Wheel of Time series on Amazon

[Fishking]

I've read the books, quite a task for sure, and the series is now out. I'm on Ep 3 and so far it's pretty good. I think the chemistry of the actors aren't bad for the beginning of a series (always takes time for things to fall into place). It's taking me a bit to get used to seeing characters I only pictured in my head but it's falling into place.

 

[Cardinal]

I've read the books, quite a task for sure, and the series is now out. I'm on Ep 3 and so far it's pretty good. I think the chemistry of the actors aren't bad for the beginning of a series (always takes time for things to fall into place). It's taking me a bit to get used to seeing characters I only pictured in my head but it's falling into place.

I got up to book eight before the series ultimately collapsed under its own weight, the insufferable pacing and more characters with similar sounding names than you’ve ever imagined possible. Also, do you like tertiary characters who slow the story to the speed of continental drift? Then you’re gonna love Wheel Of Time!

The world-building was amazing, but the writing, narrative style and dialogue were absolute dog shit. I’m curious if the show is capable taking the good (the world-building) and adding good dialogue and pacing to it. Also, if they slash roughly 2/3rds the number of characters they might have something really good here.

For those thinking, “Gee Cardinal, getting to book eight is kind of impressive for such a bad book series,” you’re underestimating the importance of really good world-building. Also the series only started to slow down by book five, meaning that I didn’t realize what was happening to the pacing until I was already completely invested in the story.

The pacing got to be like getting into the exit lane to get off the freeway, and the car in front of you starts slowing down way too early for no good reason, you’ve still got half a mile to go and now it’s awkward to pass around him. And you’re now going 25mph and screaming, “Hey! Let’s get a ****ing move on here!!”

 

[Cardinal]

7.6/10 on imdb. That’s...pretty good. .2 better than Foundation, and while that’s certainly not a perfect series it’s still quite enjoyable.

To be clear though, book 1 was pretty great (the story; not the writing), and books 2-5 were good, so the tv series has about 5 good seasons in it before the writers have to start making serious overhauls to the source material.

 

[Redress]

I got up to book eight before the series ultimately collapsed under its own weight

I made it to I think book 5. There was an interesting story, and a great world in there, somewhere, but Jordan was not a good enough writer to pull it off. In addition to what you mention, I think his biggest sin is not following the advice beginning writers are given to show, not tell. Don't tell me a thousand times that the one girl tugs on her braid when angry, just have her tug on her braid when she is angry and let the reader figure it out(it won't take long). To take 4 pages, multiple times each volume, explaining that she does that is just maddening.

 

[Cardinal]

I made it to I think book 5. There was an interesting story, and a great world in there, somewhere, but Jordan was not a good enough writer to pull it off. In addition to what you mention, I think his biggest sin is not following the advice beginning writers are given to show, not tell. Don't tell me a thousand times that the one girl tugs on her braid when angry, just have her tug on her braid when she is angry and let the reader figure it out(it won't take long). To take 4 pages, multiple times each volume, explaining that she does that is just maddening.

Remove the mentions of chicks tugging their hair and 14 books are reduced to 12.

You got out before the list of tertiary and quaternary characters (all of which have similar sounding names) stopped the story dead in its tracks. People complained that Game of Thrones had too many characters, and I’m always like, “Man, you’ve clearly never heard of Wheel of Time.”

I can’t prove this, but I just know it’s true: Robert Jordan realized he had a killer idea, and knowing that writers are lucky to have even just one good idea, he stretched the series out for as long as possible. We all laughed and said that at this rate he would die before finishing the series. Then he died before he could finish the series.

 

[Fishking]

I got up to book eight before the series ultimately collapsed under its own weight, the insufferable pacing and more characters with similar sounding names than you’ve ever imagined possible. Also, do you like tertiary characters who slow the story to the speed of continental drift? Then you’re gonna love Wheel Of Time!

I finished the whole thing, just one more thing I'm better than you at

But seriously, you hit the nail on the head. I'm a pretty patient reader, having read LotR about 7 times (gd songs everywhere!). He develops side characters more than main characters in other books and then they are all split apart, requiring their own individual story arcs. You end up reading a 1K book and only like a week of chronological time had passed, with some characters basically untouched. It's pretty rough.

For me it was really good to about book 6 before it turned more into an act of will than enjoyment.

The pacing got to be like getting into the exit lane to get off the freeway, and the car in front of you starts slowing down way too early for no good reason, you’ve still got half a mile to go and now it’s awkward to pass around him. And you’re now going 25mph and screaming, “Hey! Let’s get a ****ing move on here!!”

 

[Fishking]

Remove the mentions of chicks tugging their hair and 14 books are reduced to 12.

You got out before the list of tertiary and quaternary characters (all of which have similar sounding names) stopped the story dead in its tracks. People complained that Game of Thrones had too many characters, and I’m always like, “Man, you’ve clearly never heard of Wheel of Time.”

I can’t prove this, but I just know it’s true: Robert Jordan realized he had a killer idea, and knowing that writers are lucky to have even just one good idea, he stretched the series out for as long as possible. We all laughed and said that at this rate he would die before finishing the series. Then he died before he could finish the series.

