Wheel of Time
 

The second season of Amazon's series "loosely" based on the Wheel of Time books is pretty damned good.

Season 1 was absolutely terrible and I had resolved to not watch season 2 at all. An old friend, who also thought season 1 was terrible, told me season 2 is a huge step up and actually good TV, and he's right.

Have watched up through episode 5, and each one gets a bit better than the one before it. Episode 1 wasn't great, but the rest have been very good.

If season 1 is/was a D, season 2 is about a B+. I still have issues with the adaption of the books to the series, but they've fixed most of the problems from season one with writing, direction, acting, and costumes.

I only read about 5 of these books because I thought Robert Jordan was "juicing" the story to keep it going as long as possible. I thought it was vastly inferior to Lord of the Rings in terms of themes and literary value.

I watched the first season, but had only vague memories of the book. And yeah, wasn't that impressed. Season two started off confusing, but has had some pretty darn good episodes. The costumes and sets are terrific.

Interesting. Like most, I thought season 1 was terrible outside of 1 episode. I have only watched the 1st episode of season 2 and wasn’t impressed either. I had pretty much written it off, but it sounds like I need to continue.

Jordan's wife was his editor and she definitely didn't do a great job trimming out the fluff. Books 1-7 are pretty good, though they start getting a bit bloated, and books 8-10 should have been 2 books at most. Book 11, Jordan's last, is probably the best of the series. Sanderson did a good job wrapping up the series.

I'm somewhat sad I never got there. Unfortunately book 10 killed it for me and I DNF'd.

I'm a masochistic completionist.

There was a bigger thread during season 1. This show has really picked up in season 2. Finished episode 7 tonight and can't wait for the finale. Just hate that it's the final episode of the season. This show is so ****ing good.

Season 1 being so bad turned a lot of people off I think. I read all the books and was excited for the show, but couldn't even finish the first season. I think I stopped after 4 episodes.

Season 1 was atrocious when it came to keeping true to the spirit of the books. Season 2 is way way way better, while there are still some "why why why" moments overall it's keeping much more true to the overall themes of the books other than completely neutering Rand so they can focus on girl power instead.

Episode 7 had a LOT of WTF are they doing/thinking moments. Hopefully they don't repeat the horrifically bad finale style like they did season 1.

At some point Rand needs to become a bad ass. Season 2 finale is that time.

Let’s start with what the series has done right. The castings of Rand, Mat, Moraine, Lan, Elayne, Fain and the Maidens are pretty good. The sets and environments are also very well done. Costuming as well. Fades, Trollocs and the Whitecloaks are spot on.The weaves of the One power are pretty close to how I envision them, although it seems as everyone not born with the spark can see them.
Now for what they’ve done wrong. I don’t mind the diversity in castings, it was just poorly done, like they did it randomly for the sake of diversity without a care for the cultures each character was from. Moraine was never a lesbian. Lanfear is supposed to be the most beautiful woman in the world, clearly missed the mark there. Nyneave isn’t bitchy enough. They’re turning Hopper into Perrin’s pet. Speaking of Perrin, where the **** is his axe. The Seanchen are mostly wrong. I’m tired of typing so I’ll just say everything else is wrong.
Oh, and where the **** is Perrin’s axe!

I liked season 1, but Im not a book reader. I think Rand goes full ****ing Dragon on some mother****ers or at least he better.

I'm ready for some bad assery from several of that friends group and those Aiel women are badass bitches. Wanna see some more of them lol.

Holy ****ing shit. That finale. Damn it was good. Best episode of the series by far for me!

So you aren't a book reader.

The finale was maybe a 3/5. Which is a big step up from the 1/5 of the season 1 finale. I'd like to give season 1 finale a 0.

So many missed opportunities that likely are directly related to budget. Whitecloaks vs Seanchan should have been outside the city.

While the heroes of the horn scene was cool, it was drastically less cool than the book version.

Was nice to see at least a glimpse of the real Mat in this episode. Of course they had to **** that up by having Mat stab Rand.

Where the **** is Gaul? I know he should have appeared a few episodes ago, but not including him a a huge mistake.

The "fight" between Rand and Ishmael was a total ****ing dud.

We also got cheated out of an amazing sword fight between Rand and Turac. Having Rand kill him with the Power was cheap. Though it is keeping with the theme of nerfing Rand.

I'm wondering if any of you are still watching, because this season is absolutely stellar. Easily the best thing on Amazon Prime right now.

I didn't realize it was still on TBH. I'll have to come back around to it.

First season was an absolute slog. I'd completely forgotten about this.

Did you not watch the 2nd season? It's sooooo much better than season 1. Season 3 blows them both out of the water.

Is it worth skipping season 1 and starting with season 2? I just couldn't drag myself through the first season.

Honestly, you probably could. If you have any questions about what happened just look it up lol. Just watch the little recap before the second season or I'm sure there are people that explain what happened pretty well.

I assumed you were talking about the 2nd season. LMAO

As a book lover season one almost turned me off of watching this ever again. I gave season two a chance and it was definitely better and they pretend like season one never happened. I agree, they are starting to hit their stride with season three. I'll always get pissed at the blatant disregard for the books but understand they have to change a lot to bring it to the screen unless this was going to be 30 seasons long. I'll have to just continue to ignore the bs but am looking forward to each new episode.

