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cannoli-reader · 3 days ago

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Elayne's song in S3.06 and what it says about the show

When I was watching episode six the other day, and it became clear Elayne was actually going to perform a whole song, I skipped past it, because I have better things to do. But an oblique reference I saw on another platform, suggested there was meaning to it, so I just went back and watched that part.

Turns out, she was singing about breasts. Some discussion under the cut.

The lyrics are: A Tarabon boy with coin a plenty Went looking for love and more’s the pity Now he’s lost in the hills of Tanchico city When one’s not enough and three’s too many And two bring a man to his knees – Hey! –

Hills of Tanchico – Hey! – The hills of Tanchico – Hey! –

These hills will flatten a whole ship’s crew These hills will make a man out of you

Hills of Tanchico – Hey! – The hills of Tanchico – Hey! –

At various times during the song, women listening are shown rubbing or groping their chests, and Elayne even does it herself while singing, usually when the word "hills" comes up. She even kind of shimmies at one point, despite wearing a long dress that doesn't show off anything below the waist, and the emphasis of the movement is her chest, which is thrust out. There's not much jiggle going on, but that's more a function of Ceara Coveney's build.

So in the books, we have a world where women hold power and female dignity is of paramount social importance, where women who pander to base male appetites are looked on with contempt, not out of some prudish moral standards, but simply because most people expect they can do better than that. A girl who sings a suggestive song in a common room apologizes to an Aes Sedai listener, claiming she did not mean to offend this powerful woman. A line from the song on the show is borrowed from a line in a crude song in the books, that a Darkfriend, who is seen as unusually cruel & perverse even among her own fellowship, is compelling a female ruler to sing in private for her own amusement, simply because it's gross, and degrading to the woman.

There is also the character of Elayne, who is extremely sheltered, and innocent in matters particularly pertaining to sex, which stands in contrast to her education and sophistication in other matters, giving her depth and distinct characterization. Her innocence and naivete actually make her dedication to duty all the more significant and appealing.

Elayne is also very conscious of her dignity and her position and how she needs to maintain a particular persona because she represents important institutions to the world. The series does wring a good bit of humor, as well as character growth, from the moments when her dignity is compromised, or she loses control and finds herself in an embarrassing situation, particularly with a sexual connotation, but again, the humor and the character development work precisely BECAUSE these moments are outliers, and go against the grain of her normal behavior.

What has the show given us in place of that? A crude, gross sordid setting, where women are constant victims, despite the great advantage of a monopoly on preternatural power. A world where attitudes, speech & social practices are anachronistically comparable to modern ways, but placed in a completely different, and jarring, context. A character whose most referenced and demonstrated trait is alcohol consumption, who has nominally been raised, and is being trained, to hold positions of great power, authority and concomitant responsibility, and who pays lip service to that fact, but at every turn is shown seeking to act out and debase herself.

"The Wheel of Time" works, as does Tolkien, and other similar books, because you have characters striving to be better, cleaner, more dignified and high-minded versions of normal people, in a contrast to the extreme evils and horrors of the setting. The preternatural dangers and threats are held at bay when reading, by the determination of the characters to live up to higher standards. It's part of what makes the story fantastic. Even supposedly gritty works, like "A Song of Ice & Fire" do this, by having the brutal, and at times exaggerated, realities of power, aristocratic class systems and warfare contrasted with the romance and glory of medievalism. What the screen adaptations are giving us is sordid on top of sordid, balanced by crudity and squalor, without even the myths of heroism and romance to deconstruct.

In their adaptation the producers are clearly trying to "correct" what they see as sexism and failures on the part of the author to be properly feminist. And yet, we have interactions between female characters limited to fighting, flirting or fucking. The only acceptable relationships among women are sex partners, enemies or "friends" who put one another down or compete all the time. Their idea of empowering women is to place them in positions that are male-coded in the books or real life, and generally involving the use of force, while placing men in female-coded roles or occupations, in a way that makes it clear they see these things as lesser or degrading. And frequently by accident, they undermine or degrade other female characters or make the men the voices of reason.

