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Yeah I sorta get why they did it, the men vs. women aspect of WoT is very eye-roll inducing in 2021. However the source material kinda requires it. Like you have men declaring themselves as the dragon because they can channel, but where are the women doing the same thing? If the dragon can be a woman in this adaptation you need to run it fully through the logical steps. A single comment from Liandrin about how it's a relief the false dragon was a man this time, how it was a tragic loss to still a woman who claimed to be the dragon, etc. Would do a lot to help smooth over such a major change. Finale was fine but I agree the nynaeve dead-ish and then healed was dumb and cheap. Burning out on the power is supposed to be super scary and dangerous not just something you oops lemme heal you, sis. I also feel like they don't know how much time to give on a battle scene. The snowy fight with the aiel woman, while cool, went on too long, and the Fortress at the gap cut from Agelmar stab to welp, Fortress has fallen. Show is good but flawed but that's fine. Inside me are two wolves, one is thrilled to see any adaptation of the books and the other one gets mad about all the dumb minutia. Both of them go and bite white cloaks when perrin needs help.
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Dec 27, 2021 18:32
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SynthesisAlpha posted:If the dragon can be a woman in this adaptation you need to run it fully through the logical steps. A single comment from Liandrin about how it's a relief the false dragon was a man this time, how it was a tragic loss to still a woman who claimed to be the dragon, etc. Would do a lot to help smooth over such a major change. It’s mentioned that aes sydai have to be willing to take down anyone that abuses the power even another aes sydai which reads to me as a thing that has or can happen
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Dec 27, 2021 19:18
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zoux posted:Now that we're past it I'd like to say that the idea to have the dragon reborn possibly male or female didn't really make sense. Part of the tension about the Dragon Reborn existing is that he's going to be the most powerful channeller on the planet - and also going insane, as likely to destroy the world as to save it. A female Dragon Reborn would just be an extremely powerful Aes Sedai. Like, if you're show-Moirane, you are desperately hoping that Nynaeve or Egwene is the DR, because if it's one of the lads, it's orders of magnitude worse. But it's treated as if it's even money for all five. The last Dragon got their half of the Power corrupted, if that happens again everyone's boned
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Dec 27, 2021 19:31
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The way egg was whisked away to be killed by the WC really is glaringly bad given cities can just field a wizard corp
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Dec 27, 2021 19:31
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canepazzo posted:She wasn't dead, she is still moving, rattling in her dying breaths. Why is it different from Nynaeve mass healing Moraine and Lan in episode four? Book spoiler? From what we see, she/the link had burnt her out using the power, which is the same as stilling. It even killed the other ladies, because they had less capacity, or were simply not skilled enough to handle that amount of power. Unless that is not a thing in the show, I'll have to rewatch to see if it is explicitly spelled out. Rarity posted:The last Dragon got their half of the Power corrupted, if that happens again everyone's boned Is saidar and saidin a thing in the show?
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Dec 27, 2021 19:42
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Collateral posted:Is saidar and saidin a thing in the show? I don't know how else you explain the male channellers going mad without the distinction.
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Dec 27, 2021 19:44
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Submarine Sandpaper posted:The way egg was whisked away to be killed by the WC really is glaringly bad given cities can just field a wizard corp In the book, this is explained by the fact that civilization has been on the decline for hundreds of years. Kingdoms can no longer project enough power to keep the peace throughout their entire nominal borders. Sometimes their de facto limits are the walls of the capitol city, regardless of what the country’s border looks like on the maps. Then, too, the Aes Sedai are widely mistrusted or feared as witches—women in an exclusive club who say they can’t lie or use their power as a weapon, but how far can you trust that? If I recall correctly Tar Valon is supposed to be a city-state rather than a larger nation like Manetheren was, so they don’t really have even a theoretical claim to the land outside their island. Grundulum fucked around with this message at 19:47 on Dec 27, 2021 |
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Dec 27, 2021 19:44
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Grundulum posted:In the book, this is explained by the fact that civilization has been on the decline for hundreds of years. Kingdoms can no longer project enough power to keep the peace throughout their entire nominal borders. Sometimes their de facto limits are the walls of the capitol city, regardless of what the country’s border looks like on the maps. Then, too, the Aes Sedai are widely mistrusted or feared as witches—women in an exclusive club who say they can’t lie or use their power as a weapon, but how far can you trust that? If I recall correctly Tar Valon is supposed to be a city-state rather than a larger nation like Manetheren was, so they don’t really have even a theoretical claim to the land outside their island. I know the books, it's just that maybe the WC should not be able to do that anywhere given how open channeling is from tiny rear end villages to the ruling class.
