The Wheel of Time - Season 1

⭐ 6.5/10

(Originally written by Tim)

I have been putting off this review because I have been rolling it around in my head and trying to come to terms with it. I don't want to be the guy that's like "this sucks the book is way better", but its hard not to be. I don't think The Eye of the World is amazing, but I love the story and the world it introduces, and while the show came close at times it ultimately fell short for me.

The first 3 episodes I would give a 9/10. I was totally fine with the changes they made, and I thought it established the world really well. It moved quickly, but the focus and world building were there. Shout out to the scary dream sequences (those are super important and disappeared in the 2nd half...) and the fleshing out of Logain (one of my favourite characters in the books who is cool because you know so little about him, but the flashback prologue for him was excellent and a great choice for an adaptation). But as the season went we were less focused on the people I thought mattered, and in an attempt to expand the universe of the show it lost its heartbeat. I was so dissatisfied by ending that its hard to remember the positives.

I could go on and on about changes I didn't love, but ultimately I felt it strayed so much from the source as to almost become its own thing. The dynamics between White Cloaks, Aes Sedai, using the power, and The Age of Legends just felt so different its like they were telling a different story using all the same names. I am fine with character arcs being changed, but they tried to establish so many different factions that the main thread was lost. There is a whole episode on Warder dynamics, with characters that don't matter, instead of letting us just see Warder dynamics through the eyes of the characters that do!

I did think the casting was pretty good, and even though the CGI lacked a bit the world looked great. I just wish they had given the main cast more to do, so that when reveals happen they at least feel relevant. The pregnant Aeil fighting was the coolest part (with some terrible de-aging for Tam at the end), but it felt completely out of context, trying to give us a Rhaegar Targaryen moment with zero groundwork laid. And then the character that matters has his own lame reveal, which was spoiled by this prologue that already revealed it to us. We can do better!

I'm ranting now. I want to love this, and I was so confident after 3 that the nonsensical finale has broken me. Again, The Eye of the World isn't amazing, so I was okay with this being a setup season for all the great stuff to come, but it tried to do too much and I fear it is already past the point of recovery.