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Elder_Haman

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Posts posted by Elder_Haman

    8 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Moiraine is now the main character of the story

    So? What's wrong with that? Why is introducing the audience to the protagonists through Moiraine a bad choice?

     

    9 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Nynaeve is (1) a potential dragon, (2) master tracker, and (3) comes out on top of every interaction she's in. 

    (1) Again, so? Moiraine (wrongly) believes that a woman can be a dragon? What does that matter? (2) as she was in the books; (3) no she doesn't. She's unceremoniously dragged away by a Trolloc. Lan bests her easily and ties her to a tree.

     

    11 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Nynaeve is adept at hand to hand combat now, for some reason.

    No she isn't. She doesn't ever engage in 'hand to hand combat' - she attacks a Trolloc from stealth and then later defends herself with a knife when a man stumbles toward her.

     

    13 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Egwene is now (1) as powerful as Logain and (2) a member of the Women's Circle (the ruling body of her community!) when the series begins. 

    (1) we don't know this and what does it matter really since Egwene is an insanely powerful channeler? (2) the Women's Circle is never established as a 'ruling body' in the show and anyway, so what?

     

    14 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Egwene is maturely dealing with the end of her and Rand's relationship meanwhile he acts like a child. 

    Which is ... well, on brand for both characters.

     

    14 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    The leader of the Tinkers is now a woman for no reason other than the writers didn't want it to be a man. 

    So?

     

    15 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Rand is a side character

    No he isn't. He's a member of an ensemble cast.

     

    15 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Tam's influence on Rand has been greatly diminished 

    No it hasn't. We just haven't seen it all yet.

     

    16 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Perrin is a wife murderer

    He is guilty of negligent homicide at best, but so?

     

    16 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Mat is a thief

    So?

     

    16 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Abel Cauthon is a drunk abuser

    I didn't see him being abusive. He was drunk and supposedly carousing with other women. And he behaved like a coward. But, anyway, so? (Also worth noting that Mat's mom was a drunk and verbally abusive toward her young daughters. But that might get in the way of your theory)

     

    18 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Master Luhan isn't even there

    So?

     

    18 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Thom can barely sing or play an instrument

    I loved Thom's song. And we've only seen him in action once. So there's no reason to assue his character is static.

     

    19 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Character development for males = Dark past. Mistakes. Flaws. Inner demons. 

    Character development for females = Good at everything. Super powerful. Just, like, so good and great. So great. Literally the best. 

    Character development for EF5 is exactly the same as it was in the books at this point (Mat and Perrin being darker). Rand - still just a shepherd who loved home and his best girl; Mat still a jokey gambler who got poisoned by a cursed dagger; Perrin still a gentle giant worried about hurting others.

    22 minutes ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Rand was like, "You know a lot for a gleeman" and then Thom responded with something like, "We call ourselves gleemen because it sounds harmless. Nothing is more dangerous than a man know knows the past." 

     

    What else could this possibly be implying? 

     

    "We call ourselves gleemen in order to make people think that we're harmless when in reality we're not." 

     

    That's the definition of trying to throw someone off a scent. 

    It implies that gleemen know the past and are therefore dangerous. The mysterious musician is hardly an unusual fantasy trope. 

    1 minute ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    The writers have already shown their willingness to diminish the male characters while presenting female characters who are beyond reproach.

    No they haven't.

    They've put female characters forward. That's all. No male characters have been "diminished" and none of the female characters are "beyond reproach". The show has presented viewers with a world where females occupy positions of power. That's it. 

     

    Most of the things on your list will make it. Some may not. There's no giant conspiracy.

     

    Just now, Sabio said:

    So how does one explain their thinking there might be multiple Dragons?  Honestly was dumb for them to toss that in the series.

    No one thinks there are, in fact, multiple Dragons. The conversation was about the difficulty of relying on ancient translations. It's a conversation about Moiraine's frustration at her inability to figure out who it is. 

    1 hour ago, WOTReader2 said:

    Let's give it a go:

     

    "He, or she, is born again! I feel him or her!  The Dragon takes his, or her, first breath on the slopes of Dragonmount, but maybe not now!  He, or she, is coming!  He, or she, is coming!  Light help us!  Light help the world!  He, or she, lies in the snow and cries like the thunder!  He, or she, burns like the sun!

     

    Not exactly catchy.

    It's not hard.

    "The Dragon is born again! I feel it! The Dragon takes its first breath on the slopes of Dragonmount! It comes, it comes! Light help us! Light help the world! The Dragon lies in the snow and cries like the thunder. It's soul burns like the sun!!"

    1 hour ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    Right. Absolutely correct. 

     

    The man judging shows up everywhere else. 

    • Change to the Tinker leadership. Totally pointless, but they made a woman the leader instead of a man like in the books. 
    • Lan disobeying Moiraine and entering Shadar Logoth when in the books it was her idea. Show portrays it as Lan's mistake. 
    • Egwene w/Valda compared to Rand w/Darkfriend girl. Egwene is strong and gets to stab Valda while Rand runs away from a short, stubby lady who isn't even paying attention to him. 
    • Abell Cauthon's character
    • No mention of Village Council. Women's Circle given spotlight 
    • Nynaeve learns to track because all wisdoms track in the show as opposed to being taught by her father in the books. 
    • Playing up the "Nynaeve snuck up on Lan" thing. The writers are just gloating at this point. 
    • Egwene placed on equal power level to Logain, as if strength in the power were some kind of currency and Egwene had been wronged in the books for being weaker than any man. 
    • Rand and Egwene's conversation about Moiraine in episode 2. In the books, it's framed as both parties being out for themselves. Egwene defends Moiraine because Moiraine tells her nice things about herself, Rand mistrusts her because he doesn't like her closeness with Moiraine. Show just portrays Rand as wrong and stupid and Egwene as right. 
    • Tam, a heron marked blademaster, loses to a Trolloc while Nynaeve kills one with ease. 
    • Master Luhan, Perrin's male role model, completely excised from his backstory. 
    • In not explaining the Saidin/Saidar divide, the show has not shied away from implying that it's men who are tainted and not the male half of the One Power that they draw on which taints them. (This will likely be explained later, so I'm not too bothered by it.) 
    • In the books, it takes 6 Aes Sedai to shield Logain. 2 in the show. 
    • Mat given a vice to make him "interesting". Perrin kills his wife for the sake of "character development." Meanwhile, Egwene is now a member of the Women's Circle and Nynaeve is superwoman. 

