#don't even get me STARTED on the Aes Sedai/Warder bond I can't think about it too hard or I'm afraid I'll go feral

[eleanorfenyx]

Just binged both seasons of Wheel of Time over the last three-ish days and uhhhhh screaming, crying, throwing up, etc.

[markantonys]

fuck it, proposing an s3 episode-by-episode structure even though we barely have any info to go off of, because i'm bored and yearning for s3 news. can't wait to see how wrong this ends up being! i can't emphasize enough how much this is just me completely inventing structure ideas because, for real, we barely know ANYTHING yet, so do not latch onto anything i say here.

we know 4 episode titles so far, so i've included those.

3x01: to race the shadow

A-plot: the gang in falme

lots of relationship-building between various dynamics, especially rand & elayne (just friendship with Crush Hints for now) and nynaeve & lan (ring scene maybe)

rand and egwene's final breakup

mat's luck established during a gambling scene

mat goes through the doorway in turak's room of curiosities, is told to go to tanchico, gets his marriage prophecy & medallion & ashandarei, and gets cpr from rand

elayne and nynaeve learn something about liandrin that points them towards tanchico

rand decides to go to the waste and egwene does too after speaking with amys in her dreams, and perrin goes with them because he has no other plans as of yet

B-plot: aes sedai politics, catch up with siuan, catch up with liandrin

3x02: a question of crimson

i'd always hoped this would be a caemlyn episode, and the title points to that imo!! perfect title for elaida's intro episode, and red is andor's color as well.

so, A-plot: rand, egwene, perrin, et al pass through caemlyn on their way to the waste

egwene has been tasked by elayne with delivering a letter to her family; rand insists on coming with her; they trespass in the caemlyn palace and meet gawyn, galad, morgase, and elaida

i don't expect a forsaken here just yet, i think it's important to see Normal Morgase and Normal Caemlyn first so that we have a contrast later once they ARE under forsaken control.

perrin hears rumors of trouble in the two rivers and decides to split off from the group to investigate, with loial, bain, and chiad accompanying him

the rest of the group reaches the waste at the end of the episode

B-plot: nynaeve, elayne, and mat arrive in tanchico (they split off from the others in falme and go straight there, no caemlyn trip for them)

C-plot: more white tower stuff

3x03

A-plot: rand in rhuidean + general intro to the waste (rand's focal episode)

B-plot: perrin arrives in the two rivers and gets situated

C-plot: continued tanchico shenanigans, maybe they run into thom and/or min and/or tuon (who is undercover for reasons) if they didn't already in 3x02. my guess is min has been kidnapped out of cairhien by liandrin, who knows min figured out she's black ajah and doesn't want her to snitch, so maybe at some point in the early episodes there's a plotline of mat, elayne, and nynaeve rescuing min from the black ajah, and after that point min joins their scooby gang (because she's got a personal vendetta against liandrin now and also she wants to re-earn mat's trust and prove herself).

an alleged leak puts mat, thom, and min all in tanchico, so that's why i have them in this plotline. it's also why i have tuon in this plotline, as i can't think of a strong reason to move mat from the waste to tanchico if not to incorporate elements of the ebou dar trip and have him meet tuon who is filling an egeanin-type role.

3x04

A-plot: nynaeve encounters moghedien in TAR and almost dies but is saved by birgitte, whom elayne saves by bonding her as a warder (this whole sequence is the midseason climax at the end of the episode)

mat gets into some kind of shenanigan with tuon and they grow closer, but neither knows the other's true identity

B-plot: elaida, gawyn, and galad reach the white tower and start investigating elayne's disappearance and clashing with siuan

C-plots: the waste gang doing their thing, learning about aiel ways, developing avirand, etc; perrin doing his thing in the two rivers, meeting faile if he hasn't already

i could also easily switch 3x03 and 3x04 so that 3x04 is the rhuidean episode. just depends if they throw rand right into it like TSR does or if we get a General Waste Intro episode before sending him off to rhuidean. but based on a combination of leaks, we do just about know that the glass columns visions are during block 2 (eps3/4).

3x05

A-plot: perrin in the two rivers, maybe digging more into the whitecloaks, padan fain, laila trauma, luc/slayer, wolves & TAR, relationship with faile, etc. (potentially his focal episode)

B-plot: cold rocks hold stuff for the waste gang

C-plot: continued tanchico shenanigans; continued white tower politics

3x06

A-plot: alcair dal, asmodean identity reveal & capture

B-plot: some kind of tanchico conclusion. maybe this is when tuon finds out some of her new buddies can channel (and possibly even that sul'dam, and she herself, can channel) and heads back to the seanchan with Much To Think About. maybe the black ajah make their exit from the season to shift full focus onto Final Boss Moggy.

