I will look forward to this with excitement and trepidation in my heart. I read Wheel of Time when I was younger and in love with epic fantasy, so it'll be good to see a favorite in TV form.
The Dragon Reborn is still one of my favorite works of literature, and I'll eagerly await its adaptation.
And now I want to see Kenneth Branagh as Demandred. One over-the-top Shakespearean actor playing an over-the-top Shakespearean villain? Please? Or am I the only one who wants this? >_>
RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Not so much an epic special effects fest, but A Chat with Verin Sedai is a pretty awesome chapter IMO.
Like many others here I'd love to see Dumai's Wells done right.
Some potential pitfalls:
Olver might be an issue for a long running series, because kids age out of roles.
The World of Dreams might end up being super expensive to replicate, what with so many long scenes set there using dream logic.
Olver might be a character that never shows up. There's bound to be tons of those.
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The World of Dreams might end up being super expensive to replicate, what with so many long scenes set there using dream logic.
You can do 90% of that with I dream of genie level camera trickery
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RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Olver might be a character that never shows up. There's bound to be tons of those.
Leaving out Olver would be a pretty big change considering his role in the last book. It's not quite the same as leaving out Random Aes Sedai #423. (Who is of course named with a full backstory in Jordan's notes)
** spoiler omitted **
I worked at a wolf center living in a tent for a few months. If they gave a REALLY big howl, "they have caged shadowkiller" is what went through my head :)
Sean bean as lan. Come on you know you want to..
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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Matt was my favorite from the beginning. Who they cast as Mat will probably determine if I like the show or not.
Since we are talking about quotes and OMGAWESOME moments, AMOL has imho one of the finest quotes and I'm going to paraphrase it here.
"Who says that all heroes must be men?"
If my memory serves me, that's Hopper responding to the Horn of Valere.
I'm a big softy and that quote made me tear up....still does. But to be fair, it wasn't just the quote it was the subtext, what was happening at the time and it was Hopper who I fell in love with back in 1996 when I read Eye of the World.
Agreed. This moment was also such a beautiful callback to "we come, Young Bull. We come."
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 4, Legendary Games
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Not so much an epic special effects fest, but A Chat with Verin Sedai is a pretty awesome chapter IMO.
Verin = one of the best characters in the entire series. And that chapter was her Crowning Moment of Awesome.
cumberbach for ishmael?
Norse,
Maybe but I always thought that perhaps John Hamm could do for Ishmael.
But that's just me.
Honestly everyone loves Matt because he realizes from the get-go, everyone is full of crap.
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Sean bean as lan. Come on you know you want to..
Sean Bean can only be cast if he dies horrifically somehow, isn't that a clause in all of his movie contracts? :-)
Otherwise, great choice!
For mat what are the chances of getting chris pratt some sun orchid elixir?
I'd expect all the younger main cast to be relative unknowns. Characters like Moraine, Thom, etc are the ones who would likely get more established actors.
The only reason I wouldn't want Sean Bean is because all I'd see is Sean Bean. I enjoy his performances, but he's almost too iconic now. I haven't even seen him in Game of Thrones (not my cup o' tea), but between 006 in Goldeneye and Boromir in Fellowship of the Ring, he's got a certain persona he replicates. I enjoy it, but you could say it Bean done before.
<(o.0)>
Yeah I'm with Cath, we don't need more Sean Bean.
Maybe more like David Tennant?
Yeah I'm with Cath, we don't need more Sean Bean.
Maybe more like David Tennant?
Maybe as thom merlin, but i don't think he can pull off lantern jawed badass.
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Maybe as thom merlin, but i don't think he can pull off lantern jawed badass.Yeah I'm with Cath, we don't need more Sean Bean.
Maybe more like David Tennant?
If we're already discussing previous Doctors, Capaldi would fit my mental image of Thom Merrilin quite perfectly if you glue a great mustache to his face.
Tennant would be an amazing padan fain though
MM! Yes!!! Padan Fain! I'd LOVE that. :) Mostly because I felt Fain was...under used at times.
Thom...I think should be someone with grey to them but maybe like...Brian Cox?
And Sanderson never really managed to get Mat right.
The scene where he put on armor was immersion breaking. Like I thought his Luck to AC Mythic ability only worked if he had no armor on.
Maybe the goal was to highlight the higher stakes, but it fell flat.
DM,
Probably. I mean it certainly didn't seem like something Mat Cauthon would do in most circumstances.
