Wheel of Time (Amazon)

Loughc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118213682#Comment_118213682

Judging by hype and reviews online there isn’t much appeal for this at all.

Pawwed Rig

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118213682#Comment_118213682

Not gritty enough for me tbh. It is like GOT for a younger audience. It doesn't have the nastiness that defined GOT baddies like Joffrey and Ramsay Bolton. These guys were nasty to the core and invoked an emotional reaction in the audience. Equally we were invested in the Starks from the first episode. So far in WOT there are no characters I particularly like or dislike and in 3 episodes we had

Spoiler Warning

the LOTR fleeing from baddies onto the barge and from countless fantasy books the visit to the cursed city (that "doomed us all" but not really). Couple this with the cliched not very graphic village massacre it seems like it is just generic family friendly woke fantasy

I will watch the next one and see how it goes. Have to say I am finding the book hard work aswell.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118213778#Comment_118213778

I'm not sure why people think it should be like GOT. In my opinion GOT is very different from most Fantasy, especially older stuff.

WOT of time while written in the 90's feels like something written before that.

The TV is based on the books, but there no reason for it to slavishly follow them, for a modern audience.

Pawwed Rig

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214139#Comment_118214139

I never said it needed to be like GOT but it is the natural comparison to make given the limited amount of series made in the genre. My point above was that GOT had stronger characters that got you invested in the story whereas so far I don't really care about any of the WOT characters. This may change as the series goes on.

Right now I'm getting a BBC Merlin vibe, with blood. It does feel like something the BBC would string together, rather than a mega budget global smash

Sleepy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214250#Comment_118214250

It's a natural comparison and the reality is that, despite still not being finished, A Song of Ice and Fire is a far better written series than The Wheel of Time with better developed characters. It would never have gotten published without the success of Wheel of Time though as the latter's depth of world-building pretty much changed the face of fantasy literature.

In short, Game of Thrones had much stronger material to adapt for a television series, it no doubt helped that George RR Martin had worked in television so some of his story structuring was more naturally suited to adaptation too... the drop in quality of Game of Thrones in it's final few series started the minute they passed the novels published to date.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214523#Comment_118214523

One thing I will say. I think that Martin is completely stuck because he is unwilling/unable to completely abandon (mentally) dead-end story plots. Jordan/Sanderson were ruthless there

Pawwed Rig

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214314#Comment_118214314

That was the series I was trying to think of. Agree completely

Nody

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118213778#Comment_118213778

Books up to around book 6 is the peak of the series; it's downhill from around there with the lowest point around book 11 before it starts to slightly climb upwards again but never getting back to previous peaks (it becomes more a "Well I might as well finish the series").

In regards to the series it appears they fall foul of a common issue; they want to make it "their own" but they don't dare stray to far away from the original material in doing so yet they stray far enough to annoy. I'm thinking Ghostbuster 2016, The Watch! (BBC) etc. as examples. If they really want to do another turn of the wheel then they need to be more bold in their approach and go their own way or stick closer to the original. Trying to keep a foot in both camps at all times is a sure recipe to fail.

Mitch Connor

The head cannon of it being a different turn of the wheel doesn't actually make sense in terms of what the books say.

Rand having LTs memories is a shock of sorts to the Forsaken - and it is staight up said by them that people being re-incarnated just isn't a thing that is known or suspected on a wide scale. the dragon being reborn is a big deal because of the reborn part as much as the dragon part.

When they talk through the different ages there is no mention of lives being repeated in slightly differing ways - it is different people in a different time doing different things.

So I don't think it is a case of trying to keep a foot in both camps - they have simply chosen to adapt the books in places rather than go line for line or even beat for beat. Sanderson's stated head cannon is no more valid then the head cannon things you see in any fandom to explain away differences or plot points.

By the way, where the hell is Lan's cloak? Or did I... not see it?

Sleepy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214788#Comment_118214788

I saw a reference to this on reddit: apparently both Lan's colour-changing cloak and the Aes Sedai's "ageless" appearance were sacrificed as the CGI budget would have been too expensive to maintain both for the duration of the series.

Or it's a world on the other side of a standing stone, which is not good as they are tied completely to the prime world from the books

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214741#Comment_118214741

Exactly this. Not something that bothers me. Once I got past a helicopter in Where Eagles Dare, (my fav xmas movie) I can get over most things.

Black Sheep

I read the WOT years ago and although I agree the series dipped heavily towards the end, even before Jordan's death, on the whole I look back with approval and nostalgia.

