DRAGONMOUNT

January 4, 2022

28 minutes ago, Ralph said:

Because it isn't part of the story for the world to have to be like that, and would need explaining why it is. But tbh, I don't believe this is why they charged things like R&E having sex - that was to make their relationship real, and increase the emotional seesawing through the on/off of the series.

I have seen people presenting this as a reason not to change gender dualism, and I don't understand the argument. You would say in this world souls are restricted to gender because it is not a real world - that wouldn't mean anything to anyone.

Handmaid's tale is not a comparison because that is part of the point of the story

But it COULD be part of the story. There is so many different gender dynamics in these different cultures, plus the whole balance theme in general. It could be and to a part is automatically in the story.

MY main point in all of this is here: I dont have a problem with most of the changes due to this ideological influence we are discussing, but I can see that they are there. And since I can see them, yet dont have the expectation/right to say how others judge them, I understand (though not necessarily agree with) some of their positions.

Btw. I think this debate just suffers from overpoltication, but the first step to really getting rid of that would be to acknowledge that the influences are there, the changes are there, now make of that what you will...

What I dont agree with is one side saying there are no influences whatsoever because that would be giving in to the other side that just looks at every artistic decision that somehow, real or imaginary, disfavors a man because their whole vision is colored by an antiwoke filter from the get go(and for the most part I dont find the people here to necessarily fall into either category, but that is a trend in the wider fan community).

There is an inbetween here where I can say, those influences from Rafes selfdeclared political wolrdviews are playing a role here and that has bad AND good(compare the way they handled nudity with what GoT did and you can tell that we are a decade later and minds have shifted) consequences, lets discuss that.

January 4, 2022

24 minutes ago, Weird_Old_Lady said:

Who could it be then?????

Not all of us, that much nuance at least can be required.

25 minutes ago, Weird_Old_Lady said:

Again. Still. More. After all this time ...

That fight will never end. As with other liberties they have to be fought for and defended lest they be rolled back. But I stand in solidarity with you sister as do millions of others. And it is not like it doesnt get better. Id say it has gotten better step by step for last 100-150 years, each step hardly fought for. And the real change comes only over the generations. My grand parents had a "traditional" marriage. My parents married at a time where at least some of the laws youu describe were still active, yet there was never an issue in terms of equality(and Ive asked my Mom), both worked, she cooked, he cleaned and did laundry... etc. As for myself, Im currently planing a summer vacation with a friend and his 2 little kids, because he will take a 2 month vacation from his job to take full time care of his kids so that his wife can finish her doctoral thesis. I dont think I remember any instance in our live where either me, my friend or my father (who was a pacifist in general) would ever have willingly hurt another human being except as small boys scuffling with others. Plus I imagine youd be rather ok with our voting record?.

Im rambling though.

Dont ever think you stand alone in this fight(and dont think there arent any men standing with you either), makes for too much depressing thought AND isnt accurate.?

Raal Gurniss · January 4, 2022

1 hour ago, Weird_Old_Lady said:

Chivalry is made by men and for men. It was mostly to keep women in control. I'm glad it's dead because it was obviously failing.

Are you sure we are from the same reality?

Yes, I will gladly take having to open my own doors in exchange for bodily autonomy and freedom to fully participate in society. What the heck. Wouldn't you? Why or why not?

Since this is where they lost me a bit. While I totaly, 100% stand beside you on any real world implications.

This is a fantasy world. So why does it have to be changed. Why cant it be there as is and then we have a debatte about it in comparison to reality? The most misogynicst fantasy world Im aware of is the Handmaids Tale and as far as Im aware that sparked a lot of positive debate. Not saying thats something I ever expected of them, but they really had(and have) an opportunity here to do something similarly impactful.

The most likely answer to my own question is I fear, they dont trust their audience to understand the complexity(as is the case with most hollywood prod.).

January 3, 2022

1 hour ago, Ralph said:

I still want to hear from each of the many participants on this forum who are seeing an "agenda" -

Were you concerned about this potential before the show started, due to Rafe's comments about being a feminist and updating certain parts of the gender divide in WOT?

I have asked this several times and not received any response, and I still suspect there is confirmation bias going on over here.

I haven't seen a single change I believe was motivated by trying to downgrade the men. Every change has its reason, which may or may not be justified, but I believe only someone looking for it would see this as an agenda

Concerned no, not until ep.7/8 and i still am only to a point.

I was aware of this debate prior to the show starting though, which might be relevant if thinking about co.bias. I certainly am not concerned because of my politics, voted for a party one step to the left of bernie led by two feminist women just a few month back, im about as lefty as you can get ?

