[TV] The Wheel of Time

[Daedius]

^

Only watched first two episodes of season 1 then dropped it like a hot potato... for a hidden isolated village it has literally every race represented in it for that extra diversity making it look beyond ridiculous.

[Nymrohd]

This is a VERY GOOD QUESTION for Wheel of Time, but also for so many of the other properties that have been adapted rcently.

Why the focus on diversity? Why are the showrunners/writers focused on it? Why are the fans focused on it? Why does it matter?


In a perfect world, it shouldn't. Diversity that just comes about naturally because of the story, changes made to actors because of available talent, and diversity purely due to random chance are normally rolled with by most audiences and celebrated by media. It is a bit odd to celebrate something like that by the media, but they do, and as long as it doesn't detract from the story, so be it.


However, we live in a very, very unperfect world. Showrunners like Rafe (and he is FAR from alone in this) spend alot of time touting how they pick their writers and cast based on diversity, and shower in the praise they get from media outlets. Not too surprising, given those are the people they are going to deal with 90% of the time, but it does make audiences a bit leery.

Why? Because it means that the focus was on how the cast looked and the messaging from the show. Which means the focus CANNOT have been on casting good actors and producing a good show. You can't focus on both of those things, one HAS to take priority.

For Wheel of Time, Rafe came out and said early on that they were going to do a faithful adaptation and that he was a huge RJ fan who wanted to get the show right. Fans were pleased by this and were hopeful. Then he said he was casting for diversity, then he said to expect some pretty major changes, BUT he said that the people he picked were the best for the job and that people would love it.

Then the show came out. People watched, they watched alot (for Amazon...) and they stuck with it, for about the first 3-4 episodes. The characters were NOT good, the actors did a "mostly" bad job, the sets looked pathetic for the amount of money they had to work with, and the writing showed they were going in a VERY different direction.

Then the show veered HARD away from the source material, and people stopped watching. By the end of the season, they were down really far on viewers and the fans were unhappy.


But they weren't nearly this unhappy at the start..... so was it the diversity that caused it? Or was the focus on diversity simply a symptom that the person in charge wasn't serious about doing a good job? Some people knew that going in, but tried to stick with it (me). Some people learned it by watching their favorite series get turned into trash.

But time after time, show after show, movie after movie, the same trend appears. If the people in charge of it are focused on anything other than making a good product, it shows. You get what you aim at. They didn't aim at making a good show....... but it was diverse.

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It is the media you consume. Both sides suck, but to pretend the Left isn't massively more authoritarian than they used to be is just disingenous.

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I expected her to be bad, given she was a former Power Ranger, but her acting wasn't the worst. The scenes they put her in were terrible and her story with Lan was destroyed, but she was one of the better of the bad bunch. She looks nothing like Nynaeve, and having a bunch of braids /= having A long braid.

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Boring actress who looks like she is 20 years older than Rand. I can't wait to see if they try to make her into Elmindreda. That will be laughable to an extreme.

Haven't seen who they cast as Min. Min always was intended to be more mature than Rand but still youthful. I'd say you would cast someone in their 30s for the part, or even 40s (cause this is Hollywood and plenty of people in their 40s still look very much young).

And I don't think diversity really impacted the writers. That is a casting decision. The showrunner wanted to tell a bad story and they just told a bad story. Making everyone in Eamon's field look related won't make Perrin's backstory changing completely any less retarded.