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Dec 27, 2021 20:01
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Upgrade posted:I’d give the season a B-. I think my biggest complaint is that it feels a little CW right now - and I wish it was a bit more adult. Not in the sense of being filled with rape and torture, but in treating the viewer as a bit smarter and more sophisticated. Same. I think one of my biggest issues with the show is it feels real low budget and devoid of any subtlety. Not sure if that's a cinematography issue and/or bad writing. Doesn't help that the actors who play Rand, Egwene, and Perrin are terrible. I guess my question is where did all the money go?
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Dec 27, 2021 21:35
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Collateral posted:Is saidar and saidin a thing in the show?
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Dec 27, 2021 21:37
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Can't help but feel like if they think they can possibly get away with not having to explain saidar and saidin in detail and the audience not demanding further explanation, they won't. They're really not leaning real hard on the whole "binary" nature of things like the yin-yang symbol that they could easily have done, and it would have made a very impactful visual hook. I can't see them having avoided doing that for any reason other than they specifically didn't want to poke the beehive of "gender essentialism/men and women are basically different species to the point where they use fundamentally opposite forms of magic" in 2021, no matter how central to the universe's premise it is. Reddit may rage but this is the only way the show lives.
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Dec 27, 2021 21:43
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Just let a trolloc channel all over everyone's faces and become the dragon reborn
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Dec 27, 2021 21:46
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The Dark One's clothes were meant the ape the ones shown in the cold open. It was a small detail that made me think "Oh he was clearly expecting to meet someone else" and gave his scenes with Rand a nice charm, like a parent playing peekaboo with a baby. I think Rand's decision to reject the fantasy world at the end is meant to contrast with Lews' at the beginning, right down to having a baby at the center of both tug-of-wars. Lews rejects the arguments and opinions of a woman who (to me) is implied to be the mother of the child; Rand (without even having argued with Egwene) is able to accept and hold her point of view and dreams above his. It's a clear signal that this Dragon will be different from Lews. BUT all of that is completely undercut because the show has not really shown what happened with Lews after that argument, and so there's no reason to really contrast them. The Nynaeve/Egwene plot in this episode is pretty weak. I don't even really care about whether they are on the walls or down on the field, since this show is tending to run with the "rule of cool" (a little too frequently imo, but in this case inconsequential). It exists as it is just to show Egwene channeling (because we haven't seen that for a few episodes! someone might have forgotten because we didn't give her anything else to do!). It also nominally intersects with Nynaeve's desire to protect everyone. That being said, it could have been much stronger. Cut Nynaeve's near-death experience and just show all the other channelers burning out. It would then be obvious to the viewers, Nynaeve, and Egwene: Amalisa was trained by Aes Sedai. Even a trained channeler couldn't handle all of our power. We should probably get trained so that we don't kill anyone else! Then have a terrifying moment as N&E take their channeling blinders off and realise more trollocs are coming. They run back to the city and all the warrior women take up arms and finish off the rest of the trolloc army. Or even just cut Nynaeve's death and leave the rest. Also cut one of the scenes between Amalisa and Agelmar that are near duplicates of each other and use that time on one of the other underbaked plots. Perrin has been given maybe one or two character moments over the season, and he desperately needs more. He alone among the Emond's Fielders has not been given a full motivation or a direction in the plot, and so has been reduced to just literally wandering around wondering what purpose he can serve. That being said, Perrin is merely a runner-up, the winner of the Shortest Shrift Award goes to... Loial, who is apparently the world's most lumbering errand-boy. What a waste of a charming performance. His ability to disappear and reappear when necessary rivals that of Milford men and hobbits. I'm guessing stabbing him is meant to be fan service, not in the sense that book readers will like it, but to give them something to be shocked about, to make predictions about, and to put in Youtube thumbnails with overly surprised faces and MSPaint arrows. It's even cheaper than pretending to kill Nynaeve because the show has given us so little w.r.t. Loial. Padan Fain was great and I accept his reasoning for not killing Perrin. Him having the dagger was a  from me. Considering how it was set up in Shadar and the following episodes, it's a little odd to see it with him, but implies that he is so much worse than we've seen yet. I really liked that.
