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butterflydm · 8 months

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wot rewatch (book spoilers edition): 2x2

Additional thoughts that had too many spoilers to go into my earlier post will be found here. Spoilers for all the teasers and trailers, plus through book 13: A Memory of Light.

So one of the big questions that I have is: how much is Lanfear acting with Ishamael's knowledge and how much is she going her own way? Ishamael said in the Darkfriend social scene that he is still looking for Rand. If he's being truthful there (and he's talking to his minions, so there's really no point in lying), then Lanfear has not told him that she located Lews Therin.

2. I hadn't thought about this on my first watch, but @ladyofpembroke noted that Lanfear is probably in Rand's final dream in the next episode, so it seems possible that she actually has a hand in all his dreams. Constantly reminding him that he could kill his friends if he sees them again is a good way to make him want to stay where he is (with her) and not try to reconnect with his past life. Like any effective manipulator, she's keeping him isolated from his friends and family as much as she can.

3. otoh, we know from the books that being able to locate someone's dreams doesn't mean that you know where they are in the physical world, so this might be an Ishamael-influenced dream (I note that while Rand's visions of his friends has them wearing their S1 outfits, Ishamael is wearing his s2 outfit, which Rand hasn't seen), so this might be an Ishamael-influenced dream since he figures he might as well torment Rand in the dream if he can't find him irl.

4. Given that Rand is already hearing whispers, I wonder when the show plans to re-introduce Lews Therin to us in his own form. It might even be this season, if they wanted to make sure to keep a lock on the actor (or we might get another Age of Legends cold open -- though I note that we only had one cold open in this set of three episodes, though that might be because Rafe & co were aware that they would likely all air the same night so that might have affected their choices there - I'd love an AoL cold open where we get to see Lanfear and Lews Therin together).

5. So, did Rand find his way to Cairhien first and then Lanfear set up an inn in the Foregate to entice him to her, or did she set up her inn before he arrived and she figured out a way to lure him in? Either way, she's doing a much better job than the Lanfear in the books. She's much less suspicious than "random noblewoman who managed to appear in an unpopulated parallel world so that Rand could save her" and she's more subtle too. While the cringefail Forsaken in the books can be amusing, the threat level of the villains also helps tell you how seriously to take your protagonists, so I'm glad that they beefed up her threat level by actually making her effective. Right now, Lanfear is #winning on every possible level.

6. I love Errol because he serves several story purposes -- he's reminding us that Rand looks "like an Aiel"; he's serving Hurin's purpose in the story of giving Rand someone to look after and be protective of; he's teaching Rand sword forms because he was a blademaster; and he's giving us a bit of history about "the Aiel war". And the actor is quite charming. Plus he's used to show us both Rand's compassion and his need/desire to find mentors to help teach him the skills he needs. At this point in time, Rand does believe that he's defeated the Dark One and his nightmares are just nightmares but he does still want to learn how to protect himself and how to control himself.

7. We mostly hear indistinct whispers until Rand is walking down the hallway (it's the shot from the trailer) and it resolves into "Do you hear me? You are mine, Rand al'Thor." Which is very interesting. Our first inkling of Lews Therin? If so, it shows a greater awareness of Rand as a person than LTT's voice showed in the earlier books when it appeared in his head. I've speculated that this might happen, so I wonder if we're going to get more genuine back-and-forth between Rand and LTT than we really got in the books as a way of letting us into Rand's internal narration without him needing to pour out his heart to any of the characters around him.

8. I am actually loving Perrin getting Rand's plotline here -- it's working really well for him, being used to show us how Perrin can smell what happened in places so vividly that he's re-experiencing the past. I feel like if I didn't know this was Rand's original plotline, I wouldn't have guessed. It suits how they're exploring Perrin's character so well. I do wonder... Elyas speaks of Perrin experiencing a 'vision' -- I wonder if they're going to make the mystical side of being a Wolfbrother more distinct from what Dreamers do in this show version. Because it really was kinda... weird in the books how Perrin and Egwene are doing all this training in the same dreamworld but Perrin never runs across her or any of the Aiel Dreamwalkers, even once they're spending more time in the wetlands side of things.

9. The nailed-up Fade is used in the books to mark when Fain 'takes control' of the Darkfriends & Trollocs. I wonder here if it's meant to mark the moment when the dagger owns him more strongly than the Dark One does. Because the people of Shadar Logoth were not darkfriends -- and they focused on this in s1, too, because dagger!Mat is not a fan of the Fade that he meets in the farmhouse.

10. Love foreshadowing of Errol talking about "Aielman among us and no one bats an eyelash in the entire place" -- Rand is going to be bringing a lot of Aiel to the wetlands. I bet we're going to get to see some of these sword forms in the finale!

11. Liandrin does seem like she's becoming genuinely invested in Nynaeve. I like that (almost) everyone gets their own personal Darkfriend -- Nynaeve has Liandrin, Mat also has Liandrin (she's a hard worker!), Rand has Lanfear, Perrin has (remorseful) Ingtar, Moiraine has (double agent) Verin, Lan has (repentant) Tomas, and even Egwene gets a scene with Sheriam (who will get to be Her Darkfriend Among Us later on, if we're able to follow the books that closely when we get there), though she's not really the focus of Sheriam's attention. Everyone gets a little personal attention from the Shadow!

I like that Nynaeve gets rushed forward to the test for Accepted due to Liandrin wanting to teach her so badly. It seems more realistic reasoning than we get in the books.

12. Another big lie from Liandrin here about how Mat is here because they are "only observing" that the effects of the dagger are out of his system, which Mat immediately calls bullshit on. He's locked in a cell and only Liandrin is around -- that is not an official observation by any means. That's a prison. It's been six months. So I would put Liandrin's official lie count at two. Notably, she's only lying to Mat so far, who is both kept well away from other people and also doesn't really know as much about Aes Sedai (we know from Egwene and Moiraine's conversation in the woods in s1 that the people of the Two Rivers do not have the Aes Sedai oaths memorized).

13. My dearest, my darling, my deepest love is finally here! At the end of my reread, when I was ranking my favorite characters, Elayne was my number one favorite. Ceara is doing such a good job with her and the writing is also excellent. I love how many different sides of her we get to see in just these two episodes -- sheltered noble, awkward girl who grew up with no friends, someone familiar with the Tower but not familiar being a novice in the Tower, but a tinkerer (!!! so excited that they put this in so early) at heart and incredibly loyal and compassionate. I just adored her so much in these two episodes and I am looking forward to seeing more of her. I do really hope that, in the midst of all the chaos, that the show does manage to give her something of a meet-cute with Rand, even if it's less obviously romantic than the one in the books. But I'm really looking forward to more of her interacting with Egwene and Nynaeve, and hopefully meeting Aviendha and/or Min and/or Mat in the finale or before it.

14. I have zero issue with Sheriam not being a redhead. I think it's a good idea for the show to cut down on the number of redheads, given that Jordan says it's rare but then keeps giving us random redheads. Limiting the on-screen ones to the Aiel and the royal house of Andor seems like a good idea to me.

15. So first we got Perrin's letters last episode. Now, in this episode, Elyas tells Perrin that the soldiers he's with right now "are not your pack". While he could be talking about the wolves, of course, I feel like, as a viewer, that makes me think of the EF5 and how that's who Perrin belongs with right now. Especially after Perrin's letter talking about how he feels 'exposed' without the others around. Again, it gives me the hope that we'll get more moments of reconnection between the EF5 over the course of the show.

16. This moment with Verin is such a great one to look at knowing the truth of her situation. "Even oaths have loopholes one can exploit". She's the expert at it. Oaths are a bit of a minor theme in this episode and the next -- the loopholes and also, next episode, we're introduced to the Seanchan oaths where Perrin is, I assume, going to take the very reasonable position that a forced oath is not binding (which is the same position that Mat had in Winter's Heart but inexplicably abandoned in Crossroads of Twilight when he decided his accidental wedding vows were binding).

Oh! I knew I remembered hearing the words "Toman Head" in these three episodes but hadn't remembered it was Verin mentioning it! I thought it was noted as part of the Dark Prophecies but it's mentioned here as mainline prophecy. But the name is out there now. And this conversation also confirms "sword of flame" and "battle in the sky" for the finale, most likely, and a mention of a "branded hand" which feels like it confirms the herons. I wonder if Rand is going to use the same weave on his dad's sword that we saw Verin using at the end of the last episode for Tomas's sword. This may also mean that it's using that weave that burns the herons into Rand's palms?

17. The Rand and Lanfear scenes. Wow! But, yeah, I wonder how much her non-reaction to his bloody knuckles struck show-onlys. She doesn't ask him what happened, who he beat up. She just kisses his bloody knuckles and sweet-talks him into bed.

18. So far, we've heard/seen three separate form of violent teaching in the White Tower -- the unnamed woman who beat Moiraine to make her channel (likely Elaida); Liandrin's behavior with Nynaeve; and Sheriam telling Elayne that she'll be switched. Both Liandrin and Sheriam, of course, are Black Ajah. But from Egwene's reaction here, it doesn't seem like being ordered to be switched is anything close to the common punishment that it seemed to be in the books. But we'll see!

19. It does occur to me that Gawyn (maybe Galad too) might already have been in training with the Warders even if Elayne wasn't a novice yet -- Elayne has been spending her summers in the Tower and it's entirely possible that Gawyn's training to protect her meant he was sent off early to start learning from the best. We don't get any hints in this episode or the next about her brothers, but we're pretty focused on her developing friendship with Egwene.

20. "Min is in Tar Valon" and "Min and Mat share a plotline" were my two most hoped-for options for Min's storyline for this season, so I'm happy about that. I do wish that Min had been given a chance to bond with Elayne or Egwene but, hopefully, there will be time for that later. But I really love the set-up we've been given where we are going to explore Elayne with Egwene and Nynaeve; Min being more fully-explored with Mat; and then Aviendha when she enters Perrin's storyline. All of them are getting fleshed out as individual characters before any of them get romantically involved with Rand. I am feeling pretty hopeful that we're going to get our polycule (and a genuine polycule, not a harem) in the upcoming seasons. They've been putting in a lot of "poly relationships are valid and complex" groundwork in and it looks like they are going to be making sure that all of the characters involved get to be full characters who have their own agendas and their own arcs.