In the scene involving the song, for example, Elayne, Nynaeve, Min & Mat are supposed to be asking around for clues about the Black Ajah or the artifact they are seeking. What we get is Min & Nynaeve drinking in a bar and accidentally finding a lead when a man walks past who triggers a useful viewing in Min, seconds after she is saying how rarely and unreliably that happens. We get Elayne drinking in a different establishment and bantering with low-lifes whose interest in her is clearly prurient, while Mat, otherwise depicted as louche and insecurely awkward at best, and contemptibly hedonistic, egotistical and selfish at worst, is actually shown pursuing their goal and making helpful connections, ultimately even acquiring one of the objects they sought and recruiting a more knowledgeable ally.

And then, Elayne blows her cover by exposing her apparently well-known face and drawing attention to her celebrity status, forcing her to "prove" she's not a princess with the degenerate performance mentioned above. And you can tell the writers and producers think this is fun and "empowering" because, she's a princess, see, and princesses don't get to do stuff like this. Except the first thing she did upon getting set up in her rooms in the White Tower was to set up a still for making alcohol, and drinking with Egwene while Nynaeve was taking her Accepted test. She spent her "last night of freedom" before returning to the White Tower, making more booze in hopes of loosening up the inhibitions of her crush, so they could make out or have sex while the rest of their companions were being attacked and nearly murdered. Then, in the Tower, when her family comes to visit, she spends a good deal of their visit drinking with her step-father and commenting how this is what they normally do at home. At this point, dancing on a table and singing a song about tits is just a small step in a progression in depravity, not a contrast or "breaking out of her shell" moment.

In the books, Elayne has moments. Late in the fourth book, watching entertainment in the common room of an inn, for the first time in her life, she gets drunk, because she doesn't know better than to stop the server from topping up her cup. This leads to her lowering her inhibitions, remembering her relationship to Thom and confronting truths about her mother and herself. Both of her friends who encounter her disapprove of her state, as she would herself. No one considers it a joking matter or a subject of fun or teasing or taking advantage of her for amusement.

In the fifth book, in order to hide from someone who knows her, she joins a traveling circus, while in disguise and under an assumed name, and performs as a tightrope walker, wearing a costume that is only immodest by the standards of her class and culture, while fully covering her body. There is no sexual element to her performance, and her presentation is dignified and aloof. Also in that book, after a spending nearly the whole arc with her relationship with her companions deteriorating under the stress of their situation and looming dangers, she drops her normal comportment and screams at the top of her lungs. This is, again, not seen in a good light by her friends, or presented as positive, no matter how understandable when you are aware of her internal struggles. It's also funny, precisely because it's something she never does. And there is a payoff with the reconciliation between the friends and strengthening of their relationship, after coming through the stresses together.

In book six, she is in a conflict with another main character, where she wages a form of psychological warfare by acting superior to him, passing judgment on his job performance and giving him approval in a condescending fashion. It works, because we have seen her behavior for five and a half books at this point, and understand why she is doing what she is doing. Furthermore, the readers get to see both characters' competence at play, and the tactic relies on a presumption on Elayne's part of the ability and good faith of the other character. It's a conflict without the characters tearing one another down, or one being wrong in relation to the other, but because they have different perspectives and goals. You can like and root for both, and in fact, liking both of them heightens the experience of reading about the conflict precisely because you understand where each one is coming from. We also do get to see Elayne slumming with the riffraff in the bad part of town, but again, she is not actually stooping to their level, she is enduring, and also stressing because her searching partners have different attitudes toward the lowlifes they encounter.

Book seven sees her first walk into a negotiation that turns out to be a lot more hardball than she expected, resulting in having to agree to more onerous terms than she has had to accept before (i.e. a growth moment, in keeping with a theme of the book). Later, she is confronted with her poor behavior in the past toward another character, and is compelled by both her sense of justice and her desire to live up to the expectations of people she cares about, to apologize and make amends, despite feeling humiliated and embarrassed by the effort. This, in turn, leads to a case where her behavior is mistaken for something approaching the lascivious nature of the show's fare, and due to the mission she is undertaking, she is forced to endure the corrective measures and public embarrassment of being seen so. As with the negotiation, this is another instance of character growth and her loss of dignity and pride actually helping her make progress on her mission to save the word.

