DigificWriter

Even though it was made clear that such was going to be the case long before the show even premiered, it's clear that some people are still super salty that Rand isn't the Series Lead.

It could also suggest that, despite the events in Caerihen, Siuan's trust in Moiraine has been mended and they're once again working in concert.

From the moment I started .my rewatch, I've been trying to remember/decide which episode(s) of Season 2 is/are my favorite(s), but after rewatching Episode 2x06, "Eyes Without Pity", I've settled (for now, anyway) on it as one of my favorite S2 episodes alongside the S2 Finale, "What Was Meant To Be". I also realized/remembered that there's some pretty fun, yet subtle, foreshadowing that happens in that episode vis a vis Rand using the One Power offensively, which happens in 2x08. It's also funny to hear everybody talk about how nice and kind Barthanes is knowing that he's a Darkfriend. Ryma folding up a Sul'dahm like an origami doll is still just as simultaneously awesome and freaky as it was the first time I saw it happen. I alluded to this in an earlier comment, but Renna is another villainous character that I can't help but find interesting and complex even though she is doing some pretty horrible things. I continue to love Nynaeve and Elayne, and the way they go from antagonistic to friends as a result of Ryma sacrificing herself still makes me happy and I'm hoping that there will be opportunities in Season 3 for them to build on that friendship.

Yes. My belief has heretofore always been that even though the show was most likely going to depict Moiraine 'dying', it was also likely going to keep Rosamund Pike as the Series Lead and protagonist of this particular Turning, but as we get closer to Season 3, I'm becoming less sure that the show isn't going to just kill Moiraine off permanently and shift to another actor as the Series Lead 'Game of Thrones'-style.

Death.

New observations/thoughts from my rewatch (Episodes 4 & 5): * I really love the Cairihen plotline that runs through slash dominates Episodes 3-7, mainly because I love the character of Anvaere Damodred * I love the interplay that we get between Ishy and Lanfear and Ishy and Suroth in Episode 5 * Even though I classify myself as a Show-Only WoT fan, I've chosen to not be unspoiled when it comes to details about the novels: one of the downsides to that, though, is that I'm still slightly confused about the overall end-goal of the writers including the White Tower subplot from Episode 5 of Verin playing Detective given that her actions don't seem to fit certain future novel-based revelations about her moral alignment * I've always been of the belief that while we are going to see Moiraine 'meet a sticky end', as it were, the TV series' focus on Rosamund Pike as the Series Lead won't change, but as we start to get closer to Season 3, I'm kind of starting to wonder if my assumptions are going to be proven wrong, which makes me sad given that Moiraine is my favorite character *I love how Episode 5 establishes that Moiraine and Anvaere are still 'best sisters' in spite of their decades of separation from one another and the clear resentment that said separation fostered on Anvaere's part

Yes, people in our world abuse animals. My point still stands, though: abuse is not training. The show pretty clearly wanted to make it obvious to audiences that the Damane are abused slaves (not trained and coddled pets), and the in-the-mouth gags do that super-effectively, as does the intense, in-your-face depiction of what happens to Egwene.

You don't train dogs or horses by abusing them.

Collars and leashes don't send exactly the same message as gags do, though, or at least not as effectively. Also, the Damane in the TV series aren't 'trained'; they're abused into submission and subservience, and putting them in gags in public is a symbol of that for both the Damane themselves and the wider world at large.

The point of the gags isn't that the Damane are rendered silent in Seanchan culture; the point is that they're subservient, enslaved, and subhuman. Anything other than literal in-the-mouth gags doesn't actually convey the intended message either culturally or in terms of why Sharon Gilham added them to the costuming in the first place.

Costume Designer Sharon Gilham added the gags to the Damane costumes as a visual representation of the Sul'dam (and the Seanchan in general) viewing the Damane as subhuman, which means that she obviously thought that having such an overt visual clue of how the Damane are viewed was in fact "necessary" or else she would not have bothered to incorporate gags into the costuming.

^ Again, the gags aren't pointless; they're a visual symbol of how dehumanized the Damane are in the eyes of the Suldam who control them.

😄 1. The Sul'dahm would never be expecting their Damane to have any need to verbally communicate because the idea is that the Damane are essentially pet dogs. 2. The only Damane we saw with the ability to detect the ability to Channel in others was Miri, and she could pretty clearly and obviously communicate non-verbally (like, again, a pet dog)

Here's a transcript of Moiraine's line: I now believe that this Aes Sedai could have been/was Liandrin, because the attitude and approach as described matches what Liandrin tries to do with Nynaeve, and would also explain why Liandrin felt 'familiar' enough with Moiraine to caress her cheek in Season 1. This is really neither here nor there, but some portions of the fandom have latched on to the idea that the presence of Jenny the Irish Wolfhound in Moiraine's room - despite Novices not being allowed pets - was related in some way to the aftermath of the incident(s) she describes. Re: my comment about finding the villains rootable, it comes down to the writing and performances, with a bit of costume design thrown in, and Kate Fleetwood, Natasha O'Keeffe, and Fares Fares were all killing it with their portrayals of Liandrin, Lanfear, and Ishy. Re: the gags, they do serve a purpose, which is to be visually and psychologically dehumanizing; they also look neat and cool as designed.

