Rarity posted:

You say there's no great quotes but I'm gonna be remembering 'that's not how roads work' for a very long time

Rarity posted:

You say there's no great quotes but I'm gonna be remembering 'that's not how roads work' for a very long time

Sab669 posted:

I already can't remember what this line is from and I've watched each episode 3 times

Xotl posted:

- That Two Rivers bow didn't seem all that impressive.

Rarity posted:

You say there's no great quotes but I'm gonna be remembering 'that's not how roads work' for a very long time

Pham Nuwen posted:

I thought so too, but they probably just don't want to deal with maneuvering a 6' chunk of wood around when, to my memory, it was never even drawn in the first 3 eps (haven't watched #4 yet). Also Rand ruined his bowstring jumping into the river outside Shadar Logoth anyway.

th3t00t posted:

I don't understand why you think the intro credits are derivative of GoT?

GoT: a map showing specific locations we'd be at for the episode, no voices used in the song.

WoT: a loom weaving together a tapestry of people, no maps. Voices used in the song.

th3t00t posted:

I don't understand why you think the intro credits are derivative of GoT?

GoT: a map showing specific locations we'd be at for the episode, no voices used in the song.

WoT: a loom weaving together a tapestry of people, no maps. Voices used in the song.

Xotl posted:

It's funny in that it's obviously backwards, and yet over and above the fact that you have an actual GoT writer on this show, GoT being one of the greatest successes in TV history, so recent, and in the same general genre means that this show is going to fall in its shadow constantly. There will be derivations, unconscious copying, and deliberate reactions to/against it. Beyond Bezos stating that he wants his own GoT as the impetus for this show, I wonder just how many of those 11,000 corporate notes were about GoT in some way.

Dr. Clockwork posted:

10,999 of the notes were just quotes from the books where Jordan mentioned breasts.

Pleads posted:

"Bosom not formidable enough!!! - Jeff"

Xotl posted:

Gully Foyle posted:

I'm hoping that like GoT, the intro is updated for each season, have the Pattern weave a new tapestry that is relevant for that season. It was a genius touch in GoT to use the intro as a way of providing world building at the same time as hype music/animation.

Gully Foyle posted:

I'm hoping that like GoT, the intro is updated for each season, have the Pattern weave a new tapestry that is relevant for that season. It was a genius touch in GoT to use the intro as a way of providing world building at the same time as hype music/animation.

Sab669 posted:

GoT's was per episode, IIRC. It mapped out the locations that episode took place in.

At first I thought this show was gonna weave images of the episode's characters, but I guess it would largely just be the Brady Bunch Two Rivers Folk every time

The Glumslinger posted:

Yeah, it was an absolutely genius way to remind viewers where everything was in a show with a lot of important locations.

I'm really hoping we get a bunch of new maps as a result of the show since I've always felt like the existing ones were low quality and cheap

Xotl posted:

Just watched the first four episodes with my wife, and we decided to stick with it.

- Intro/credits is derivative of GoT broadly, but the weaving metaphor is a nice touch and the visuals are quite striking.
- The Moraine opening was clumsy. Either the Foretelling or the original prologue would have been far better. At least it was quick; "momentum" in general seems to be a thing they were going for. I hope it slows down once in a while and gives things time to breathe.
- Emond's Field was strangely jumbled ethnically for a place that's been an isolated, provincial backwater for 2,000 years, so far off the beaten path that the yearly trader visit ("omg an outsider!") is the cause of excitement. It was nice that everyone in the show wasn't white, since Jordan always went out of his way to emphasize how mixed the world as a whole was, but I would have preferred if they were consistent in the village: all SE Asian, all black, whatever. Admittedly a quibble, along with fantasy English accents for all.
- That Two Rivers bow didn't seem all that impressive.
- The post-apocalyptic window dressing is nice.
- They've removed most of what makes Nynaeve annoying, which has also served to make her a bit more bland. Overall I think it's an improvement, even if I wish she was a bit more thorny.
- Where is Moraine getting rumours of Ta'veren in the equivalent of Boise Idaho from that would cause her to divert to such an out of the way place on her quest, especially since no one actually in Boise seems to have any idea that it's the case because nothing is happening there along those lines? It's lazy writing for the sake of convenience and I hope not a sign of things to come.
- I enjoyed Dana's motivation for being a Darkfriend; it felt pretty rooted in her and her place, even if it's the reasoning of another as we learn later.
- Matt staring at the shadow and saying "I see you..." was a great bit. I like Matt in general here. (As an aside, his finding a dagger in Shadar Logoth makes me wonder who actually looted a demonic hellhole like that, since the place seems stripped to the bone; certainly it wasn't the place itself, which doesn't seem to touch non-organics.)

The changes made so far vs the books seem solid to me. Making the Dragon possibly male or female is a simple expedient to enlarge the potential number of candidates and thus keep non-book watchers guessing; the writing is clearly leaning into throwing out red herrings on this and generally making the mystery a bigger deal than any book reader would expect. Perrin having a wife and killing her was an interesting choice rather than just making him have the motivation out of general personality characteristic reasons. More screentime to Logain makes sense in that he'll be easier to remember down the road vs. having him showing up however many episodes or seasons later and being only supported by a "hey, remember that false Dragon dude we briefly mentioned as being captured offscreen at the show's beginning?". No ageless Aes Sedai is not surprising, considering what a pain in the rear end that would have been to implement. Making the cast older changes the overall tone and allows them to have more capable actors. And so on. The only thing I miss is Thom's fabulous moustaches; I expected some serious Sam Elliott energy. Give the guy some facial hair you cowards.