C-plots: perrin prepping for battle; continued white tower politics

3x07: goldeneyes

A-plot: perrin defending the two rivers (perrin's focal episode, unless it's instead an earlier one that's less about a major battle and more about his internal life as a character)

B-plot: tower coup? i'm very unsure where in the season to place this, i could see it at any point in episodes 6, 7, or 8. kinda doubt it would happen earlier than ep6 because i'm not sure if that would allow us enough time to build up to it, especially since major coup players like elaida and gawyn are being introduced for the very first time this season so we need decent time with them before shit goes down (plus, it just naturally feels like a Late Season Climactic Event). the head writer of 1x06 & 2x07 (aes-sedai-heavy episodes) being the head writer of 3x08 could potentially indicate that the coup happens in 3x08, but she is also an executive producer so it's not like aes sedai politics is The Only Thing she knows about.

C-plots: the waste gang travels back to the wetlands, rand learns from asmodean; tanchico crew takes a sea folk ship to the eastern part of the continent (same city where waste gang is headed)

3x08: he who comes with the dawn

A-plot: the climax of the waste crew's plotline, potentially a battle in cairhien or tear, but that may cause Battle Fatigue if 3x07 has just had a big battle. maybe this could point towards their destination being tear and them taking the stone in somewhat more of an infiltration operation like in TDR, as opposed to the more traditional battle for cairhien in TFOH? just to mix things up a bit with perrin's traditional battle in the prior episode.

okay yeah i'm leaning towards tear, plus there was the leaked alleged sammael audition script (i trust no audition scripts after the phony gawyn one from s2 lmao) where the person he's talking to is demanding to know where "it" is. so my vision is that sammael's sitting comfy in tear, rand & co launch an infiltration operation to take the stone, rand finds sammael and demands to know callandor's whereabouts, and sammael ultimately flees to continue causing trouble in a new location in s4.

A-plot part 2: the tanchico crew gets involved with the infiltration operation, and nynaeve battles & defeats moghedien AND breaks her block (if she hasn't already, that could be a good Early Win to include around ep5-6 ish)

after all this stuff is done, there is a Final Final confrontation with moiraine and lanfear getting yeeted through the doorway; nynaeve bonds lan straightaway rather than his bond going on a noncon detour to alanna

post-battle checkin with perrin, but not a ton of time with him in this episode

final stinger: our buddy tuon from tanchico is shown dressed to the seanchan nines and being addressed as the daughter of the nine moons. gasp, mat's fated wife is our buddy tuon from tanchico, who is in fact a high-ranking seanchan noble! dun dun dun!!!!!

elephant in the room: "emily, why are you having rand in the wetlands for 3x08 when an episode called 'he who comes with the dawn' would obviously be about alcair dal?" listen, i know, but i typed up this whole post before i found out about that episode title and was too attached to it to change it lmao plus, i genuinely can't think of enough for rand & co to do in the waste for 6 entire episodes. i could see an argument that they chose this episode title as a general "yeah that's a baller title for a season finale about rand coming into his own in a big moment" rather than as a specific "this episode focuses on rand coming into his own in a strictly-aiel-related way" (see: 2x07 just being about general political shenanigans rather than literal daes dae'mar). rand pulling callandor from the stone while surrounded by his aiel followers could still be a "he who comes with the dawn" moment, okay!

so i will leave this post as is, but if indeed 3x08 only takes us up to alcair dal (and the moiraine & lanfear yeeting which i think will be this episode no matter what), that actually doesn't change my structure too much. basically it'd just be slowing down both the waste & tanchico crew's plotlines and having their climaxes be still in the waste & tanchico respectively, and then we can do a travel timeskip between seasons and have s4 open with the waste crew taking tear or cairhien and the tanchico crew meeting up with them there. i do strongly believe that mat, elayne, and nynaeve will join up with rand & co for s4 and skip their whole salidar/ebou dar detours, because that positions mat to form the band and have his Dragon's General storyline in s4, positions elayne to spend time with rand and aviendha and potentially join rand in retaking caemlyn and then just stay there to start her succession, and positions nynaeve to spend time with lan in the immediate aftermath of moiraine's "death" and then join up with elayne's or rand's future storyline. for these 3, salidar & ebou dar are filler sidequests rather than Main Story storylines imo and it could be quite efficient to cut those out and just distribute the handful of Main Story elements from them into other Main Story storylines.

[swordofsun]

Wheel of Time episode 5 - Blood Calls Blood

Here be book spoilers. Just all the book spoilers. I take no responsibility for you being spoiled after this point.

I think I need to break this up via character. Possibly my favorite episode and I didn't expect to even think about throwing out the word favorite without even seeing Siuan or Min. The next three episodes are going to destroy me, I can tell already.

Rand and Matt (and Loial):

Again their story stays a bit simple, but lovely and full of foreshadowing.

Mat is increasingly paranoid which is great, but I wish we got to SEE the dagger a bit more. Like we got to see him clutching it, but it wasn't obviously the dagger.