There are more things like this going forward, but in the interest of (relative) brevity (for me, at any rate), I'll leave it at that, and just point out how each incident relies on Elayne otherwise being the dignified, aloof and courteous princess, on making sure to establish her caring and concern for her friends and how much they mean to her, and on her mindset of duty above all, to motivate her actions, and to make her moments of embarrassment or humiliation have meaning to her characterization and in most cases, these incidents provide lessons and opportunities for growth.

The show gives us none of that, when they are constantly associating Elayne with recreational boozing, having her sniping or putting down every woman she doesn't sleep with, or making her sing about tits in public. There is no pedestal on which she is perched that is being shaken, no challenges to her self-image, no lessons learned, no relationships being formed, and no sense of a mission for which she will sacrifice unimportant but dearly-held standards. If we ever get to plot point where Elayne has to legitimately do something awkward or beneath herself for the mission, how or why are we supposed to care, when we see what she'll do casually? Hell, she herself picked out the song, her accompanist was like "Really? That one? Are you sure?" and she doubled down. She wasn't forced to sing a song outside of her comfort zone, she volunteered to prove her slatternly status by singing on a table and picked a particularly lewd piece. When Elayne in the books gets down off the figurative throne to abase herself because Aviendha & Birgitte think she did something wrong, or because Nynaeve thinks it's necessary for the mission, it tells you how much she values accomplishing the mission or doing the right thing, and how much the opinions of her friends matter to her, and how much she trusts their judgment. Clearly her little musical number in the latest episode did none of that.

But that's typical of the show.

#wot on prime #books vs show #season 3 #elayne trakand

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cannoli-reader · 5 days ago

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Because Moiraine is, in both media iterations, extremely arrogant, solipsistic and short-sighted.

This is the same person who assumes her own death must encompass the failure of the cause. Basically her mindset is "if I die we're doomed, so there is no point in protecting the Sakarnen anyway."

Why did Moiraine get the sa'angreal *before* going into the rings? She could have died there and it would just be hidden in her pouch forever. She could have dropped it. Taking it could have been the thing that sealed her death, for all she's interested in the future. Doesn't it make more sense to go through the rings first?

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cannoli-reader · 5 days ago

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Probably for the same reason novices wear shifts while taking the test for the Accepted, and Aviendha & Moiriane went to Rhuidean fully clothed.

okay I have one small problem with the show. Why are the sea folk wearing shirts???

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cannoli-reader · 6 days ago

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Because you stopped traveling, and are home now. And you now live in a place without wood, so you make do in other ways when you do need to move goods a long distance.

*Aiel Chieftain who’s ancestors were kinda boring and not involved in any interesting history*: hey so does anyone know why we stopped using wagons?

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cannoli-reader · 7 days ago

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That (positive) attitude toward small towns is always going to be playing catchup ball, because of all the entertainers who left their small towns for New York or Los Angeles or London in order to pursue their careers that have given them the pulpit in which to preach their own version of self-actualization is the right and best way.

“people who have never left their home towns are so small minded and boring” is something I wish we could leave behind because on one hand it’s an incredibly classist statement (what if they don’t have the money to leave? what if they have family obligations? why is the default to call them uninteresting when they didn’t have the funds or privilege to go to school or travel?) and on the other………….have we considered that some ppl are happy? that keeping roots in the soil you were born, staying in a community that nourishes you, isn’t embarrassing or shameful?

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cannoli-reader · 11 days ago

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TV characters are only as smart as their writers. These writers are not even very good at using the English language, which you would think is a basic prerequisite for being a professional writer (OTOH, see also, Sanderson, Brandon), so expecting them to have characters demonstrate forethought and insight and intelligence is a bit much to ask.

For the record, Moiraine is often quite dumb on the show. She didn't bother to interrogate Siuan's vision about the Eye of the World, couldn't work out that Lan still being bonded to her proved she had not been stilled by Ishamael, was blitheringly incompetent in hiding her relationship with Siuan in the Tower, farted around accompanying Logain's escort to Tar Valon, when he was gentled and no longer needed her strength to shield him, instead of heading for Tar Valon at best possible speed to give herself some breathing room before Liandrin arrived to make trouble for her, and she also failed to keep any sort of control over the Two Rivers folk when they returned to Tar Valon, especially Mat's indiscretion, after Siuan, a much bigger idiot, rather handily quelled his loose tongue with a simple conversation.