Also if you really want to deal with modern issues and you pick the Wheel of Time, don't shy away from it, lean into it and try to subvert it. There are ways you can read into the books that are just not flattering in the current day; the fact that the Age of Wonders was destroyed because when channelers tried to subvert the gender binary they opened the door for Satan is just not flattering to the books. The novels are completely obsessed with gender. On one hand there is a consistent "Women are from Venus, Men are from Mars" concept. We are bombarded in POVs with men and women that seem completely incapable of understanding the other gender's way of thinking. Saidar is about being passive and surrendering, saidin has to be fought through. The war was lost cause people completely fell under gender lines and men doomed the world by being rush and aggressive. In Jordan's books, lesbians are everywhere, gay men don't seem to exist (well Sanderson added a token gay man). Satan can change your sex but your soul still stays the same gender as before (Balthamel). I mean these are not some deep cuts; I am not reaching here. It is all very much in your face. Then multiple depictions of matriarchy that are culturally focused on denigrating men and allowing women to exercise any power at them, with examples like not being allowed to own property, complete matrileneal inheritance, even allowing women to kill men at will (Altara). And then there are the Seanchan who are just a massive can of worms, what with being a slaver society that is at the same time depicted as far more efficient and far more advanced and offering to everyone other than the slaves a higher standard of living while treating a prominent minority as if they were animals (and by the looks of it, they WIN in the end).
So yeah if you are going to do the Wheel of Time, you either need to NOT care and be willing to go through all its faults and just let it entertain people with what it is good at (and if asked, acknowledge it), or you need exceptional writers who can subvert the narrative. And I doubt the second will work because there is absolutely no room for subtlety in Hollywood's virtue signalling (and really, little appreciation for it in Gen Z because they grew up at a time when communication from all sides has been brutally forward). You are not going to be able to keep the original storyline and not upset people so I don't know, maybe just don't do it all if that's a serious consideration.

[Surfd]

Also take the "ban books" with a grain of salt, half the time by ban they mean the teachers or librarians removed it from lesson plans/didn't stock it, which is the prerogative of said teacher/librarian. Also some of the books I have seen banned feature literal pornography so.

Umm, no. By "ban books" they literally mean: Completely ban these, and make it impossible for ANYONE to read them.

The Republican government of the US state of Missouri recently tabled legislation that will literally defund their public library system, effectively destroying it, as a direct retaliation (literally admitted out of their own mouths) to an ACA lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of other legislation passed by that exact same government mandating the banning of over 300 books from the school library systems. THAT'S how far these shitgoblins are willing to go to control what people can read. They are willing to literally kill public libraries in an ENTIRE STATE just to make sure LGBTQ kids are unrepresented in school library literature.

[Gumble]

the banning of over 300 books from the school library systems. THAT'S how far these shitgoblins are willing to go to control what people can read. They are willing to literally kill public libraries in an ENTIRE STATE just to make sure LGBTQ kids are unrepresented in school library literature.

So I've looked through the list of the books alot of the states who are going through this are not happy about (Texas is doing it too). The vast majority of them contain graphic depictions, if not outright images, of sex acts, often illegal sex acts between adults and minors.

First, why would someone be defending those books?

Second, why would someone want those books provided to children?

Third, is that was "represents" the alphabet people? Frankly I think most Gay and Lesbian people I know are not particularly happy with the rest of the letters that get associated with them, or how those people represent them.



I can't say I'm for banning books, but why were books like these included in any way for distribution to children? I'm not a fan of the man, but if you want to make sure Trump wins again (or someone just like him), tell a bunch of parents you want to force their kids to be exposed to these types of books. You'll quickly find you are in the tiny minority of people that approve of this.

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Haven't seen who they cast as Min. Min always was intended to be more mature than Rand but still youthful. I'd say you would cast someone in their 30s for the part, or even 40s (cause this is Hollywood and plenty of people in their 40s still look very much young).

The actress is in her late 30s, but Min is supposed to be like early to mid 20s at most. The boys are all supposed to be 18-19 at the start of the books, with Egwene being about 16 and Nynaeve being approximately Min's age. They definitely scaled the ages up, but Min's actress should be made to look much younger than she is, and they do the opposite and make her look older. She easily looks like she is older than Moiraine in the show.

And I don't think diversity really impacted the writers. That is a casting decision. The showrunner wanted to tell a bad story and they just told a bad story. Making everyone in Eamon's field look related won't make Perrin's backstory changing completely any less retarded.

