The Wheel of Time TV Show 4: The Budget Rising [BOOK SPOILERS]

[Loge]

Like others I don't remember ever reading about Ishamael inventing the Oaths. The only thing is that he created the Black Ajah, who remove the Oaths and swear their own. And the rod definitely was used to punish criminals in at the Age of Legends. That's what it was made for.

[Jace, Extat]

Old Robbie J knew that The Rod is the only thing that keeps bitches in line once they've tasted power. 

[Werthead]

Laaaaaaaaaaan!

[Corvinus85]

Tooooo short (the clip). He's got the hadori, yay!

[Werthead]

Season 2 greenlit, shooting to begin immediately after Season 1.

So we're going to see the Seanchan on screen.

[Starkess]

Yay! Any news yet on when S1 is expected to drop?

[Slurktan]

5 hours ago, Werthead said:

Laaaaaaaaaaan!

Granted its a 6 second clip but I really wish they went with Death is lighter than a feather, duty heavier than a mountain.  It is Lan.

[Werthead]

12 hours ago, Starkess said:

Yay! Any news yet on when S1 is expected to drop?

There seems to be a growing feeling pointing towards September-October time.

[IFR]

How certain are we that the first season will exclusively adapt Eye of the World material?

I ask because it seems very strange to me, with such a large series that will undoubtedly demand a lot of compression, that so much of it would be focused on the earlier segment, which is rather weak. The Wheel of Time doesn't really have its own identity with the first novel, which borrows transparently from Tolkien as the companions set off on their adventure to Mordor to defeat the Dark Lord.

The later material of WoT still borrows readily from the likes of Dune and Star Wars and other works, but the series at least comes into its own further down the line. It kind of worries me that so much attention is being focused on the beginning portion.

Unless the writers are somehow able to give the series something visually exciting that elevates the series from the rather weak beginning? (I hope that's the case.) I can't imagine the show will last longer than 6-8 seasons (so 64 episodes max). To devote 1/8 of it to EotW....

[Corvinus85]

9 hours ago, IFR said:

How certain are we that the first season will exclusively adapt Eye of the World material?

I ask because it seems very strange to me, with such a large series that will undoubtedly demand a lot of compression, that so much of it would be focused on the earlier segment, which is rather weak. The Wheel of Time doesn't really have its own identity with the first novel, which borrows transparently from Tolkien as the companions set off on their adventure to Mordor to defeat the Dark Lord.

The later material of WoT still borrows readily from the likes of Dune and Star Wars and other works, but the series at least comes into its own further down the line. It kind of worries me that so much attention is being focused on the beginning portion.

Unless the writers are somehow able to give the series something visually exciting that elevates the series from the rather weak beginning? (I hope that's the case.) I can't imagine the show will last longer than 6-8 seasons (so 64 episodes max). To devote 1/8 of it to EotW....

Some of the episode titles seemed to indicate it will go beyond the first book. Or at least, the plot will combine some stuff with other characters that show up later, but maybe still conclude with the confrontation at the Eye of the World. 

For example, the showrunner said Logain will have a much bigger role.

[Werthead]

10 hours ago, IFR said:

How certain are we that the first season will exclusively adapt Eye of the World material?
 

Extremely. They were filming material in the Ways, the Blight and Fal Dara in the shooting block for Episodes 7 and 8 of the first season, they have cast almost every major role from Book 1but barely any for Book 2 (and those were for the new Logain story arc), and to be honest the set leaked more virulently than the Titanic after it met the iceberg. We know almost what was filmed in what location on almost every day of the (massively prolonged) shoot.

They are doing flashbacks to New Spring material and they have a major new storyline where we see Logain's capture in real time, so it's not just EotW, and some EotW material itself has been cut.

Spoiler

Baerlon is seemingly gone, and there's even growing doubt that the characters go to Caemlyn

For later seasons, yes, they need to compress things a lot more, but for the first year they decided to stick somewhat close to the book, although there are also massive changes from the book as well. 

[Slurktan]

On 3/21/2021 at 10:58 AM, Loge said:

Like others I don't remember ever reading about Ishamael inventing the Oaths. The only thing is that he created the Black Ajah, who remove the Oaths and swear their own. And the rod definitely was used to punish criminals in at the Age of Legends. That's what it was made for.

I hadn't read this previously but I'm pretty sure it was.... strongly hinted at in the BWEB

[Poobah]

I don't think it's unreasonable really to have the first season mostly focused on EotW + flashbacks to New Spring and the new Logain stuff given that they also need to introduce a hell of a lot of characters and concepts to the audience, after that though I would expect to see some rapid acceleration with my guess being that by the end of the second season Rand has his hands on Callandor, and honestly I think that's quite doable without much of anything of substance being lost.

The books tend towards being very heavy on description and characters faffing around for hundreds of pages at a time either travelling places or sitting still in places waiting for other things to happen/catch up, plus the early books are rather structurally repetitive - what actual major plot points and cool moments are in TGH and TDR? There aren't that many, and a lot of it could be remixed in to one cohesive story - it's pretty silly for instance that the Wondergirls go to the tower, train for a bit, get kidnapped by Liandrin with Egwene getting enslaved for a bit, then go back to the tower and train a bit  more before then leaving tower again on a Liandrin related mission where they get captured again - I'm sure there's a smart way to mix these things together in to one less repetitive story and likewise Rand really doesn't need to have three boss battles with Ishamael. Moiraine really should kill at least one Forsaken. Mat needs to get cured of the dagger at some point, realise that his protagonist power is being the luckiest man alive, and blow the horn. Perrin needs to do some wolfy stuff and meet Faile.  The Wondergirls need to meet, train and head out on a mission together. And uh... Lanfear should probably be cougaring after boys centuries younger than her. And that's about it? Personally I'd like to see at least one of the girls do the Accepted test, the Portal Stone "What if? / I win again Lews Therin" thing, and for Mat to kick Gawyn and Galad's asses with a staff but none of those scenes are strictly necessary as such. Also shoutouts for Thom assassinating the king of Cairhien so subtly that inattentive book readers probably didn't even notice so that, while undoubtedly cool, is probably not making it in. 

