The Wheel of Time (Page 4 of 5)

Ugh, you finally made me do it. You finally made me actually watch the show. When Season 1 premiered, I was super excited and had done a full re-read of the books in the months before the first episode, so it was all super fresh, and the changes and cuts they made felt waaaayyyy too glaring. This series of books is probably my favorite all time fantasy series, and it's not exaggerating to say that's out of thousands of books read in my life, so I was kind of emotionally close to the series from the get go too.

When I saw that we'd reached the Trial of Rhuidean and you guys who are show watchers had the same emotional reaction I had when reading it for the first time, I knew I had to see it for myself.

So I've watched through season 1, which I only had made it halfway through the first time and I just... yeah I want to say a few things.

The Positives.

Goddamn the creatures of the Dark are awesome looking. The Faceless Ones (Myrddraal) and Trollocs (the demon beast things) look great. The channeling is also well done for the most part. I like that the Aes Sedai weaves (the magic thready rope looking stuff that you see as they're channelling) are depicted as pure white, and the male channelers are depicted as white with black as well. The black signifies the taint the Dark one placed on the source, which is absorbed by men when they channel slowly driving them insane. This is mentioned in the show, but I think they could have done a better job explaining what we were seeing. That is a reoccurring theme in the show sadly, more on that later. Most of the characters are well done and fit their respective descriptions in the books well. I very much like that the Two Rivers have a dark complexion, whereas Rand and the Aiel are red headed and fair skinned. I also like that the Borderlanders and Lan are depicted as Asian and Siuan (the Amryllian leader of the Aes Sedai) is black. This fits as the various nations in the books were very varied on the people. The story Moraine told of the Fall of Manetherin which was the nation where the Two Rivers was was well done too. The story of Manetherin came up a few times in the books and was something that always stuck with me, hearing her tell it got the ol' tears to well up a bit. Jordan did a good job describing how they held for 9 days waiting for reinforcements. Tai'shar Manetherin as they say in the books.

Things that were mentioned in the show that were NOT explained very well. Read only if you want for in depth book lore that got cut and wasn't shown well... maybe they'll show it better later.

1. Aes Sedai and their Wardens. The show mentions they're bonded 

2. Darkfriends. The term is used for humans who've aligned themselves with the Dark One. The show just kind of offhandedly refers to

as one, but doesn't elaborate on the term at all in Season 1. In fact I'm disapointed that the Whitecloaks didn't mention Darkfriends more since that's their whole thing, hunting supposed Darkfriends. Their beef with the Aes Sedai is that they consider all Aes Sedai Darkfriends.

3. The Forsaken. They refer to themselves as the Chosen.

4. Rand's sword. The heron marked blade.

Conclusion. Overall so far having just watched season 1, I'm liking this more on a second try around. I was too emotionally close to see it for a good show given the glaring changes.... like... Perrin's wife's entire existence. The show is overall a pretty good adaptation of the books, but... my biggest complaint is how condensed it all is. They skipped months of Rand and Matt's journey to Tar Valon in literal seconds. Like... one frame they're fleeing the farm they were staying at, and the next they're suddenly there and they casually mention over a month has passed. They skipped entirely the story of Egwene and Perrin post Whitecloaks, and the river boat captain who Matt and Rand traveled with initially. Thom the gleeman gets a criminally short amount of screen time as we see him rob Matt, bury the Aiel, and save them from the Fade, but none of his travels with Matt and Rand, nor teaching Rand and Matt some basics of how to be a gleeman. Loial the Ogier

They also missed the Padan Fain jail scene from the books which was a hugely gruesome scene and makes his character far, far less menacing than he should be.

Overall, this ain't bad. I'm sure I'll torture you guys with some in depth posts on Season 2 and 3 here shortly lol. Sorry for the novel. Appropriate given how long the book series was