If the focus from the people behind the camera isn't on a good story, they push the writers into making crap too. A good example is the Witcher. The writers of these shows are not focused on the story or lore, they are focused on changing the messaging to something they approve of.

Also if you really want to deal with modern issues and you pick the Wheel of Time, don't shy away from it, lean into it and try to subvert it. There are ways you can read into the books that are just not flattering in the current day; the fact that the Age of Wonders was destroyed because when channelers tried to subvert the gender binary they opened the door for Satan is just not flattering to the books. The novels are completely obsessed with gender. On one hand there is a consistent "Women are from Venus, Men are from Mars" concept. We are bombarded in POVs with men and women that seem completely incapable of understanding the other gender's way of thinking. Saidar is about being passive and surrendering, saidin has to be fought through. The war was lost cause people completely fell under gender lines and men doomed the world by being rush and aggressive. In Jordan's books, lesbians are everywhere, gay men don't seem to exist (well Sanderson added a token gay man). Satan can change your sex but your soul still stays the same gender as before (Balthamel). I mean these are not some deep cuts; I am not reaching here. It is all very much in your face. Then multiple depictions of matriarchy that are culturally focused on denigrating men and allowing women to exercise any power at them, with examples like not being allowed to own property, complete matrileneal inheritance, even allowing women to kill men at will (Altara). And then there are the Seanchan who are just a massive can of worms, what with being a slaver society that is at the same time depicted as far more efficient and far more advanced and offering to everyone other than the slaves a higher standard of living while treating a prominent minority as if they were animals (and by the looks of it, they WIN in the end).
So yeah if you are going to do the Wheel of Time, you either need to NOT care and be willing to go through all its faults and just let it entertain people with what it is good at (and if asked, acknowledge it), or you need exceptional writers who can subvert the narrative. And I doubt the second will work because there is absolutely no room for subtlety in Hollywood's virtue signalling (and really, little appreciation for it in Gen Z because they grew up at a time when communication from all sides has been brutally forward). You are not going to be able to keep the original storyline and not upset people so I don't know, maybe just don't do it all if that's a serious consideration.

Ironically, most of what you point out gives credit to Jordan for being ahead of his time in discussing gender.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

So I've looked through the list of the books alot of the states who are going through this are not happy about (Texas is doing it too). The vast majority of them contain graphic depictions, if not outright images, of sex acts, often illegal sex acts between adults and minors.

The apparent Missouri list.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...b7lbg/htmlview

And a few examples.

Batman: The Killing Joke

Watchmen

1984: The Graphic Novel

The Handmaid's Tale: The Graphic Novel

Gender Danger: Survivors of Rape, Human Trafficking and Honor Killing

A Game of Thrones (The Graphic Novel, Multiple Volumes)

The Walking Dead (Multiple Volumes)

Batman: White Knight

African Art: An Introduction

50 Artists You Should Know

50 Sculptures You Should Know

50 Women Artists You Should Know

A History of Art (Essential Library of Cultural History Series)

I’m not gonna go through the whole list but given that they have theses id say it’s unlikely the majority have graphic depictions with minors.

Well unless you count robin getting beat up.

[Gumble]

The apparent Missouri list.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...b7lbg/htmlview

And a few examples.



I’m not gonna go through the whole list but given that they have theses id say it’s unlikely the majority have graphic depictions with minors.

Well unless you count robin getting beat up.

That seems like quite a different list from the one in Texas, though a few books in the MI list do seem to show up consistently.

I did a little looking and it seems they got caught up in the provision of that bill that "specifically bans any depiction or description of sexually explicit material, which include sexual intercourse, genitalia, or “sadomasochistic abuse.”"

and

A district spokesperson....

“The majority of the books that are circulating online and noted as ‘banned pending investigation’ are being returned to our shelves,” said Brynne Cramer, the spokesperson for Wentzville, in an email to Education Week. “They were not ‘banned’ during the review process. The review process was to ensure our library collections are in compliance with SB775.”


