Things have gotten very dark this week in The Wheel of Time, and although there are a few moments of connection between some characters, the theme of isolation continues to ramp up. For better or worse.
Recap
The sul’dam, Renna (Xelia Mendes-Jones), takes Egwene to a cell and tells her how the collar, an a’dam, works. When Egwene is uncooperative Renna uses the collar to torture Egwene, then leaves her alone in her cell.
In a dream, Lanfear tells Rand that she’s been protecting him by keeping Ishamael out of his dreams and that Ishamael is going to turn his friends to the Dark in order to control him. She also tells him that Logain is in Cairhien because Moiraine wanted to lure Rand to Cairhien. Rand asks Lanfear what Ishamael is planning, and she tells him that she has a condition if they are going to work together.
Rand wakes and tells Moiraine that he has to leave her—staying away from Moiraine is Lanfear’s condition. He confronts her about Logain, then leaves despite Moiraine’s pleas.
Min and Mat arrive in Cairhien during a celebration, and Min suddenly wants to leave. Mat is undeterred.
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Ryma and her Warder Basan (Bentley Kalu) convince Nynaeve and Elayne to trust them. They explain what Liandrin did, and Ryma realizes that Liandrin is a Darkfriend Aes Sedai, a member of the Black Ajah.
Lanfear visits Liandrin and her son, Aludran (Vladimír Javorský). She tells Liandrin that she is sworn to the Dark, not Ishamael, and suggests that Liandrin should serve Lanfear instead. She kills Aludran to free Liandrin from the last tie to the person she used to be.
Suroth forces Loial to performing tree singing for her and her court. Loial’s song makes a tree grow taller until Suroth cuts him off. Later, Loial and Ingtar discuss plans to steal back the Horn of Valere, and whether or not it’s possible to rescue Egwene. Loial assures Ingtar that if anyone is strong enough survive the torture of the damane kennels, it is her. Egwene tries to attack Renna with her water pitcher, and learns that the a’dam will prevent her from touching anything she thinks of as a weapon.
Alanna, Ihvon, Maksim, and Lan stop to camp near a Darkfriend temple. They act coldly towards Lan. That night Lan tries to sneak away, but Ihvon and Maksim confront him over the poem, asking if he is a Darkfriend sworn to Lanfear. Lan is ready to fight them but Alanna traps him with the One Power and he is forced to tell them the truth: that he and Moiraine found the Dragon Reborn, and that he needs to tell Siuan.
Rand dreams that he has killed all his friends and is confronted by Ishamael. Lanfear arrives and banishes Ishamael from the Dream. She offers Rand a gift, to see anyone in the Dream World he wants to see. Rand asks to see Egwene and sees her cell. Lanfear tells him that Ishamael has captured her, just as Lanfear warned he would. Rand says he will do anything. Egwene wakes from her dream of Rand. She tries to talk to her neighbor in the cell next door, but the woman only repeats the rules of the damane.
Nynaeve and Elayne refuse to leave Falme despite Ryma’s urgings. The three sit down to study one of the a’dam.
Moiraine tries in vain to write a letter to Siuan. Barthanes brings her a sandwich and tries to talk to her, but she is cold to him. Anvaere confronts Moiraine for abandoning her family and threatens to kick her out. Moiraine answers that she is the elder sister, and the house is hers if she wants it. Riding in a gilded coach at night, Siuan hears a commotion outside and prepares to defend herself. But when the door opens it’s Lan, who tells her about Moiraine.
Rand urges Logain to teach him, pointing out that Rand is Logain’s only chance to make a difference in the world now that Logain has been gentled. Logain walks him through embracing the Source but Rand takes too much power. Logain shouts at Rand to let go before he burns himself out and Rand collapses, vomiting. In the Foregate, Rand hears Mat’s voice at a dice table. The two embrace, and Mat asks where everyone else is.
Ryma warns Elayne and Nynaeve that some of the damane can sense channeling, so they must be careful. She tells how her sisters died to obtain it, and one, a Sitter of the Blue Ajah, was collared.
Renna tells Egwene that the a’dam was created by an Aes Sedai. Manipulating Egwene’s power through the a’dam, she has Egwene destroy the tree outside Egwene’s window by heating its sap until it catches fire. Renna exalts in the teamwork and connection, but when she asks Egwene to touch the pitcher she still can’t. Furious, Renna kicks and beats her.
Rand tells Mat about what happened, how he is the Dragon Reborn and that he let everyone believe he died at the Eye of the World. When he tells Mat that Ishamael has Egwene, Mat is eager to come with him. He tells Rand to meet at the gate in one hour. Mat finds Min drunk and tells her that he ran into his friend and Min tells him not to go, that she had a vision of Mat killing Rand with the ruby-hilted dagger. Mat realizes that Min has met Rand before, and that their entire relationship has been a setup. She tries to tell him that she is still his friend, and that if Mat loves Rand he must stay away.