For reasons others have outlined above I agree comparisons to Games of Thrones are inevitable and inescapable. Game of Thrones, as written, probably does inherently lend itself better to HBO adaptation. The plotting is ingenious, at least for the first several books /series.

The violence in Game of Thrones, whether the book or TV version, is a few notches too high for my personal taste. Not sure I know anyone who thinks it is a great show because of the extreme violence(?). It's not gratuitousness in the way Eli Roth uses violence in his horror movies, but inflicting violence on vulnerable people, whether 'realistic' or not, sometimes feels like it's a lazy way for a writer to get a rise out of the audience.

In fantasy fiction obviously we have had the whole 'grimdark' phase which is somewhat losing its grip in recent years, although it's here to stay to at least some extent.

Jordan preceded that, and that's one of things I like about the WOT. It's not just less violent compared to Martin .... It's also less so compared to Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen or most other big multi-book epics I can think of.

With so much violent content around, to be honest I liked the way that Jordan kept of his gruesome stuff offstage and in the mind of the reader. I remember as a kid shuddering as I would read vague allusions to Trollock cookpots, or Fades torturing people with hot pincers, but that was about as spicy as the writing got, and he didn't need to be more explicit to achieve his objectives, IMO, it wasn't what the books were about, they feel more like they were pulpy, enjoyable fantasy adventure writing intended to cause people to have strong emotions but not to revolt or tackle "issues".

As for the Amazon show...

***SPOILERS BELOW***

It's not awful.

Things I like: The depiction of the trollocs, the wardrobe of characters in general, the casting of Moiraine, Nynaeve, Lan, Perrin and Mat (He's recast though). Whitecloaks... I kind of liked the quasi religious cult aesthetic they developed for them, I actually think it works better than the Crusaders / Normans aesthetic that Jordan seemed to envisage in the books.

Things I can accept: The plot changes that the writers made around there being 4 ta'veren, Perrin having been married etc. I really doubt they will achieve what they hope they'll achieve, but writers are going to do things like that when the IP originator is dead. I do think their decision to imply that Egwene COULD somehow be the Dragon makes no sense in the context of Jordan's world building. I understand their desire for it, but his whole idea of why men (and the Dragon) go insane is because the male side of the One Power is tainted by the Dark One. If Egwene were the Dragon then she wouldn't go insane, it just doesn't work with the whole rest of the plot for the books. I've seen people on Reddit saying "calm down, we know it's not going to be her anyway so what does it matter?" ... And yeah, it doesn't actually matter, but... It's still OK to say it was a stupid decision from a writing standpoint.

Things I don't like: The pacing... I get that it's a large series, but I feel, at times, like we're watching a re-cap or abridged version. In their haste to get through all that source material I feel they run the risk of not building the characters enough. At this stage, for example, Rand is kind of coming across as a bit of a dick. In the books, by now, you're much more sympathetic to him. He's a fish out of water once he leaves his village, but we're never in doubt that we're rooting for him. In the show, he's just a disgruntled ginger with a chip on his shoulder so far.

Overall, hard to see this show not sinking without a trace after a few seasons, however, it feels 'lightweight'.

Loughc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214314#Comment_118214314

Yes this is exactly what it reminded me of!

Gary kk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214314#Comment_118214314

Rome was probably the best show that they ever did and is worth a watch

Flinty997

I think the villages look too generic, and too small in scale. Which might be giving it that TV vibe.

OwaynOTT

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118214617#Comment_118214617

I dint agree that Jordan was ruthless with storylines at all. So many meandering storylines that had little pay off or just went on and on while we waited for other storylines to catch up.

YellowFeather

Hmmm. I liked it. Although I can say that, in a weird way, as I grew up with these books and have read the series a few times. They are close to my heart. But I know they cannot be recreated exactly, and a few plot changes are par for the course in bringing this to the screen.

To be totally faithful would require hours upon hours of internal monologue, and this would, at best, satisfy the hard core fans, but alienate new comers. Even though I will miss knowing what Elayne thought of her diluted wine, or Matt on his spicy stew..

I actually quite liked the Trollocs’ look. Wouldn’t want to meet one of those in a dark alley.

But, I am not the hugest fan of the racial diversity in the Two Rivers. I mean, it won’t matter in the grand scale of things, but it seems purely done to offset any complaints, but, as mentioned, there are many, many different characters - some very important - who are of different races, so I don’t understand the need to do this. It would be like a tv show about Ireland in the 50s, where half of the characters are mixed race. It’s just slightly jarring.

