I’m on another reread of the series, this time I intend to finish it. Last time I read up to Book 11, which was the latest at that time.
I remember Books 1-7 were great, 8-10 were draggy and felt bloated, and 11 was a great return to form for Jordan. The ending for Book 9 was epic though! What are people’s opinion of 12-14?
Spoilers for non-readers:
I’m really excited to see the TV show’s version of my two favorite events from the book - Rand’s visit to Rhuidean and learning the history of the Aiel, and the cleansing of saidin.
I vaguely remember the middle-ish being a bit of a slog for me. But after investing that much time into it, wanted to see it through. Thankfully was worth it, as it got better again towards the end.
Well, that was a strange set of changes from the books regarding Moiraine and Siuan. I’m not sure what the point of making them lovers and the exiling was about, what it was meant to convey?
Episode 6 had lots of other little changes from the books that’s going to infuriate the book purists.
Decent episode though. I liked the visualisation of healing Mat from the dagger.
Really? I had read New Spring so long ago but totally can’t remember that about them.
The changes that especially irritated me in that episode were:
The Waygates looking nothing like how they’re described in the book, and Moiraine channeling to open it instead of Loial using the leaf key stone.
Saying the Dark One’s prison is at the Eye of the World.
Uggghhh!
I didn’t give up but I nearly did and understand the sentiment. It becomes a real slog for a few books before the wheel spinning stops and the wheel starts turning again.
I would still re-read the first 5 or so for a third time. I’ve only ever gone to the end once.
I’m personally finding that when the show forges it’s own way though the story, it results in less comparison to the books. I enjoyed that episode, thought the Siuan / Moiraine dynamic enhanced rather than clashed with the book.
The waygate was very likely a budgetary issue. Building a static gate would require far less CGI compared to the scene they filmed. Bringing carved leaves to life would have looked amazing if done well, but they may have decided they couldn’t pull it off well enough for the $$$ available to put it on screen.
Very interested in the Mat arc. With Padan Fain hanging around, something will be going down between those two.
For those that want to know the production issues:
That scene at the waygate was due to Barney Harris walking off the production. The actor just left and they had to edit him out of the story for the final 2 episodes. So they cobbled together the least worst way of detaching him from the group. He’s recast for season 2. Barney has since deleted all his social media and disappeared, so odds are that something rather bad has happened to the guy, which really sucks.
Not really what I was expecting or wanting. I guess with covid and Mat being recast it has had a pretty large effect on season 1.
Fortunately the wot story only gets better and better. Hopefully they can improve on a lot of things and have a 10 episode season 2 to do the story justice.
Thought this too, especially when like 15 minutes before that you had Moraine talking about how unreliable their myths are and the “multi headed Dragon”
Wasn’t a huge fan of how they did the waygates, visually their opening was awesome but to be quite honest the actual Ways look a bit low budget - stalagmites, like come on? Also the Mat thing, just super disappointing that the actor left and it had to be done but oh well.
I also have to criticize a bit of how Amazon have done their visual design which has been killing me for the last four eps. Apparently they have come up with their own version of CMS - Clear Motion Smoothing - which is that gross soap opera effect you see in Neighbours and H&A. It ultimately leads to a lot of awesome looking scenes and vistas looking so real that they look fake. Not a fan and when you combine it with modern tech like VRR and CMR you can actually get FPS drops in some scenes which looks suuuuper janky.
There’s also a scene where Moraine is standing at the top of the White Tower looking down at Tar Valon and you can literally see a white glow around her due to the CGI screen in front of her. Considering Tar Valon is one of the few standing scenes they built for the series it’s a bit disappointing, and I can’t help but draw comparisons to how much better Jackson made Minas Tirith look in 2003.
Willing to give them a pass for the first season though and still keen to see what else they come up with. Considering how they seem to have scrapped the whole Mordeth thing with Mat and Fain, I’m expecting Fain to pop up to battle Rand at the EotW
I’m wondering how much the Mat / Fain arc was impacted by the actor departing. Seems odd to have Fain in Tar Valon and then not use him.
And I agree with you on the images looking off somehow. There’s something jarring about the image quality that breaks immersion. People have said it looks far far better on OLED TVs, so I wonder if they’ve targeted the most modern screens to the detriment of everyone else.
You’re not the only one Nev. I gave up about a decade ago somewhere beyond book 7. I liked the characters and story but I agree with you - too many words, not enough action. Each to their own, and I am looking forward to discovering how the story concludes. It might take another decade of paying for Amazon Prime but I’m enjoying the show so far.
