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

I watched the first season and just noticed season 2 is on seems 0 advertising.

First episode recap realised i cannot remember anything that happened in the first season. Starts weird and even more wtf is going on, fell asleep before the end. Will have to try watching whole episode again.
 
RobHu said:
Yeah no idea what they are thinking with that. They could've just had her accompany Egwene/Nynaeve to the white tower and shown the stuff she was doing off-screen(page) during the great hunt (finding information about the prophecies, forsaken etc), along with some kind of white tower politics plotline that conveniently ties up with getting her where she needs to be at the end of the book.
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It makes me wonder if they'll change her book arc from what happens in book 5 so shes present for the entirety of the TV series.
 
Episide 4 was bit confusing.

I hope they are world building more before they unleash Rand, Perrin & Matt. Matt after all was the best storyline in the books.
 
I really struggled with Episode 4, in fact I gave up after 20 minutes. I'll have another go but it's so jarringly different to the books I'm struggling to watch it. I almost feel like talking about the books is barely spoilers in most cases. But I'll refrain.
 
PlacidCasual said:
I really struggled with Episode 4, in fact I gave up after 20 minutes. I'll have another go but it's so jarringly different to the books I'm struggling to watch it. I almost feel like talking about the books is barely spoilers in most cases. But I'll refrain.
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To me, the TV series is like someone being described the synopsis of all the books onto one page, and read it to the writers backwards.

Because the writer Judkins and the rest of the writers have been proven to be clueless.

Game of Thrones series eight is a masterpiece compared to what they have come up with so far. In Series one and two of the WOT. At least I could watch GOT, this series is unwatchable.

Yes, I understand that a TV series cannot hope to encompass the books huge plot. But the writers have proven ignorant even with this basic idea, they have gone so far off the reservation it beggars belief...
 
Ah, it’s getting a lot better now for me with episode 4 finished. Although I am terribly confused - the man at the end of season one who Moiraine and Rand fought - he isn’t the Dark One but Ishmael? Is that right? And if so, then where is the Dark One?
 
VonScar said:
To me, the TV series is like someone being described the synopsis of all the books onto one page, and read it to the writers backwards.

Because the writer Judkins and the rest of the writers have been proven to be clueless.

Game of Thrones series eight is a masterpiece compared to what they have come up with so far. In Series one and two of the WOT. At least I could watch GOT, this series is unwatchable.

Yes, I understand that a TV series cannot hope to encompass the books huge plot. But the writers have proven ignorant even with this basic idea, they have gone so far off the reservation it beggars belief...
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I think you have to let the books go. It's not that story. I agree though it makes it a confused mess for anyone who's familiar with the books. Very difficult to watch.

So its for a global audience who haven't read the books. Weird but ok. But they just plundered the books to sell it. That's doesn't sit right with me.

If you've not read the books. Don't. It will ruin the TV for you. Imo.
 
OspreyO said:
I think you have to let the books go. It's not that story. I agree though it makes it a confused mess for anyone who's familiar with the books. Very difficult to watch.

So its for a global audience who haven't read the books. Weird but ok. But they just plundered the books to sell it. That's doesn't sit right with me.

If you've not read the books. Don't. It will ruin the TV for you. Imo.
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This is a valid point. The books this is not.

However, the TV show in isolation is also to put it simply, terrible. And I am not seeing improvement.

I am not seeing the global audience embracing it either.
 
Why ? It happens time and time and time again.

Just the usual uber nerds having internet ********* millenial tantrums or UNSMT saying how they are not following the source material to the letter. Same thing is happening with Foundation.
 
It's one thing to make changes to suit TV format and generally follow the story. It's another to change it so its unintelligible for book readers.

We must be close to Idiocracy if reading a book makes you a nerd, and discussing something is a tantrum.
 
Foundation is changed massively from the books. But it's different enough and coherent enough to make sense on its own.

Both the books and TV show are quite unconventional stories. Doing something different isn't entirely out of character.
 
