Wheel of Time S1E1: Five MORE Things
Dec. 1st, 2021 10:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerYes, I have a lot of thoughts about the premier of the Wheel of Time streaming series. After starting with Five Non-Spoiler-y Things about S1E1 I then shared Five SPOILER-y Things. Now here are Five MORE Things!
1) Mat's parents are trash. And he's a thief. 👎
In my previous blog I wrote about changes from the books in the character backstories for Nynaeve and Perrin. Nynaeve's change, I can abide; while Perrin's was an absolute trainwreck. Screenwriters changed Mat, too, and... well, at least it's not as bad as what they did with Perrin. 😨
The first changed thing we see about Mat is that his mom's a no-good drunk. That's quite a change from the books because in the books Mat's mom isn't even around. Streaming-Mom is an albatross around Mat's neck. She pities herself because her husband openly cheats on her. That's a change from the books, too, where Mat's dad was absolutely not a cad. His mom's self pity would be understandable, albeit tedious in a minor character, but her portrayal turns really unsympathetic when she's shown to be utterly unappreciative for how Mat sincerely tries to take care of her. It then turns incredibly unsympathetic when she shows no care for her two young daughters. Trollocs are running around the town killing people, and she's like, "Oh? My little girls aren't with me? I hadn't even noticed." Not that's Mat's dad's any better. He's like, "We have daughters?"
Mat should have killed them during the Trolloc raid like Perrin did with his unsympathetic wife.
Mat's also shown in the screenplay to be a thief. He eyes a townswoman wearing a nice bracelet.... Later he sells it to Padan Fain, who assumes he stole it. This indicates Mat has a reputation for theft. This is an irksome change to his characterization. Book-Mat lives for himself but at least is fundamentally honest. Streaming-Mat cares about others except for everyone he gets the impulse to steal from. That's an unsympathetic change. And his parents suck. That's an unsympathetic change, too.
2) There's a sacred bath-cave in Emond's Field?
In one scene Moiraine approaches Nynaeve while she's scrubbing rocks around natural pools in a cave. "The village Wisdom must scrub rocks?" Moiraine goads her. "This place is sacred," Nynaeve counters. Meanwhile I'm like, Where did this sacred bath-cave come from?! Suffice it to say there's absolutely nonesuch in the books.
As I noted previously, I'm not opposed to changes from the books per se. I evaluate them on their impact to the quality of the story that's being told. Changes are good when they add new texture, nuance, or constructive narrative tension. Changes are bad when they turn things that should be sympathetic, un-sympathetic. This change is... just weird.
The novel cave setting is clearly very intentional. The show spent time, effort, and money to stage it. It would be ridiculous to invest all that in a completely throw-away reference. I'm confident that sacred bath-cave will appear in the story again... but how?
3) Trolloc CGI is good, Myrdraal missed his cues
The portrayal, with CGI, of Trollocs in the show is great. They look exactly as they're described in the books: monstrous goat-boar-vaguely-human abominations. The portrayal of the Myrdraal, though, leaves a lot to be desired.
We only see the Myrdraal in one brief scene. He has a vaguely lizard-like face shrouded by a deep cowl. This is a fail; it's way less creepy than a Myrdraal should be!
Part of this fail is due to the villain's somewhat meh appearance. In the books Myrdraal are shadowy, eyeless human-like figures who inspire fear on sight and can disappear by turning sideways. But a bigger part of the fail is failing to use him to drive the dramatic tension.
In the books, Rand gets increasingly creepy feelings that something is watching him, something is following him. He turns around and looks several times but only ever catches a glimpse. It's real enough that the dramatic tension arises with each flicker yet imaginary enough that Rand wonders if he's just being spooked— which also raises the dramatic tension. In episode 1 it's like the Myrdraal missed all his cues to spook people.
4) Fast pacing: mostly good, some bad
Episode 1 concludes with Moiraine telling the 4 young protagonists, Rand, Mat, Perrin, and Egwene, that they must leave home, fleeing from the Dark One's forces out to kill them. In the books this is about 150 pages in. That's quite a lot of ground to cover in a screenplay that's just 58 minutes— which obviously means a lot of material is cut out.
