Robert Jordan’s fantasy epic The Wheel of Time coming to TV

It's almost as if TV companies will have to start focussing on actual scripts, plots and characters rather than super snazzy yawnsome special effects. One side effect of this is that fantasy and sci-fi shows may fall to the wayside but there are many, many decent sci-fi shows of the past 50 (even 60 years if you count Doctor Who) that were great TV without leaning on effects. I'd argue that both WoT and Rings of Power have decent enough scripts and both would have/ will work with less spent on the CGI. Expansive CGI generated views are very nice to look at for the brief time they're on screen but aren't strictly necessary to drive the story on.
 
Bluecube said:
It's almost as if TV companies will have to start focussing on actual scripts, plots and characters rather than super snazzy yawnsome special effects. One side effect of this is that fantasy and sci-fi shows may fall to the wayside but there are many, many decent sci-fi shows of the past 50 (even 60 years if you count Doctor Who) that were great TV without leaning on effects. I'd argue that both WoT and Rings of Power have decent enough scripts and both would have/ will work with less spent on the CGI. Expansive CGI generated views are very nice to look at for the brief time they're on screen but aren't strictly necessary to drive the story on.
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Same as with computer games right, you can have all the shinys, all the effects, but if the core game sux then the shinys effects wear off quickly and your at the meh stage.
 
Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said:
A picture says 1000 words. Robert Jordan : "hold my beer"

25% does feel about right as a target for pruning, that would put it probably at 150-175% of so of LOTR (by words written) and would be a nice size for say a 5 season (max) or 3-4 film adaption.

Problem is, again, fans happy to chop up and change the authors work on stuff they agree with, but cannot accept change they don't.
I am not convinced Robert Jordan would have been any more accepting of someone chopping 75% of his book as needing pruning as he would have been of a little "woke" being added.
In fact I would argue an author may well see the first as a more significant assault on their works, and that its just peoples other prejudices being hidden using changing things as an excuse.

I find it interesting in that I believe if you have read a works you become more invested, drawing some mental pictures and having a richer more detailed world set out.
Unless the adaption is bringing something excellent its going to struggle against that vision.
LOTR with Jackson has someone who instead of brining a version to the screen brought his version, with a very detailed setup of all the things that mattered to him.
His understanding was probably 5x most fans.
I remember Bernard Hill saying just putting the armour on made him feel part of Theoden, with stuff like the imprints on the inside no one else would see.
Thats Jackson getting to create as close to ME as he could, with other peoples money.

I read Silence of the Lambs before the film. I was a bit meh about it, where as everyone else seeing it was raving. I was meh as it dropped stuff, changed stuff etc
Its the same as happens in just about any conversion, that stuff thats written for film/serialisation doesn't suffer from.

Crossing threads but its going to be interesting to see on Harry Potter.
As someone who has never read the books (I am actually waiting for the new audible conversions with something like 100 actors doing them), I didn't have the issue of things having been changed.
I suspect for many people the films are the definitive version of Potter, at least for now.
Potter will be interesting, obviously JKR is still alive and we know has strong views on some things but her views on other stuff that would be considered woke do not seem to be in the public arena.
One other thing thats interesting is she has strong female characters already so thats not lacking, its already more modern than stuff written by old white blokes who only really wrote strong white men as the good guys (JRRT in particular)
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I don't have the greatest memory but...

Harry Potter books and the movies aren't hugely different from one another.

LOTR has some chunks missing but nothing essential and the characters are mostly true to the book. An actor might not be who you had in your head, but that happens. I would suggest its a story that's different experience as a book vs a film. I think you get different things from the different media.

Wheel of time TV show for the book reader wrecks your head. It's both familiar and alien at the same time. But not in a good way.
 
PlacidCasual said:
Having read the WoT in its entirety at least twice and some of the earlier books an extra time I might be called an Ultra and having discussed the books and the series with other book fans I'm not sure I've ever spoken to anyone who doesn't think the books themselves let alone the a TV series based on the books didn't need serious pruning. Most criticisms of the TV series from book readers I've read is not the cuts but the new creative choices that undermine some of the key character arcs or progressions for seemingly unintelligible reasons. A TV show based on the best 25% of the books would probably meet most book readers expectations as long as the crappy original ideas were kept to a m,inimum, say 0%.
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This is it entirely.

The bones of Wheel of time books are fantastic. But it lost focus and wandered something awful in the middle. I speed read/ skipped huge chucks of it. Both when I originally read it as a kid, and when I re-read after it was finished. It's a classic how not to write a story. Too many characters too many story arcs. But yet equally lots of great stuff.

The TV was painful to watch. I'm not surprised it got cancelled.
 
OspreyO said:
The TV was painful to watch. I'm not surprised it got cancelled.
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My main criticism personally is that it spent far too much time with the characters talking about doing things rather than doing them and essentially running on the spot. I actually enjoyed quite a bit of the show in the bits when it got moving and it was nice to see a show that was consistent (mostly) for the mechanics and visuals for things like the powers used and how they affected the outcome of fights, etc. - which is probably lost on a lot of viewers.

There were some other aspects which also detracted from it.
 
This show made me start listening to the audio books again when in the car alone and when out walking. I'm on book 7 now (bowl of the winds) and whilst I remember most (think this is my second listen and I've read them twice as well) there is still that occasional little surprise.
 
OspreyO said:
This is it entirely.

The bones of Wheel of time books are fantastic. But it lost focus and wandered something awful in the middle. I speed read/ skipped huge chucks of it. Both when I originally read it as a kid, and when I re-read after it was finished. It's a classic how not to write a story. Too many characters too many story arcs. But yet equally lots of great stuff.

The TV was painful to watch. I'm not surprised it got cancelled.
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My experience with the some of the middle books, maybe Jordan was already unwell when he wrote those. However the story picks up again when Sanderson takes over, much more action focused, less navel gazing and definitely much less ruminating over how many corporal punishment strokes a character was receiving!
 
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I almost thought Sanderson rushed it all, and there was almost too much happening to the point that it lessened the impact of pivotal months. But I guess it still took 2 weeks. So maybe he had no choice.
 
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