So it looks like libraries identified anything that might go against the provision, are having those books reviewed, and then put back if they don't violate it.



While the list certainly looks overboard, the provision (at least as written) I can see being approved by most parents for public consumption of books. If you want your kid reading about sex (straight, gay, or other), then that is fine, but you do it on your own terms.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

That seems like quite a different list from the one in Texas, though a few books in the MI list do seem to show up consistently.

I did a little looking and it seems they got caught up in the provision of that bill that "specifically bans any depiction or description of sexually explicit material, which include sexual intercourse, genitalia, or “sadomasochistic abuse.”"

and

A district spokesperson....

“The majority of the books that are circulating online and noted as ‘banned pending investigation’ are being returned to our shelves,” said Brynne Cramer, the spokesperson for Wentzville, in an email to Education Week. “They were not ‘banned’ during the review process. The review process was to ensure our library collections are in compliance with SB775.”


So it looks like libraries identified anything that might go against the provision, are having those books reviewed, and then put back if they don't violate it.



While the list certainly looks overboard, the provision (at least as written) I can see being approved by most parents for public consumption of books. If you want your kid reading about sex (straight, gay, or other), then that is fine, but you do it on your own terms.

To bring this back around to the actual thread topic, you are aware that the provision as written could ban Wheel of Time given that it has things like rand sleeping with his Aiel girl friend after they run off into the snow naked or the female warder link where they can feel each other having sex.

While wheel of time isn’t as dirty as say the GoT novels id say any provision that could block it is way overboard even if it might block other worse things.

[Gumble]

To bring this back around to the actual thread topic, you are aware that the provision as written could ban Wheel of Time given that it has things like rand sleeping with his Aiel girl friend after they run off into the snow naked or the female warder link where they can feel each other having sex.

While wheel of time isn’t as dirty as say the GoT novels id say any provision that could block it is way overboard even if it might block other worse things.

Possibly, though WoT has some of the most tame sexual dynamics for a fantasy series you can get. That was one thing I always found silly about it.

If you are a person who believes that the Dragon has been reborn, that means the potential end of all existence is approaching. Imagine how much sex would be occurring with the possibility of "no tomorrow" looming over everything.


Though, if we are going to go with what would actually get anyone upset, it will likely be Mat, though he'd never admit it.

[Xath]

Haven't seen who they cast as Min. Min always was intended to be more mature than Rand but still youthful. I'd say you would cast someone in their 30s for the part, or even 40s (cause this is Hollywood and plenty of people in their 40s still look very much young).

And I don't think diversity really impacted the writers. That is a casting decision. The showrunner wanted to tell a bad story and they just told a bad story. Making everyone in Eamon's field look related won't make Perrin's backstory changing completely any less retarded.

Also if you really want to deal with modern issues and you pick the Wheel of Time, don't shy away from it, lean into it and try to subvert it. There are ways you can read into the books that are just not flattering in the current day; the fact that the Age of Wonders was destroyed because when channelers tried to subvert the gender binary they opened the door for Satan is just not flattering to the books. The novels are completely obsessed with gender. On one hand there is a consistent "Women are from Venus, Men are from Mars" concept. We are bombarded in POVs with men and women that seem completely incapable of understanding the other gender's way of thinking. Saidar is about being passive and surrendering, saidin has to be fought through. The war was lost cause people completely fell under gender lines and men doomed the world by being rush and aggressive. In Jordan's books, lesbians are everywhere, gay men don't seem to exist (well Sanderson added a token gay man). Satan can change your sex but your soul still stays the same gender as before (Balthamel). I mean these are not some deep cuts; I am not reaching here. It is all very much in your face. Then multiple depictions of matriarchy that are culturally focused on denigrating men and allowing women to exercise any power at them, with examples like not being allowed to own property, complete matrileneal inheritance, even allowing women to kill men at will (Altara). And then there are the Seanchan who are just a massive can of worms, what with being a slaver society that is at the same time depicted as far more efficient and far more advanced and offering to everyone other than the slaves a higher standard of living while treating a prominent minority as if they were animals (and by the looks of it, they WIN in the end).
So yeah if you are going to do the Wheel of Time, you either need to NOT care and be willing to go through all its faults and just let it entertain people with what it is good at (and if asked, acknowledge it), or you need exceptional writers who can subvert the narrative. And I doubt the second will work because there is absolutely no room for subtlety in Hollywood's virtue signalling (and really, little appreciation for it in Gen Z because they grew up at a time when communication from all sides has been brutally forward). You are not going to be able to keep the original storyline and not upset people so I don't know, maybe just don't do it all if that's a serious consideration.