Moiraine tries to apologize to Barthanes and tells him she believes he will make a wonderful king. Anvaere comes in to report that the Amyrlin, along with fourteen Aes Sedai, has arrived in Caemlyn, and has summoned Moiraine to an audience. In the courtyard Liandrin tries to fish for information but Siuan brushes her off. Rand waits for Mat but realizes he isn’t coming, while Mat watches from a hidden spot. Rand starts to leave but Lan is there with Alanna and her Warders. He tells Rand that he can’t let him leave.
Elayne and Ryma study the a’dam with the one power. Nynaeve struggles to channel until Ryma gives her advice. She uses too much power, but discovers that the a’dam is wounded, that it won’t be whole until it is around a woman’s neck. They realize that they have been detected by the Seanchan and Ryma determines to sacrifice herself so that Nynaeve and Elayne can stay hidden. She gives Nynaeve her ring to carry back to Tar Valon.
She and Basan fight the damane and sul’dam as long as they can, but Basan is unable to kill Ryma before he is killed himself, and Ryma is collared. Elayne stops Nynaeve from going to their aid.
Renna comes to Egwene again and Egwene is able to touch the pitcher. After several tries and more beatings by Reanna, Egwene is able to touch the pitcher. When Renna leaves, Egwene screams in anguish, and the woman in the cell next door tells her not to cry. Egwene did better than she did, and she was a Sitter for the Blue Ajah.
Analysis
This was a really difficult episode to watch, and even as someone who has read the books and knew what was coming with the damane, I felt completely blindsided with the tonal shift this episode has made in comparison to everything that came before it. I found much of the torture and violence in this episode gratuitous, and I can only imagine how unprepared a viewer who hadn’t already read the books might have felt when faced with such a dramatic and sudden increase in the intensity and volume of violence, both physical and psychological, in this episode.
It’s going to be difficult to review as well. But I’ll start with the things I do like about the episode.
Ryma is a wonderful character, and beautifully portrayed. I was very moved when, as a healer herself, Ryma was able to talk about channeling in a way that made sense and was accessible to Nynaeve.
My favorite scene was the confrontation between Min and Mat. I really love Dónal Finn as Mat, he brings all the sunshine to the character that was missing in season one, and he really sells Mat’s struggle coming to terms with abandoning his friends when they went into the Ways. His open vulnerability around Min is really moving, especially when he learns of her betrayal, and I appreciated that there was no outward expression of anger there. Finn and Alexander have a great chemistry, and I love the way that Min’s character is written for the series. She’s a bit more jaded and tired than the Min of the books, and she and Mat make a great pair with their matching attitudes of sardonic optimism and secret inner shame.
(Aside: Both Min and Aviendha’s introductions are different from those in the books, and I think both are handled really well by the show. Book fans will know why I think it’s fascinating that The Wheel of Time has paired the two off as initially Mat and Perrin’s friends, respectively. I am so curious about what this might mean for certain later developments that may or may not unfold according to the book canon.)
I also loved Mat’s conversation with Rand and his adorable reaction to learning that Rand is the Dragon Reborn. His determination to go with Rand and not abandon his friends this time was really moving, and made the fallout from his conversion with Min that much more emotionally wrenching.
She’s not in the episode much, but I was so pleased to see Siuan again. I loved the way she prepared to defend herself with the daggers made of air, and honestly I’d watch a whole episode of Sophie Okonedo walking around in incredible costumes and sitting at writing tables.
I was sort of disappointed that Rand leaving undid Moiraine’s progress with her family, but it does make narrative sense, since Rand has been Moiraine’s entire reason for existing even before she lost her ability to channel. Watching her try to write to Siuan was heartbreaking. And Barthanes is an unexpected joy in the series. I absolutely adore him, and I would like him to make me a sandwich with extra butter, please. I really need it.
The middle ground for me was the confrontation between Lan, Alanna, Ihvon and Maksim. The idea that they were worried that one of their closest friends was a Darkfriend, that they would be willing to kill him unless Lan could provide another explanation, was pretty powerful, and I liked the way it harkened back to the conversation Ihvon and Lan had about how Ihvon knows that Alanna wants the same thing he wants—the triumph of the Light over the Dark. When asked what Moiraine wanted, Lan couldn’t answer, and I can see how finding the poem in Lan’s saddle bags threw that conversation into a suspicious light for Ihvon.
However, even writing it out makes me feel like I had to do a lot of mental work to figure out what was going on there, and everything with them in regard to the discovery of the poem and the decision to go to the Amyrlin was executed in a very clumsy and unclear way. As a The Wheel of Time fan, I was able to reverse engineer my way to understanding what was going on, but my partner, who was watching with me and hasn’t read the series, was utterly lost.
