Wheel of Time

I'm convinced there must be some financial & union politics explanation. Theres simply no logical explanation for it, so I can only imagine its politics & money.

The existence of screenwriters, and their obsessive need to "adapt" the book into a script, is the problem in itself. If these people exist they have to justify their existence. Its the same reason middle managers introduce new policies and software developers introduce a new UI.

The world would literally be better - not just if these people did a better job, not just if someone else got their job - but if their job didnt even exist in the first place. You want to make a WOT show? Awesome, the screenplay is literally already written. Here it is - it comes in 14 volumes. Start casting.

zzeris said:

That's why it's important to get the story kinda right. We all know they are going to put shit actors into fantasy shows. The least they can do is cover it up a little by following the story. Is it so hard to do paint by numbers show creation? They specifically use well known books to sell their garbage, so maybe try to keep your show above water by following the source content? How many other people are willing to watch a poorly created and acted show they know nothing about for more than 3 episodes?

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I agree that it would be nice if they just followed the source and, from what I have read here, it makes little sense to change what they did. Both this show and Foundation could have probably been in the 8.0+ territory, if they had just followed the books.

Unfortunately, for book readers, they are not the target demographics that Hollywood makes products for. The readers are just there to create buzz and it gets more people to watch that vital first episode. Does Netflix release it's weekly numbers by show? It would be interesting to see how this show compares with Shadow & Bone or Carnival Row, over time (like opening weekend numbers).

From the reviews and score on IMDB, it looks like the target demos like the show just fine (not great, not terrible), and will continue to watch it. Even some of the non-critical (non-nerds/geeks) readers seem to like it.

Aldarion said:

I'm convinced there must be some financial & union politics explanation. Theres simply no logical explanation for it, so I can only imagine its politics & money.

The existence of screenwriters, and their obsessive need to "adapt" the book into a script, is the problem in itself. If these people exist they have to justify their existence. Its the same reason middle managers introduce new policies and software developers introduce a new UI.

The world would literally be better - not just if these people did a better job, not just if someone else got their job - but if their job didnt even exist in the first place. You want to make a WOT show? Awesome, here is the book. Start casting.

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Even though the show "Episodes" is a comedy, it is probably pretty accurate in terms of how the writers with a vision can get pushed around by the rest of the crew (and other writers who are just there for a paycheck).

Everyone has their own opinions on the script, who should get more screen time, and then they push for those opinions. When it's a producer, director, or star of the show (who have never read the source, nor do they care to) asking for changes, how can the writers say no?

Something along the lines of:
Producer: "People respond better to people that they can relate with, and have a tragic backstory, sooo... we need at least one of the main characters to be marred and one with tragedy to fit this bill."
Director: "Outstanding work! We have a tragic character right from the start, great! Now, we need more sex, because we know sex sells, virgins don't"
Actor_03 (standing next to the Producer): "I talked it over with the Producer and Director, and I think my character should do this instead or that"

To get a A+ show, you need strong writers, willing to tell everyone to fuck off and producers that support them. It is most likely one of the things that made D&D in GoT so successful in the first seasons, and that exact same thing that lead to the shit pile of the final seasons.

Hateyou said:

The books are. Men broke the world so there is a lot of beta-ness going on. It’s pretty over the top annoying, especially mid series when it’s just beat to death. That’s one thing the show didn’t need to amplify, but they did anyway. Like nynaeve soloing a trolloc and it’s blood just happens to form the flame of tar valon symbol (yin-yang) in the water. Stupid.

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It was and it wasn’t. Yes women had a ton of actual power because all of the channelers were women, which turned into political power. But it didn’t pull any punches with how fucking terrible the white tower was and how much of a corrupt cuntfest they made it. As far as actual strength though, men who could channel absolutely are more powerful across the board and it explicitly states that on many occasions. Women just had an advantage in not needing men to link, which wasn’t true for men (they needed a woman to link).

velk said:

In the show she actually said that the dark one sent her visions of them in dreams.

In the books the various darkfriends they run into can sense them - unclear if it's Ta'veren'ness, Saidin usage or Baalzamon's touch.

The former is presumably the simpler version because that chick is several different characters merged together.

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Yeah it’s not clear that I remember in the books in this instance, but you see the forsaken/Shaidar giving direction to dark friends in their dreams in later books. I’m guessing it was something like that where all dark friends basically got a bolo on them.

Lithose said:

The costumes, monsters and many other elements are right out of Hercules the Legendary Journeys. Except its missing the fun campiness of that show.

Take that how you will.

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Well, GoT showed that if the source material is good enough, and you follow it closely (til they ran out of books), the masses as well as book readers will eat it up. No clue why these bungholes didn’t follow that lead.

Qhue said:

How does the darkfriend innkeeper chick know about them, especially the "5" of them? Do the Forsaken have a listserv they run? I may be remembering things wrong, but didn't the Three Oaths predate Artur's siege of Tar Valon?