#wot on prime #books vs show #moiraine dumbodred

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cannoli-reader · 12 days ago

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Nynaeve proposed to Lan and he tried multiple arguments to get out of it. She only got as far as she did because he was cornered by a compulsion-backed conspiracy among multiple women who decided they knew better than he did what was best for him.

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cannoli-reader · 12 days ago

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First of all, you're just as racist. Six episodes were directed by women of African descent, two more by an Asian and another two by a women who also directed episodes of The Wire, probably the greatest TV show ever, and by extension, the best majority-black show ever. Among the white writers are Rohit Kumar, Beverly Okhio, Celine Song, Rammy Park and Ajoke Ibironke. Their skin color has nothing provable to do with the show, they are just incompetent. I do love that one of the writers is named "Ajoke". A joke.

More importantly, there is also Perrin & Loial, both of whose characteristic intelligence did not make the jump from book to screen, both being played as "gentle giant" stereotypes. Other prominent characters cast in Season 1 with black actors include scumbag rapists, Padan Fain and Emmon Valda. And with the casting of Aviendha, they completed the trifecta of having black actresses playing the three female characters most known for bad tempers.

Nynaeve being sidelined for the action setpiece opening the season is just par for the course. In the books, she was a prominent leader in the village. She was the first female character whose name appears in the story, and before she is even on screen, we see what an effect she has, with multiple arguments about her, and we also see that she has support, as a woman threatens to eject her husband from their house for talking about interfering with Nynaeve's authority. That same woman is introduced on the show as a sloppy drunk, BTW. We also see that even old cranks who don't like her personally, cannot deny her abilities. When Nynaeve herself shows up, the PoV character is so focused on her that he does not even notice his own love interest beside her. This was exactly reversed on the show, as Egwene walks into the common room with an aura of light, and you have to pause just right to catch Nynaeve ducking in beside her and shuffling off out of her limelight. They repeatedly refuse to show Nynaeve as a leader in the village, with either the prayers for the dead, or the opening of the festival. Nynaeve appears in both scenes, but not in any capacity that might indicate she had any real position in the village beside secret ceremonial cliff-pusher. Nynaeve fails to protect anyone during the Trolloc attack and of the two wounded she tries to treat, one dies and the other is left behind when a Trolloc drags her off by her braid, for the easter egg!

Nynaeve's tracking skills do not win honest compliments from Lan or a request for help, based on his appreciation of her ability, instead he questions her as if he knows she is cheating somehow, taking it for granted that there is no way she could possibly have tracked him and later, the fact that she tracked him is the punchline of a joke as his colleagues roast him. In the finale, they reveal that, yes, Nynaeve is NOT good enough to track Lan, she followed his trail by tracking his companion (which also ignores what his companion was actually doing for Nynaeve to allegedly track). Where the other Emond's Fielders listen when Nynaeve talks, and her words matter to them, on the show she is ignored as she pleads for them to stop arguing. And her anecdote of her first time channeling, revealing how much she cares for her fellow villagers (and when we know more about channeling, how extraordinarily altruistic her wilder trick is, compared to the usual categories that Verin cites from her long-running survey of the topic), that is all repurposed, with Nynaeve's channeling, or any other active participation, excised, all to hype up Egwene with an implausible feat of a child refusing pain meds to will herself to overcome a terminal illness. And that's not even getting into her having all her accomplishments taken from her in Season Two, and her basically playing the foil for Elayne's emergence.

They also made Ingtar and Amalisa Jagad into Asians ... and the former an arrogant blowhard who slights Moiraine in open court and the latter into an incompetent channeler who gets herself and two other women killed, while failing to save any of the soldiers holding the line. They made Min Asian, and, accidentally it seems, made her a Darkfriend, who knowing made a deal with Ishamael to betray Mat in order to have her visions removed.