My Concern now stems mostly from their unwillingness to go into BL culture, thats a thing i dont like.

There are other things that I am on case by case good/neutral/bad on though where I can see the influence, especially in the aggregate. I can again only refer to my post at the end of p.1, dont really like referring back, but im not gonna write 2 pages again ?.

notpropaganda73 · January 3, 2022

28 minutes ago, VooDooNut said:

backing up my point or disputing

neither, Im analyzing ?

ArrylT · January 3, 2022

3 minutes ago, WhiteVeils said:

Every single thing that people have labeled misandrist about the series would not be called misogynistic if it happened for a female character. All the things that make men look stronger than women in a show or movie or book...do they make the show/media/book misogynistic? Or "realistic"?

Im not subscribing to every thing people have labeled as such, but maybe some.

Misandrist is too strong a word for to subcribe to either, yet two things seem clear to me.

1. Pretty much all of media published pre 1980 is somewhat misogynistic and much of it is untill today, simply because (parts) of the world are like that. How you react to those elements is where the variety of humans comes in. (I have a feminist aquaintance that absolutly loathes watching James Bond for understandable reasons. Yet I have an equally feminist mother and her friends and they all love the old bond movies... ) Question is how each of us is primed to react. The point where I think it becomes fair criticism is if people complain due to love of the books and not liking the changes THEY THINK might be due to an agenda. Whats not fair, at least here(thats for sociologist..), is viewing everything under this lens from the start because you yourself have an agenda/are angry at "wokeness". Most here seem to fall into the first catergory, but I definetly have seen the second kind as well in the wider fan community.

2. Rafes feminist world view has, for bad OR good, impacted the course of this season(see my post on p.1 that sadly took some time to get approved).

Raal Gurniss · January 3, 2022

32 minutes ago, VooDooNut said:

Criticism is pointless if you can't use it as a means to stick a hand in the creative process and arbitrarily decide what is good or bad (for everyone)?

Criticism, pointless as it might be in influencing the creative process, is the natural consequence of people doing the analyzing and investigating you and I both want to see. Just a consequence of people being emotionally invested, as well they should be, all part of the balance ?

DaddyFinn · January 3, 2022

1 minute ago, Ralph said:

Rafe said it never got past script stage. No scenes were shot that were omitted for this reason

Werent there scenes in Nyns house with a lot of herbs etc. and what about the money shot from the trailer with E. and the colors?

I might overestimate this though.

Point still stands, I dont really see why Amazon has to give time restrictions to the productive team. Money, yes ofc there will coorporate decision making, but not giving time restrictions to Rafe would really only benefit the series.

Vartija · January 3, 2022

3 hours ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

Why not go slightly cheaper and make 10 episodes if that's what Rafe really wanted?

This is the part where Amazon REALLY shot themselves in the foot. I mean as I understand it there were quite alot more scenes shot for ep.1 character development already. Plus character development scenes in general arent the most costly ones, as you usually dont need CGI and the actors are already paid. Plus it is what Rafe wanted and what Im sure 99% of all fans they mightve asked before would have told them.

January 3, 2022

13 minutes ago, fra85uk said:

Seanchan (and Aiel for me) definetely the ones with larger personality.

True, but I would add the AS, their whole internal customs and history as well as their influence of the WEstlands as a whole is pretty fleshed out.

As for the other (southern and central)countries, they are in many way similar but there are differences shown when they are relevant to the plot. I mean even the "sister nations" of Andor and Cairhien are portraied rather differently in terms of good governance, how they treat commoners and as a result how they view their Queens/Kings. I dont think Id be a fan of merging those two for example.

Cipher · January 1, 2022

Besides characters, plot and lore the thing that stood out to me most in RJs work was the depth of the cultures he crafted.

While I am kind of ok with what they did in S1 concerning the first 3 things I cant say Im very satisfied concerning the last part.

Of the 3 major places we get to see at least 2 have been significantly changed.

The Two Rivers go from being prudish and cut off from the world to a much more modern feel ( I get why they did it and it doesnt bother me that much, but it IS a rather significant change).

The Tower seems fine to me so far.

And then we get to the Borderlands, that in my opinion really got the short draw. Yes there are manbuns and reddots, but thats about the extent of it.

From being rude to AS, to not being shown as at least somewhat militarily competent, to the whole letting women and children??? fight in what is portraied as a hopeless fight?

This isnt the BL I read about.

This makes me curious as to what changes, good or bad, might be in store for us in the coming seasons.