That scene with Logain huh? They are keeping his Talet of seeing ta'veren it looks like. Seeing both Mat and Rand together must've been a trip.

At least Rand didn't climb any fucking walls here.

Rand picked up a book of Dragon Prophecies! Hell of a thing for an inn to just have on a shelf.

I know the ogre - ogier thing was for rv watchers, but it really gave a shout out to what a nerd Rand is in the books. We've all had that moment where we realize we've only ever read a word and don't actually know how to pronounce it.

Speaking of Loial I'm sad at the lack of ears, but understand the practical application was probably too hard and expensive.

Overall liked Loial, very excited about the humans and wants to make friends

Although a bit odd they kept the "chased through the city" stuff when changing the meeting to Tar Valon. Says a lot about Ogier that they aren't recognized on sight in Tar Valon of all places.

Rand recognized Dragonmount! That is both your birthplace and your grave you little ray of sunshine! I can't wait for the emotional and mental torment to really start destroying him. Not to mention the physical. (I heard Joshua was excited about the box. Can anyone confirm?)

Nyneave!:

I love that everyone was assuming the previous episode was her first time touching the One Power. Or course they haven't been spending the past month pushing her to break her block, they don't realize she has one!

Nyneave best still have her block. It's fucking important to her character.

Then we get Nyneave telling Rand about Egwene and the break breakbone fever! Her actual first Healing.

Side note I love Moraine's whole everything when Liandrin tried to suggest Nyneave might end up anywhere but the Yellows.

Nyneave's continued distrust of Aes Sedai and how little they are doing to fix that. Nyneave never fully buys into the White Tower propaganda and I love it.

The Warders:

I really liked how much time they spent on Stepin. So important to show the effect of the bond breaking, of a Warder losing their Aes Sedai.

Nyneave spending her time worrying about him and offering what comfort she can. She's been giving him sleeping tea! She told him his pain would never go away when it was exactly what he needed to hear! Such a good and compassionate healer.

I adore the deatb rituals shown. One of my favorite things about New Spring is the hints of actual spirituality RJ put in and the show expanding on that is perfect.

Alanna singing, the candles, arranging the bodies in a motherfucking circle!

"May the last embrace of the mother welcome you home." Don't mind me sobbing.

Everyone in Tar Valon knowing what an empty horse with a backwards boot meant. Such a small detail, but so good.

Warders returning their Aes Sedai's ring is such a good detail. Give them a reason to make it home and try to keep them alive.

The way all the Warders stood in quiet solidarity. I love the bits of Warder culture we got in the books and this adds to it so well.

The discussion about being chosen as a Warder and the honor in it.

How everyone was sad, but not surprised, that Stepin killed himself.

Stepin's funeral! I really like the idea that everyone morns, but one person is choosen to vocalise that grief. It takes the silly single wail we see so often in shows and movies and makes it a group expression of loss.

Moraine and Nyneave reaching for each other. I want them to be uneasy allies.

Moraine:

Between her discussion with Alanna and the funeral scene I think the groundwork for what she does with Lan's bond has been well laid. Especially because she can see how much Lan and Nyneave care for each other already.

Her shared grief with Lan. The pain and loss unique to Aes Sedai and Warders.

Her sexy silence about Siuan. I can't wait for them to finally have some scenes together.

Thought: If we're getting Min in Fal Dara it's likely Moraine has spent time with her before and perhaps been given some of Min's foretelling. Her expression during that talk with Alanna makes me wonder if she doesn't know that she'll be dying before Lan.

Egwene, Perrin, and the Tuatha'an:

I love that we got our first look at Tuatha'an dedication to non-violence at the same time as we got to see how far White Cloaks will go.

Poor Aram just left knocked out on the ground. We'll see you later!

Egwene being Egwene! This is the Eggy we know and love. Core of iron and unbreakable. Her entire discussion with Valda had me internally screaming about future Amyrlin Seats. So good.

Perrin finally told someone about Laila. That was such a good scene. He really needed to hear that it wasn't his fault.

Egwene splitting the threads! So sneaky and great!

Egwene just straight up stabbing Valda. Loved it!

Goldeneyes!

Perrin is a bit more werewolfy then in the books. I like it.

He starting to understand the wolves and realize he's been adopted.

As gruesome as it was I adore the wolves just tearing apart the White Cloak camp. Saving Young Bull and being terrifying.

Are we gonna get Elyas next episode?

This has gone on too long so final thoughts:

I heard they 3D printed a lot of the set for the White Tower and cannot fault them if true. It looks gorgeous and the sort of intricate stonework the books talked about.

Was Alanna eating an apple or a peach? I need some better screencaps because it looked like a peach and I am not okay with that.

Peaches better still be poison. I need that bit of bizarre canon.

Still got penis mountain and vigina island.