• Most new users don't bother reading our rules. Here's the one that is ignored almost immediately upon signup: DO NOT ASK FOR FANEDIT LINKS PUBLICLY. First, read the FAQ. Seriously. What you want is there. You can also send a message to the editor. If that doesn't work THEN post in the Trade & Request forum. Anywhere else and it will be deleted and an infraction will be issued.
  • If this is your first time here please read our FAQ and Rules pages. They have some useful information that will get us all off on the right foot, especially our Own the Source rule. If you do not understand any of these rules send a private message to one of our staff for further details.
  • Please read our Rules & Guidelines

    Want to get your edit apporved? Read these tips

Wheel of Time - Amazon Prime

Moe_Syzlak

Moe_Syzlak

Well-known member
Trusted Reviewer
Messages
3,606
Reaction score
1,304
Trophy Points
118
Some of you know from my book reviews that I read this series at the beginning of the year. Well the long (COVID-19) delayed tv series is coming in November and today the first trailer dropped.


My first impressions are pretty lukewarm. I like the look and feel of the characters, but the tone doesn’t feel right for the first book. The first book is very FotR/ leaving the Shire like. Now I’m sure they’ve strung together a lot of the more intense sequences for the trailer, but still it didn’t hit home for me. The other thing is that it feels very bright. I’m sure they didn’t want to have the look too close to Game of Thrones but I think that darker, grittier look helped that show to make some early dodgy CGI look better. Here it just looks pretty cheap IMO. I’ll watch the first season no matter what. It’s the second season that I’ll need to be sold on.
 
I'll reserve judgement until I watch it but I agree with your assessment so far.
 
I have not read the Wheel of Time, but to me the whole thing looks incredibly generic and says nothing to me about what makes the Wheel of TIme different to any other fantasy world. The music for the trailer doesn't help, which sounds like its been copied and pasted from every modern trailer ever.
 
Also, hello, Mouth of Sauron:

1630601931466.png
 
The Scribbling Man said:
I have not read the Wheel of Time, but to me the whole thing looks incredibly generic and says nothing to me about what makes the Wheel of TIme different to any other fantasy world. The music for the trailer doesn't help, which sounds like its been copied and pasted from every modern trailer ever.
Click to expand...
Part of the problem, I assume, for this show is that, though the books start very much evoking LotR (intentionally according to the author), much of the subsequent original narrative has been the influence for GoT and other fantasy works since. So the strong female characters won’t feel unique, the politics and machinations won’t feel unique, etc. But if they tell the story well, I think it will be good. It’s definitely way more magicy than GoT, which I’m skeptical as to how well that will translate to the screen. But I agree that the trailer itself does al ist nothing to convey what’s going on here. It’s a “teaser” rather than a full trailer that generally gives you more of a feel for a story and its tone. But still…


The Scribbling Man said:
Also, hello, Mouth of Sauron:

View attachment 482
Click to expand...

To be fair, Robert Jordan is nothing if not exhaustively descriptive and that’s a pretty spot on Myrdraal (sp?) from the books, which were written long before Jackson’s Eye of Sauron hit screens. To the best of my recollection the Eye of Sauron was not represented this way in the books.
 
Last edited:
I have anticipated that someone would milk Jordan's masterpieces for a series of movies or shows since I heard they were making the Hobbit movies and Game of Thrones. It's only natural. Same with Foundation. I have high expectations for both. These were very important worlds for me to fall into as a teenager.

I have never allowed a trailer to sum up the whole of the parts for me. I've always saw them as a little taste or sniff of whats to come.
 
ArtisDead said:
I have never allowed a trailer to sum up the whole of the parts for me. I've always saw them as a little taste or sniff of whats to come.
Click to expand...

Amen to that. The Phantom Menace teaser was amazing! 🤣
 
Looks promising to me. Generic-ish fantasy? Sure, but the books pretty much were too. I suspect the trailer won't pull out much of the detailed machinations of the books. I'm not surprised to read that WoT had some influence on GoT (Song of Ice & Fire) since the multiple, intertwining plots, schemes, and machinations felt like it came from there. I will certainly be watching the first season, and Foundation as well.
 
Having watched the teaser a few more times I’m much more positive than I was initially. I think the music, which is NOT by the show’s composer, really threw me. The images themselves, once parsed, actually work for me very well as someone who recently read the books. I’m still not sold on the lighting, but that’s my only major reservation at this point.
 