Specifically Im wondering on what we will get on AS laws and customs, especially regarding the novices and accepted, somehow I doubt we are going to see THAT much spanking etc. , what changes might they have regarding power rankings / status amongst envoys / the power of the amyrlin vs the hall/ the interplay between the Ajahs etc.

Really interested how they will choose to go about the weirder man/woman dynamics. Thinking Altara and Saldea here.

What will we get about the Aiel, what might be dropped? (anyone think of them when M. said about the corpse sometimes young BL try to challenge the blight)

Will they keep the Sea Folk as is?

...

ps. I looked for 7 pages and didnt find an appropriate thread, if there is one feel free to kick this over there.

Raal Gurniss · January 1, 2022

On 12/28/2021 at 7:22 AM, SingleMort said:

I really hope she isn't stilled. The only way out of that I can see is for them to just transplant the Nyneave Logain story onto Moiraine and bring that forward 6 seasons early.

I agree 100% with the sentiment, just one thing to (sadly) remember.

Logain gets healed (and Eg. becomes Amyrlin) in Book 6. 6/14 -> 3-4/8 so while Nyn healing stilling still seems of hundreds of miles away for us it would actually only be about 2 seasons even without them changing any timelines.

RextheDog · January 1, 2022

11 minutes ago, Vartija said:

Maybe add some kind of visual or audial representation of the warder bond snapping. Kind of like hearing returning after a bomb goes off in war movies.

This part they actually did if I remember correctly. Kerene dies and then they directly cut to him being somewhat dazed.

Maybe should have mentioned this before but what I really like were some of the cuts. From the more visual ones like Danas blood to landscape, to the subtle hints like cutting to Eg the moment after we first get told of burning out in a flash.

Plus there is this somewhat small thing about the nudity. There are quite a bit of scenes later on that if accuratly portraied require nudity in a non gratitious way(aka. the opposite of GoT). They somewhat did this in ep.1 but even better in the ep.6 scene with the first selector.

Vambram · January 1, 2022

I really thought about this for a while now, and all in all I think I land on a 6 out of 9.

First up this was never going to be a 10. Deducting 1 point from the scale is the least we can do to be fair to Rafe and the cast. I mean he himself would be the first one to acknowledge that more money and screen time were ALWAYS going to be better (this is not an excuse for AMAZON, if anyone there ever reads this, GIVE RAFE MORE MONEY!!!!! and stop, just stop with giving him ANY time restrictions otherwise I and everyone else in the fandom will immediatly unsubscribe our Prime accounts!!!)

For the overall cast Id give 8/10.

There were some smaller standouts, for the short while they are in Logain and the stuntactress that played Shaiel get a flat 10 / 10. So do the actors for Loial and Moiraine. The fact Loial s costuming is horrendous up to the point it really freaked me out when I first saw him and YET the actor does such a superb job in moving and talking to make me completly forget about that in later scenes says a lot. Same thing with both L. and M. s height. THis has been mentioned for L. but for me this could have been an issue with M. Ever since reading Mistborn I somehow have a thing for action sequences involving smaller people, somehow that adds to the badassery and in my mind (maybe wrongly???) Moiraine stands at no more then 1 m 50 cm.

Yet the second Pyke comes on screen she IS Moiraine and thats all that needs to be said, really glad she is here with us for the ride.

Lan and the rest of the EF 5 land at 8-9/10. There are small things here and there I didnt like and I feel especially Perrins actor really hasnt got the chance to do that much acting( the true breadth of an actor cant shine if your character is mostly locked into just one emotion), but overall they too do FEEL like the characters from the books.

Ill also give a 7-8/10 for the channeling and CGI and just overall pictures and transitions (the big landscape shots, the Hall of the Tower shot from above etc.). My biggest fear going into this was that channeling would look super goofy and instantly kill the mood and it most certainly didnt. CGI at times was clunky (SL and ep.8 ) which in part seems to stem from their Covid/time problems so I can be forgiving and hopeful this will only improve in future season. I would love to see the weaves getting a distinct feel between the elements, either via color or some other way and I feel they could very well make that transition as part of Eg/Nyns training, but thats more a hope not something i reallly expect.

Now we get to the writing and here is where some of the trouble lies.

Again it seems obvious, that those 2 episodes Rafe requested really are missing. From a double episode at the start to just those small exposition moments that felt cut short.

-Loial in the ways was a PERFECT opportunity to lean into the whole AoL men going insane / what actually happened there. And it wouldnt have taken that long either, I know because a friend of mine asked for background and I managed to condense the breaking/ogier steddings/the exile/the creation of the ways in a less then 3 min voice chat, ofc onscreen it is a different thing, but still...