    Look closely at the show and you'll find that there's not a single male character in the show who has been leveled up from their book version. Meanwhile, most of the women have been given additional skills or abilities or just had their power levels inflated. 

    Why is this supposed to bother me? Do you not think that we are going to see that dynamic shift over the course of the series?

    1 hour ago, JeffTheWoodlandElf said:

    The idea that they're called "glee-men" not because they bring glee and do party tricks and play songs at taverns but because they're hoarding forbidden knowledge and want to throw those in power off their scent is enormously stupid. 

    Uhhh, what? Thom said that "gleemen" is a silly name and then made the familiar point that bards and musicians know the past. I'm not sure where you're getting throwing people off of scents.

    2 hours ago, DojoToad said:

    Yes, happened real fast in the books too. I only ‘believe’ the book version more because Moiraine didn’t have WT resources available to her. Seems they could have had a better crew leaving from WT in the show

    It’s obvious that Siuan and Moiraine have a serious misunderstanding about the DO and the nature of his plans. It seems fairly clear they are being lured into a trap. 
     

    What they are doing is a ridiculously risky move - almost to the point of being foolish (so I hope to get more information about how they settled on this plan). Given that, it makes sense that they would want to keep their intentions secret. 

    7 hours ago, Jaysen Gore said:

    Hollywood reality strikes; the actor they had originally hired for Agelmar got a much better gig, so they had to recast. But instead of causing confusion with an actor switch, they're causing it with a character switch, as Lord Yakota is in season 1, and Agelmar in season 2

    Incorrect. Agelmar is in S1. “Lord Yakota” was originally cast as Ingtar. Ingtar will not appear now until S2. 

    47 minutes ago, swollymammoth said:

    Pardon me if I don't think this was intentional.

    Of course you don’t. Because the only interpretation you’re open to is your own. 

     

    44 minutes ago, swollymammoth said:

    Pushing Rand to the side is a worse idea every episode.

    Only he hasn’t been pushed to the side. He’s had as much dialogue and screen time as anyone. 

     

    45 minutes ago, swollymammoth said:

    Such a cheap payoff.

    In your opinion. 

    2 hours ago, Flamen said:

    Moiraine " Lews and 100 male Aes Sedai thought they could contain darkness itself ...... The arrogance". Also Moiraine - Let's go directly to the Dark Ones prison and yeet 5 villagers at him. All I have to say about the quality of the writhing on that show.

    Why is this bad writing? Seems pretty solid to me - blind to her own (and the Tower's) arrogance, Moiraine is about to walk into a trap. Irony. Juxtaposition. I love it.

    15 minutes ago, swollymammoth said:

    stop justifying changes by appealing to lore that the showrunners themselves have proven they don't respect." 

    The showrunners haven't "proven they don't respect" lore. You don't approve of the choices they've made concerning the lore. Those are two entirely different things. If you don't like the change, it's a massive, world-breaking change. When someone points out that the change is actually consistent with something, the lore isn't important. Seems like you're the one who's trying to have it both ways.

    3 minutes ago, WheelofJuke said:

    If everyone's saying something, perhaps there's some truth to it? 

     

    A lot of the real complaints are the same because they're objectively and technically pretty poorly done:

     

    Lighting, editing, some of the set constructions, some of the cgi.

     

    A lot of the good stuff such as: outstanding acting in places (e.g., Siuan, Logain, Moiraine, Teppin) is ruined by ham-fisted story-telling/editing. 

     

    Pacing is a problem that is almost universally mentioned. 

     

    It's NOT just nit-picking missing or changed details from the book. It's the gestalt that doesn't pass the smell test, despite some really really giving it every benefit of the doubt.

     

    I'm glad a large sub-segment of the fandom is enjoying it, and I hope they continue to! ?

     

    But I sure hope the (also perhaps large) sub-segment of the fandom that ISN'T enjoying it (for legitimate reasons, see above) gets drowned out. It's not negativity so much as calling it like we're seeing it. 

    I agree with almost all of these criticisms. I will argue with "objectively and technically pretty poorly done." But yes: 

    • There have been some lighting issues, some inconsistent CGI, bad edits, and uneven set design. I liked Wayne Yip better than the other two directors, for example. But compared to other shows, it's in the upper echelon of quality.
    • I'm not sure what you mean by "ham fisted storytelling" - but I will agree that there have been some questionable things. Loial is just part of the group now for ... reasons as an example. The very convenient way everyone just is in Tar Valon because they need to be.
    • Which leads into pacing. Which has also been uneven - to put it charitably. But I think most people who have read the books would agree with this: the best stuff is not in EotW. And while we'd all love to have the time to leisurely build out the world like EotW did, If you're going to get to the good stuff, you have to get moving.

    I will get into these weeds all day. I love talking about this stuff. In good faith. With people who are interested in this stuff. Not with people who just want to jump in with personal attacks on Rafe, inserting political culture war takes, and pronounce the series 'ruined'.