12-24-2021, 06:17 PM
I am still processing but I pretty much disliked a lot of it. Which I won't go into too much detail about (as the more I think about the whole series, it's pacing, and this particular episode, it seems to wax and wane. Overall, I felt hugely disappointed and mostly"meh". Little pieces of lame dialog still come to me and make me cringe. Perrin...what a waste of a character....nynaeve speechifying as she's being burned out. )
Regarding the AoL, the timing and situation make no sense. The "fight" between Latrae and LTT was at the height of of war of power. The bore had been drilled, shadowspawn had been released, cities had been burned out by balefire, numerous AS had gone over to the shadow, and the forces of light were on the ropes.
The bore was widening and how to deal with that was the issue. 2 plans came to the fore: seal up the bore using the power or using the newly built choedan Kal to erect a barrier to buy time.
It was chaos and desperate and both sides became less and less reasonable. There was fear and terror and both sides accused the other side of sabotage. No female AS of any strength were willing to go along with LTTs plan and soon, even female AS who weren't strong enough vowed to oppose them. This was the Fateful Concord. Rj described it as one side paralyzed by fear at the approaching Boulder rolling downhill.
Hot-headed young men on LTTs side exacerbated the situation and called themselves the companions.
The plan of Latrae seemed hopeless as the choedan Kal access keys were in territory the shadow took over. The shadow was on a down hill roll, taking more and more and it was near the end. Still, the women refused to work with the men even now that their plan was in shambles.
In the end, LTT decided to act when intelligence told that all the forsaken were at shayol Gul for a meeting. If they acted they could possibly take out the top level of the shadow in one fell swoop.
We all know what happened. And the women not partaking ended up being a good thing as saidar would have been tainted as well. But it bought 3000 years of peace.
A terrible price and none of the options were great. But not acting was worse
And the next 3000 years had their own imbalance as a result. It took Rand and Egwene primarily working through their differences and truly talking and listening to do it right
This...this was none of that. This was no war (the AoL looked great and futuristic). There was no urgency. There was no desperation.
This was one man deciding to "make the world better", whatever the fuck that meant, by sealing up the DO. And Latrae saying it was arrogant and he couldn't change humanity or free will or whatever. So....was he unleashed? Had the bore been made? If so, it didn't seem to be a bad thing or anything to worry about.
My gut feeling was that LTT was trying to kill the DO and end evil the way Rand wanted to do in AMOL. And that doing so takes away the choice of evil.
So was LTTs stupid and prideful attempt to remake humanity why the bore occurred and what broke the world?
Bah, so cliche. Such a stereotype. Stupid male arrogance overreaching in the face of wise female acceptance and wisdonm. No nuance. No terror. It wouldn't have taken much to show a ruined crib, LTT and Latrae dirty and angry and fearful as they argue about the best way to end things once and for all. To show the city, glimpses of futurism amidst destruction. Feel the war of power and the desperation on both sides. That both sides were good people making opposes decisions.
Nah. Let's just make it arrogance and hubris that (evidently) caused everything including the bore. Because it sure doesn't look like a war is going on. No one acts like a war is going on.
I've slept on it. And nope. Just hugely disappointed. I'm trying to parse the good things and they feel so far in between.
I have never minded changes because I know they are needed. As long as the characters and the spirit of the story are the same, I don't mind. But this betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the theme.
There were other things like moiraine CANT teach Rand how to channel, a lame battle with CGI that looked like early 2000s video game cut scenes, why Lan can't be with Nynaeve (didn't 3xplain why that didn't work- anymore than Anakin and Padme couldn't be together.)
I'm not trying to nitpick. I've tried to like this. I went in excited and ready to be blown away. I was expecting a prologue set in the AOL and was happy I was right. And there are things I do like of the series. But from 1 to 10, this gets a 4. And as a finale, it failed for me.
I probably should bow out since I don't want to ruin it for others. Because my irritation hasn't gone way.
Regarding the AoL, the timing and situation make no sense. The "fight" between Latrae and LTT was at the height of of war of power. The bore had been drilled, shadowspawn had been released, cities had been burned out by balefire, numerous AS had gone over to the shadow, and the forces of light were on the ropes.
The bore was widening and how to deal with that was the issue. 2 plans came to the fore: seal up the bore using the power or using the newly built choedan Kal to erect a barrier to buy time.
It was chaos and desperate and both sides became less and less reasonable. There was fear and terror and both sides accused the other side of sabotage. No female AS of any strength were willing to go along with LTTs plan and soon, even female AS who weren't strong enough vowed to oppose them. This was the Fateful Concord. Rj described it as one side paralyzed by fear at the approaching Boulder rolling downhill.
Hot-headed young men on LTTs side exacerbated the situation and called themselves the companions.
The plan of Latrae seemed hopeless as the choedan Kal access keys were in territory the shadow took over. The shadow was on a down hill roll, taking more and more and it was near the end. Still, the women refused to work with the men even now that their plan was in shambles.
In the end, LTT decided to act when intelligence told that all the forsaken were at shayol Gul for a meeting. If they acted they could possibly take out the top level of the shadow in one fell swoop.
We all know what happened. And the women not partaking ended up being a good thing as saidar would have been tainted as well. But it bought 3000 years of peace.
A terrible price and none of the options were great. But not acting was worse
And the next 3000 years had their own imbalance as a result. It took Rand and Egwene primarily working through their differences and truly talking and listening to do it right
This...this was none of that. This was no war (the AoL looked great and futuristic). There was no urgency. There was no desperation.
This was one man deciding to "make the world better", whatever the fuck that meant, by sealing up the DO. And Latrae saying it was arrogant and he couldn't change humanity or free will or whatever. So....was he unleashed? Had the bore been made? If so, it didn't seem to be a bad thing or anything to worry about.
My gut feeling was that LTT was trying to kill the DO and end evil the way Rand wanted to do in AMOL. And that doing so takes away the choice of evil.
So was LTTs stupid and prideful attempt to remake humanity why the bore occurred and what broke the world?
Bah, so cliche. Such a stereotype. Stupid male arrogance overreaching in the face of wise female acceptance and wisdonm. No nuance. No terror. It wouldn't have taken much to show a ruined crib, LTT and Latrae dirty and angry and fearful as they argue about the best way to end things once and for all. To show the city, glimpses of futurism amidst destruction. Feel the war of power and the desperation on both sides. That both sides were good people making opposes decisions.
Nah. Let's just make it arrogance and hubris that (evidently) caused everything including the bore. Because it sure doesn't look like a war is going on. No one acts like a war is going on.
I've slept on it. And nope. Just hugely disappointed. I'm trying to parse the good things and they feel so far in between.
I have never minded changes because I know they are needed. As long as the characters and the spirit of the story are the same, I don't mind. But this betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the theme.
There were other things like moiraine CANT teach Rand how to channel, a lame battle with CGI that looked like early 2000s video game cut scenes, why Lan can't be with Nynaeve (didn't 3xplain why that didn't work- anymore than Anakin and Padme couldn't be together.)
I'm not trying to nitpick. I've tried to like this. I went in excited and ready to be blown away. I was expecting a prologue set in the AOL and was happy I was right. And there are things I do like of the series. But from 1 to 10, this gets a 4. And as a finale, it failed for me.
I probably should bow out since I don't want to ruin it for others. Because my irritation hasn't gone way.
"Good and ill.
We're like the wind,
we blows both ways."
- Mad Sweeney, American Gods
- Mad Sweeney, American Gods