Yes. She mentions it to Rand in The Eye of the World. More observations about S2 that have come out of my rewatch so far: * I really want to know when and how Moiraine learned that Rand had gone to Cairihen and how exactly she got Logain transferred to the Sanitorium there * Credit for this one goes to KritterXD, but the fact that Egwene and Elayne met because Elly's maids left pillows in front of Eggy's door and Eggy returned them is amusing given the existence of the concept of Pillowfriends * When the show has such interesting bad guys like Ishy, Liandrin, Lanfear, and the Seanchan (just in general), its kind of hard not to find them 'rootable' * I still love the costuming choice to have the Damane wear pacifier gags, especially given the revelation from later on in the season that they're only forced to do so in public spaces * Having Moiraine and the characters around her believing and behaving as if she'd been Stilled is still really effective even knowing the truth of the situation, and I like that it exposed her as flawed, imperfect, and in some cases unlikable

@Mailman Pretty much every single person I named is a respected pillar of the WoT fandom (and four of them are directly involved with Dragonmount.com itself), and so by calling anybody who maintains that the characters in the TV series are absolutely recognizable vis a vis their book counterparts (which all of the named individuals have said is very much the case) 'borderline delusional', you are directly calling into question their credentials and credibility as WoT experts and fandom leaders, which is very much not a smart thing to do and which I was politely trying to dissuade you from doing. You don't have to like the TV series or the way its characters have been written, but there is a distinct difference between expressing negative opinions and calling into question the cognitive functions of any person who disagrees with you, which in this instance is a group that includes all of the individuals that I name-checked.

I'd be very careful calling diehard WoT fans like Thom DeSimone, Kathy Campbell, Rajiv Mote, Maureen Carr, KritterXD, Ta'varen Tavern, Winespring Cafe, LezbiNerdy, and MalkierTalks (to name but a few) 'borderline delusional'.

A person's refusal to acknowledge/see something as being true doesn't mean that it isn't true. I'm rewatching Season 2 at the moment and had a thought that I wanted to reiterate: until/unless we're told otherwise in the future, I'm fully convinced that Liandrin was the Aes Sedai that forced a young Moiraine to get over the things that were blocking her ability to Channel because it makes so much sense in regards to how she (Liandrin) is characterized in the early part of the season (S2).

Egwene specifically using the One Power to revive Nynaeve is a one-off thing until/unless she's able to consciously replicate whatever she did and revive someone else, at which point it becomes something to possibly explain and explore (although I expect that Race and his writers will 'default' to whatever Egwene actually did being generally dismissed as impossible, which is perfectly fine). Nynaeve's two 'power explosions' established that it is possible for the One Power to be unconsciously used in OTT ways, but the circumstances under which the three examples of 'power explosions' that we've seen have all been different and, thus far, have not been shown to be replicable insofar as intention and control is concerned.

You might find the notion ludicrous, but that's often how storytelling works, especially in Sci-Fi and Fantasy stories. Inexplicable/unexplained things will happen, and then they're intentionally never followed up on.

Unless Egwene ends up being faced with another situation where she revives someone using the One Power, what happened at Tarwin's Gap remains what it came across as, which was a one-time unconscious emotion-fueled OTT 'power explosion' that revived someone she cared about. Also, the fact that she was untrained actually reinforces the idea that what she did at the Gap was just a one-off OTT feat that she did entirely unconsciously.

One anomalous case unconsciously fueled by emotion does not establish either a precedent or a rule. Also, the only two people who would know, in-universe, whether or not Egwene revived Nynaeve from death would be Egwene and Nynaeve themselves, and I don't see much reason why they'd openly discuss the truth of what happened with anyone.

Nothing about the world-building is 'damaged' even if Nynaeve was dead and Egwene used the One Power to revive her because such action was a one-off unconscious occurrence.

How? It's a one-off OTT use of the One Power that is fueled entirely by emotion and isn't a conscious choice any more than Nynaeve's two 'Power explosions' were. There is also an argument to be made that Egwene was possibly in possession of an Angreal at the time in the form of the jewel Moiraine gave her in the episode Shadow's Waiting. I just rewatched a discussion of Season 1 from three of my favorite WoTTubers (KritterXD, Winespring Cafe, and Ta'varen Tavern) where the execution of Egwene's revivification of Nynaeve was discussed slightly negatively, and, had I been in their chat when they Livestreamed, I would've tried to make the argument that there is no difference, either mechanically or metaphysically, between Egwene - who had been established as an exceptionally powerful Channeler - using the One Power to revive Nynaeve and the two times that Nynaeve herself - who had likewise been established as an incredibly powerful Channeler who was even stronger than Egwene - accomplished/performed entirely instinctual OTT feats/actions with the One Power. As for why The Eye of the World is my favorite episode of Season 1, it contains the strongest character development of the season for certain characters (Rand and Moiraine), is our first introduction to the phenomenal Fares Fares (Ishy), tees up future storylines in ways that I found extremely compelling when I first watched it and that I still find exciting upon rewatch, and contains my favorite Cold Open of the season (the Age of Legends convo between Lews and Latra). I also choose not to be negative over or critical about things that were 'extracurricular' to the episode narratively.

Somebody above was once again complaining about Egwene healing Nynaeve in The Eye of the World (my favorite episode of Season 1), and, after just finishing a rewatch of that episode, all I have to say is this: people really do need to chill out when it comes to the 'correctness' or 'incorrectness' of how the show uses the One Power, because in the end, the point of that scene is to show off Egwene's strength in the Power and deepen her relationship with Nynaeve. Being hyperfocused on whether or not Nynaeve was dead and taking the stance that the One Power couldn't have brought her back to life if she was is completely missing the point. People don't have to like that scene, but there's a difference between disliking something and lodging pedantic objections against said thing simply for the sake of having something to comment on. The same also applies to Egwene saving herself from Renna; pedantic objections to that plot point based on whether or not the A'dam should've worked the way in which it's used in the scenes in question are entirely missing the point.