And let's not forget Aviendha, our first Aiel character, whose sole topic of conversation in her first season, regarding herself and her fellow Maidens, is their respective degrees of sexual interest in Perrin. Our introduction to the sisterhood of the Maidens and Aiel honor, is to have Bain & Chiad, played by Scandinavian actresses, spend considerable screen time punching her in the face, because she failed to save the life of a fellow Maiden in a battle that saw Aviendha herself captured. A made-up, nonsensical violation of ji'e'toh, created to justify a scene of Aviendha getting beaten bloody.

Even Elyas suffers in his miniscule adaptation, where he is also borrowing Hurin's role as well. Where the book Elyas cared about people and helped them, was friendly with the Tinkers and to Perrin's eye, missed human company, the show version only cares about his fellow wolfbrother and can't be bothered to give more than cursory help to a mission of critical importance to the fight against the Shadow.

They do the same stuff with feminism, and arguably even homosexuality, as the introduction of a number of such relationships actually serves to cast the interactions between the characters in a different light and undermines a lot of their decisions being made, and making their same sex attraction effectively a character flaw.

They are definitely pro-diversity, female chauvinist and pro-gay, but their ineptitude at characterization, world-building and plot development creates a very different product than they intend. I think it's fair to say that they are also really pro-black, they are just similarly incompetent in their execution.

i'm so tired of white wheel of time fans praising the show as some sort of queer fantasy paradise when like who gives a fuck when the show is so riddled with antiblackness/colorism/etc...like racebending characters without actually considering how Siuan for instance being black but making her completely incompetent as Amirlyn, doing what equates to domestic abuse to moiraine in 2x07, and even just the cold open of this season where you see a dark skinned black woman literally beaten to DEATH when everyone else gets killed with the one power, nynaeve getting completely sidelined (yes i know she's blocked but she still did amazing things even while blocked!!!) this season, ihvon getting killed off when he survives til the last book and rafe judkins' white boyfriend OC taking up screentime/surviving...I am just so over this show and fans praising it for its "representation" when cool they racebent some characters who are played by amazing actors but the show is ultimately still written and directed by white people!! and it shows in every single episode!!

#wot on prime #books vs show

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cannoli-reader · 12 days ago

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And the women dream of romance and children.

As is proper.

Feminism, FTW!

Perrin DOES dream of labor.

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cannoli-reader · 14 days ago

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They've been "aged up", so we get to see the characters being so much more "mature" on the show!

Jordan's Mat and Rand would talk about adventures and new places or things they had seen, while Sanderson's boys would talk about who accomplished more cool things or killed more Trollocs, and Rafe's boys talk about "who banged whom."

#wheel of time #wot on prime #books vs show #anti sanderson

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cannoli-reader · 15 days ago

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What exactly do you mean by this? Specifically, what do you think the person who says "I loved Gawyn's story arc" means? And why do you think they are wrong?

"That is well-written, well-developed part of the story!" No, it's bad, an inexplicable piece of incompetent writing among Jordan's other great stuff.

"Gawyn is great and awesome, a superb hero!" No, he's an idiot who keeps making mistakes and acts on bizarre assumptions.

"I hate Gawyn and love to see him suffer! That's a creepy way to read a story about heroism and unity and everyone having a common humanity.

"I am too dumb to realize that good stories are about success and people doing great things, and stories where they run into obstacles or make mistakes are bad." Gawyn's arc is the latter, so you should hate it. You are dumb if that's your favorite!

It's possible for someone to see the same thing in Gawyn's arc that you do, and enjoy it even if they dislike Gawyn or what he is doing. I absolute hate Egwene, and have never made any secret of it. On wotmania.com and its successor site, readandfindout.com, that was more or less my identity. I was the "Hates Egwene Guy". I had no problem with that, I even leaned into, by going over every single transgression, great or small through the whole series, explaining her faults and errors and compiling them into a list, with emoticons symbolizing her various sins.

However, where I ran into issues with that rep, was when people also assumed that I wanted to see her fail, and would not be happy with a story where she "won" or did well. Or that given a choice I would change the books to either punish her with failures and humiliations or alter her into my ideal of a good person or to do right by my faves. The other big one was the assumption that I wanted to see her excised from the story, or would skip her chapters, given my druthers.