- We get some of Lans backstory but the most relevant aspect to the story they leave out (his oath to fight the shadow/his solitary war against the blight, how can you leave this out when it isnt only central to his character, but more importantly central to the next scene he has with Nyn, why in the world would he reject her NOW???)

And then are the changes that can not be attributed to Amazon not providing enough recources but fall squarely into Rafe/the writers territory.

NOT a fan of the whole Perrin takes the way of Leaf story line. I can see how they came up with this and it isnt totally out of character (except him becoming a vegetarian just at the time his wolfyness starts to emerge, but they did drop that comment at the start of ep5. so thats ok)

In hindsight the whole ep.5 Steppin becoms a disaster. Dont get me wrong ep.4 Steppin/Kerene were awesome in showing us AS/Warder relations (the whole snark he gives her in their 1on1 scene is better then anything they say after to show that this isnt master/servant but partner relationship) and the actor is fine. But wasting time on a depressing suicide story, that ultimatly goes nowhere and isnt really that impactful as we didnt have enough to time with him to actually care that much about him, was just bad. It doesnt really give us other important scenes OR that much exposition into AS/Warder relations. I dont think any nonreaders I talked to or watched picked up on the fact that his depression was amplified by the severing of the bond. And considering the time scarcity really hits at other points, as well as the fact that the writer CHOSE this over the simple and booktrue variant of having him go out in a berserkersuicide(or just have him be dead immediatly so even Nyn cant heal him and throw in a line about how death cant be healed aka. free exposition fitting in the plot as opposed to...), this is a strike against them.

I have other problems related to either changing the cultures in the world or just logical inconsistencies ( most of my nonbookreaders think Padan Fain is a channeler and why wouldnt they, seems to be the logical conclusion of what they show us), but I dont want this to go on forever and just focus on the negatives.

All in all this series worked well enough to keep me engaged, prompted several people I know to do so as well (and some of them probably will start reading now) and I realize that watching this means going along for the whole ride including all the ups and the downs.

So ill go down 1 point as mentioned before, because this was never gonna live up to what I have in my head -> 9/9 . One point down because while actors/CGI etc. are good there is room for improvement->8/9. One point down for those changes I think were unnessary and unhelpful ->7/9

And finally one point down for the missed opportunities / generall unwillingness to follow the magic rules / mess that is episode 8 and we land at -> 6/9

wastingtime · January 1, 2022

Urg, this is too depressing??

Maybe better play a rainbow fairy game? Makes for a better mood ?

The DARK is an allegory for Cocoa and the DO means to kill humanity by inducing Diabetes.

All the AS are strict teachers and dietician that want to zealously try to protect the world from candy.

At the last battle Rand realizes that chocolate is needed for happiness and casts a great spell allowing us to to gobble as much candy as we like without ever incurring health problems.

December 30, 2021

Not sure how to quote from the closed thread, so ill just post the quotes in italic, all quotes by KakitaOCU except my repost at the end

Quote

"I use "you" in a generic sense. My apologies if it came off as an attack on you. "

"Also, I love that you watch the LTT where Latra calls him arrogant and prideful and assume that's all there is to the story."

Thats not a generic you unless you assume that the vast majority of nonreaders assume thats all there is to it and you love that?

Apology accepted anyway?? (and not really necessary, Im White Ajah enough to really not care whether someone attacks or insults(which you didnt) me. In fact being (logically) attacked for my arguments is kinda why Im here?. How boring and useless would these forums be if we all had the same opinion from the start!)

Quote

"However if a person IS a book reader, then they know all these other details going on and that arrogance and hubris were one of LTT's primary failings to the point that Rand acknowledges them and then almost repeats them anyway."

My problem isnt showing LTTs arrogance and hubris. My problem is NOT showing the desperation of the act and the situation during the war and thereby making arrogance the so far only discernable motive for this. Idve also liked to see a (very short)repudiation of Latras plans, because once I realized the strength of the Choedan Kal in the books I thought to myself here is a plan thats even more crackbrained and dangerous then what the men did and thats without taking into consideration the acces keys were lost in shadow territory at this time or the possiblity the bore might widen under the shield. I mean having a device that can "crack the world like an egg" run FOREVER really seems designed to bring about the apocalypse. Also didnt like LPD predicting everything correctly even though this something thats never been done before.