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Dec 27, 2021 22:06
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Data Graham posted:They're really not leaning real hard on the whole "binary" nature of things like the yin-yang symbol that they could easily have done, and it would have made a very impactful visual hook. I can't see them having avoided doing that for any reason other than they specifically didn't want to poke the beehive of "gender essentialism/men and women are basically different species to the point where they use fundamentally opposite forms of magic" in 2021, no matter how central to the universe's premise it is. Yeah you can't have a show with the central premise being "Women are powerful magic users and hunt down men who use magic because they go mad and can destroy the world, and our main hero might be one of them!" and then just sort of pretend that gender isn't a thing. Honestly it's a similar problem that Y: The Last Man TV show had. That entire comic book series was built on the idea that "all men died" except for the main guy and his monkey. That didn't really take into account non-binary or trans individuals in any real way, so I get it when you remake the show for a 2021 audience you have to make some changes. But the entire point of the series was the importance and panic and chaos that happens when there's only ONE man left alive. Making it more realistic and accurate by showing that "actually there's plenty of men alive still. Just one guy has a Y chromosome." lost a lot of why the audience should give a poo poo about the main character. And you ended up with a lot of weird moments where people saw the trans man character all the time and didn't think it was a big deal at all, but the second they saw the cis male character it was all chaos and chases and panic. It made little sense and the writing suffered because of it. Wheel of Time in its desire to not dive into the "minefield" of gender discussion is also risking losing out on a big part of the story, which is the differences between men and women, and the strengths and weaknesses of both, and how ultimately the importance is working together and helping each other. Still, we're early on. Things could improve and get more developed in future seasons.
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Dec 27, 2021 22:19
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Can someone explain why it matters if the dragon is good or bad? Doesn't everything just restart at the end of the cycle and get spit out again? So the last dragon was bad but the world just started another cycle, right? That part has me confused as to why its such a big deal.
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Dec 27, 2021 22:21
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Breaking the world and ending an age may be part of the circle of life, but that doesn't mean everybody's looking forward to it happening.
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Dec 27, 2021 22:22
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Niwrad posted:Same. I think one of my biggest issues with the show is it feels real low budget and devoid of any subtlety. Not sure if that's a cinematography issue and/or bad writing. Doesn't help that the actors who play Rand, Egwene, and Perrin are terrible. i've understood that it was spent on the sets they didn't show that much and which were burned or abandoned. like eg the village at the start of the season didn't have just front of the houses, but they were all built inside too. and the corona raised the budget also
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Dec 27, 2021 22:22
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Niwrad posted:Can someone explain why it matters if the dragon is good or bad? Doesn't everything just restart at the end of the cycle and get spit out again? So the last dragon was bad but the world just started another cycle, right? That part has me confused as to why its such a big deal. There's a refrain that every book starts with. “The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past (insert a reference to the start of the book the reader is on here). There are neither beginnings nor endings to the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning.” Things don't just reset on the completion of an age, things go on. The previous age, the Age of Legends, didn't result in a reset where everything started over, people kept living, as best they could, through the breaking of the world and into the 3rd age, the one the show is taking place in.
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Dec 27, 2021 22:26
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Niwrad posted:Can someone explain why it matters if the dragon is good or bad? Doesn't everything just restart at the end of the cycle and get spit out again? So the last dragon was bad but the world just started another cycle, right? That part has me confused as to why its such a big deal. It's not clear what happens at the "end" of the cycle. It's clear though that there is "Carry over" from each age into the next. E.g., at the end of the last age, the Dragon hosed up and the male side of magic got broken, and is still broken three thousand years later; that's why men who do magic still go crazy, including the new Dragon this time. So it looks like probably no, there isn't a "hard reset" -- it looks like stuff carries forward age to age.
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Dec 27, 2021 22:34
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Collateral posted:Is saidar and saidin a thing in the show? Niwrad posted:Can someone explain why it matters if the dragon is good or bad? Doesn't everything just restart at the end of the cycle and get spit out again? So the last dragon was bad but the world just started another cycle, right? That part has me confused as to why its such a big deal.
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Dec 27, 2021 23:02
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Yeah from what they've said it's clear the Dark One's never actually won or else the Wheel would have stopped turning already (or he has a really good PR team in the Darkfriend recruitment department)
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Dec 27, 2021 23:34
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If anyone, like me, was trying to find a review that is: 1. critical of the show 2. by a book fan, but not a white dude who is super mad about the gays and the skin colors here's a good one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hxz8B2YsUag man, this show started okay but woof. woof.
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Dec 27, 2021 23:37
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watched a couple of minutes of that. she said episode 6 was her least favourite before the finale. that was the one with moraine going about tar valon manipulating everyone right? that was the best one.
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Dec 27, 2021 23:51
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Sanderson did a watch-along commentary for ep 8 with one of the WoT youtubers (there's so many spoilers in it, look it up yourself) and he remarked on a couple things that might interest this thread: - He was quick to say he didn't dislike any episodes, but 8 was his least favorite. - Because of COVID restrictions that came down between production of episodes 6 and 7, he was not able to give feedback on the scripts for 7 and 8 as early in the process as the other 6 (apparently only immediately before filming, after any major changes could be made). Make of that what you will.