But it’s a small point really. I think I will continue on with the series, although I terrible at watching things to completion.

Except if there is that one scene with a good friend of Perrin’s. Won’t be watching that. The book part alone had me in a bad way!

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118216103#Comment_118216103

I meant it in more that they didn't care to go to every little detail. It was lax but just meant that they kept writing.

Martin has several plot lines that I don't think the story can get out of

Mitch Connor

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118216103#Comment_118216103

agreed - i think it is more a case of him not liking where he left something off and deciding to ignore it for the most part.

Why in the name of the light did Matt not tell Elayne about Lord Gabrial. FFS. COME ON MAN.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118217336#Comment_118217336

That's my point. Martin will never finish ASOI&F because he is incapable of letting go

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118217355#Comment_118217355

Wonder does GRRM have a Brandon Sanderson lined up in case he doesn't get the job done. If he does I doubt it'll be Benioff and Weiss...

Daroxtar

I thought Sanderson did a great job of tidying up the books. He tied up as many threads in his first 2 or 3 chapters as Jordan did in the previous 3 books.

All my complaints (and I feel most are valid) and here I am still waiting on the next episode

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118222572#Comment_118222572

I know he had a job to do but it felt like a bit rushed in the end.

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118216573#Comment_118216573

I actually quite liked the Trollocs’ look. Wouldn’t want to meet one of those in a dark alley.

There were pretty serviceable for the main footsoldiers of villainy although I can't get out of my head the description I quoted above:

up close they look like Lemmy out of Motörhead (RIP) after a bad night. 

The Fades definitely cut a dash though, wonder if they took visual inspiration from this guy

YellowFeather

They do not look like Lemmy on a bad night. 😂

But, yah, it’s I’m actually not sure why the Fades need those pointy teeth. Scary, for sure, but perhaps not required on a day-to-day basis.

Anyway. Fourth episode is ready and waiting for watching over dinner. Quite looking forward!

Loafing Oaf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118228378#Comment_118228378

Fourth episode is ready and waiting

So it is. Thought it wasn't due till midnight

YellowFeather

Enjoy!

Pawwed Rig

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118228402#Comment_118228402

Bloody toy show

Mitch Connor

Best episode of the 4.

Having read the book I have serious questions on some of the choices they have made and might be making.... But was easily the best episode.

Daroxtar

Fully agreed, that was a bloody good episode.

OwaynOTT

Best episode was the one that deviates the most from the book.

enjoyed that. We’re started to get some of the lore and one of my fave characters had a powerful moment there.

shadowman lurking was good too

Washout

Loved episode 4.

We have to accept that the tv show will have to take liberties and deviate form the books. it is too complex a written series to mirror to a tv show. The amount of characters alone in the books is too vast to reproduce to TV,

Casting of most characters is excellent. Liandrin, Moiraine and Lan I can feel a correlation between the tv characters and book.

The actor for Rand worries me.

spookwoman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118206084#Comment_118206084

I was taking the piss but had a feeling someone would bring it up at some stage

https://twitter.com/martinbeanz/status/1464375343326937094?s=20

Ive made my peace with the tv writers making their decisions to suit the necessities of the small screen

Im enjoying it as its own thing now and i think its picking up nicely

Effects and fights were well dodgy at the start and not all performances are great but its getting better

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118230330#Comment_118230330

I'm my head they were like a Romani Greenpeace except passive and playing flamenco music.

From a writing point of view. To be honest wagon train of normal traders would have served the same purpose in the books and not needed another sidetrack story arc. With a backstory that then may have to be made relevant.

Any similarities to any group in real life is superficial. But it would have been better to make then more different to anything. It's a good example of where the books had bells and whistles added where none were needed.

Ishmael

Massive improvement in the EP4. Some actual character development finally. Seems like there is a different director for every 2 eps (according to wikipedia) and there was a noticeable difference between eps 1&2 and eps 3&4. Wondering if there will be as noticeable a change with the next 2 eps.

Slydice

Alright, lemme see. One episode in and overall two first-impressions:

• This show reminds me of other fantasy/magic shows that got cancelled/not renewed. Something like it not being the gritty/grounded level needed to keep an audience.
• Looks like a pretty cool universe with a feel of it's own that looks like it'll be cool to explore. The magic effects and the mountain scenery were cool. The backstory sounds like it's in-depth and has been thought-through. Having Rosamund Pike is a huge win too.