Dictating it from his deathbed to another author, which then still took 3 books to finish off, and I don't think it could've been wrapped up any quicker. I'd like to be more generous with his mindset and think that he had an idea to create this giant story with people that he had in his head and then got lost in his own world that he built.

 

[Fishking]

7.6/10 on imdb. That’s...pretty good. .2 better than Foundation, and while that’s certainly not a perfect series it’s still quite enjoyable.

To be clear though, book 1 was pretty great (the story; not the writing), and books 2-5 were good, so the tv series has about 5 good seasons in it before the writers have to start making serious overhauls to the source material.

Special effects we decent for the Trollocs. The special effects for the Aes Sadai were even better, with a pretty unique and well done stylization.

 

[TheDoctorWasIn]

I got up to book eight before the series ultimately collapsed under its own weight, the insufferable pacing and more characters with similar sounding names than you’ve ever imagined possible. Also, do you like tertiary characters who slow the story to the speed of continental drift? Then you’re gonna love Wheel Of Time!

The world-building was amazing, but the writing, narrative style and dialogue were absolute dog shit. I’m curious if the show is capable taking the good (the world-building) and adding good dialogue and pacing to it. Also, if they slash roughly 2/3rds the number of characters they might have something really good here.

For those thinking, “Gee Cardinal, getting to book eight is kind of impressive for such a bad book series,” you’re underestimating the importance of really good world-building. Also the series only started to slow down by book five, meaning that I didn’t realize what was happening to the pacing until I was already completely invested in the story.

The pacing got to be like getting into the exit lane to get off the freeway, and the car in front of you starts slowing down way too early for no good reason, you’ve still got half a mile to go and now it’s awkward to pass around him. And you’re now going 25mph and screaming, “Hey! Let’s get a ****ing move on here!!”

None of this is wrong - but the last four books are better than the middle six.

Jordan did turn things around in his last book (Knife of Dreams), and Sanderson spent the last three books doing everything he could to tie up all of Jordan's loose ends in a way that worked.

 

[TheDoctorWasIn]

Special effects we decent for the Trollocs. The special effects for the Aes Sadai were even better, with a pretty unique and well done stylization.

I appreciate they went with rubber suits for the trollocs, instead of CGI.

 

[Fishking]

I appreciate they went with rubber suits for the trollocs, instead of CGI.

Lots of GCI for animated characters is REALLY hard to pull off believably and if it's off just a little bit, it can be jarring.

 

[TheDoctorWasIn]

Remove the mentions of chicks tugging their hair and 14 books are reduced to 12.

This is a funny statement, and possibly literally true.

 

[Cardinal]

None of this is wrong - but the last four books are better than the middle six.

Jordan did turn things around in his last book (Knife of Dreams), and Sanderson spent the last three books doing everything he could to tie up all of Jordan's loose ends in a way that worked.

Getting back into a series like this after ~20 years is no small deal. It would be nice if book 9 came with a YouTube video that starts with “In last season of The Wheel of Time...”

 

[Cardinal]

This is a funny statement, and possibly literally true.

Eliminate all instances of women sniffing and adjusting their boobs and we’re down to 11.

I think Robert Jordan may have been effectively making 12 book-long “bags of sand” comment and we kept missing it.

 

[Cardinal]

Eliminate all instances of Rand and Co. thinking or saying, “Golly! By the Dark One’s fire! (Or whatever they say - I forget). Women make no gosh darned sense!” Now you’re down to eight books.

 

[Cardinal]

Lots of GCI for animated characters is REALLY hard to pull off believably and if it's off just a little bit, it can be jarring.

That reminds me of an uncelebrated but important feature of Paranormal Activity. The movie was shot on a budget of about $500, so guess what? No CGI for them. The result is you never see the demon, which remains unknowable and therefore terrifying throughout the movie. Then another found footage haunting movie with about the same budget shows the monster, and any possibility of it being scary is destroyed forever, because it’s impossible to be scared of something you can’t stop laughing at.

 

[Fishking]

Updating after having watched episode 4. This latest episode, while it still is straying from the books (at this point I'm just accepting things are going to be different) and has some disjointedness to it, it got a lot better and gives me hope that it will continue to improve.

 

[Slartibartfast]

That last episode was pretty good I think. Different from the book, but like the starship troopers movie, good in its own way even if different.

 

[Goshin]

I read the first 6 or 7 books back in the 90s, before I lost interest and quit reading them.

My opinion of the books was they were not bad, but not great either. Jordan (imho) wanted to be the new Tolkien of the 21st c but didn't quite have the chops. Still, it was good enough that I remembered it and was interested in the TV series.

I try, hard, to judge movies/tv and the books they are based on separately. By preference, I like to watch the show first and THEN read the books... the books inevitably have much more content, and there's less spoilage that way.

But in many cases it is the other way around, because the movie/tv version comes out 10-20 years later, so I try to just go with it as what it is.