What I would added though is some bigger picture stuff that sets the stage for what's to come. Siuan & Elaida doing politics in the white tower with the Black Ajah (and Mesaana!) in the shadows. Hints of other Forsaken pulling strings and spinning plots elsewhere and generally building up a bit of a sense of the Shadow accomplishing things and being somewhat competent in the short term, even if sooner or later there's gonna be a messianic wrecking ball headed their way with a Balefire suppository. Keep the Seanchan consistently in the picture a bit more rather than having them mostly peace out to regroup for 5 books

[A True Kaniggit]

34 minutes ago, Poobah said:

Moiraine really should kill at least one Forsaken.

Be’lal?

[fionwe1987]

I think Moiraine can be given Balthamel in book 1 easily. There's no particular reason it has to be the Green Man.

 

And yes, I suspect a remix of Tear and Falme is almost certain, but having the Seanchan, the Horn, Callandor, Be'lal, Fain, the Black Ajah... All that in one finale might be a tad crazy. 

[karaddin]

Yeah that's the one I was thinking as well. I still think 13 is a few too many Forsaken, we don't get to know all of them well enough to carry through the threat - at least when you take resurrecting them into account - but I'm not sure how you can deal with that. Maybe playing up some of them as though they're a higher tier which was kinda the case anyway.

The resurrecting can play into the threat as well, but only if they feel like a threat in the first place. Maybe keep it for Lanfear but Aginor and Balthamel are chumps before they die and chumps after they're resurrected. Which again is actually part of the point, that their reputations greatly overstate some of them, there's a reason they joined the shadow and for some of them it's essentially that they were losers. 

[Maltaran]

5 hours ago, karaddin said:

there's a reason they joined the shadow and for some of them it's essentially that they were losers. 

I think for Asmodean it was pretty explicitly that.

For me, the thing I most want to see, which won’t be until at least season 3, is the Aiel history sequence

[Werthead]

13 hours ago, Poobah said:

The books tend towards being very heavy on description and characters faffing around for hundreds of pages at a time either travelling places or sitting still in places waiting for other things to happen/catch up, plus the early books are rather structurally repetitive - what actual major plot points and cool moments are in TGH and TDR? There aren't that many, and a lot of it could be remixed in to one cohesive story - it's pretty silly for instance that the Wondergirls go to the tower, train for a bit, get kidnapped by Liandrin with Egwene getting enslaved for a bit, then go back to the tower and train a bit  more before then leaving tower again on a Liandrin related mission where they get captured again - I'm sure there's a smart way to mix these things together in to one less repetitive story and likewise Rand really doesn't need to have three boss battles with Ishamael.

The example I used of how to combined things was having the Seanchan conquer Tear rather than Falme, and merge the narratives of Books 2 and 3 together that way. You have to sweat out some details (how does Perrin meet Faile in that case) but generally speaking the two books have a very similar, repetitive structure which you can combine and merge fairly easily.

I know one of the writers on the show heard that idea and said that was exactly the sort of thing they were looking at doing (whilst not confirming they were doing exactly that) to bring the narrative down in length whilst keeping the story beats broadly the same. A lot of WoT is repetition of themes and ideas, with characters looking for Plot Devices (the dagger, the Choedan Kal access keys, the Seals, the Horn of Valere, the male a'dam, the Bowl of Winds) to overcome an obstacle to defeating the Dark One or which is preventing ostensible different teams of good guys from joining forces, and there are plot redundancies there you can work on.

[fionwe1987]

While all that is true, the Seanchan conquering Tear has some distinct issues. Or maybe I should say downstream effects.

For one, Falme was a nothing town. Conquering Tear would make the Seanchan an immediate global threat no nation would ignore.

The Tower certainly couldn't, given that Callandor is there. So how would Siuan justify sending just three Accepted to Tear?

Maybe Liandrin takes them there instead, but that assumes Siuan does nothing and sits on her hands, which just doesn't seem feasible. Liandrin would have to worry about non-Black Sisters being in Tear to interfere.

Then there's the issue of the Aiel. You can have the Aiel fight the Seanchan in Tear. But I don't see how both that and the Horn of Valere make sense in the same sequence. It's just too much.

One thing I've thought of is maybe the Seanchan capture the city, but the Stone itself manages to hold. It was built with the One Power, so it's feasible to argue there are some wards or something that prevent the Damane from destroying it. 

So you'd have a city under occupation with it's rulers safe, with their own harbor to get supplies.

Toss in Rand going to get Callandor, Nynaeve and Elayne trying to rescue Egwene into one plot and it works. Just can't have the whole Fain thing crop up here. That would need to be resolved sooner.

 

[Denvek]

17 hours ago, fionwe1987 said:

One thing I've thought of is maybe the Seanchan capture the city, but the Stone itself manages to hold. It was built with the One Power, so it's feasible to argue there are some wards or something that prevent the Damane from destroying it. 

 

The Stone would have to hold - the whole prophecy that's important in book 3 is that it will only fall to the Dragon Reborn.