1: Alright, good intro to the characters and what's going on.

Spoiler Warning

So, it looks like there's a light side and a dark side, Magic and Monsters and there's gonna be a focal point in the light to be found to fight a focal point in the dark.

Lol, when the shade showed up I was like.. does.. does that have no nose? Then they were like.. it has no eyes and I was like.. oooooh.. so just one big long nose hole 😁

Awe felt bad for that Wisdom who said she'd protect the place even from Rosamund Pike.. who .. when the fight came.. could only manage to pull out a dagger and then just got kiddnapped by the Trollocs. I dunno .. maybe she's working with the shade or something.. or will get turned to the dark by the shade.

Onwards to The White Tower (TM) I guess 🙂

Clegg

Four episodes is probably too early to make a sweeping judgement of the show, but my first impression is that I don't really like it so far.

I think the writers have failed to really encompass the depth and breadth of the story. We're told how dangerous a man Logain is. That he raised an army of thousands and overthrew a kingdom merely at the suggestion that he was the Dragon Reborn. But on screen we saw him fight three soldiers and talk to the king. It's all the tell and none of the show.

I like some things about the series and in many ways they've improved on the first book. I enjoy the interpersonal relationships between Lan, Moiraine and Nynaeve. Perrin's travels with the Tinkers and the flowing the way of peace is rather touching considering what he has been through. Mat actually has character development in this, rather then waiting until book three.

But so far, the overarching story is really lacking. I don't think they have properly nailed down why the Dragon is so dangerous or what the Prophecies of the Dragon actually entails. They're being hunted by Fades, but so far they haven't really shown us why they're such a danger either.

Episode 4 answered some of those criticisms. There was a bit of world building at least. It was an improvement over what came before, but still only like a 6 or 7 out of 10 quality wise.

Mr.Nice Guy

I agree that was the best episode so far. Better character and story development. A small criticism would be the special effects, which looked a bit ropey at times.

Theyre making sure that new tv viewers are as invested as possible in the mystery of which two rivers character might be our main hero

Egwene and perrin lack a lot of oomph early on, mat probably has a decent start but it gets a bit random for a while

The story changes reflect this i think

whelzer

Is this ok for a 13 year to watch?

Pawwed Rig

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118232383#Comment_118232383

Yeah be fine.

Mitch Connor

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118232301#Comment_118232301

I thought they had got matt wrong by having him be mean and a thief, so paranoia would not be out of character when the dagger got hold. But they have changed the impact of the dagger so it makes a bit more sense now.

The actor has already been recast for season 2 so don't get attached!

Slydice

2: Well well well, look who it is... Anyway, show still comes across very much a mystery.

The backstories and group building is working well.

Spoiler Warning

It's odd how vague everything seems to be. The history, the trollocs, this city.

Wierd that everyone has been so separated and isolated from knowing stuff.. that appears to be only a few days horseride apart.

I thought this city was done well. The stonework and effects around it felt solid.

Then the darkness felt right creepy. I was like.. Nooo dude, don't open the box!! 🙂

City also felt like it had a bunch of history.

They better get some magic healing soon or Rosamunds character is gone. That can't be a thing so soon into the show surely!

Maybe this Wisdom woman will be able to sort it.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118232383#Comment_118232383

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118232408#Comment_118232408

Yeah looks like it should be ok-ish. I only really know the commonsensemedia that gives guideline age ratings.

It gives this one a 14s (from kids) / 16s (from parents): https://www.commonsensemedia.org/tv-reviews/the-wheel-of-time

Slydice

3: Felt grittier in this one. Story also got a bit more absorbing.

Spoiler Warning

Damn, that knife through the neck of the bartender got me! Wasn't expecting it. Thought the two guys were gonna have to pull together and bond or something. Guess they're bought into the dangers they face now though.

Overall story still feels a bit mysterious. Though, the need for one of these to be this Dragon still feels a bit vague. I'm guessing more detail to that story and the level of need as it goes along. This mention of a fifth being the original wisdom who escaped the trolloc and is with Rosamund Pikes character now I'm guessing.

Book gripe, as usual it seems for me

Spoiler Warning

That's a massive bait and switch they're pulling making an uninitiated audience think Nynaeve is the Dragon. I can't help but think that this will backfire on them through the exact vocal minority they are playing to.

There will be a backlash that Nynaeve (an actual badass with the best character arc) is not going to be the central character, rather it'll be the white guy.