The TV series now seems to be in a much more active stage of development. So far they've confirmed the following:
Episode 1 has been written by showrunner Rafe Judkins and is called "Leavetaking", which is also the name of Chapter 10 of THE EYE OF THE WORLD.
Episode 2 has been written by Amanda Kate Shuman and is called "Shadow's Waiting", which is the also the name of Chapter 19 of THE EYE OF THE WORLD.
This strongly suggests that they are planning to get through the novel in just 6 episodes or so (THE EYE OF THE WORLD is about 775 pages in length and the "Shadow's Waiting" chapter takes them up to around page 300). This may indicate a plan to get through the first two novels in the first season, which makes sense given there are fourteen books in the series.
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Did they say how many episodes a season and how long each episode will be? A Game of thrones is 694 pages and they did that in 10 episodes, so I can see them doing 2 books a season if they get the usual 22 episode season or so.
It's Amazon, so no chance they'll get 22 episodes. I was hoping for an AMC-style run of 16 episodes, so 8 hours per book (which is fairly doable), but based on what we've seen so far it's more likely to be the standard Amazon/Netflix run of 12-13 episodes.
The nightmare scenario would be 10 episodes, as I don't think it's physically possible to do one book in 5 hours. The first WoT book is about the same length as AGoT, although it has a more straightforward (and linear) storyline with a smaller cast and less complex politics.
Smaller cast sure, but the FX budget will be ENORMOUS!
Also I think they could do TEotW in about 13-15 episodes...maybe.
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Huge Q&A with the showrunner today.
Main take-aways:
The books will not be mapped 1:1 to the TV show seasons. This sounds like the approach taken by The Expanse (which took all of Season 1 and then 4 episodes from Season 2 to adapt Book 1, then 8 episodes of Season 2 and 5 from Season 3 to adapt Book 2 etc) and the new His Dark Materials show (which will adapt 3 books across 5 seasons).
Episodes will be 1 hour long each.
There'll be more than 5, but definitely less than 14, seasons in total.
Amazon hasn't greenlit the project yet but there's been positive sounds in the last few months (which is why he's been allowed to do the Q&A).
New Spring may be adapted as well, possibly as a special of some kind once the series is fully underway (could be a good way of keeping Moiraine and Lan's actors interested when they're not doing much in the main series).
The TV show will be a faithful adaptation of the books, but will of course have to condense some characters, storylines. Apparently the "latter middle" section of the series may be compressed a bit more (i.e. PoD through CoT, surprising nobody). Judkins notes himself as a Lady Stoneheart fan (from Game of Thrones) and was sorry to see her cut from the TV show, but these things are sometimes necessary.
He wants to cast Rand and the Aiel as "tall gingers" if possible.
On LGTBQ+ representation, there'll be "pillow friends out of the wazoo."
How channelling will be handled is still being discussed, but Judkins liked how the magic was done in Doctor Strange and Avengers: Infinity War, which may serve as a template.
Trollocs and other Shadowspawn may be a combination of CGI and prosthetics, but he feels that prosthetics is better for both actor and viewer immersion.
Billy Zane will not be reprising his role of Ishamael from the Red Eagle informercial.
Judkins is aiming for the quality level of the LotR movies or GoT, definitely not Shannara.
Brandon Sanderson, Harriet and the rest of Team Jordan will advise on the show's development, some more than others (I suspect Brandon will be busy with his own books to do a huge amount, though).
Confirmed characters: Rand, Egwene, Cenn Buie (if less than in the book), Logain (in an expanded role), Tam, Bela, Padan Fain (who'll be less obviously a villain), Faile, Mat. His favourite Forsaken are Graendal and Moghedien, so it sounds like they'll be in as well.
Unconfirmed characters: Aviendha, Min, Elayne. Judkins notes that the four-way relationship from the books isn't really viable for the show and will be changed. He refused to confirm if this means that some of these characters will be merged or cut. I suspect this is the most controversial take-away from the Q&A. My guess is that the characters will still be in the show and Rand may be sequential relationships with them, but won't be in a polygamous relationship with all of them at once.
His favourite character is Egwene and his favourite scene is Dumai's Wells. His least favourite character is Faile, but promises she'll be awesome on the show. In terms of tough scenes to write, Tel'aran'rhiod is proving problematic (mainly as they won't know how it's going to be depicted until the vfx department comes on board).
There'll be less braid-tugging and dress-smoothing than in the books. There will be one braid-tug in the first episode though.
