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shallownessNo particular focus as we followed everyone, and with Nynaeve and Egwene’s only interaction being the former overhearing the latter have a whinge about her, we had loads of strands in the White Tower. It started with a literally dark scene with Rand being all broody. It looked as though he was sexing his landlady for board, although she’d have it that they were giving each other some emotional support via sex.
When we saw where he was living and working in daytime, I was reminded that scouting locations for WoT must be such fun. As his storyline progressed, we learned that the Dragon Reborn isn’t quite in control of his powers, but he always intended to make the bullying orderly unable to work so that he could interact with the False Dragon, which is sneakier than it had seemed when he was being nice Rand helping the traumatised old soldier. Though the sword fighting lesson should come in handy someday.
Mat with his new face continued to try to escape like he was the Count of Monte Cristo, and opened a hole…to another cell, which housed the bartender who could see futures from the end of the first series, Min. He intrigued her by saying that he didn’t want to know his future, but of course, she and we got to see it anyway, and it involved him stabbing Rand (good or bad thing? Intriguing, anyway.)
Also intriguing was that the effect was awfully similar to Perrin’s vision, only his was of the recent past, as his party followed the track with the help of the Tracker, then decided to stay the night at a settlement. The Tracker told Perrin this party weren’t his pack, among other titbits that don’t mount up to a proper conversation about what is going on with him, though at the moment he’d like to pretend it was nothing.
Anyway they got attacked and just as the soldiers were turning the tide, the back-up, women who could channel, but had weird gags in their mouths (and their culture seemed to be big on covering women’s mouths if not always gagging them) turned up and bested them with SFX. When Perrin came to, he realised they were prisoners, and then a truly impressive party came forward, with the top lady being carried on, like, a mini pyramid with wheels (production design on WoT must be fun too). And by her side? Ismael.
Who had got namechecked just before by Moriaine. At the start of the episode, she and Lan were not fully healed, but the older Aes Sedai had decided they’d go along with them, though there seemed to be some disagreement about where they were going to. Things – communication, their relationship – were not what they should be between Lan and Moiraine, and I was in the ‘what you did was stupid, Moiraine’ camp.
That night, Moriaine found out that Meera Syal’s character had a pretty good idea of what she was up to and that she’d just have to trust her. It seemed as if things could be patched up with Lan as they were asked how they had first met and the story was told naturally enough, except it turned out that Moiraine was determined to break the bond (I was horrified that Alanna’s two warders would have to be part of taking him to the White Tower to carry this out.) She seemed mad that he hadn’t protected her from the fades (which is unreasonable as she sneaked out after barely talking to him), and was all ‘I never saw us as equals’. She dished out so much pain at him, and it’s hard to know if this is her being noble and sacrificial or dropping the mask. Or where the plan with the older Aes Sedai fits in.
Liandrin insisted that Nynaeve take the initiation rite, to progress from novice to accepted so that she could train her, after Nynaeve saw some magical healing. Alana and the Mistresses of Novices had a chat about whether she was ready and whether having Liandrin train her was a good idea. It emerged that the new novices were extraordinarily powerful (would have cheered Egwene to learn that she was namechecked, actually) and they thought that that meant that the Pattern was gifting them fighters for the Last Battle. On balance, the Mistress of Novices thought that they should let Nynaeve move up the initiation.
Nynaeve was following Liandrin around, and saw her go to the man that Moiraine had mentioned she knew Liandrin visited often (helpfully in the ‘Previously’ section.) He was old and sick, and Liandrin was dosing him with something she’d nicked, but the Wisdom pointed out that it had gone to the heart and caused him more pain. Liandrin lashed out at her and sent her away, but we stayed and heard her call him ‘my beautiful boy’, suggesting that he’s her son and she has been ‘stealing time’ and is waaaay older than she looks, as was only seeded as something Aes Sedai can do in this episode.
Despite this, because of her earlier campaign, Liandrin had to come to Nynaeve and take her to her initiation rite, which looked scary (great cliffhanger.) Liandrin looked like she’d sucked lemons even harder than usual.
Before then Nynaeve had gone to Egwene’s to discuss what she’d learned, but Egwene wasn’t there, she was in another novice’s room. And it wasn’t any old novice, as we’d learned all episode. It was Elayne, the redheaded heir of – well, basically, the king of Two Rivers (although isn’t there a suggestion that Nynaeve is descended from the true royalty?) and, she’d later humblebrag the most powerful nation in the world. Am dubious about how she can be both heir and an Aes Sedai.
Elayne was built up as a Lady Entitlement, getting her room all done up, and attached herself to an unimpressed Egwene. We gradually learned that she’d been lonely all her life, and she earned some respect from Egwene for taking on the (corporal) punishment for the person who’d let her bring her servants and furnishings to decorate her room against the rules. She was also familiar with the White Tower. When Egwene started complaining that the Aes Sedai ignored her, though she kept all the rules and tried so hard, but were all about Nynaeve, she pointed out that ‘jealous wasn’t a good look on her,’ and that’s true, although I thought that some of the other stuff that Egwene was saying about Nynaeve’s motivations for being in the tower was nonetheless true.
