WoT on Prime episode 5 SPOILERS

[Thalia]

Stepin was from Andor. We don't know for sure if it's specifically Andor's interpretation of the Forsaken, or if every culture will have different images/associations. It's a clever way of merging/cutting too I guess if people believe slightly different things. They are basically mythical at this point. But I don't think the show will over complicate tbh. My guess is they will simplify Ishy down to just that one name and we won't hear the Ba'alzamon title (although interestingly they've already identified Ishy as "the last man to bring the dragon to the dark one" but given him one of the DO's titles as well). But anyway, I think the fact his face looks a little like the dream mask is just viewer's first, very obscure hint that the creepy dream guy IS Ishy and not the DO, and that yes as Stepin and Lan wonder, they do have some ability to exert influence on the world.

EDIT: oh, and also, my husband is quite gleeful that you called him clever lol

[Ascendancy]

Well to be fair Rand in the TV is kinda boring. I mean what fantastical has he done at this point?  He knocked down a inescapable wooden door that could have been pure exaggeration of the Dana's part.  He didn't help Bela in their sprint out of town, he hasn't gotten deathly sick, everyone had the same dream about the bats.  He hasn't done anything interesting.

Mat is sick.  Egwene has channeled a little.  Nyna had an explosive 'first' channeling experience.  Perrin called wolves.  Rand?

I think Bela was "refreshed" by Rand. When Moiraine was healing all the horses and Lan made her stop, she checked the last horse and didn't heal it (presumably because it had already been healed). Obviously we didn't "see it" on screen, but I got the impression that's what that scene was showing us.

[Nox]

I took it as she took Lan's advice even knowing rand did. And if he did we should have seen him sick. Instead they cut months ahead with no mention. (In either case)

[Ascendancy]

I know...

[Thalia]

I also thought she took Lan's advice. But the implication is still there: if the horses were tired enough to need refreshing, how did the horse she missed keep up with the others? They had to run soon after that scene.

I reckon they'll play with off-screen or implied action more and more as time goes on, so that the audience is trained to accept it. By the time we get deep into Black Ajah and disguised Forsaken it will be an important narrative device. Especially for those who aren't supposed to be able to lie.

I think it's a shame they didn't do the Sickness in passing though, they didn't even need to linger on it (or it could have been a line of dialogue). Since we skipped time perhaps it happened then but was too transitory for the characters to notice much (especially considering how poorly Mat is by now). But I can't see any reason they couldn't have given us something. It's possible he might be confronted with it later I suppose, if Moiraine outright asks him if he's been sick. It's a minor detail really but it's a bothersome one because (door aside) there are really no clues to look back on about his channeling.

There's enough I think for him being the dragon (albeit with little to no prophecy context yet). His looking like an Aielman. Recognising dragonmount. Given he'd have no teeny tiny baby memories it does suggest LTT is already starting to get comfy in there, even if he hasn't begun the resolute screaming yet... But even Logain's laughter was presented as Mat's paranoid imagination. Given both boys were there they didn't have to do that, they've already implied Mat's a channeler, the audience would have filled in that blank on their own. It really feels like they've quashed everything apart from a few sprinkled references the audience won't understand yet. But they are risking quashing the entire character along with it.

I did read they had to fight to keep the Logain laugh scene. So given that it was presented that way it does make me wonder if there was some outward pressure on the writers to downplay Rand. It's getting to the tipping point of being a detriment though. We're over the midpoint now.

I think we will be getting a lot of him in ep 7 (I think this is when we'll see Tam's fever dream). But I still feel like they need to do something with him beforehand. At the moment he's walked all that way to find Egwene, whose intention is to stay at the White Tower (which he knows). Apart from a disappointing reunion his goal is done. I do think we will discover he's so fixated on not losing her because of what Tam said, she's the last true "home" thing he has now, but ep 7 seems so late to only be starting to build his emotional depth. I feel like they need to start upping Rand's role next episode or the reveal risks falling flat.

All of the E5 need compelling reasons to follow Moiraine to the waygate, and imo it needs to be more than "it's one of you" and "we have no time" (Otherwise it'll just be a repeat of Winternight only with Moiraine having moved the goalposts) They all have that impetus apart from Rand. If he STILL just goes in order to follow Egwene they've robbed him of any agency.

Discovering HE'S a channeler in ep 6 is the only way I can think of to start tying things together. He'd have to run to avoid being gentled, then. But given the great lengths they've gone to to hide it so far I'm just not convinced they'll do it.