And nothing could be further from the truth. I saw her arc as a very well-written story about a total asshole. I saw her "rise to power" as a superbly crafted story of usurpation and good intentions paving a way to hell, as at the same time the voices of reason in the story were calling for an end to fighting among humans, where Rand said he desired and intended to force, if necessary, a cessation of petty battles among humans, with Tarmon Gaidon looming on the horizon. And the most pointless petty battle over status and pride was being started, accelerated and waged by the person to whom Rand was closest at the start of the series. I loved this story, and I did not need Egwene to fall or fail for it to be well-done. When Jason Denzel of Dragonmount earned his cameo later in the series with a sycophantic and hagiographic advance review of A Memory of Light, citing it contained Egwene's greatest triumph, I was subjected to jeers and condolences, and I ended up having to write a post about how Egwene triumphing was NOT a bad thing for me, that it would neither displease nor discredit me. I'm a history buff who prioritizes freedom and human rights, and an anglophone Catholic of partial Irish descent. I am used to reading about failure and tragedy for fun.

TL;DR, just because someone loves a particular character arc, don't be so sure you are not in perfect agreement on the characters and such.

byu/TheRealUlfric

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cannoli-reader · 15 days ago

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I admit to not getting it, because I A. reject the term Westlands for just that reason, and B. have become accustomed to every idiot and their mother using the term anyway.

It makes no sense to call it the Westlands, because it is only the Westlands from the perspective of the Sharans, who would, of course, include the Aiel & the Three-Fold Land in "Westlands" while every other use of the term is to distinguish it from the Aiel & their homeland. Why would a Domani or Tairen call the western portion of the continent the Westlands? As far as the Domani are concerned, most of that land is to their east. As far as the Tairens & Cairhienin are concerned, they themselves live in the extreme east of anything that matters to any practical purpose. That's kind of the point of calling the Dragonwall the Spine of the World. Because there is nothing on the other side of the spine. In front of the spine is the rest of the body, behind it, nothing. It only makes sense for the people in the west to refer to themselves that way if they are in constant contact or conflict with the more eastern regions, and so refer to themselves as "the West". Up until the 20th century, I am pretty sure Europe thought of themselves as Civilization, and did not count America or Latin America as being in their category, while the Western hemisphere, or at least the parts not still under European rule, were more about asserting their own identity. The idea of The West was born in the Cold War. In Tolkien, it's an identification with the Far West, where their divine leadership resides. "Stand, Men of the West!" does not refer to their geographic location in Middle-Earth (actually, the aforesaid Men of the West, are from two of the most eastern nations in their part of the known world, much like Tear & Cairhien), but to their allegiance to the Valar of Aman.

So Jordan's naming of the Westlands for a very non-canonical RPG*, is just a patch on his refusal to give the continent, or the important half of the continent, a diegetic name.

*My recollection of the channeling system was that it made no sense, with weaves on a level system and limits to the number of weaves per level you could use during a game, when a much more sensible system would be like Final Fantasy or Diablo, where you have a tank of power, and each use takes a certain amount of power, depending on how significant the effects are. Also, I might have been misreading it, but Nynaeve was stronger than Rand. Another aspect I noticed was that characters had certain abilities that gave them the capacity to perform actions relevant to that ability. One such was "Balance" which characters like Thom, and several others had. You know who didn't have it? Elayne, the professional tight-rope walker.

Interesting error to check your trivia

On 21:29-21:46

Moiraine to Rand talking about the Aiel War:

"To kill him for breaking his oath to protect the tree and destroying the pledge of peace of it. And they hunted him, burning every city in the Westlands unitl they finally caught him on the slopes of Dragonmount and killed him there."

I am making this post with the genuine question if there is someone who can recognize what is the most interesting error in this quote?

This is not mocking of the script or jab for it. Not this time.

I am not talking about more obvious errors in the narrative like Aiel crossing the whole land. Or talking about bad errors which ruin everything.

But something I suspect that is hard to find even for hardcore fans. Something that if I ask 100 fans who have read all the books, 100 of them will answer that they see nothing wrong.

But this is only my presumption. May be more of you can surprise me while testing your knowledge of WOT canon.

Hint if you are still curious and willing to spare time on it. The error is not connected about Laman despite the context of the quote.

Let the Light keep you safe.

LightOne

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