Quote

" If you only read EotW with no knowledge going forward you'd get a similar view of Men=Stupid and arrogant and failures while Women have to pick up the pieces. "

I really dont think I felt this way, but to be fair it has been very long since I first read the EotW so I might not remember correctly

Quote

"But why you feel this is based on?"

and from a later post (seems we have enough disagreements to argue and debate for a while ?, thats why im here, respectful and constructive exchange of thoughts and ideas)

Quote

"In general, the idea that there's any deliberate attempt to undermine men for any agenda is an unrealistic fear with no real support regardless of what you call it. "

And in response Ill just repost myself from page 33 of the last thread:

Since this is a response to a response to a post of mine, but more importantly because this seems to be the main dividing point over which this fanbase splits I feel I should make myself very clear here.

For context let me first say that Im a lefty. I dont live in the USA but if I was Idve voted for Bernie. I also consider myself a first and second (but not third) wave feminist and I have attended anti-neonazi protests since I was 12. This is to dispell any notion that I am somehow "anti-woke". I wouldnt consider myself "woke" either (I hate that word, in part because it is used as a slur by people who often(but not always) are quite openly racist and misogynist, but mostly because it is imprecise)

Im also a trained physicist/scientist, meaning I was trained to seperate the analysis of a problem from the judgement that only follows after.

Now, when analyzing this one has to be very careful, because if you view something through a colored lens everything becomes monochromatic and most of the time, if you search for signs of something hard enough, you end up finding them and ignoring everything else. Certainly some of the "nerfing all the men"-crowd have fallen into this trap which amuses me greatly as it reminds me of the feminist complaint that female videogame characters (think LoL here) are often portrayed in a sexist way, scantily clad armor, big boobs etc. , which is true but completly ignores that the same is true for the men, i.e. giant muscles, chisseled chins etc...

That all being said, it is impossble for me to deny that modern feminist ideology has played a part in shaping this season. Whether or not I think that is good or bad in each individual case is immaterial to this at first.

Now there are plenty of other reasons that should be considered first when analysing this.

For example, the downpowering of Logain (he gets held by 2 -3 AS instead of 6 if i remember correctly) has nothing to do with a desire to "nerf men" and everything to do with an episode that doesnt work so well if most of the scenes happen in an overcrowded cave. Could you avoid this by changing the setting? Yes, but thats a whole lot of cost (lets remember here that most ppl think ep 4 was the best or at least close) for not a lot of gain (Logains accurate strength beyond he is strong is irrelavant to the series).

Similarly you can argue that showing the womens circle is important for Nynaeve and Egwene and gives us the river scene which I think most bookies liked, whereas showing the Village Council would do nothing similar for the boys(though it would show balance, but time is scarce).

There are other examples.

When we want to actually understand whether or not ideology plays a part in this season or not we first need to define what exactly we are talking about. In the shortest way possible, the heart of modern (third wave) feminism /wokeness in general is the denial of biological sex as a relevant factor and instead explaining everything in terms of gender or sociological/psychological sex (which to me is just as absurd as most right wing positions that try to postulate the opposite, obviously both biology AND sociology play a role in forming humans).

It also includes a normalizing of non heteronormative sexual relations(which I personally think is a good thing so long as it means being tolerant towards those that get born with these inclinations but can become a bad thing if it is expected to be the new norm, i.e. just because Im in favor of viewing LGBT people in the same light as everyone else doesnt negate the fact that the large majority are plain old heteros)

Now these two "tropes" can be found abundantly throughout the season and this is where it becomes clear that at the very least this worldview of the showrunners has influenced their decision making, at worst they are actively trying to rebuild parts of the world of WoT in this image. At this point I will remind you guys that Rafe said this before the season ever started, he thinks there are things that Jordan would have written differently if he were to write the books today and he hopes to implement this ...

But lets get more concrete. In no less then 4 episodes in a row we get told/shown how normal homo/bi sexual relations are. Dana mentions it at length in ep 3 . we get humorously shocked Nyn in ep4, Lan and Steppin talk about it in ep5 (which is actually very offensive as they almost imply that being gay/bi is a choice, a notion the gay community has fought for decades) and then we get Moirain and Siuan.

None of these thing bother me on their own, I expected Siuan and M. and I found Nyn reaction funny, but together they start to paint a picture here, because after all screen time is very very valuable...

Lets get to the first "trope", the denial of biological differences. Obviously this is not to mean that men have Boobs or can carry babies etc.. Rather it goes into into denying/minimizing the differences that come with men being physically superior but less socially/emotionally adept.