[Mikhail]

Yeah, it's true. Aside from the tiny sprinklings of data, there isn't a lot to make Rand stand out. Not having him cleanse Bela (hell, they'd have to set that Bela was HIS horse- or that Egwene was riding it, if they wanted to add that- for it to make any sense) nor having him getting channeling sickness is a thing. Granted, we have TWO suspicions as to why mat is sick- the dagger and the power. But Rand doesn't have one of those. So having 2 guys get sick (And how do you differentiate them without a voice over about being loopy and in the clouds? How do you make that MARKEDLY different than Mat's suspicion fueled sickness that leaves him looking haggard.) We don't have time to show him recover and be back to himself either.

I get why they couldn't show the weeks of traveling, both story and money wise. So cutting the sickness makes sense.

Thing is, there is very little story for Rand. Very little characterization. He's a bit thin on the ground. As said, his motivation is going to WT to be with Egwene. We haven't gotten anything else from him. To be fair, as I think back, in the book it was about getting away to protect the village and his dad and then to be close to Egwene as he felt she was his responsibility. Maybe Tam's ravings as well, making him want to find himself and his place.

They cannot afford to wait until the penultimate episode to start showcasing Rand. Yes, next ep is Siuan and Moiraine. But their core is about the Dragon being reborn. Rand has to start coming into focus at least peripherally. Otherwise, it will seem a bait and switch and those are never fun.

And Rand needs a REASON to feel driven to follow Moiraine. In the books, it was because they were always 1 step ahead of the dark dogging their heels. We assume this is so, but haven't seen anything since the farm house. That need to run with Moiraine was also a driver. This isn't the case in TV. Instead, it would have to be running off from the AS or something and that doesn't....feel right.

BS said 6 was his favorite. I am hoping we see threads come to together. And please, Amazon, just give them 10 seasons already! damn it! We need more time. As much as I liked the warder stuff last week, if it comes at the expense of the 1st season story with the main characters, it was a bad move. Because while the set up is there for Moiraine and Lan later on, that is LATER ON. They don't have time to waste or squander and not service the main characters. I hope that everything balances out. It feels really uneven atm because we know what is supposed to happen or be revealed and it doesnt feel like we have enough time.

But I am hopeful I am wrong because I dont see the full picture.

[Thalia]

I think they could work in the horse thing, they'd only have to say it was the horse Egwene was riding, but I don't think they'll go back to that detail. I think Moiraine missing a horse was just an easter egg for the readers. They might have cut the Sickness altogether I guess, I can't remember if it's been mentioned in relation to women or not.

I agree that those are probably the reasons they skipped it (and they make sense), but Rand's new to channeling, it could literally have been something as off-hand as Rand retiring to bed earlier than normal or Mat quipping he hopes Rand hasn't caught what he's got, and then never mentioned again. Or even just a comment when they arrived at the farm that suggested Rand was glad they had a barn to stay in because he felt a little off colour.

I was expecting them to skip the rest of the travelling tbh, and was glad they did. The episodes that weren't just travelling are stronger imo. We got more or less the same beats, and in an 8 hour season it was enough. Not that I wouldn't have loved to see more had they had more time for it! Particularly Thom; he deserved more screen time.

I do hope they do more with Rand next episode; he needs it at this point. 

I think one of the drawbacks of using Tar Valon over Caemlyn is that it feels like they've stopped running now; they have an authority to hand everything over to. I'm happy enough to sit back and see what they do, and I 100% agree that knowing the story in this instance is a detriment. The Stepin story was so powerful in terms of character that I think they can pull it all off, but we'll see. 

I'm curious to see how ep 5 feels when we can see it in relation to the whole season, and if the pause there is justified. I think it did more longterm set-up than just Lan and Moiraine's eventual fate though (like bond consent and acts of grief). I think the main and immediate payoff was for Lan (who I would hazard a guess is probably a firm fan favourite). We know now that Lan is a man who feels deeply (and clearly has deep wells of pain behind that stoicism), and I think we basically saw a glimpse of him as a king without a kingdom -- which will make the reveal of his past far more poignant now and not just "backstory." I think that revelation will be fairly soon, possibly when they get to Fal Dara? But in any case, when he gives Nyn the ring but rejects her, which will be before they leave Tar Valon I reckon, we are REALLY going to feel it now. We know Lan's stakes better for ep 5, and he was given the room to breathe without just being Moiraine's warder. I can't think how else they could have done that with the same emotional impact (and especially with a character who speaks little and shows little).