Dont see that series yet, but seems intrusting from what i read here and on other forum
 
Well, nobody's seen it yet. Two more days until it starts streaming. My wife and I will definitely watch the first episode (and probably the whole series).
 
Actually a lot of people have seen it. It had its premiere on Monday, though it goes live on Prime on Friday. The fans that have seen it are pretty overwhelmingly positive. The critics? Not so much. This may stem from expectations. It seems people that aren’t familiar with the books were expecting another GoT. And, especially with the first book, it’s way more LotR than GoT. Or it could be the fans that got an early look got swept up in the hype (anyone remember AICN’s raving early review of Phantom Menace?). Either way, I’m glad it’s been renewed through season three. I assume things will get compressed and it won’t follow a season per book formula. And book four is really where this series came into its own IMO.
 
It’s… not bad. Predictably, lots of fans are bemoaning any changes from the books. To me, it is a pretty faithful adaptation. But it’s an adaptation. You’re never going to get a word for word filming of a book and the closer movies have been to that, the worse they are for it, IMO. That said, I struggled with the first book in the series when I read it at the beginning of this year due to it feeling like LotR fan fiction. I’ve heard that Jordan did that intentionally, but this series leans into that hard so far. It just doesn’t feel original at all. It has a big budget and it shows. The actors are good and the adaptation is pretty solid. But it’s just pretty “been there, done that.” As I said above, I’m glad it has been renewed through three seasons because I think it will take that long to get to where the books really come into their own given how faithful the adaptation is so far.
 
Watched the first two episodes. After watching number one, my wife wanted to watch the next right away. Then it was too late to watch 3 yet. So, yes, we are enjoying it so far.

It's been a number of years since either of us read the books, and we both want to go back an read them again. I was remembering the broads stokes of the scenes, and it's a pretty good adaptation IMHO. I did like that they spent a few minutes up front to give a 30,000 foot view of what the historical motivation for what the Aer Sedai are up to. It helps put their motivation into some kind of context. I do remember that reading the books there was a bit of "why the heck is Moiraine doing that? What's going on?"

I was a little concerned with the casting at first, but the actors quickly settled into their characters and that aspect is all good so far.
 
Brandon Sanderson is a consulting producer (he wrote the last 3 books) and he says we should go into it with the mindset of this being another turning of the Wheel (for the people who have read the book). He very much enjoyed the whole show, says there's a 10/10 episode in there somewhere.

I myself have only read book 1, decided to wait on 2 until after the show.
 
Stromboli Bones said:
Brandon Sanderson is a consulting producer (he wrote the last 3 books) and he says we should go into it with the mindset of this being another turning of the Wheel (for the people who have read the book). He very much enjoyed the whole show, says there's a 10/10 episode in there somewhere.

I myself have only read book 1, decided to wait on 2 until after the show.
Click to expand...
So far the biggest departures from the books are the backstories they give Mat and Perrin. I personally think those backstories work as a shorthand for a broad audience to quickly understand the characters’ demeanors and motivations. But many book fans absolutely hate it. Also, the Whitecloaks are much more of an intimidating force than the books and I think the story is better for it. Obviously we also have the aging up of the main characters l, which also is a positive change IMO. Looking towards the future, I think Logain will clearly have a much larger role than in the first book. And my hope is that they make significant changes to the book’s ending, which frankly didn’t work well for me and doesn’t work well within the larger series in hindsight.
 
Looks kinda like Hercules with Kevin Sorbo. Cheap, generic fantasy/LOTR wannabe. Couldn't even get past to the end of the trailer.

Ok, now back to waiting for Witcher season 2 :p
 
Gieferg said:
Looks kinda like Hercules with Kevin Sorbo. Cheap, generic fantasy/LOTR wannabe. Couldn't even get past to the end of the trailer.

Ok, now back to waiting for Witcher season 2 :p
Click to expand...
It definitely took heavy inspirations from LotR and starts out much the same way, but takes a more modern approach, and it deviates more and more as it goes. on.

It also has MUCH more detailed character work.
 
Stromboli Bones said:
It definitely took heavy inspirations from LotR and starts out much the same way, but takes a more modern approach, and it deviates more and more as it goes. on.

It also has MUCH more detailed character work.
Click to expand...
As I was reading the books, I almost gave up early on as it did feel like LotR fan fiction. But later I started to feel like it made A Song of Ice and Fire feel like Wheel of Time fan fiction. The rich characterization (for fantasy) and the political intrigue seems to have definitely influenced that series. Wheel of Time definitely leans harder into the fantasy tropes, however. And those tropes are likely forever tied to Tolkien.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom