The Wheel of Time - 2.7 Daes Dae'Mar
Apr. 14th, 2025 08:27 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessA goodie, even if a few things happened very conveniently just before the final episode of the season. I was reminded by the previously that Perrin and his new companion were also heading for Falme.
It turned out the Aes Sedai had realised that Rand was in the same neck of the woods as them and wanted a word with him before he left for Falme. I liked his scene with Lan, who recognised that Rand was a (very young) man and talked to him like a decent role model might. Given that he’d be called ‘boy’ a lot by Siuan (though she’s probably older), it was probably good for his ego.
I wouldn’t believe that Mat actually was in Falme for the longest time, and would like to know how the Forsaken managed to get him there. (But then Lanfear, wearing all kinds of natty outfits, turned up in Caithness – well, perhaps she’d physically stayed around and only gone to Falme via dreams.) Basically Ishamael got him to drink some tea that was meant to show him all his past selves and who he really was. Seemed like a hallucinogen that was hammering home the message that he was NO GOOD to me. Ishamael then got to spout his cod philosophy. He seems to want to destroy the world so he can stop being reincarnated, or something?
Perrin and Whatshername came across some more of her people. I did think they could have told him that this wasn’t his business and not to interfere before beginning their ridiculous ‘honour’ business, which involved a two-on-one duffing up because whatshername had dishonoured someone who was now dead so that she could stay alive. No wonder Hoppy and Perrin were disturbed, but the party of five eventually got to Falme. The ladies seemed surprised by the water, as if it hadn’t been there before, or was it just that they’d never been to Falme before? They may be underdeveloped given all that’s going on, is all.
Elayne was bossing Nynaeve to do things her way, of which I thoroughly approve, and so they were stealthily scouting Falme, and found Loial. His warmth at reuniting with Nynaeve, who seems to have adopted him as one of hers now, contrasted with his respectful treatment of Elayne, who was all noblesse oblige, got the information they needed from him and didn’t make overblown promises. This led to them kidnapping one of the trainers and putting the collar on her, in the hope of getting to the kennel. I don’t think they have a clue what they’re doing, but their hearts are in the right place.
Egwene and others were taken outside and out of town by their trainers and a head trainer. Horrible to see her mouth covered like the rest of them, and her hair done up wrong. It was about seeing how much power they had, and it was more about the arm piece pulling out their powers than their doing anything. Of course, Egwene had a great deal of power, her trainer was pleased, and deigned to bathe her back in the cell. She babbled on about their empress being all for the light and this form of slavery being about bringing everyone together. (I was reminded that Egwene had weaved with other women freely at the end of the last season.) Egwene observed that she’d kill her one day (attagirl) and the trainer left in a huff.
It was all nicely complicated at Caithness. We had a flashback to 20 years ago, where Moiraine and Siuan were celebrating after a war’s end, teasing each other about who’d be each other’s fishwife when they retired. I know they had different outfits and hairstyles, but the actresses conveyed that they were younger and happier too. They went to tell another, more senior Aes Sedai, (oh, imdb informs me she was played by Hayley Mills!) but she was having visions of Rand being born/the Dragon being Reborn, and thus the couple’s plans were radically changed.
Reunited in the present, Siuan was disappointed that Moiraine had basically lied to her for six months. Siuan had had a meeting with Rand and been able to deal with his weaves fairly easily. She was therefore unimpressed by how far along he’d come, (I snorted in some sympathy when she said it would have been easier if he’d been a girl) and decided to scrap their former plan. They’d now follow the White Tower approved plans for the Dragon, where he’d become the Aes Sedai’s weapon. Rand really disliked that, and I couldn’t blame him. Moiraine had a few issues with it too.
Fortunately, wheels within wheels were turning, and Meera Syal turned up and very carefully got the Amerlyn Seat’s lieutenant (who was wearing the most glorious costume) to hand over shielding/depowering Rand to her. Which she dropped, so that Rand could pop into the dream world and ask Lanfear for a favour i.e. help him get out of the joint. Her way of doing so was to set fire to places and never mind the human damage.
Lan had questions about Moiraine’s stilling, because she wasn’t going insane (even though she was avoiding sleeping), just going to continue her mission alone with whatever she had left. So he went to see the False Dragon, who conveniently had noticed that her weaves had been tied up in a powerless knot. Alanna and one of her warders (the other was following Meera Syal’s warder, interesting to see that they made their decisions as a triad by majority rule) were willing to help. Totally understandable that Lan, sill angry the False Dragon had killed his friend’s Aes Sedai and led to his suicide, would not give him an easy out.
Meanwhile also, Liandrin had been going about, doing her thing, and it was revealed that Moiraine’s milquetoast nephew wasn’t such a nice guy after all (and maybe his interest in Rand wasn’t because he fancied him.) He was a servant of the Dark. He also didn’t know that his mother was spying on him and overheard the order to kill Moriaine and herself if necessary. This led to a face-off, where, fair dos, his mother did the right thing, as she knew the sister she didn’t like very much would. I like to think she was in part motivated by not wanting him to have his family’s blood on his hands as well as wishing to stop the bloodshed and furthernace of the Dark’s plans.
So I guess the royal wedding is off, then? Also, the Aes Sedai seemed unaware of this plot strand.
Because Alanna and co. and Meera Syal were helping Rand, Moiraine and Lan escape, by giving them an Ogiris map that handily led to one of their gates. In a cool, but confusing moemnt, this seemed to happen in a court just below Siuan, in full Amerlyn Seat mode, and most of the other Aes Sedai, who were trying to protect the city from Lanfear. They didn’t notice all that, and it was only when her lieutenant turned up, responding to an order she’d never issued, that Siuan realised Moiraine was helping Rand escape.
At the gate, which needed someone to channel to open it, and Rand was barely competent, Lan broke the news that Moiraine hadn’t been properly stilled, and got Rand to use his sight to show it to us. Lovely moment where Moiraine said she trusted Rand to cut the knot (well, she had to.) He managed it, and MOIRAINE WAS RESTORED TO THE SOURCE, which deserves all caps. Just as I was sharing her delight and hoping that things would be all right between her and Lan again, Siuan turned up. Battle of wills between the lovers about whether they were going to let Rand go of his free will to Falme to rescue Egwene/fulfil a prophecy/seemingly do what the Forsaken wanted, or cage him in the White Tower to be used by the Aes Sedai.
It got personal with Siuan issuing an order to Moiraine as the Amerlyn Seat, despite Moiraine begging her not to, which was, of course, a betrayal of trust.
But then! Enter Lanfear, attacking Siuan and threatening to kill Moiraine, as she’d said she would. Rand begged her not to (was this when Lanfear repeated that he was turning more and more into her ex, the former Dragon?) She said he was lucky that she had more use for a ‘broken’ Amerlyn Seat, and so she let Moiraine live. So, Lan, Rand and Moiraine (taking her time to say a wordless, multilayered goodbye to Siuan. Has occurred to me that for all Siuan’s power and status, Moiraine has amassed more allies over the past 20 years) were allowed to leave for Falme, just in time for the season finale.
It turned out the Aes Sedai had realised that Rand was in the same neck of the woods as them and wanted a word with him before he left for Falme. I liked his scene with Lan, who recognised that Rand was a (very young) man and talked to him like a decent role model might. Given that he’d be called ‘boy’ a lot by Siuan (though she’s probably older), it was probably good for his ego.
I wouldn’t believe that Mat actually was in Falme for the longest time, and would like to know how the Forsaken managed to get him there. (But then Lanfear, wearing all kinds of natty outfits, turned up in Caithness – well, perhaps she’d physically stayed around and only gone to Falme via dreams.) Basically Ishamael got him to drink some tea that was meant to show him all his past selves and who he really was. Seemed like a hallucinogen that was hammering home the message that he was NO GOOD to me. Ishamael then got to spout his cod philosophy. He seems to want to destroy the world so he can stop being reincarnated, or something?
Perrin and Whatshername came across some more of her people. I did think they could have told him that this wasn’t his business and not to interfere before beginning their ridiculous ‘honour’ business, which involved a two-on-one duffing up because whatshername had dishonoured someone who was now dead so that she could stay alive. No wonder Hoppy and Perrin were disturbed, but the party of five eventually got to Falme. The ladies seemed surprised by the water, as if it hadn’t been there before, or was it just that they’d never been to Falme before? They may be underdeveloped given all that’s going on, is all.
Elayne was bossing Nynaeve to do things her way, of which I thoroughly approve, and so they were stealthily scouting Falme, and found Loial. His warmth at reuniting with Nynaeve, who seems to have adopted him as one of hers now, contrasted with his respectful treatment of Elayne, who was all noblesse oblige, got the information they needed from him and didn’t make overblown promises. This led to them kidnapping one of the trainers and putting the collar on her, in the hope of getting to the kennel. I don’t think they have a clue what they’re doing, but their hearts are in the right place.
Egwene and others were taken outside and out of town by their trainers and a head trainer. Horrible to see her mouth covered like the rest of them, and her hair done up wrong. It was about seeing how much power they had, and it was more about the arm piece pulling out their powers than their doing anything. Of course, Egwene had a great deal of power, her trainer was pleased, and deigned to bathe her back in the cell. She babbled on about their empress being all for the light and this form of slavery being about bringing everyone together. (I was reminded that Egwene had weaved with other women freely at the end of the last season.) Egwene observed that she’d kill her one day (attagirl) and the trainer left in a huff.