For better or worse this opening season really is "Moiraine's Quest" and it makes sense that they build her and Lan up first for that reason. The Aes Sedai and the Tower are kinda WoT's USP so I don't think it was the wrong decision to have so much focus there, and I imagine subsequent seasons will feel far more ensemble than this one has room to. But equally, the dragon reveal has to have an impact, and if it looks like they just "pick" the character that flew under the radar, but who no one really cares about, then that's a problem. So I totally agree with you, it has to be worth it. It's impossible to judge that until the finale, but it's a concern precisely because we do know the story.

In terms of the bond loss being way in the future though, if you haven't read the books you don't actually know it's later on, and I think once Moiraine and Suian's interactions makes it clear how much personal risk they are undertaking this is going to feel like a huge threat (and is supposed to). Viewers have GoT and LOTR as a reference after all, and GoT killed off its big name star "main" character at the end of season 1, and after Gandalf everyone knows the mentor character doesn't survive to the end. The risk there will feel both real and immediate.

[Mikhail]

I think that is valid. The need to show Lan outside of his relationship with Moiraine matters. We have to remember, in the book our perception of Lan is primarily from Rand. Of course Lan is going to be reserved and not expressive in front of him. Now I do believe RJ fell when showing the budding romance between Lan and Nynaeve. While we saw her pay rapt attention to Agelmar's telling of Lan's story in Fal Dara, we didn't really see any indicators from him that she was planting seeds in his walls.

The show is setting up Lan to be a more relatable character and allowing him to show the depths of his feeling in a ritualized and prescribed manner did that brilliantly.

Lan *IS* a fan favorite. But ultimately, while ALL of them matter in the long run, the story is about the EF5 and the Dragon in particular. We need to see more of both what he is and more about Rand. Rand needs more story to keep him from being defined purely by his relationship to Egwene (and to Mat, to a lesser extent.) Rand needs his own story. And we haven't really seen one, whereas we have from all the others.

I was going to say it will be tough to do in 3 episodes, but we are talking 3 hours. It can be done in that time- but needs to be started in the next episode. Waiting until 7 to show the blood snows might be too late. Pacing has been pretty wonky this first season. And I get the challenges.

Book 1 is notoriously hard to adapt for a number of reasons:
1) it was intentionally written to mirror or recall LOTR. Not just the 1st few chapters, as RJ admitted. A lot of the same story beats appear in it as well, at least until they hit Baerlon.
2) he was *trying* to fit it into the trilogy he pitcher to TOR back in the 80s. But he was already bursting at the seams with the story. Still, it made it uneven because it seemed Rand was fighting the DO. (I've heard that if the series wasn't picked up past book 3, that Rand's killing of Baalzamon would be his taking out the DO. In RJs early notes, that was a possibility, as odd as it seems now.)
3) his magic system was still being worked out. Things like the Eye or the green man's place or how dreams worked are hard to explain given how rigorous his metaphysics became. (There are some way to explain it using the world of dreams it's intruding into the real world, but it takes some work.) The battle of Falme (in book 2) is definitely hard to explain, with them appearing in the sky and their battle being reflected in the battle between the heroes and the seanchan. RJ tried to explain in a q&A on Dragonmount n 2005 that the pattern was intervening to remove all the false dragons from the board by doing that, but frankly that felt like a retcon.
4) The 1st season cannot simply be a replication of book 1. It has to set up the whole series. So it has to also introduce characters and politics and settings that would not become visible until later, when our viewpoints were expanded beyond the EF5. So some time from the book 1 story line would have to taken and given to world creation and later story set up.

So Rafe and co have to do a lot and juggle a lot. The dragon mystery is good but....we need to remember why we care. The stakes about the Dragon need to be raised. Let alone the fear of male channelers. Because that is a huge driving point for rand in book 2. His terror at being able to channel and his attempts to avoid doing so at all costs. We've not seen any real indicators that the fears about male channelers are justified- that the response of the AS and the red in particular are NOT exaggerated. 

But 3 hours is a whole movie (Endgame, for example.) Hopefully, the writing is tight, the editing flows (Nynaeve's meeting loial and being led to Rand should have been on screen so that it didn't seem out of nowhere), and the focus is laser like. I am excited to see 6 since that is (or should be) the beginning of the downhill rush to the end.

