11-27-2021, 10:39 PM
Former false dragons was your idea ck, haha.
The show gives every indication that it’s just the taint, apart from having named one of the voices. There’s little obvious reason for that if it’s just madness. It’s not a person, it’s not sentient. If Logain later refers to “Elusha” as being one of the voices he used to hear then fair enough, I concede. The fact they mention Logain having a sister (who sounds like she betrayed him) maybe means we are going to get more show-only backstory for him, so perhaps a non-book named character connects with that. Otherwise I think it’s too odd to just brush off.
The fact the figures were the One Power wreathed in the taint doesn’t suggest external compulsion to me, I thought it was Logain’s power we were seeing, but if it were compulsion that would be an interesting twist. I can see why someone suggested it as a possibility. Especially since LTT sounded mad in Rand’s head, complete with maniacal laughing. These voices were sweet-talking and manipulative. Very different. And very much like the tactics of certain Forsaken.
If it’s not just taint madness, my money is on it being something to do with Lanfear while she’s still in the Bore but close to release, else just released (I have no idea on the book timeline for that), and we just saw her first attempt to hunt down and manipulate Lews Therin.
The identities of the Forsaken were one of the biggest mysteries of the books. We may see different aliases in the show, not instead of their book ones, but in addition to. Let me cling to my crackpot theory
Personally I quite liked Jesus-Logain. I was expecting them to use him to highlight the danger of a false dragon too (or even just a male channeler), in fact I was expecting a proper antagonist, but I didn’t mind what we got instead. It made his gentling all the more emotionally devastating that he wasn’t a tyrant, and I thought it highlighted how imbalanced the world is.
Perhaps they’re saving the carnage for the LTT flashback. Or they’re saving it for Rand himself.
The identity of the DR is a bigger thing than I thought it was going to be. Because of that they don’t really have to focus on the dangers of male channelers yet, because for all the viewer knows the dragon could be a woman anyway. We have seen enough about male channelers for world building purposes. A female dragon would still be prophesied to save or destroy the world of course but it’s not at all the same thing and the dynamic (for good or ill) is changed as a result. Revealing Rand as the DR and a male channeler might be a double whammy shock factor thing, especially if they double down on healing Nynaeve’s candidacy in the meantime. They might only choose to address exactly how awful it is when it actually happens. Here is our saviour, already going mad and blowing the world to bits? I also can’t imagine them introducing the two forsaken at the Eye (can’t remember the names), it doesn’t make sense for the finale to be with anyone but Ba’alzamon. So maybe they will incorporate elements of the Falme sky-battle (minus the Seanchan and Horn parts, and probably located somewhere else) and up the civilian casualty?
Not having really shown the danger of a male channeler so far could also just be a budget constraint thing, they’ve gone all out with spectacle so far but have still presumably saved the meatiest part of the budget for episodes 7 and 8 (critics have only been shown up to 6, and 8 has no details released at all, not even the episode name).
Omg Asc, our husbands said the same thing! Ba’alzamon is creepy af and Lan is the favourite, he was also quite distraught when he thought Lan was dying.
The show gives every indication that it’s just the taint, apart from having named one of the voices. There’s little obvious reason for that if it’s just madness. It’s not a person, it’s not sentient. If Logain later refers to “Elusha” as being one of the voices he used to hear then fair enough, I concede. The fact they mention Logain having a sister (who sounds like she betrayed him) maybe means we are going to get more show-only backstory for him, so perhaps a non-book named character connects with that. Otherwise I think it’s too odd to just brush off.
The fact the figures were the One Power wreathed in the taint doesn’t suggest external compulsion to me, I thought it was Logain’s power we were seeing, but if it were compulsion that would be an interesting twist. I can see why someone suggested it as a possibility. Especially since LTT sounded mad in Rand’s head, complete with maniacal laughing. These voices were sweet-talking and manipulative. Very different. And very much like the tactics of certain Forsaken.
If it’s not just taint madness, my money is on it being something to do with Lanfear while she’s still in the Bore but close to release, else just released (I have no idea on the book timeline for that), and we just saw her first attempt to hunt down and manipulate Lews Therin.
The identities of the Forsaken were one of the biggest mysteries of the books. We may see different aliases in the show, not instead of their book ones, but in addition to. Let me cling to my crackpot theory
Personally I quite liked Jesus-Logain. I was expecting them to use him to highlight the danger of a false dragon too (or even just a male channeler), in fact I was expecting a proper antagonist, but I didn’t mind what we got instead. It made his gentling all the more emotionally devastating that he wasn’t a tyrant, and I thought it highlighted how imbalanced the world is.
Perhaps they’re saving the carnage for the LTT flashback. Or they’re saving it for Rand himself.
The identity of the DR is a bigger thing than I thought it was going to be. Because of that they don’t really have to focus on the dangers of male channelers yet, because for all the viewer knows the dragon could be a woman anyway. We have seen enough about male channelers for world building purposes. A female dragon would still be prophesied to save or destroy the world of course but it’s not at all the same thing and the dynamic (for good or ill) is changed as a result. Revealing Rand as the DR and a male channeler might be a double whammy shock factor thing, especially if they double down on healing Nynaeve’s candidacy in the meantime. They might only choose to address exactly how awful it is when it actually happens. Here is our saviour, already going mad and blowing the world to bits? I also can’t imagine them introducing the two forsaken at the Eye (can’t remember the names), it doesn’t make sense for the finale to be with anyone but Ba’alzamon. So maybe they will incorporate elements of the Falme sky-battle (minus the Seanchan and Horn parts, and probably located somewhere else) and up the civilian casualty?
Not having really shown the danger of a male channeler so far could also just be a budget constraint thing, they’ve gone all out with spectacle so far but have still presumably saved the meatiest part of the budget for episodes 7 and 8 (critics have only been shown up to 6, and 8 has no details released at all, not even the episode name).
Omg Asc, our husbands said the same thing! Ba’alzamon is creepy af and Lan is the favourite, he was also quite distraught when he thought Lan was dying.
![[Image: thal-banner-scaled.jpg]](http://thefirstage.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/thal-banner-scaled.jpg)