This is why we have scenes like Egwenes father being super worried, Steppin moping about instead of going out in a rageinduced berserkersuicide and ofc Lans whole transformation from "stoneface" to crying at a funeral and being quite in touch with his feelings. Again, this isnt necessarily bad. I think it works when it comes to Lan/Nyn especially because being stoic doesnt mean you are emotionally inept, just that you arent prone to showing emotions in public. I really didnt like it at the funeral, because here it seems forced to me (but thats just opinion).

This also seems part of the reason why we get to see a whole lot of tears and crying and whining from Rand and Perrin. Im not saying that this was done bad or without incharacter reasons, but it was a choice to focus, especially Perrins arc, on this. They could have chosen to highlight other parts just as well but didnt.

Now for the minimizing of difference in physical strength.

This starts with the Emondsfield women being the only resistance to the trollocs, goes on to Dana trapping and chasing Rand with a sword and lands in the sacrifice of the core principals of the Borderlanders(for people who claim to admire the diversity of RJs cultures they sure didnt care about this one). The Borderlander culture is based on chivalry. They would rather die then let a women take a wound. Throughout the series there are loads and loads of rules set by women that the men have to and do follow, remember what Agelmar tells rand when he wants to say goodbye to Egwene, they do not necessarily understand the womens rules, but they abide by them. So it is not a matter of disrespect. The price for this chivalry is the (afaik) ONLY rule ever imposed on women by men, that is they are not allowed to fight shadowspawn / join the men fighting in the blight(not even Tenobia, queen of Saldea could break this even though she manages to ignore it at the LB and promptly gets herself killed). I wrote about this earlier, this always made supreme sense to me, for one because women on average are physically much weaker then men (womens football/soccer nationalteam cant win against an average U16 mens club even though at that age there is almost no height difference, also Siuan Sanche agrees, see the TGH lection with Nyn/Eg), but more importantly because while you can ask people to die in a hopeless fight against the shadow in order to protect their loved ones and most will be willing to take on enormous risk, but if you ask them to die WITH their loved ones/wives and especially children any decent husband/father will take his family and run.

But instead of showing this as one of many cultures we get to see loads of women with swords and armor and Amalisa calls on all women and children to stay and fight/die(after all she doesnt expect to win here).

Now finally for the part that doesnt need any "trope". In ep.1 Moiraine clearly states that "the arrogance of men" was responsible for the breaking. At the time I wrote this of as unreliable narration which made sense to me in a world where the prophecies are muddled, but the cold open of season 8 flatout confirms this to be true. It is not arrogance and desperation, it is not due to the fact that the plan of the women /LPD for whom if I remember correctly LTT orignally postponed his plan at first and only came back to it later after the womens plan became untenable, it is purely due to the arrogance of men (whereas the women were wise enough to exactly forsee the consequences of something that has never been done before...).

It is those last 2 things, both happening in ep8 that broke the camels back for me.

Note that I am not going into a lot of the complaints voiced here before:

- Lan getting responsibility for the break up of the group (M. says your losses are my losses, but she is unconscious at the time and warns against it before) but not getting his decapitating a Fade moment;

the whole tracking thing;

-M. Eg. Nyn. and Shaiel getting their visually awesome moments, most if not all of which I liked (someone noted earlier that badass moments dont make strong characters which might be true for the poster but is at least only half true for the vast majority of viewers, Nyns explosion as well as the fight are a big reason ep.4 was so well received, also lets not kid ourselves people watched GoT because of battles and dragons and smart intrigue not because they enjoyed cersei drinking wine and looking out of a window) but there being nothing remotly similar for the men up to them giving Rands power moment to the women;

-giving Mat and Perrin nasty backgrounds and nasty endings (ones a potential DF at this point the other just lets his friend bleed out and the Horn just taken away, heck even if he follows the Way of the Leaf he couldve tried to at least block them and then get knocked down or wounded, the tinkers did it earlier)

-etc.

On their own all these things can be explained by other factors which is why I dint include them in my original argument, but the sheer number of them adds weight to the general argument.

There is also at least one (very minor yet still I hoped for this before the season) aspect to this that i think is 100% positive, they managed to show non-gratitious nudity (bathhouse scene with the first selector), something that could be very helpful in properly implementing various scenes later one as well as something that I would not trust a hetero, non-nudist, man to get right.