In general I think the screenwriters did well with choosing what to cut. I remember thinking, on my first read of The Eye of the World, that the first 150 pages were too slow. An example of a cut I think works okay is removing Tom Merrilin— or, rather, delaying his introduction until later. Tom was far from being tedious, but spreading out the introduction of new characters so as not to overwhelm TV viewers not familiar with the books is a good thing.
Some of the omissions in the name of brevity are not so good. I mentioned the missed opportunity with the Myrdraal in #3, above. Screenwriters could've played that a lot stronger with even just 30 seconds of additional scenes.
A bigger omission that weakens the story is Tam's delirious ramblings. In the books while Rand is rushing his injured father (Tam) to town after the Trolloc attack, Tam talks semi-consciously about how he found Rand as a baby and brought him home. This is an important character development point as it kicks off a long running thread of internal drama Rand struggles with for several books, wondering who he really is and whether he should even consider Tam family.
And BTW the screenwriters could have made time for these things. They went way longer on the CGI Trolloc fight scene than they needed to.
5) Victory at a price; Why Aes Sedai are distrusted
About that length Trolloc CGI fight scene.... It goes poorly for the villagers. Even with the Myrdrall missing all his cues. 😅 Lan and Moiraine join the fight but even they are overmatched. Moiraine calls twice on great bursts of One Power. With one burst she summons a lightning strike that kills several Trollocs; but the strike also lights a tree on fire that worsens the village's burning. Later, in a last ditch effort, she uses OP to send stones from a building flying outward against the Trollocs. The stones crush the members of the advancing horde... but the town's inn collapses.
"Victory at a price" is an powerful moral in storytelling. It's rare in Hollywood type productions, so I appreciate it in the few instances where it's used. Here it's even more powerful because it tells the woe of the Aes Sedai. They are distrusted for destroying things they claim to save. Here many would choose to believe that Moiraine destroyed the town, for she worsened the fire and collapsed the inn. But her actions saved the town from all-out slaughter.
1) Mat's parents are trash. And he's a thief. 👎
In my previous blog I wrote about changes from the books in the character backstories for Nynaeve and Perrin. Nynaeve's change, I can abide; while Perrin's was an absolute trainwreck. Screenwriters changed Mat, too, and... well, at least it's not as bad as what they did with Perrin. 😨
The first changed thing we see about Mat is that his mom's a no-good drunk. That's quite a change from the books because in the books Mat's mom isn't even around. Streaming-Mom is an albatross around Mat's neck. She pities herself because her husband openly cheats on her. That's a change from the books, too, where Mat's dad was absolutely not a cad. His mom's self pity would be understandable, albeit tedious in a minor character, but her portrayal turns really unsympathetic when she's shown to be utterly unappreciative for how Mat sincerely tries to take care of her. It then turns incredibly unsympathetic when she shows no care for her two young daughters. Trollocs are running around the town killing people, and she's like, "Oh? My little girls aren't with me? I hadn't even noticed." Not that's Mat's dad's any better. He's like, "We have daughters?"
Mat should have killed them during the Trolloc raid like Perrin did with his unsympathetic wife.
Mat's also shown in the screenplay to be a thief. He eyes a townswoman wearing a nice bracelet.... Later he sells it to Padan Fain, who assumes he stole it. This indicates Mat has a reputation for theft. This is an irksome change to his characterization. Book-Mat lives for himself but at least is fundamentally honest. Streaming-Mat cares about others except for everyone he gets the impulse to steal from. That's an unsympathetic change. And his parents suck. That's an unsympathetic change, too.
2) There's a sacred bath-cave in Emond's Field?
In one scene Moiraine approaches Nynaeve while she's scrubbing rocks around natural pools in a cave. "The village Wisdom must scrub rocks?" Moiraine goads her. "This place is sacred," Nynaeve counters. Meanwhile I'm like, Where did this sacred bath-cave come from?! Suffice it to say there's absolutely nonesuch in the books.