And it *appears* we will be seeing the Eye (Aside from the last episode name) from the map of Randland and cultural styles. If you look at the screenshot panning you can see a dotted line from the 2R to TV and then to Fal Dara and then it disappears heading north into the blight.

it will be interesting

[Thalia]

Oh absolutely, RJ did a poor job of their romance when it has all the ingredients of a FANTASTIC love story. There are some wonderful bits to it don’t get me wrong, but build up was not his forte when it came to the romances (like, any of them). The rejection scene came a bit out of the blue to me as I recall, and felt very much like Nynaeve just suddenly decided that Lan was the man for her. It doesn’t help that we get it filtered through the perspective of a character listening in to something private I think? I might be getting scenes mixed up, it’s been a while since I read it.

Still, seeing those two dance around one another is one of the things I’ve been looking forward to, and both actors are killing it. Nynaeve in particular does a fantastic job of showing the character being a complete tour de force while still somehow expressing her vulnerabilities. I can feel how everyone will be rooting for them. After ep 5 his bond to Moiraine feels a proper complication, and not only that, but the pull on Lan’s loyalties is going to be excruciating. 

I disagree in the sense that I don’t think it’s wrong for the main weight to be put on Moiraine and Lan this season. They are the driving force of book 1 and also the best vehicle to expedient worldbuilding as far as the show is concerned. The E5 should have a decent setup but they are also still babies with lots of growing to do, and I actually think we only need to see their first steps into embracing that. Where I agree completely with you is that the others have all had those first steps; all of them apart from Rand, who might as well still be herding sheep in the Two Rivers. He's sweet and loyal and resolute in his quest to find Egwene, but he’s still just the farm-boy waiting to go home. The others don’t have a way back now; they are changed by their experiences. Rand isn’t, and it's getting noticeable now. I can only assume its purposeful, but I can't imagine why. But maybe it feels like that because we know the story?

Rand absolutely isn’t the main character in the books imo. He’s the dragon and the plot revolves around that (and him as a result) but all of the E5 are the main characters and I think they should have equal weight overall. However ‘who is the dragon reborn’ is the crux of this season and what we're headed rapidly towards, which means even if he's not quite the focus yet he shouldn't be lagging so badly behind. Right now it feels like they’re doing Rand a huge disservice. But like you said, there are 3 hours left, and with Sanderson and most of the critics (the ones who stuck with it and enjoyed it at least) saying 6 is the best so far we can probably be hopeful that it'll work out well.

I absolutely agree that waiting until ep 7 feels too late for some Rand love though. I think we need to know he’s a channeler somewhere in ep 6 tbh. But I’m not convinced it will happen. It might just be because we've been primed for this to be the "Tower" episode though, so we don't know what else to expect in it.

I wonder if there was a scene between Nynaeve in the Tower and Nynaeve with the boys that ended up cut just to make the episode fit the hr time slot, or if they hadn’t intended to bookend them like that but for some reason had to in the final cut. It was completely jarring that they placed them together. I didn’t like it. But I also wondered if it was an attempt at the kind of implied off-screen action that I think they will make use of to obfuscate things in the future, and they just failed to execute it effectively.

Liandrin encouraged Nynaeve to the gardens, saying they were accessed beyond the library. From that I think we are supposed to assume that Nynaeve did head that way but never made it to the gardens because she encountered Loial in the library first. The xray trivia at that point is actually about Ogier loving libraries and the White Tower having the best in the world.

I’m not 100% sure it was intentional, but it seems like they expected us to fill in the blanks. Putting those two scenes back to back was a really bad idea though. It was a really rough time jump.

[Thalia]

I’ve been thinking about Rand and if there’s any other reason they might have underplayed him so far (other than trying to hide him as the dragon). It’s at the point now that he’s noticeable precisely because the others all have something going on, and in that sense the camouflage no longer works anyway. If they really wanted to obscure it as a “surprise” then surely all the E5 would be presented as a likely possibility?

I was thinking about how the majority of Mat’s character-work was done in the early episodes, particularly in the changes they made to his background. Once he’s corrupted by the dagger, his character is essentially on ice. He can’t grow, he can’t do anything really, until he’s free of that curse. They had to get that stuff in early for us to care about Mat and what he goes through; he spends a long time sick under the dagger's influence.

Are they just trying to do the opposite with Rand?

Are they sticking with the tenacious, stubborn, loyal farm-boy for so long on purpose, not to disguise him as the dragon, but because that IS the point of his arc in the show? Stick with me, I know I ramble haha.