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she specifically says she had a dream where she was told to look out for the 5, and Matt mutters "5?" since they have been told by Moraine there are 4 tavernen - Rand, Matt, Perrin, and Egwene. Nynaeve of course has got to be the 5th wildcard. She also mentions that 3000 years ago someone named Ishamael brought the Dragon Reborn to The Dark One and was rewarded. The dreams are a hint, we have seen multiple times now a dude with glowing fire eyes hover around the background of each of the dreams, its not too far off to assume he can also appear to darkfriends in their dreams and give out instructions.

I watched the 3 episodes over the last 2 days and enjoyed them, especially the third. The set designs and backgrounds are amazing, huge lord of the ring vibes from the wide shots. It was filmed apparently in the Czech Republic but could be New Zealand Middle Eart 2020 easy. Yeah the costumes are a bit cheap and something feels missing, especially in the Lan and Moraine dept, but we'll see. I hope we get the prologue in before the end of the season.

There is a strong undercurrent of "men are retards who are the cause of all problems and put women down, fuck men, girl power!" in the first 2 episodes and I expect that to continue a lot, but its honestly not as bad I thought it would be. Some strong performances from Matt, Thom, Moraine (that Manetheren speech), and even Rand wasn't too bad. As someone said, if you've watched Foundation or some other new stuff this is so much better adaption. I'll keep watching for sure. I've read all the books so its interesting to see the differences but also how faithful they have been. Too bad no Mordin so far.

Yes, the second episode grew on me, although I hated the black goo. And not the idea in itself, but the execution, it looked like cheap tv.

But the wolf chase looked great, the Manetheren story was good, and I loved it how Lan owned Nynaeve at the end.

Pretty good, pretty good, better than the first episode.

Edit:
Sory for the edit, but there is something that drives me fucking mad. I am watching The Great too, and the costumes there are... well... great. Look here:


Oh, Wheel of Time, how great you could have been.

wamphyr said:

Yes, the second episode grew on me, although I hated the black goo. And not the idea in itself, but the execution, it looked like cheap tv.

But the wolf chase looked great, the Manetheren story was good, and I loved it how Lan owned Nynaeve at the end.

Pretty good, pretty good, better than the first episode.

Edit:
Sory for the edit, but there is something that drives me fucking mad. I am watching The Great too, and the costumes there are... well... great. Look here:
View attachment 383846View attachment 383847

Oh, Wheel of Time, how great you could have been.

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I am not sure that is a valid comparison.

You want to compare people who are literally royalty with farmers. You want to compare a Fantasy piece with the fairly accurate representation of opulence of royalty. Save for the fact that both use humans, I cannot think of a more apples to oranges comparison. A better comparison might have been to compare with Rosamund Pike's character.



She is as close to royalty as the show seems to get for the moment. I will grant you that the detail could have been better handled but remember this is not based on reality. When going out to explore, I imagine a descent amount of comfort and protection is what you want to wear. The GREAT is not going out camping. Even if she were, she lived in a completely different universe of thought as to what was important when it came to cloths. Did the show decide to save some money on the cloths? I imagine that was part of the conversation. If the story was good, and the effects were well done, I would not have cared.

Yeah, if the Two Rivers is backwater country bumpkins then you can't bitch about the fact that their clothes look like... hand me down thrift store rags that a bunch of people who never get out of their little slice of the world wear.

There are instances where the wardrobe can probably use some work of course. But Rand/Mat/Perrin is not it.

matt looks like he is in a bathrobe lol

We're 3 episodes in (I'll be honest, I caved and watched it but fell asleep part way through Ep 2) and y'all are complaining about the fabric choices?

This is a fucking dumpster fire and Egwene and Nynaeve are two of the ugliest women cast in any TV role, ever. Not just Zendaya-style "not pretty at all but checks the diversity box", I mean offensively fugly. Like, even virgin dudes in a small farming community would be making jokes about whether youd rather fuck a pig or Egwene, kind of ugly.

But if only they'd made better fabric choices!

The only important woman is Min anyway. The rest sucked all through the series.

Edit: But maybe she is ugly as well. I'm not invested at all in this.

spronk said:

matt looks like he is in a bathrobe lol

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Yup.

Aazrael said:

The only important woman is Min anyway. The rest sucked all through the series.

Edit: But maybe she is ugly as well. I'm not invested at all in this.

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Have they cast Min yet? I have a hard time imagining them doing the "Rand gets 2 chicks" thing.

it probably ends up as a tranny-nonbinary throuple by the time we get there.

Aldarion said:

Have they cast Min yet? I have a hard time imagining them doing the "Rand gets 2 chicks" thing.

it probably ends up as a tranny-nonbinary throuple by the time we get there.

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He actually gets 3 chicks.