Bruh Min was like 23 and they cast someone who looked like they were in their late 30s at best. Rand was 19 maybe not even at the start of the story. Egwene was a couple years younger had literally just come of age which would be between 16 to 18 depending on culture, Nynaeve is 24 and was older than Min meanwhile Lan was 45

[Biomega]

Possibly, though WoT has some of the most tame sexual dynamics for a fantasy series you can get.

It's like a harem isekai where MC gets all the girls, but barely anything ever happens between them.

Though I guess he did get one girl pregnant so IDK.

[bledgor]

Umm, no. By "ban books" they literally mean: Completely ban these, and make it impossible for ANYONE to read them.

The Republican government of the US state of Missouri recently tabled legislation that will literally defund their public library system, effectively destroying it, as a direct retaliation (literally admitted out of their own mouths) to an ACA lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of other legislation passed by that exact same government mandating the banning of over 300 books from the school library systems. THAT'S how far these shitgoblins are willing to go to control what people can read. They are willing to literally kill public libraries in an ENTIRE STATE just to make sure LGBTQ kids are unrepresented in school library literature.

Some of them, yes, but I have seen plenty where they just removed it from the curriculum and people claimed it was being banned. So yes sometimes it is BS, sometimes it is justified, and sometimes it isn't, like I said.

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It's like a harem isekai where MC gets all the girls, but barely anything ever happens between them.

Though I guess he did get one girl pregnant so IDK.

IIRC he has twins with Elayne and quadruplets with Aviendha. The only one I dont remember him having kids with is Min.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

It's like a harem isekai where MC gets all the girls, but barely anything ever happens between them.

Though I guess he did get one girl pregnant so IDK.

Rand gets around a fair bit him self, he sleeps with the Aiel girlfriend in i want to say the 5th or 6th book then takes turns with her and the queen girl in like book 8/9, and there are likely abunch of other times I'm forgetting. think Min is the only one he doesn't sleep with multiple times before the end.

I think Mat is actually the one who gets the least (mabye no?) sex surprisingly.

[Deln]

Rand gets around a fair bit him self, he sleeps with the Aiel girlfriend in i want to say the 5th or 6th book then takes turns with her and the queen girl in like book 8/9, and there are likely abunch of other times I'm forgetting. think Min is the only one he doesn't sleep with multiple times before the end.

I think Mat is actually the one who gets the least (mabye no?) sex surprisingly.

Mat was basically a sex slave to Tylin.

[bledgor]

Mat was basically a sex slave to Tylin.

I enjoyed that arc, was sad what happened to Tylin.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Mat was basically a sex slave to Tylin.

I remember him being a slave to her for a time but is it ever explicitly sexual? Mabye I just don't remember it.

I know Parrin got it on a fair bit with his wife.

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Ah actually I was thinking of Tuon, I don't actually remember Tylin and Mat at all.

[rhorle]

Ah actually I was thinking of Tuon, I don't actually remember Tylin and Mat at all.