It was all nicely complicated at Caithness. We had a flashback to 20 years ago, where Moiraine and Siuan were celebrating after a war’s end, teasing each other about who’d be each other’s fishwife when they retired. I know they had different outfits and hairstyles, but the actresses conveyed that they were younger and happier too. They went to tell another, more senior Aes Sedai, (oh, imdb informs me she was played by Hayley Mills!) but she was having visions of Rand being born/the Dragon being Reborn, and thus the couple’s plans were radically changed.
Reunited in the present, Siuan was disappointed that Moiraine had basically lied to her for six months. Siuan had had a meeting with Rand and been able to deal with his weaves fairly easily. She was therefore unimpressed by how far along he’d come, (I snorted in some sympathy when she said it would have been easier if he’d been a girl) and decided to scrap their former plan. They’d now follow the White Tower approved plans for the Dragon, where he’d become the Aes Sedai’s weapon. Rand really disliked that, and I couldn’t blame him. Moiraine had a few issues with it too.
Fortunately, wheels within wheels were turning, and Meera Syal turned up and very carefully got the Amerlyn Seat’s lieutenant (who was wearing the most glorious costume) to hand over shielding/depowering Rand to her. Which she dropped, so that Rand could pop into the dream world and ask Lanfear for a favour i.e. help him get out of the joint. Her way of doing so was to set fire to places and never mind the human damage.
Lan had questions about Moiraine’s stilling, because she wasn’t going insane (even though she was avoiding sleeping), just going to continue her mission alone with whatever she had left. So he went to see the False Dragon, who conveniently had noticed that her weaves had been tied up in a powerless knot. Alanna and one of her warders (the other was following Meera Syal’s warder, interesting to see that they made their decisions as a triad by majority rule) were willing to help. Totally understandable that Lan, sill angry the False Dragon had killed his friend’s Aes Sedai and led to his suicide, would not give him an easy out.
Meanwhile also, Liandrin had been going about, doing her thing, and it was revealed that Moiraine’s milquetoast nephew wasn’t such a nice guy after all (and maybe his interest in Rand wasn’t because he fancied him.) He was a servant of the Dark. He also didn’t know that his mother was spying on him and overheard the order to kill Moriaine and herself if necessary. This led to a face-off, where, fair dos, his mother did the right thing, as she knew the sister she didn’t like very much would. I like to think she was in part motivated by not wanting him to have his family’s blood on his hands as well as wishing to stop the bloodshed and furthernace of the Dark’s plans.
So I guess the royal wedding is off, then? Also, the Aes Sedai seemed unaware of this plot strand.
Because Alanna and co. and Meera Syal were helping Rand, Moiraine and Lan escape, by giving them an Ogiris map that handily led to one of their gates. In a cool, but confusing moemnt, this seemed to happen in a court just below Siuan, in full Amerlyn Seat mode, and most of the other Aes Sedai, who were trying to protect the city from Lanfear. They didn’t notice all that, and it was only when her lieutenant turned up, responding to an order she’d never issued, that Siuan realised Moiraine was helping Rand escape.
At the gate, which needed someone to channel to open it, and Rand was barely competent, Lan broke the news that Moiraine hadn’t been properly stilled, and got Rand to use his sight to show it to us. Lovely moment where Moiraine said she trusted Rand to cut the knot (well, she had to.) He managed it, and MOIRAINE WAS RESTORED TO THE SOURCE, which deserves all caps. Just as I was sharing her delight and hoping that things would be all right between her and Lan again, Siuan turned up. Battle of wills between the lovers about whether they were going to let Rand go of his free will to Falme to rescue Egwene/fulfil a prophecy/seemingly do what the Forsaken wanted, or cage him in the White Tower to be used by the Aes Sedai.
It got personal with Siuan issuing an order to Moiraine as the Amerlyn Seat, despite Moiraine begging her not to, which was, of course, a betrayal of trust.
But then! Enter Lanfear, attacking Siuan and threatening to kill Moiraine, as she’d said she would. Rand begged her not to (was this when Lanfear repeated that he was turning more and more into her ex, the former Dragon?) She said he was lucky that she had more use for a ‘broken’ Amerlyn Seat, and so she let Moiraine live. So, Lan, Rand and Moiraine (taking her time to say a wordless, multilayered goodbye to Siuan. Has occurred to me that for all Siuan’s power and status, Moiraine has amassed more allies over the past 20 years) were allowed to leave for Falme, just in time for the season finale.
