The Wheel weaves as The Wheel weaves.
Last night, I stayed up late, to watch the premiere of Amazon’s The Wheel of Time series. A real feat in my third trimester with enough IEPs to fill the White Tower’s library and a toddler with all the energy (and at times tenderness) of a trolloc… though with higher levels of adorable-ness. Seriously though… some days it takes all the patience, and reflexes of an Aes Sedai to keep up with her, and prevent the entire house from crumbling.
But I digress. The point being, I watched the premiere, and while it was fun to begin another fantasty series, I ran into an all too familiar issue I have with adaptations. Changes. Now, weirdly there’s a lot of changes that to me feel pretty meaningless. As far as the casting goes, I think everyone cast is great. But with any book series I enjoyed any changes make me feel like something is either missing or unneccasrily added.
There are two changes specifically that are minor spoilers, both for the first episode, and for book series. The first of which came at the very beginning with Moiraine’s exposition, when she spoke of how the dragon reborn could be male or female. Quite frankly if anyone has read the books, especially the prequel New Spring, the idea that the Dragon Reborn could be female is ridiculous considering the set up of the series, and all of the inner politics of the Aes Sedai, particularly of the Red and Blue Ajahs.
One of the things that I always loved about the books, particularly New Spring and The Eye of the World, was the different ways the Ajahs (and other characters) looked at the legends and myths of the Dragon Reborn through their own dogmatic or superstitious perspectives, and to a degree, making the possibility of the Dragon Reborn being a girl really lessens the urgency that I think many Red Sisters would have regarding how they firmly (if not violently) think the world should be kept safe.
The only other change I disliked is purely production, not plot related. Despite the fact that my last post (months ago) was about Bridgerton, I am not really in favor of shows showing skin, just to keep things entertaining. As I told a friend this morning, I don’t need to see that much of Lan to be interested in his character. He’s got an epic and tragic backstory, of a man who willingly abandoned his right to a throne and a nation, to avoid costing lives and for the sake of his honor. However, right now, he’s just a hottie in tub. If I want that, I rewatch season one of the The Witcher. Additionally, in the books Rand and Egwene were quite the “will they, won’t they”, and at this point… well they will.
But, either way, by the end of the first episode the characters are off on their journey, and I’m excited to see where it goes. To a degree it helps that I read the books years ago, because it’s got me in a place where I’m remembering as I go, and I think that lessens my nitpicky-ness.
Finally, one change I loved. In the books we never get to see how Moiraine protects the village from the trollocs. Watching her weave, and channel, and kick ass was a fantastic way to stay up late. I’m absolutely looking forward to seeing her (and others weild the one power), and the show will definitely worth staying up late for.
On that note, I’ll be catching episode two, after my adorable trolloc is fast asleep.