All in all I think it is fair for everyone to judge the success and extent of these influences for themselves and we can argue/debate the merits/faults of them to our hearts content afterwards, but to actually say that there simply are no such influences, even after watching the whole season and actually reflecting on it is absurd.

ps. Im new here and certainly dont feel in a position to demand new threads plus Im aware that this discussion was raging (and probably getting out of control sometimes) even after the first 3 episodes were released and I think the mods shut down some threads due to repetetivness and maybe toxcicity of the debate, but as this seems to be one of the main topics and we can now discuss this with the full season watched maybe it would be appropriate to concentrate this topic in a new thread, should the mods choose to do so so certainly feel free to transfer this post.

pps. not sure why this needs to be approved by a mod, is it simply the length? If so, np. If there is something im doing wrong or maybe some words that automatically trigger this pls tell me so and i will try to change that in the future.

fra85uk · December 29, 2021

1 hour ago, KakitaOCU said:

It's almost as if the first season is setting up a world where women constantly feel superior and have a massive political and power advantage. Where in we can later find out there's more nuance and detail.

So you think this is all a big ploy to actually show the arrogance of women being shown to be on par with the arrogance of men?

To some degree im sure, as that IS the direction the books go (AS especially get set up very high in the first books only to be taken back down to earth later). But Im not confident at all that this is their main motivation for all this. Should I proven to be wrong in future seasons... mea culpa(and a big yay since that would indicate an overall much better direction of the overarching themes then what I fear we might get)

1 hour ago, KakitaOCU said:

Also, I love that you watch the LTT where Latra calls him arrogant and prideful and assume that's all there is to the story. If you haven't read the books, you don't have a reason to complain as that might be how LTT was, you don't know.

For those of us who are book readers. We know there's a war going, we know there's more we're not seeing, and... We know this fight happened and that LTT was challenged for his arrogance and Hubris. We ALSO know that Rand accepts and ACKNOWLEDGES those weaknesses in aMoL. ?

This is the second time you directly or indirectly accuse me of having preconceived notions/not being able to acknoledge depth/taking things at face value. Considering the length and content of the post in which I responded the first time(which you must have gotten a notification for since I quoted you), to which you did not respond, as well as you not picking up that I am a book reader that in that particular paragraph chose to consider things from a show only perspective, maybe you shouldnt throw around these accusations so carelessly.

December 29, 2021

3 hours ago, CanisNoir said:

I think you might be jumping to conclusions. We've been told we're going to be seeing more from The AoL in future seasons, which means we'll be seeing LTT more. Most of us didn't know Tam's fever dream took place until a third of the way through Episode 7. That flashback completely re-contextualizes Rands character from Episode 2 through 7. There is still room to paint a fuller picture of LTT character.

Pretty sure they will. At this point there is no war of the shadow and if nothing else you need that to explain the Forsaken.

That doesnt change the fact that they CHOSE to portrait that scene the way they did.

LTT is arrogant and the benign reasons he wants to do what he does are left out. He wants to do something thats never been done before even after being told of the enourmos risks(and with seemingly no upside, showviewers are told the DO was sealed but even sealed there are trolloc and fades and the blight whereas before LTT did what he did everything seems pretty utopian)-arrogance in its purest form.(Also, never been done before???? LTT lived for more then a hundred years before the bore was opened, but thats a tangent to this point)

LPD is not only wise enough too completly foresee the consequences(of something thats never been done) and counsel against it, they leave out the AT LEAST as dangerous and reckless plan she has. Not only because it is unteneable at this time due to the shadow holding the territory with the acces keys, more importantly because it involves channeling 2 SA, one of which is enough to crack the world open like an egg, FOREVER. Forever is a pretty long time for something that cannot go wrong once...

Son of Lance · December 29, 2021

1 hour ago, 7th age said:

Havent seen Everyday Negroes reaction to ep8 yet. But one comment that stuck in my head. In the (awesome) cold open of ep.7(minute 2:50) :

"-middle guy:So are we thinking this is Rands mother?

-guy to the right: gotta be, shes everything hes not.

-guy to the left: thats a fact"

right after:

"they say the apple dont fall far from the tree, somebody took that apple and rocket launched it"

Now mind you these guys seem to be really enjoying the series(and if you are into reaction videos i found them to be the most entertaining nonreader reactions by quite a bit)

Btw. THIS right here is why not giving Rand his power moment in breaking the army is so problematic in my mind. Havent seen any nonreader reactions to ep8 yet, curious to see how many picked up the fact that Rand did 100% of what Ishy wanted in their fight. Those that didnt will find out next season when the other Forsaken join the series and it becomes clear that they were freed due to the Dragon breaking the seal/opening the Dark ones prison.

