DigificWriter

@Deviations The show chose to use the tools of visual-medium storytelling to depict Mat's character in a way that in turn led to them changing the characterization of the people closest to him.

Trying to draw a line in the sand and say that those changes were unnecessary is to essentially deny the producers of the show the freedom to tell Mat's story in a way that made sense to them in the context of a television series as opposed to on the written page.

14 minutes ago, Ralph said:

I don't think the people who have remained involved in the conversations on this site are saying this. 

 

It is more that they cannot fathom why some of these changes have occurred, because they see them as unnecessary, since they love the books so much. 

All of these attitudes are, I believe, rooted in an unwillingness to let the producers of the show retell the story using the tools of visual-medium storytelling.

5 minutes ago, dwn said:

I'd say he adapted Lan because someone who barely talks, and who has only minor development over 14 books, wouldn't work as a one of the main characters in an ensemble TV show.

Yep.

The 'purists' don't seem to be willing to let the people making the show actually use any of the tools of visual-medium storytelling and instead want a 'purely as written' depiction of this world and story, which is something that can't exist.

@RhienneAgain There is no right or wrong way to adapt something.

An adaptation that changes everything about its source material other than the names of the characters and the basic overall beats of the story it's adapting is just as valid as an adaptation that doesn't change anything except the way it visualizes sets, costumes, and props relative to how these things were depicted in the source material.

5 minutes ago, Gothic Flame said:

Mayve you should be more familiar with the source material if your going to defend the show.

And maybe you should check your arrogance at the door.

All of the hardcore book fans I've chosen to engage with online are, for the most part, enjoying the show. That has absolutely nothing to do with my personal level of familiarity with the novels.

3 minutes ago, Gothic Flame said:

Maybe you should have done the same. Or at least gone a bit further than the Great Hunt. Maybe you'd understand why others feel so differently.

How, pray tell, does the amount of novels I've read have anything whatsoever to do with the fact that a large number of hardcore book fans who either contribute to this website, post WoT content on YouTube, or host podcasts covering the novels are enjoying the TV adaptation?

6 minutes ago, Gothic Flame said:

Really? The same "fans" that only read one or two books?

No.

These fans are people who've read all of the novels hundreds of times .

Some of them are even contributors to this very website, and most of the others are YouTubers.

5 minutes ago, Bruan said:

many people who love the books are not loving the show

I beg to differ on this point.

All of the WoT book fans I've been engaging with since the premiere have been very happy with the show overall, even if they're not 100% happy with all of the choices that the show is making.

1 minute ago, Bruan said:

They wanted Archie to feel more mature in ‘Riverdale’. Now we have Archie banging Ms. Grundy instead of hanging out with Jughead and mixing up date nights with Betty and Veronica... Not the same story there either, but at least they didn’t call it ‘Archie and Friends’ and claim to be faithfully ‘adapting’ the comics to the screen.

This is completely off-topic, but "Riverdale" is 'faithfully adapting the comics to the screen'; it's just not adapting the old-school Archie Comics, and was never going to because its source material is the Archie material published from 2010 and beyond.

The WoT TV series is not the novels, and so the TV versions of the characters are not their book counterparts, nor should they be expected to be based on the practical differences between the written and visual mediums.

That's why I said that it's good that the TV show's versions of Lan and Nynaeve (and all of the other characters) are different from their book counterparts.

6 minutes ago, Elder_Haman said:

The books still exist. The story you care so deeply about isn't worse because someone chooses to tell it in a different way.

Exactly.

5 minutes ago, RhienneAgain said:

very little of it feels like the kind of things the book Nynaeve and book Lan would say to each other (or at all). 

Good.

Because the show's versions of these two characters aren't the same as their book counterparts, nor should they be.

1 hour ago, Eelfinn_Ty said:

more I think they will kill Moiraine at the eye.

Rosamund Pike hasn't left the series, so they didn't kill Moiraine.

52 minutes ago, divica said:

it is undeniable that the show ignored the effects of rand finding out that tam wasn't his father in ep 1

Not telling the audience about information that the characters know before it becomes relevant to audiences understanding the story isn't 'ignoring' the existence of said information.