No decision yet on filming locations. He hopes the budget will be large enough so they can visit the most appropriate locations around the world.
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All I care about is Dumai's Wells. If they don't showcase the crap of that...then this show isn't what I'd hoped it would be.
Well hopefully they'll get some decent actors to help flesh out the villains. And you know the other main characters.
Crap his favorite character is Egwene
Dumai's Wells should be hard R
Well, Egwene is the co-protagonist of the series, so it'd be helpful if either her or Rand was up there for him (ideally both, but Rand is a bit of an ahole for large chunks of the series, albeit by design).
According to some internet sources that might be reliable, the focus will be on Moiraine and her PoV, rather then the Two Rivers folks.
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Well, Egwene is the co-protagonist of the series, so it'd be helpful if either her or Rand was up there for him (ideally both, but Rand is a bit of an ahole for large chunks of the series, albeit by design).Crap his favorite character is Egwene
Dumai's Wells should be hard R
Rand is still the likable one of the two.
...The Wheel of Time has a lot of major characters. XD Egwene's definitely pretty high up, though.
thejeff,
I think the idea is to sustain the suspense about a certain prophetic person.
Egwene is kind of a protagonist...but I wouldn't necessarily put her in the same level as Perrin or Matt. Though Perrin does get side-quested a good bit.
Also I like Egwene, but she gets less likable around book 9 I think.
I'm gonna skip most of this and go back and read it later because i'm just now on the third book and want to avoid spoilers. I would watch a TV series about what I've read so far. The choreographers for the fight scenes would have a lot of free reign since it seems Robert Jordan isn't the best at writing fight scenes.
No trust me. He's better at large scale battles that involve lots of Fx.
If you want more insights, Vid, I can help. I have the entire collection in both hardback AND paperback.
No trust me. He's better at large scale battles that involve lots of Fx.
If you want more insights, Vid, I can help. I have the entire collection in both hardback AND paperback.
Maybe it will change later (maybe he gets some practice and improves at it which considering what I've heard he spent a lot of time on these no pun intended.) right now I feel like to compensate for that he does that Turtle takes the cake type stuff or just has Lan Kill enemies so quickly there's little to describe.
If you saying it gets better I will trust you however.
The individual sword fights, not so much, but the magic and the mass battles, yes.
Is Egwene really more of a protagonist than Matt or Perrin? Or even Elayne and Nynaeve?
Egwene is absolutely the co-protagonist of the story, along with Rand. The key theme of the series is duality: order/chaos, good/evil, law/anarchy, light/shadow and of course male/female. Rand and Egwene's stories really mirror and parallel one another, and the way their story arcs differ from one another is kind of telling.
Egwene, on the other hand, does things the more sensible way. She spends months in the White Tower learning the ways of Aes Sedai (Books 2 and 3). She spends months with the Aiel Wise Ones, learning from them (Books 4, 5 and 6). She even spent weeks as a captive of the Seanchan and even learned things from them (Book 2). When she becomes Amyrlin she learns from everyone around her, carefully considers her actions, makes plans, trusts in key allies and then acts swiftly and decisively and with a minimal amount of bloodshed. She brings down Elaida's White Tower from within by knowing just when to push and pull at the other factions and because she actually acts like an Aes Sedai and Amyrlin Seat (rather than blustering as one like Elaida). And shes goes in the Last Battle like a hero.
When people say they don't like Egwene but do like Rand, I am absolutely at a loss as to why.
What if you like both?
Wert,
To answer your question, Rand is better because he might react, but it's usually in a spectacular fashion.
Wert,
To answer your question, Rand is better because he might react, but it's usually in a spectacular fashion.
I'm not sure, "this character is better because he's grossly irresponsible and doesn't listen to anyone and gets lots of people killed every time he tries to do anything because he won't listen to anyone, even the dude in his head trying to give him advice" really makes up for that.
I mean, he gets better as he goes along and eventually comes good in the end (only after very nearly nuking an entire city of a quarter million people), but it's a bit of a close thing.
For what it's worth, the series is quite clear in pointing out that Rand has far less say in his actions than most people do - certainly less than basically any other character. That's an actual, in-universe thing recognized and understood by other characters. What this means for Rand's value as a character is debatable, but I think it's worth keeping in mind.
(And it's probably another deliberate contrast with Egwene, who's generally presented more as making up her mind about what to do and not being easily controlled by outside forces. Given the story's emphasis on dualism, I'm inclined to give it a pass and not worry too much about it.)