We’re shown Rand's always wanted the white picket fence. He was content in Emond’s Field. He was the ONLY one of the kids content in Emond’s Field. Mat had family problems, Perrin had a tense marriage, and Egwene dreamed of bigger things (I’m not including Nynaeve here because she’s the only one of the E5 who leaves by choice).

He left because, like the others, he had to. But he fought back against Moiraine (the only one), and since the Shadar Logoth split his sole focus is on finding Egwene, the last bit of normal in his life (and, of course, it’s the right thing to do). But that’s it. Because he wants to go home still, I think, and probably still thinks he will. Or needs to think he will, given what book-readers know Tam said. He needs to hold onto something.

Book-readers know his sense of identity must be reeling right now, and he’s chosen not to confide in the others (or the viewers) but there are some small signs that he’s struggling. Do you remember what he told Dana about how he viewed life?

“You know what’s funny? I…I never gave much thought to the Wheel before all this. I just always done what I thought was right, then moved on to the next thing and tried to do right again. But now…I don’t know. I don’t know what’s right. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know shit, really.”

He’s clearly thinking about what Tam said. But it also sums up Rand pretty well; focusing on one thing, doing what he thinks is right, then moving on to the next thing: that’s pretty much his approach to being the dragon. And it’s what we’ve been watching him do in the show. Right now he’s focusing on that one thing, in this case finding Egwene, and just hoping for the best; hoping that once he accomplishes that task, the next step will be clearer. He still WANTS to go home afterwards. He still wants to be the farmboy who marries his childhood sweetheart and watches his kids grow. At the moment maybe it’s actually important that we feel Rand CAN go back. He’s the everyman in this, swept up against his will and just wanting a return to normal life. 

It makes his being the dragon more tragic, because any of the others could have coped better with at least that part of the burden; they have things to escape, or reasons to grow. Rand really doesn’t. He’s the one who most clearly doesn’t want it, and what he does want is the farthest removed from what being the dragon will force on him.

If you look at it like that, it makes sense that they’ve withheld the Tam scene. We aren’t getting those little clues that there’s more going on, because Rand himself doesn’t want to acknowledge them. If we knew he was a channeler (or knew the life he thought he had as Tam’s son was now a suspected lie), we lose that sense that maybe Rand can escape and have the life he’s always wanted. The moment he discovers saidin is the moment he has no choice but to accept his life really will never be what he planned, and that can’t be yet: not until he’s found Egwene. 

Rand has an immediate dilemma next episode, because once he does find Egwene, he has to decide what that next step is going to be for him. What is the next right thing to do? He’ll know she’s safe soon, and he already knows she will intend to stay at the Tower. Three of his friends are channelers, and Perrin has his wolf thing; from Rand’s perspective he’s very unlikely to be the dragon. So what does he do now? How does he react now all his friends are changing? How does he try to cling on? He seems so desperate for connection right now; he’s tried to reach out to Mat several times. I imagine he feels a little like he’s slowly losing everything (and everyone) that matters to him.

I wonder if we’ll see more evidence of him struggling when the kids reunite, because I do think they need to make this more obvious now. He’s been in silent crisis, and we need not only to see it now, but feel it (that’s what’s going to make the DR reveal an impact, and ep 5 makes me think they really could make a great job). They need to fill in more of the character work like they did for Mat at the beginning, so we can understand why he has been stagnating, even if we don’t know all the why of it yet. I wouldn’t be surprised if we have another big outburst from him. Especially when he realises how little control he has here; that Egwene really isn’t coming back. I also really hope we see more obvious signs of him dwelling on Tam, outwardly longing for the time before any of this happened, and trying to figure out what all of this means he is now -- so that when we do find out about Tam, we understand him more. 

This is the emotional crunch point for him, I think. Having Rand revealed as a channeler already would have been a dilution of this conflict -- it seals his fate too early, not as the dragon, but as a man who can’t ever have an ordinary life. In delaying it, and if they play it right, his discovering he’s a channeler could potentially be very devastating for him; not because of the threat of madness, but because it’s the nail in the coffin: he’s never going home

That's his story.

I’m not sure if I’ve explained any of that very well (and sorry it’s waffly, haha), but I think they could pull it out the bag and make the dragon reveal very impactful for Rand. It hasn’t got to have the feel of a surprise, but it should feel like an emotional ride. I’m curious how they’ll handle it. I might be completely on the wrong track, but personally, I want the emotional gut punch of it being Rand, and I think something like this is how they could do it.