Enough developments to keep me hooked, and by switching from character to character, you moved on to something you’d find more engaging (than blokes angsting in the dark) quickly enough.
When we saw where he was living and working in daytime, I was reminded that scouting locations for WoT must be such fun. As his storyline progressed, we learned that the Dragon Reborn isn’t quite in control of his powers, but he always intended to make the bullying orderly unable to work so that he could interact with the False Dragon, which is sneakier than it had seemed when he was being nice Rand helping the traumatised old soldier. Though the sword fighting lesson should come in handy someday.
Mat with his new face continued to try to escape like he was the Count of Monte Cristo, and opened a hole…to another cell, which housed the bartender who could see futures from the end of the first series, Min. He intrigued her by saying that he didn’t want to know his future, but of course, she and we got to see it anyway, and it involved him stabbing Rand (good or bad thing? Intriguing, anyway.)
Also intriguing was that the effect was awfully similar to Perrin’s vision, only his was of the recent past, as his party followed the track with the help of the Tracker, then decided to stay the night at a settlement. The Tracker told Perrin this party weren’t his pack, among other titbits that don’t mount up to a proper conversation about what is going on with him, though at the moment he’d like to pretend it was nothing.
Anyway they got attacked and just as the soldiers were turning the tide, the back-up, women who could channel, but had weird gags in their mouths (and their culture seemed to be big on covering women’s mouths if not always gagging them) turned up and bested them with SFX. When Perrin came to, he realised they were prisoners, and then a truly impressive party came forward, with the top lady being carried on, like, a mini pyramid with wheels (production design on WoT must be fun too). And by her side? Ismael.
Who had got namechecked just before by Moriaine. At the start of the episode, she and Lan were not fully healed, but the older Aes Sedai had decided they’d go along with them, though there seemed to be some disagreement about where they were going to. Things – communication, their relationship – were not what they should be between Lan and Moiraine, and I was in the ‘what you did was stupid, Moiraine’ camp.
That night, Moriaine found out that Meera Syal’s character had a pretty good idea of what she was up to and that she’d just have to trust her. It seemed as if things could be patched up with Lan as they were asked how they had first met and the story was told naturally enough, except it turned out that Moiraine was determined to break the bond (I was horrified that Alanna’s two warders would have to be part of taking him to the White Tower to carry this out.) She seemed mad that he hadn’t protected her from the fades (which is unreasonable as she sneaked out after barely talking to him), and was all ‘I never saw us as equals’. She dished out so much pain at him, and it’s hard to know if this is her being noble and sacrificial or dropping the mask. Or where the plan with the older Aes Sedai fits in.
Liandrin insisted that Nynaeve take the initiation rite, to progress from novice to accepted so that she could train her, after Nynaeve saw some magical healing. Alana and the Mistresses of Novices had a chat about whether she was ready and whether having Liandrin train her was a good idea. It emerged that the new novices were extraordinarily powerful (would have cheered Egwene to learn that she was namechecked, actually) and they thought that that meant that the Pattern was gifting them fighters for the Last Battle. On balance, the Mistress of Novices thought that they should let Nynaeve move up the initiation.
Nynaeve was following Liandrin around, and saw her go to the man that Moiraine had mentioned she knew Liandrin visited often (helpfully in the ‘Previously’ section.) He was old and sick, and Liandrin was dosing him with something she’d nicked, but the Wisdom pointed out that it had gone to the heart and caused him more pain. Liandrin lashed out at her and sent her away, but we stayed and heard her call him ‘my beautiful boy’, suggesting that he’s her son and she has been ‘stealing time’ and is waaaay older than she looks, as was only seeded as something Aes Sedai can do in this episode.
Despite this, because of her earlier campaign, Liandrin had to come to Nynaeve and take her to her initiation rite, which looked scary (great cliffhanger.) Liandrin looked like she’d sucked lemons even harder than usual.
Before then Nynaeve had gone to Egwene’s to discuss what she’d learned, but Egwene wasn’t there, she was in another novice’s room. And it wasn’t any old novice, as we’d learned all episode. It was Elayne, the redheaded heir of – well, basically, the king of Two Rivers (although isn’t there a suggestion that Nynaeve is descended from the true royalty?) and, she’d later humblebrag the most powerful nation in the world. Am dubious about how she can be both heir and an Aes Sedai.
Elayne was built up as a Lady Entitlement, getting her room all done up, and attached herself to an unimpressed Egwene. We gradually learned that she’d been lonely all her life, and she earned some respect from Egwene for taking on the (corporal) punishment for the person who’d let her bring her servants and furnishings to decorate her room against the rules. She was also familiar with the White Tower. When Egwene started complaining that the Aes Sedai ignored her, though she kept all the rules and tried so hard, but were all about Nynaeve, she pointed out that ‘jealous wasn’t a good look on her,’ and that’s true, although I thought that some of the other stuff that Egwene was saying about Nynaeve’s motivations for being in the tower was nonetheless true.
Enough developments to keep me hooked, and by switching from character to character, you moved on to something you’d find more engaging (than blokes angsting in the dark) quickly enough.
