment. That, of course, brings us full circle to everyone being irrational and everyone having their own opinion, but I and a couple of others were singled out as being irrational and had to defend our position. Perhaps I missed the post where you called out @DigificWriter for basing his posts on his own opinions. Or is it just one-sided, here?

So when there is a beloved work that is being mishandled and bastardized it is not rational to want the mistreatment to end as a demonstration that the source deserved better care?

Amen and hallelujah. The complete irony is that way back in S1E5 we were told ad nauseum how important is was to spend half of an episode on the death of a warder that didn’t matter because of how integral that was to building the lore and setting up later arcs. Sanderson claimed that production started on one of these seasons without a full roadmap as that different writers were working on different episodes without much consultation between them. I think what you describe is the end result, where we have a ton of scenes that they wanted to show without the connective tissue and the consistency between them.

“That’s a neat trick Lanfear showed me.” There. That takes a fraction of a second more and clears up inconsistencies. It isn’t a matter of time, it is a matter of care. This show simultaneously spends way too much time on exposition dumps and also fails to keep information consistent in the simplest of ways.

I think I may have been the original “Avi channeling” swords complainer and I will go to the grave saying she wielded them like swords and did things you cannot do with spears…but they very clearly looked like short spears to me this episode. There are clear shafts behind her hands. Part of the issue is that the spear heads are long, javelin heads rather than spade points. It helps that she didn’t actually use them this episode to dispel the illusion.