My biggest complaint is that the show generally lacks good dialogue. It's serviceable, but not memorable, and some of the bits are outright clunky. It moves, but it doesn't sing: people won't be quoting this show, making a lot of memes of it, etc to the same degree. People talk about GoT actors like Peter Dinklage and how good they were, but a lot of what made characters like that memorable were not the actors (as good as they often were) but the lines put in their mouths or the story beats surrounding them. WoT looks to have the story beats, but not the lines. Mostly I hope they hire better writers to give people some memorable dialogue. Jordan was not the same calibre of writer as Martin in that regard, and so writers have less to draw off of.

LionArcher posted:

Glad you'll stick with it, but two things. The ethnic thing is weird you're bringing up. We've talked about this a fair amount, post future, post everyone sleeping with everyone in previous ages and different cultures so everyone looking different like a modern city is in fact great.

quote:

Your comment about dialogue is also weird. We're four episodes in. All the actors of the main are good to great, and it's such a big world, it's really only episode 4 where we're getting to have a lot of dialogue scenes that aren't info dumps (something most people agree they've done a good job of world building). Thrones took a solid two three seasons before it was super popular, and I don't think it was till season 4 or 5 where it got HUGE. And we've already got the show trending on twitter the night it drops, and "like a raging sun" is being quoted a fair amount.

Xotl posted:

In a city or some other place along major trade routes that's reasonable. There's nothing "weird" about pointing out that in an extremely isolated out-of-the-way village with a small population where nothing much has happened for a couple of millennia, I'd expect homogenization to have taken place. Modern cities look the way they do because they have large and fairly recent influxes of immigration, which occurs for compelling reasons. I don't want to get too much into this as it's a book point more than a show point, however.

Hieronymous Alloy posted:

I came across something that addressed this recently but I forget where.

Xotl posted:

It would be great to have more of that, to have variety in speech as well as appearance. But as the crew travels to increasingly far away lands maybe we'll see some of that. To some degree though you can run into the same problem as trying to cast for a singular ethnicity: try to find a large enough pool of qualified actors with the same general accent on their English to accurately depict a region and get a better "foreign" feel. Has there been a recent fantasy/SF show that's pulled that off?

LionArcher posted:

Your comment about dialogue is also weird. We're four episodes in. All the actors of the main are good to great, and it's such a big world, it's really only episode 4 where we're getting to have a lot of dialogue scenes that aren't info dumps (something most people agree they've done a good job of world building). Thrones took a solid two three seasons before it was super popular, and I don't think it was till season 4 or 5 where it got HUGE. And we've already got the show trending on twitter the night it drops, and "like a raging sun" is being quoted a fair amount.

Xotl posted:

- Emond's Field was strangely jumbled ethnically

MegaZeroX posted:

Don't forget Thom's "nothing is more dangerous than a man that knows the past"

adhuin posted:

Typical bard talk.

If you look closely at the episode, you'll notice that it is in fact throwing daggers to the neck, that are the most dangerous part of the Thom.

Xotl posted:

My biggest complaint is that the show generally lacks good dialogue. It's serviceable, but not memorable, and some of the bits are outright clunky. It moves, but it doesn't sing: people won't be quoting this show, making a lot of memes of it, etc to the same degree. People talk about GoT actors like Peter Dinklage and how good they were, but a lot of what made characters like that memorable were not the actors (as good as they often were) but the lines put in their mouths or the story beats surrounding them. WoT looks to have the story beats, but not the lines. Mostly I hope they hire better writers to give people some memorable dialogue. Jordan was not the same calibre of writer as Martin in that regard, and so writers have less to draw off of.

th3t00t posted:

I don't understand why you think the intro credits are derivative of GoT?

GoT: a map showing specific locations we'd be at for the episode, no voices used in the song.

WoT: a loom weaving together a tapestry of people, no maps. Voices used in the song.

tsob posted:

I'd find it weirder to imply that quotable dialogue is the hallmark of good writing anyway. A lot of people quote the awful dialogue in things like The Room, which is because it's memorable, not because it's good. Good exposition can be just as important as memorable quotes; good or bad. And I'd say the show is doing well in that regard. I also find some of the show's more functionary dialogue well written, like Liandran's "you make it filthy" when confronting the male channeler in the first episode. It's not quotable, and a lot of it is in her delivery, but the line itself is still good regardless.

I'd also add that I think that Ila's speech to Perrin about revenge is definitely quotable; "what better revenge against violence than peace; what better revenge against death than life". In fact, her whole monologue about her daughter was good. Again, definitely elevated by the actress, but still well written as well. I'd think Nynaeve's "a lapdop on two legs" is a good burn too. The Manetheren quote was nice as well. "We shall go into the land so our children can always hold us, and will never be alone". A lot of dialogue in episode 4 is good, basically. At least in my opinion.