You seem to either be genuinely unaware of how visual-medium storytelling works or aren't willing to let the show actually use the tools of visual-medium storytelling to convey stuff to the audience.

7 minutes ago, NetNightmare said:

Well can you point me to the point of the show where they explain this ? granted I see it at 1am and I may have missed it ...

It's not in-show information that people within the world can't see Channelers' Weaves, but information conveyed by the show's book consultant, Sarah Nakamura, about the world as the show is depicting it.

Although the show did tell us that the Aes Sedai couldn't see Logain's Weaves, so the clarification on the subject from Sarah builds on that.

Regarding the 'inconsistent' visualization of Weaves, the characters within the world of the show can't visibly see people gathering Weaves together, only the physical effects generated by or resulting from the gathering of said Weaves (such as fireballs, lightning, objects being hurled, seemingly unbreachable doors being knocked down, or brilliant explosions of light).

Therefore, the visualization of said Weaves is purely an out-of-universe storytelling tool that the production team either uses or doesn't use depending on what they're intending to communicate to the audience.

In the visual medium, edit or camera trickery is a common storytelling device, and it makes little sense to complain about its use.

WoT isn't the first film or TV series to revisit earlier events from a slightly different angle and showcase things the second time around that weren't highlighted the first time, nor will it be the last.

11 minutes ago, DaddyFinn said:

Someone said somewhere: Rand is the tabletop and the rest of EF5 are the legs. I like that metaphor. Rand is my favorite character of all fantasy and I'm not worried at all.

For the TV adaptation specifically, I think a more accurate metaphor would be that Rand and his friends are highlighted markers on a map being studied by a scholar (Moiraine).

Min sees the "white flame" and "a ring of gold" when she looks at Nynaeve and Egwene because those things are part of their futures.

As presented on the show, Min isn't a fortune teller or psychic; she's an Oracle.

6 hours ago, Andra said:

Given the identical language in the show, on what basis is it supposed to be literal?

Because the show establishes that Min's visions are actual glimpses of future events.

10 minutes ago, Skipp said:

I don't think they will change the focus because of Ned Stark and GoT.  I think they will change focus because Moiraine's role should decrease while the EF5 + Elyane's increase.  Just due to the nature of the story.

 

Not that I think Moiraine will have a substantial drop in screentime but just less than what we are seeing in season 1 and maybe 2.

I honestly believe that the amount of content and story focus that Moiraine has in the novels is irrelevant when it comes to her having been positioned as the primary main character of the TV adaptation, and that, barring Rosamund Pike permanently departing the series, her (Moiraine's) perspective of and participation in events will remain a significant and centralized point of narrative emphasis even as other characters' stories ebb and flow.

9 minutes ago, Skipp said:

I do think they will move the focus off of Moiraine in the coming seasons.  Whether that be two or three but I do believe it will happen. 

I don't.

People keep trying to make comparisons between Moiraine being the focus of the TV adaptation of WoT and Ned Stark being the focus of the first season of Game of Thrones, but the two scenarios are not even remotely similar.

The series with the most similarities to what is happening with the WoT TV series are Titans, Swamp Thing, and The Shannara Chronicles.

34 minutes ago, divica said:

who wants to see the second season when you don't like the main character?

Rand isn't the primary main character of the TV adaptation; Moiraine is... and that's not going to change just because he's been revealed to be the person she's been trying to find for 20 years.

^ With first-run shows, I don't do multiple watch-throughs, so the only time I'll rewatch a prior season of a first-run show is to get myself prepped for the next season.

I'll most likely do a Season 1 rewatch once we're close to the premiere of Season 2 so that everything is fresh in my memory.

According to what she tells Rand, Min was in Tar Valon when she was younger and either saw or ran into Tam in the streets, which triggered her very first vision: his encounter with a pregnant and dying Aielwoman on the slopes of Dragonmount, said Aielwoman giving birth to a baby boy,  and him (Tam) taking said boy to the Two Rivers and raising him to adulthood.