EVERYTHING the Dragon AND the DragonReborn do this season has defacto been a HUGE win for the DO (well no, Rand kills 2 trollocs, thats quite the cost for the shadow...), and seeing that LTT did NOT do this out of desperation but rather arrogance on the one hand, and that Rands untrained channeling has to be compared to the equally untrained Nyn and Eg. I would not have ANY confidence in this supposed "saviour"

Weird_Old_Lady · December 29, 2021

17 hours ago, Mirefox said:

I completely agree with you regarding her being TV. Her accomplishments should be hers and not a result of the pattern doing with her what it needs, so to speak.

But that never was 100% the case. While shes not labeled TV in the books ALL characters are caught in this web and perhaps none of the non TV more so then her.

I love her arc, annoying as she can be at times, and yes more then any character she gets trained and forced plus she is the one that WANTS it the most. You can see that from the Raven chapter, but also from her pairing with Gawyn who similarly to her wants to be a hero but gets denied the chance at every point during the series until that very character impulse leads him to stupidly throwing his life away.

BUT, no matter how competent she is. Considering the whole series spans less then 3 year, meaning it takes her less time then M. spends as a novice (itself a new record at the time) to go from learning she can channel to being an awesome Amyrlin, I find it hard to to not ascribe her some "tavereness". She notices this herself in ToM, something like "Im here for a reason, hes here for a reason, to me he cant be the Dragon he must be Rand, because the Dragon is to be feared while Rand can be trusted".

Skipp · December 29, 2021

10 minutes ago, SingleMort said:

I'm not saying Rand has to be your favourite character. He's not even my favourite character in the books. But I mean there's a difference between preferring other characters to him and being apathetic and I wouldn't blame the show viewers if they were closer to the latter.

Havent seen Everyday Negroes reaction to ep8 yet. But one comment that stuck in my head. In the (awesome) cold open of ep.7(minute 2:50) :

"-middle guy:So are we thinking this is Rands mother?

-guy to the right: gotta be, shes everything hes not.

-guy to the left: thats a fact"

right after:

"they say the apple dont fall far from the tree, somebody took that apple and rocket launched it"

Now mind you these guys seem to be really enjoying the series(and if you are into reaction videos i found them to be the most entertaining nonreader reactions by quite a bit)

Khan of Shadows · December 29, 2021

18 hours ago, EmreY said:

Well, off the top of my head:

Hide contents

Nynaeve healing things that are not supposed to be healable

Rand killing 150,000, with bodies strewn in heaps, not just dotted across a landscape

Rand & Nynaeve destroying both Shagar Logoth and the Taint

... and more

Actually this might be the worst part of the whole battle. I already didnt like the no army can get past 7 full sisters/you have stopped armies comments(if anyone can then it is the captain-general of the green but still). Trollocs and regular troops were made to be practically useless in battle(in ep8 much more so, despite the comments the battle in ep.4 felt right in terms of power lvls between channelers and regular folks).

They HAVE to scale this back somehow, otherwise later battles wont work at all.

If this is what 5 linked channelers can do and we stay with the inshow logic on this then the battle part of the LB should last no longer then 5 seconds, imagine Demandred in a full circle (is it 72 channelers? not sure exactly but more then 50 for certain) plus a sa'angreal, no need for balefire or anything just throw lightning at 10-20 (maybe only 5-10 if you consider the burning out but still more then enough and why wouldnt the Ayyad burn themselves out for their glorious saviour)times the strength of what was shown in ep8 and no amount of luck and military expertise can help Mat turn this tide.

jh557 · December 29, 2021

2 hours ago, notpropaganda73 said:

I really disliked this episode but it is exhausting seeing the "man-bashing" takes.

It is exhausting because in typical (modern US) political debate style most people just try to vent their frustration/want to get their position heard, instead of listening to the other side and actually engaging in fruitfull discussion.

That goes to both sides though, I really dont see that there is more nuance on one side or the other.

2 hours ago, notpropaganda73 said:

What would have been interesting in this episode was for her to suffer a block when she needed to channel the most

100% agree, in fact for a second or two when they get called to help I thought now theyre going to show her block, but then she just calmy touches the source ,something btw. she has never done before AND hasnt had any training to do. Uncontrolled stresschanneling of a wilder is one thing, but here we go from something that in the books takes weeks and month to learn to something that in the show just can be done without any training.

Though it just occured to me, considereing what Rafe said about setting up the girls for their S2 arc, that they will probably use this scene to explain why Nyn and Eg need to go to the white tower and train(because otherwise they might end up like Amalisa...).

Jaysen Gore · December 28, 2021

4 hours ago, KakitaOCU said:

But then you have to drop the pre-conceived notion that the show is trying to make men weak. Acknowledging depth and that ultimately just because someone looks good to a casual view doesn't mean they're actually looking good on the big picture.