I guess we've seen things like the Expanse where they cut out plenty of material and tightened up the plot to accommodate a TV show and it really worked. Here and there they combined characters, cut out arcs that could be bypassed in other ways and still told the core story. This is a long way from following the core story, some of the key characters have seemingly been re-written and unlike The Expanse it's really jarring. The Boy's is different again, they have just written a different story for some characters inspired by the comic, it's reached that so different the cord is snapped. The Wheel of time inhabits an unhappy place in between, for the book readers.

Although I am always amazed at the arrogance of paying large sums of money for Intellectual Property and then assuming you can make it better by changing most of it.
 
Exactly.

The expanse TV show is especially good adaptation considering how dense the material in the books is. Can't see the wood for the trees in the books.

I agree. Why not be honest about wanting to make your own story. I suspect, its a leveraging tactic to get funding. Then they use that to make something else.

That said, if they are getting the viewing numbers its hit a chord with some people. Maybe they'll remake Thomas Covenant, as a musical.
 
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OspreyO said:
Foundation is changed massively from the books. But it's different enough and coherent enough to make sense on its own.

Both the books and TV show are quite unconventional stories. Doing something different isn't entirely out of character.
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I'm not overly familiar with the books but with Foundation I think mostly the changes are to things which don't work well as a TV show or would require a lot of dead show time for no real reason like things where the timeline might be changed from say 30,000 years to 300 years, etc. which sometimes necessitates combing or replacing characters, etc. rather than go their own way with it entirely.
 
Rroff said:
I'm not overly familiar with the books but with Foundation I think mostly the changes are to things which don't work well as a TV show or would require a lot of dead show time for no real reason like things where the timeline might be changed from say 30,000 years to 300 years, etc. which sometimes necessitates combing or replacing characters, etc. rather than go their own way with it entirely.
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There's some good synopsis of the changes online. I read the books a long time ago, and never re-read them. Whereas I've re-read things like Dune, etc. Even now I've no urge to reread foundation again. I think the ideas are the best part of it, not the books or the writing itself. When I watched the TV show, it was so different, they are mostly disconnected for me.

I would say the same of the expanse books. I'm not getting more from the story reading the books.
 
Two obvious adaptions done well, Dune 2021, and Lord of the Rings 2001 (not The Rings of Power).

They have both kept the essence of the source material, but changed it enough to get it on the big screen. Oh, and both have done it with 2-to-3 hours of runtime...vs the 8-to-10 hours for this TV show.

I liked House of the Dragon, however, for good or bad, I have not read the source book for that show. But importantly the calibre of acting, scripts, direction and special effects put WOT (the TV show) to shame. I have re-watched the first series recently and it impressed (it is not perfect) in many aspects. But House of the Dragon has something The Wheel of Time is badly missing, talent.
 
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It seems we will be getting Aviendha in the next episode. It's a lot earlier than the books but they need to crack on with the storyline considering how badly the books dragged things out. Am really looking forward to the Mat storyline the most, raise the flag for The Band of the Red Hand! Give him his hat and ashandarei!
 
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VonScar said:
Two obvious adaptions done well, Dune 2021, and Lord of the Rings 2001 (not The Rings of Power).

They have both kept the essence of the source material, but changed it enough to get it on the big screen. Oh, and both have done it with 2-to-3 hours of runtime...vs the 8-to-10 hours for this TV show.

I liked House of the Dragon, however, for good or bad, I have not read the source book for that show. But importantly the calibre of acting, scripts, direction and special effects put WOT (the TV show) to shame. I have re-watched the first series recently and it impressed (it is not perfect) in many aspects. But House of the Dragon has something The Wheel of Time is badly missing, talent.
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Movies generally working well doesn't seem too surprising to me, it's when you have to maintain viewership across dozens of hours at risk of it all being made pointless by corporate pulling the plug that things get awkward. Especially bad when the source material is uhh lengthy.
 
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