It was a role reversal that type of thing that saw Mat being chased instead of him doing the chasing. It did get a little dark at times like being forced at knife point and he was a male mistress. He seemed to like it as well since he is shown growing to like being lord-like and dressing in the fancy clothes. So it wasn't all bad.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

It was a role reversal that type of thing that saw Mat being chased instead of him doing the chasing. It did get a little dark at times like being forced at knife point and he was a male mistress. He seemed to like it as well since he is shown growing to like being lord-like and dressing in the fancy clothes. So it wasn't all bad.

Man wheel of time is such a divisive place for me. On one hand I kinda of want to go through the series again for a reminder, on the other I felt like huge parts of it was a slog even the first time through and I never want to touch again.

I suppose I should be happy that the show is just a solid Ok for me as if it was better it would likely draw me back to the books.

[Gumble]

Rand gets around a fair bit him self, he sleeps with the Aiel girlfriend in i want to say the 5th or 6th book then takes turns with her and the queen girl in like book 8/9, and there are likely abunch of other times I'm forgetting. think Min is the only one he doesn't sleep with multiple times before the end.

I think Mat is actually the one who gets the least (mabye no?) sex surprisingly.

Rand sleeps with Aviendha in the snow, and again towards the end of the series. Min sees her pregnant as well prior to the last battle. He sleeps with Elayne once. He sleeps with Min quite a few times, starting with the time he felt guilty about and she berated him for. Min stays with him quite a bit towards the end and a few times is mentioned that they were sleeping together multiple times.

Perrin only sleeps with Faile, credit him with Beralain after him.

Mat fools around with ALOT of women, hard to know how many he sleeps with, but he doesn't act like Tylin was his first by any measure, so its safe to say a few. Tylin treats him like a sex toy/royal plaything. Tuon and him have sex, as she tells him he got her pregnant and she could kill him now since he gave her an heir. If I recall right, the first time we are made aware of Mat's sexual partners is the Maiden of the Spear/darkfriend he ends up having to kill.

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Man wheel of time is such a divisive place for me. On one hand I kinda of want to go through the series again for a reminder, on the other I felt like huge parts of it was a slog even the first time through and I never want to touch again.

I suppose I should be happy that the show is just a solid Ok for me as if it was better it would likely draw me back to the books.

I re-read the entire series twice since the show came out, because the show was so bad for me that I wanted to wash the taste out of my mouth. The books really aren't that bad outside of Knife of Dreams and Crossroad of Twilight. The others are all reasonably paced and enjoyable re-reads. I've actually re-read AMOL 3 times, once just because I like alot of scenes in it that I can re-read without having to go through the whole story.

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I enjoyed that arc, was sad what happened to Tylin.

The irony is that her death has no purpose, as her son does nothing of note in the story past that and Altara has nearly no importance after it. She was basically fridged. Died to make Mat sad, and arguably push him into wanting to help Moiraine.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

`I re-read the entire series twice since the show came out, because the show was so bad for me that I wanted to wash the taste out of my mouth. The books really aren't that bad outside of Knife of Dreams and Crossroad of Twilight. The others are all reasonably paced and enjoyable re-reads. I've actually re-read AMOL 3 times, once just because I like alot of scenes in it that I can re-read without having to go through the whole story.

Personally pacing wise id say just eye of the world the great hunt shadows rising and mabye memory of light (though that one erks me in different ways) really hold up well.

alot of the middle books just slush together in my memory with to be fair quite a few stand out great points but I would never be able to say what book those points actually come from.

[Gumble]

Personally pacing wise id say just eye of the world the great hunt shadows rising and mabye memory of light (though that one erks me in different ways) really hold up well.

alot of the middle books just slush together in my memory with to be fair quite a few stand out great points but I would never be able to say what book those points actually come from.

Ah I see. Yea I can basically tell you all the major plot points for every book outside of the two I mentioned. Post Cleansing and pre-Sanderson are vague for me still, but everything else I have at quick recall.

I wonder if that has anything to do with why you liked the show better. It is likely harder to be upset about screwed up plot if you don't remember it all that well. (though admittedly you say you recall the first 2 books)

Quick quiz, do you remember Noam without having to look it up?