WoT S1E2: Shadow's Waiting

[canyonwalker]

I recently watched S1E2 of the streaming series The Wheel of Time, entitled Shadow's Waiting. In this episode the "kids" from Emond's Field (in the TV adaption they're aged-up to 20 so it feels wrong to call them kids like in the books) continue fleeing their home flight with Moiraine and Lan as Trollocs and Myrddraal chase them. They face additional peril from Whitecloaks and the ancient evil of Shadar Logoth.

I've structured this blog as Five Things, but I'm going to try a different approach to spoilers here. I'll split out spoiler-y parts from things that aren't really spoiler-ish. You can see the whole blog without spoiler cuts by clicking the title.

1) Holy Shit, Whitecloaks are Evil

The episode begins with a cold open in a Whitecloak camp. Eamon Valda has captured an Aes Sedai and is torturing her. He's cut off her hands— the show indicating this stops her from channeling to save herself— and has her tied to a stake. He enjoys watching her burn alive. He adds her ring to a trophy loop of several rings on his belt— implying he's done this several times already. Holy shit, I don't remember Valda being that evil in the books. This seemed more in character for darkfriend Jaichim Carridin.

OTOH a later scene shows "not all Whitecloaks". The gang meets the Whitecloaks, who are led by Geofram Bornhald. In the books he's described as a gentle, grandfatherly man. That portrayal carries here, as he asks members of the group a few questions and lets them go. Bornhald whispers to Moiraine that she should find an Aes Sedai to heal her wound. Valda asserts himself right after that, though, asking additional questions and threatening to hurt them if he sees them again.

The problem with arguing "not all Whitecloaks", though, is that even the almost-good ones like Bornhald are still supporting an organization that clearly has completely evil people like Valda using it to support their evil deeds. One can't credibly claim to be just when one turns a blind eye to such malevolence.

2) Victory at a price; Why Aes Sedai are distrusted— again!

In S1E1 I wrote about a scene that uses the rare "victory at a price" theme and also illustrates why Aes Sedai are distrusted. Another such scene comes in this episode, at Taren's Ferry. With shadowspawn in hot pursuit, Moiraine and Lan wake up the ferryman and demand to be taken across the river immediately. Once across Moiraine sinks the ferry to prevent the shadowspawn from using it to follow them, and to prevent the ferryman from going back across to rescue his family— which would actually just make it easier for the shadowspawn to kill everyone. The ferryman, accusing Moiraine of letting his family be murdered, dives into the churning water to reach his ferry, and dies. The "kids" (there it is again) struggle with whether Moiraine is a murderer after this.

3) What the Dark One doesn't know— and we're not supposed to know, either.

All the "kids" (there it is again) are troubled by bad dreams sent at them by a hooded figure with flame for its eyes and mouth. The fact they all get bad dreams shows that the Dark One doesn't know which one is the Dragon Reborn; he's testing them all to figure it out. This also continues the trope in this TV adaption that we're supposed to think it could be any one of them, too. In the books it's pretty clear, even by mid book 1. I wonder if viewers who haven't already read Eye of the World are fooled by this.

4) "Sing of Manetheren" = All the feels

During their voyage across the steppes below the Mountains of Mist the Emond's Fielders sing an old song, "Sing of Manetheren". The lyrics are melancholy and sparse (link to Wheel of Time Fandom Wiki), and the villagers don't really know what it's about. Moiraine tells them the true-life history of their forebears, and it's an enormously sad story.

5) Shadar Logoth: Wondrous and Creepy. Things Left Out.

Shadar Logoth is an ancient city whose architectural beauty is surpassed only by the creepiness of its total lack of life. The shows skips over lots of scenes and places in the books to get the gang here, but once they do... wow, the production team clearly spent some budget on this place. It's a visual feast, and the foreboding tone is spot-on. They still cut it short for time, though, and in doing so raise some concern about how they'll portray the lasting effects of what happens here. In particular, Mat doesn't meet Mordeth, and nobody gives him the dagger; he merely finds it in a small treasure chest he opens in an abandoned building. The books emphasized that the act of receiving the dagger as a gift was critical to the evil of the place infected him. Some fans are bothered that detail is left out. Enh, I think it's fine without. But portraying Mordeth here could have upped the creepy factor even more.

Worse to me than whether this nit was left out is a huge missed opportunity I see here. Showrunner Rafe Judkins has said he's telling "the story of the whole series", not a linear, scene-by-scene story of the books. What's the missed opportunity? Show Padan Fain.

While I get it that they're solving for time here, showing Padan Fain in Shadar Logoth— instead of telling about him as a flashback way later— could've been really powerful. Revealing he's a darkfriend and is following them would increase dramatic tension. It would also set the base for his transformation with Mordeth into a much more powerful foe who appears later. Again, this would increases dramatic tension by showing the foreboding early on instead of telling it several books later via third-party exposition.

Comments

[canyonwalker]

MINOR SPOILER FROM A FEW EPISODES LATER

Re: #2: In the books the Emond's Fielders challenge Moiraine on the morality of things like sinking the ferry. Even though such actions are necessary to protect themselves— and in the books' longer story arc about fleeing from danger there are more— they still destroy the livelihoods of innocent people. In the books Moiraine assures her new companions that her "network" will deliver more than adequate financial compensation to people whose homes, businesses, etc. are damaged; and that it will be done in a way it's not traced back to the Aes Sedai.

In the streaming series Moiraine has no such conversations with the villagers. This leaves it an open question to non-book viewers (NBVs) where Moiraine's moral center rests. The streaming series does explain this later, in a conversation between Moiraine and one of her superiors in S1E6.