Wheel of Time (TV/book)

AslansCompass

New Member
The images I've seen for the WoT series seem really good, so I started reading the first one. So far, it feels very much in the style of the early Fellowship of the Rings; a flight from a homely setting due to a possible threat...not precisely imitating Tolkien but not very unique either. Does anyone have any tips for me? TV series first? Book first?
 
Hey AC,

Way back in the 90s I read the first few volumes of this, but never continued. In the first couple of books it really seemed like the overall story would wrap up in 5-7 volumes.
We learn early on that the Dark One (Sauron/Voldemort/Satan/Cthulu) is imprisoned and kept in by seven seals. In the first couple of books IIRC those seals start to break. It's pretty obvious that once all seven seals break the Dark One will emerge for the final battle. So if they break one or two per book the final battle will come around book 5.
But then Jordan starts to do mission creep - for instance, one of the characters goes off to a totally different part of the world and has a complete side adventure. So as the side stories, characters, and different realms kept expanding it felt like he lost the thread of the original story and it would never end. And, in fact, it didn't, as the story was finished posthumously by another author based on Jordan's notes. So eventually I gave up, not wanting to invest too much in a story that I feared would leave me hanging.*

That said, I saw an interview with Brandon Sanderson, the author who was brought in to finish the story with the blessing of Jordan's wife. He obviously loves fantasy literature and Jordan's series in particular, and he has a huge bibliography of his own. His enthusiasm was infectious, and now that the series is done - 30 years and 14 huge books later - I'm very tempted to go back.

Bruce

*I've never gotten into George RR Martin for the same reason (also what little I saw of the HBO series put me off). He takes forever to put out the next book, and who knows if there will be a conclusion. I also feel burned by Orson Scott Card. His Alvin Maker books are great, but book 6 came out in 2003 and we've never seen the concluding book - even though Card has said in interviews it will be his magnum opus. Occasionally I'll see some statement by him where he says he's working on it, but no pub date as of yet.

**Of course, I say this to a group of Tolkien nerds, where we have spent the last bunch of years reading through his assembled notes of the book he spent his life writing and never finished in his lifetime. Imagine if he were writing in the time of social media, with a bunch of us grousing about when the heck Silmarillion was ever going to come out.
 
Oh, and book before movie always. Else you spend the next forty years imagining Frodo with a bowl cut and Boromir as a Viking. And when the heck is Strider going to put on some pants?!?!
 
If the series really wants to be true to the books, the first half of each episode will be devoted to doing a full, detailed recap of the story so far.
 
I think I'll finish the first book for completionist sake, but the tv series isn't really working for me. I can't keep the characters straight at all. And (bookwise, at lease) they are far too reliant on the idiot ball. Even hobbits knew better than to go wandering around strange towns in the middle of the night! And thinking that stealing something is fundamentally different than taking it when offered, in terms of curses.....ugh! I don''t expect them to be completely genre-savvy, but I do expect common sense.
 
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