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Dec 28, 2021 00:02
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DTurtle posted:The cold open of episode 8 has Latra Posae Decume use the word Saidin when describing what could go wrong with Lews Therin's plan. She uses the word in the Old Tongue, but it's just translated as "the One Power" in the subtitles. "You expose the very source of the One Power to Him. If He touches and corrupts it, your Power will be out of control. It will run unchecked."
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Dec 28, 2021 00:04
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Another non-"angry white man" review who's still critical of the show right here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPFDEGu5g3o She's read all the books, and started out pretty positive of the show, but started being a lot more critical from episode 5-6 onwards.
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Dec 28, 2021 00:07
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Rythian posted:She uses the word in the Old Tongue, but it's just translated as "the One Power" in the subtitles. Which, from a book standpoint, is a … creative interpretation of the whole deal
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Dec 28, 2021 00:08
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Still worried about those horses tbqh
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Dec 28, 2021 00:20
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Rythian posted:Another non-"angry white man" review who's still critical of the show right here. I've tried to watch one of her videos, but I can't take someone's criticisms about colors and lighting seriously when they just crank the contrast down so far to look artsy.
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Dec 28, 2021 00:29
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Fair enough, I suppose. But I'd argue that just because a youtube talky person wants to look artsy in low contrast, doesn't mean their opinion on colors and lighting in a 100 million dollar TV show is null and void.
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Dec 28, 2021 01:06
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Since I've not seen anyone else mention it I guess I'm just crazy. Didn't Perrin say these two things? "My wife was the only WOMAN I've ever loved" "I loved Rand too" What I'm saying is, are they not making Perrin bisexual? Is that not what those two lines were meant to imply?
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Dec 28, 2021 01:36
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Looking forward to Aviendha being gender swapped.
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Dec 28, 2021 01:51
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precision posted:Since I've not seen anyone else mention it I guess I'm just crazy. Didn't Perrin say these two things? I don't think he emphasized "woman" they way you did. Him specifying gender was to tell Rand he didn't romantically love Egwene.
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Dec 28, 2021 02:00
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precision posted:Since I've not seen anyone else mention it I guess I'm just crazy. Didn't Perrin say these two things? They are absolutely not saying that and it's kinda weird to even think that based on the language. People can usually tell the difference when someone uses love to mean romantic, sexual love and when someone uses it to mean the brotherly/best friend kind of love.
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Dec 28, 2021 02:02
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Rythian posted:Another non-"angry white man" review who's still critical of the show right here. i think she's complaining about changes just because they're changes in some parts, but broadly agree with the overall critique. she does a good job setting out how they did lan so dirty lol.
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Dec 28, 2021 02:09
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Rythian posted:Fair enough, I suppose. But I'd argue that just because a youtube talky person wants to look artsy in low contrast, doesn't mean their opinion on colors and lighting in a 100 million dollar TV show is null and void. I mean, it does really. Just like i'm not going to take driving advice from someone who's crashed into light poles or cooking advice from someone who burns mashed potatos. If you want to be taken seriously on critiquing lighting and color choices, don't make your videos look bad on purpose.
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Dec 28, 2021 02:11
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Rythian posted:Have you never said I love you to a friend of the same sex? Or told a third party you love a friend? Platonic love between childhood friends isn't anything that crazy. I only watched it once but my memory of the scene was like "How horrible, you were mad about Rand and Egwene getting together and you were married!" "My wife is the only woman I've ever loved! Meaning I wasn't looking at another woman, I was looking at a man! Plot twist!" I mean I'm sure I'm wrong since nobody else anywhere has even mentioned it. But it seemed really clear to me! I'm stupid.
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Dec 28, 2021 02:12
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precision posted:Since I've not seen anyone else mention it I guess I'm just crazy. Didn't Perrin say these two things? https://twitter.com/rafejudkins/status/1144966494087987200
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Dec 28, 2021 02:30
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precision posted:I only watched it once but my memory of the scene was like That's not at all the tone I took from that scene. I mean, maybe they're making Perrin bisexual and he secretly had the hots for Rand? But I very much doubt it.
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Dec 28, 2021 02:34
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exmarx posted:i think she's complaining about changes just because they're changes in some parts, but broadly agree with the overall critique. she does a good job setting out how they did lan so dirty lol. What's the problem with Lan?
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Dec 28, 2021 02:37
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