Some people on reddit are still pretty disappointed that Min isn't the male-gaze fantasy that she is in the later books but I have been thrilled with the changes that the show has done so far with her. We also maybe get a hint here that Min is going to be canonically bisexual by the way she jokes about Liandrin, so I will cross my fingers on that.

20. Min's viewing! I do love that they're massively cutting down on the number of Min's viewings to focus on ones that are interesting and relevant. This one is particularly interesting because there's nothing like it in the books. Mat stabbing Rand, then cradling him as he falls.

Theory #1: this is a flicker-flicker world (maybe we only get one big one?) and it's not Our Mat stabbing Our Rand but an alternate one.

Theory #2: Rand asks Mat to fulfill his promise to keep Rand from going mad and that's why Mat stabs him.

Theory #3: Rand loses control of himself (like Lady Amalisa in 1x8) and Mat stabs him to try to get him to lose his hold on the One Power.

Theory #4: Mat gets placed under compulsion (which would be another reason for him to want protection from Aes Sedai and channeling).

Theory #5: Mat gets The Dagger again and he's the one who gives Rand the wound in his side, while under its influence.

Theory #6: It's metaphorical and Mat takes the place of Alivia and helps Rand 'die' at the end of the series (seems unlikely but I'll throw it out there).

And probably lots of other things I haven't thought of. But it definitely shakes Min to see it.

I wonder if she only agreed to help Liandrin after this moment or if she'd already agreed and this is just additional incentive. I don't think she's told Liandrin anything about Rand. She was able to keep that secret from Moiraine even under blackmail so I think she kept it from Liandrin too.

But I do love that we get a viewing that connects Mat and Rand together, even if it's through a traumatic encounter. I am a simple soul who finds messiness intriguing.

21. Lanfear! Talking about her broken heart to the man who broke it and who she is, even now, doing her best to groom back into the man that she wants. The layers in this conversation are exquisite. When she tells him that he can't hurt her, she also can say that because she has a strong grasp of what she can do with the Power while he's still stumbling in the dark. Ooof, but Rand was (unknowingly) on risky ground when he confirmed that he does sometimes think of his past when he's with her.

Also, talking about how "no one else" could ever have power over her heart now that her previous lover is gone... when she's literally talking to his reincarnation. The conversation is just so rich and so sharp and there's so much of it that is going over Rand's head because he doesn't have the necessary information to even begin to put the pieces together. "What's left to hurt if he still has my whole heart?" she says, to the guy in question. "When I'm with you, I can pretend you're him." YEAH. I BET YOU CAN.

22. So I wonder if Moiraine's threat here to Lan, that she would let Alanna take his bond if he didn't let her leave on her own, is going to be the extent of the "Myrelle" plot point that Alanna absorbs and it won't actually happen in fact. But now it's out there as an idea that Warders can be forcibly bonded so that when Alanna forcibly bonds someone else down the road, the idea isn't coming out of nowhere.

23. I was so shocked when the Seanchan attacked in episode two. I was thinking this would happen in episode five. But once I sat down and thought about it, I realizes that Perrin has already hit all the main points of the Hunt for the Horn storyline on his side of things (and even partly on what Rand would have been doing). We've found the traitor and had Ingtar reveal his sympathy towards said traitor; we've found the Fade and the moment when Fain started playing by his own rules; and we've even been exploring Perrin and his senses. This does mean that we're going to have a lot of potential time to explore the Seanchan invasion and culture.

24. I don't have any issues with Ishamael openly being Suroth's advisor vs someone covertly giving Suroth her marching orders. High Lady Suroth is a Darkfriend and always was. We're just taking it out of the shadows and showing it openly to the viewers (and Perrin).

I do wonder if Perrin specifically seeing the Shadow and the Seanchan so entwined will have an impact on his later storylines. That I wonder about. But the later books were, tbh, really weird about how low-impact the Falme encounter ended up being in the long run for pretty much everyone except Egwene. Min basically forgets she knows anything about the Seanchan even when that information could help Rand, everyone forgets about the environment of paranoia and fear that the Seanchan created in Falme, etc. There's a lot of weird forgetfulness going around, especially in CoT & KoD, when Jordan wanted to sell us on his slaver romance.

(the way that the show has been improving characters like Min and relationships like Rand/Lanfear does give me a lot of hope in how they will handle Tuon and the Mat & Tuon 'romance' and that they'll make it better than the poorly-written dumpster fire that it is in CoT & KoD)

#butterfly watches wot #wot #wheel of time #wot on prime #wot show spoilers #wot prime spoilers #wot s2 spoilers #wheel of time s2 spoilers #wot book spoilers #wot 2x2 spoilers #a memory of light

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