In this case, I like the show reasonably well. I think the scenery is great, I like the practical effects, the acting is decent, the story is interesting. Yes I know it departs from the books substantially, but I don't think that can be helped so I'm trying to set it aside.

LOTR was very different from the books, but I still loved it. The Expanse kept closer to the books than any other series I've known, as was just as good as the books. Most others fall short but hey that's life. Yes I'm looking at you Foundation!

Petty criticism:
Everyone in a show doesn't have to be beautiful, but Egwene in the show is .... well, it is hard for me to believe anyone is pining after her that hard. She certain does not appeal to me.

A bit stereotypical that the Red Faction leader looks like she could chew gravel and break rocks with her chin.

Still, I'm enjoying it. It's better than most of the crap on TV, like Apple's Invasion.

 

[maxparrish]

I've not read the books and after looking at the first episode it's also clear I won't see the remainder of this series.

As has become typical of SciFi, it's just another transparent and contrived exercise in "gender" and "diversity" mania presented in an unentertaining and cartoonishly contrived package. However, unlike other "Amazon Women" rule men nonsense, the characters in this farce range from unattractive to ugly...save for Pike.

I suppose there is an audience for this sort of tripe, wherein there is a village setting of a British accented united nations of colored races and miscegenatics all co-mingling in a mishmash under a female ruled society... but most audiences really can't relate to this sort of manipulated "woke" fantasy as a relatable context...even for a fantasy world.

This is the reason that I gladly watch South Korean, Polish, Turkish and other national people's stories with their national casting... within their social and ethnic context (e.g. Squid Game) they resonate on a real basis. Even Game of Thrones was intelligent enough to make geographic origins account for color differences among peoples.

Bye the way, a SciFi show that does a better (although not perfect) job of creating a relatable multi racial context is The Expanse... one of the few really good Sci Fi's on streaming.

 

[Slartibartfast]

I've not read the books and after looking at the first episode it's also clear I won't see the remainder of this series.

As has become typical of SciFi, it's just another transparent and contrived exercise in "gender" and "diversity" mania presented in an unentertaining and cartoonishly contrived package. However, unlike other "Amazon Women" rule men nonsense, the characters in this farce range from unattractive to ugly...save for Pike.

I suppose there is an audience for this sort of tripe, wherein a British accented united nations of colored races and miscegenatics all co-mingling in a mishmash under a female ruled society... but most audiences really can't relate to this sort of manipulated "woke" social fantasy as a relatable context...even for a fantasy.

This is the reason that I gladly watch South Korean, Polish, Turkish and other national people's stories... within their social and ethnic context (e.g. Squid Game) they resonate on a real basis. Even Game of Thrones was intelligent enough to make geographic origins account for color differences among peoples.

Bye the way, a SciFi show that does a better (although not perfect) job of creating a relatable multi racial context is The Expanse... one of the few really good Sci Fi's on streaming.

The reason for that is because in the world of the wheel of time everyone was scattered a few thousand years ago where the very continents were torn up due to a major cataclysm.

Also if you are concerned about wokeness, you should hang on long enough to see the Seanchan, the aiel, or the black tower. They will very much confound your expectations. Also the most feminist group are one of the major villains of the series. Also there’s the whole matter of perrin’s wife and her love of domineering men along with her sheer pointlessness in the book series

Oh and male dominated polygamy is there too.

I do hope that the series last long enough so that a character not yet introduced completes her 900 page quest for a bath.

 

[Cardinal]

So far we’re digging the show. The pacing, direction, acting and flow are all pretty decent, and it’s handling the world-building fairly well (at least for now). The production is a little on the cheap side, but you know what other show had a small budget in the first season? Game of Thrones. I imagine that upon conclusion of the first season, the HBO board meeting went something like this.

“Sir, the ratings for Game of Thrones are through the roof.”
CEO: “Sign it up for another season. Also give it more money.”
“How much money, sir?”
CEO: “ALL THE MONEY.”

 

[Cardinal]

I've not read the books and after looking at the first episode it's also clear I won't see the remainder of this series.

As has become typical of SciFi, it's just another transparent and contrived exercise in "gender" and "diversity" mania presented in an unentertaining and cartoonishly contrived package. However, unlike other "Amazon Women" rule men nonsense, the characters in this farce range from unattractive to ugly...save for Pike.

I suppose there is an audience for this sort of tripe, wherein there is a village setting of a British accented united nations of colored races and miscegenatics all co-mingling in a mishmash under a female ruled society... but most audiences really can't relate to this sort of manipulated "woke" fantasy as a relatable context...even for a fantasy world.

This is the reason that I gladly watch South Korean, Polish, Turkish and other national people's stories with their national casting... within their social and ethnic context (e.g. Squid Game) they resonate on a real basis. Even Game of Thrones was intelligent enough to make geographic origins account for color differences among peoples.

Bye the way, a SciFi show that does a better (although not perfect) job of creating a relatable multi racial context is The Expanse... one of the few really good Sci Fi's on streaming.

Yep, you definitely haven’t read the books.

 

[Slartibartfast]

I wish Lan was less touchy-feely, very different from the books.