I've seen several book readers blow their load over this past episode about Rhuidean. Some saying its one of the best fantasy episodes in a long long time and that the whole vibe is practically spot on for Rhuidean.

I'm not a book reader and I really liked season 2 and season 3 is actually legitimately compelling must watch TV.

I love this show.

pretty epic how they've come out of the nose dive that was season 1. Ep 5 drops in 30 minutes!

One "lesson" is all it takes to learn anything at all no matter how complicated apparently.

I'm not sure I get what you are talking about, but from what I've seen about episode 5 I'm assuming you mean Egwene. If that's what you are talking about, then I'd say they've made it pretty clear that she's one of the strongest channelers of several generations and clearly picks up things very quickly. She's no ordinary person.

Holy shit, I hate that this show doesn't get the love it deserves. This season has been one of the best seasons of TV I have seen in a long ass time. This is the show that Amazon should be pushing against House of the dragon and not Rings of Power.

This season has completely blown away anything those other 2 shows have done and I loved season 1 of HOTD. I thought episode 4 of this season was going to be tough to top, but then we just got episode 6. God damn it was awesome and had probably the 2 most badass scenes that we've gotten in WOT.

I wish more people watched so I could talk about it.

Through 6 episodes season 3 has averaged an 8.6 rating/episode on IMDB.

Reading what you have been saying about it I will have to check it out. Seems like a reverse of GOT in which it actually gets better as the seasons progress. I read most of the books, so I am hoping that the pacing in the show is much better than the books which drug on for far too long.

Pretty disappointed in the 7th episode. Even with a limited budget and time to show it it could have been so much better. I don't understand this propensity to want to adapt books but then completely dismiss the source material. Sigh.

I really don't give a shit about sticking to source material, but this week's episode was a disappointment. Easily the worst episode of the season. I'm just really not into a big huge battle that takes up a whole god damn episode unless they can do it perfect. Seemed like they could have condensed that down into a 20 minute segment and let us see the others.

Honestly, right now, the Two Rivers storyline is the most boring of them all. I just really don't give a shit about any of it and then they go and do a whole episode about it.

The emotions that should have been there just were not. Honestly I think a lot of it had to do with forcing it all into 8 episode seasons, just not enough time.

My really good friend, WOT is by far his favorite book series ever and he's read the series like 8 times or something like that loved this last episode. He told me it made him cry multiple times. I just didn't feel like we needed an entire episode dedicated to that whole battle. They could have skipped several of those scenes and gave us scenes from the Aiel wastelands group and the Tanchico group. That would have made it a much better episode.

Seasons 1 and 2 also had disappointing episode 7s, followed by terrible finales.

Season 3 has been great. I hope they don't flub the finale again.

His post is full of hyperbole. Season 3 has been pretty good, but compared to the dumpster fire that was season 1, and just meh season 2, it feels great for people desperate for it to be great.

HOTD is a better written, acted, and much better visually.

Completely agree. I had surgery last week which gave me time to binge the season up until now and while I wholeheartedly agree that season 3 >> season 2 >> season 1, it still feels like a CW level show at best. FWIW, it’s a good CW show like The 100, but a CW show just the same. I think it’s the fact that it’s mostly populated with largely forgettable young actors.

You literally called it great in your post above mine. Ok, here I'll tone it down.

Season 3 of WOT isn't better than season 1 of HOTD, but it's just as good. It is much better than season 2 of HOTD.

Through 7 episodes the average episode rating on IMDB is 8.6. No episode has been below an 8.2 rating. 4/7 of the episodes are 8.6 or higher. If the finale sticks the landing, then it will finish with a top 30 highest ranked season ever on IMDB.

So it isn't just me that thinks the show is outstanding. This season has been incredible.

I'm not sure I'd consider IMDB scores a great metric on their own, especially for a show like WOT. When a show drives away all of the casual viewers and all that remains are the devoted fans, you see a lot of inflated scores. Over time, those scores fall to where they should be as more people watch.

Same thing happened with Suits. I remember back in its initial run, the last couple seasons kept getting episodes with these high 8s and 9s and anyone even moderately objective knew those scores were undeserved. Then when it experienced its streaming renaissance, and more eyes were on the show, those scores dropped to the 7s and 8s they should've been to begin with.

I am pretty confident the same thing is going to happen here. I mean, I'm not shitting on the show, it has certainly improved in quality, but you can't straight faced tell me you think this season is a top 30 season in all of TV history. That's just absurd.

By far the best finale we've had in this series.

Some notable cockups IMHO, but it wasn't a total flop like the finales for the first two seasons.

The Rand reveal to the Aiel was honestly nearly perfect.

They also cleared runway for other things I've been hoping to see, while ending some other storylines I was looking forward to.

Hopefully we get another big jump in show quality for season 4.

Last seasons finale was the best episode of the series up to then. I really liked last seasons finale. I think it's a book reader vs non book reader thing though. I watch a breakdown of each episode with an avid bookreader and he didn't like last seasons finale at all.

This season finale was really damn good, though.