As I noted previously, I'm not opposed to changes from the books per se. I evaluate them on their impact to the quality of the story that's being told. Changes are good when they add new texture, nuance, or constructive narrative tension. Changes are bad when they turn things that should be sympathetic, un-sympathetic. This change is... just weird.
The novel cave setting is clearly very intentional. The show spent time, effort, and money to stage it. It would be ridiculous to invest all that in a completely throw-away reference. I'm confident that sacred bath-cave will appear in the story again... but how?
3) Trolloc CGI is good, Myrdraal missed his cues
The portrayal, with CGI, of Trollocs in the show is great. They look exactly as they're described in the books: monstrous goat-boar-vaguely-human abominations. The portrayal of the Myrdraal, though, leaves a lot to be desired.
We only see the Myrdraal in one brief scene. He has a vaguely lizard-like face shrouded by a deep cowl. This is a fail; it's way less creepy than a Myrdraal should be!
Part of this fail is due to the villain's somewhat meh appearance. In the books Myrdraal are shadowy, eyeless human-like figures who inspire fear on sight and can disappear by turning sideways. But a bigger part of the fail is failing to use him to drive the dramatic tension.
In the books, Rand gets increasingly creepy feelings that something is watching him, something is following him. He turns around and looks several times but only ever catches a glimpse. It's real enough that the dramatic tension arises with each flicker yet imaginary enough that Rand wonders if he's just being spooked— which also raises the dramatic tension. In episode 1 it's like the Myrdraal missed all his cues to spook people.
4) Fast pacing: mostly good, some bad
Episode 1 concludes with Moiraine telling the 4 young protagonists, Rand, Mat, Perrin, and Egwene, that they must leave home, fleeing from the Dark One's forces out to kill them. In the books this is about 150 pages in. That's quite a lot of ground to cover in a screenplay that's just 58 minutes— which obviously means a lot of material is cut out.
In general I think the screenwriters did well with choosing what to cut. I remember thinking, on my first read of The Eye of the World, that the first 150 pages were too slow. An example of a cut I think works okay is removing Tom Merrilin— or, rather, delaying his introduction until later. Tom was far from being tedious, but spreading out the introduction of new characters so as not to overwhelm TV viewers not familiar with the books is a good thing.
Some of the omissions in the name of brevity are not so good. I mentioned the missed opportunity with the Myrdraal in #3, above. Screenwriters could've played that a lot stronger with even just 30 seconds of additional scenes.
A bigger omission that weakens the story is Tam's delirious ramblings. In the books while Rand is rushing his injured father (Tam) to town after the Trolloc attack, Tam talks semi-consciously about how he found Rand as a baby and brought him home. This is an important character development point as it kicks off a long running thread of internal drama Rand struggles with for several books, wondering who he really is and whether he should even consider Tam family.
And BTW the screenwriters could have made time for these things. They went way longer on the CGI Trolloc fight scene than they needed to.
5) Victory at a price; Why Aes Sedai are distrusted
About that length Trolloc CGI fight scene.... It goes poorly for the villagers. Even with the Myrdrall missing all his cues. 😅 Lan and Moiraine join the fight but even they are overmatched. Moiraine calls twice on great bursts of One Power. With one burst she summons a lightning strike that kills several Trollocs; but the strike also lights a tree on fire that worsens the village's burning. Later, in a last ditch effort, she uses OP to send stones from a building flying outward against the Trollocs. The stones crush the members of the advancing horde... but the town's inn collapses.
"Victory at a price" is an powerful moral in storytelling. It's rare in Hollywood type productions, so I appreciate it in the few instances where it's used. Here it's even more powerful because it tells the woe of the Aes Sedai. They are distrusted for destroying things they claim to save. Here many would choose to believe that Moiraine destroyed the town, for she worsened the fire and collapsed the inn. But her actions saved the town from all-out slaughter.