I loved getting to hear Loial’s treesinging, but I really wish we had been introduced to the concept in a moment where its beauty could actually be appreciated. Also, it’s a rushed moment where I feel a viewer might not have understood what this skill of Loial’s is and what it means. In general, I wish that we had more Loial, and I think it was a disservice to the character to have him kidnapped instead of staying with Perrin. That being said, however, I loved the way the show made the treesinging sound, and I continue to enjoy Hammed Animashaun’s portrayal of Loial despite how little we get.
I also liked the confrontation between Lanfear and Liandrin, though it would have been just as effective, in my mind, without Lanfear’s drawn-out murder of Aludran. The idea that Lanfear wants to offer Liandrin the ability to follow her, instead of Ishamael, is cool and interesting, especially with Lanfear relating her own turning to the Dark to Liandrin’s experiences. The whole build up to revealing Liandrin’s Darkfriend Status has been connected to her son and to Liandrin’s connection to Nynaeve, and while it is acknowledged here that Liandrin swore her oaths to the Dark to keep her son alive, it’s not clear how the oaths work. Is Aludran being kept alive by the Power of the Dark? If Lanfear kills him, how has that oath not been forfeited? Once again the rules aren’t clear, and the show seems to assume we already know or just don’t care.
In general, season two has been a lot less welcoming to new viewers than season one was. I’m really surprised that the show doesn’t choose to use maps at any time—this is an entirely new world and the show does absolutely nothing to let us know where cities are in relation to each other, or how long it takes to get anywhere, or what makes one culture different from another. Where was the Amyrlin traveling to (or from?) that she could show up to Cairhien at what appears to be a moment’s notice? How did Lan and the others find her if she was on the road?
On the map in the books one can see that Tar Valon is pretty close to Cairhien, but the show doesn’t tell us that, so when suddenly the Amyrlin has arrived there and has summoned a bunch of Aes Sedai from the White Tower, the audience doesn’t know how that’s possible, or where all these people came from, or how long it took from Lan telling Suian about Moiraine to everyone being summoned to and arriving in Cairhien, apparently ahead of the Amyrlin. The show also does a poor job of telling us how much time has passed at any point in the season. It makes sense that to Egwene, torture feels timeless and endless, and she might not know how many days have passed, but Nynaeve and Elayne’s attempts to help Ryma figure out the a’dam seems to only take a very short time. (An hour? Maybe less?)
There is so much material in the series, so many places and events and important characters, that it was always going to be a struggle to adapt to television, especially an eight-episode format. (Imagine what could be done with the old-fashioned twenty-two episode seasons!) But if the show can’t manage to be clear in these ways now, it will only become more inaccessible in the future, and that would be a real shame.
What I found even more inaccessible about this episode, however, was how much torture it contained. Again, I expected some—the general shape of Renna’s attempt to break Egwene to the collar is more or less the same as in the books—but the volume of it, and the outwardly visceral way Egwene’s torture is depicted, surprised me. If I’m being honest, if I hadn’t been watching it to review I probably would have turned it off halfway through. Partially this is because my threshold for graphic violence is lower than a lot of people’s, which is why I’m upset that the show surprised us with it. I didn’t watch Game of Thrones, for example, because I knew what I was going to get, and I guess I thought I had a better sense of where The Wheel of Time would probably draw the line than I actually did.
The other reason, however, stands regardless of my personal threshold. I think too much of the torture we see on screen in this episode isn’t necessary serve the plot or the themes of the story, and that the show isn’t sensible enough to the way this violence read when almost everyone being harmed is a woman, and they are all people of color.
I think what disappoints me the most is the fact that the gratuitous brutalization of women is one of the hangups of the original series—I actually just talked about this issue in the most recent installment of my read of The Wheel of Time books. Although there is so much I love about The Wheel of Time, this problem, and issues of sexism in general, often hampers the other excellent aspects of it as a fantasy epic. And I thought season one of the show did a really good job in honoring what is great about the series while moving away from some of the outdated gender dynamics—the dragon can be reborn as any gender, Nynaeve and Egwene are also ta’veren, the difference between the male and female halves of the one power is less important and less dwelt upon than it is in the books, etc. Because of these improvements, I had a lot of hope that the show would also strike a better balance when deciding which elements of violence and subjugation served the plot and theme elements, and which were unnecessary torture porn.
This is especially important when most of the characters put through these experiences are women. Not only that, but because the show has done a good job of casting diversely, everyone (with the nominal exception of Liandrin and her son) who is harmed, tortured and/or enslaved in this episode is a person of color, which gives an additional aspect to the violence that the audience is witnessing. The show has even gone so far as to show more than is in the books—in the series, Loial was never captured by the Seanchan, and although Ryma does become a damane, most of what happens to her is not shown.
I am very upset about what the show did with Ryma and Basan. They are introduced to us in much the same way that the Two Rivers folk met Moiraine and Lan, and the dynamic between Warder and Aes Sedai is also very similar to Lan and Moiraine’s. Gethaiga is incredible in her role as Ryma, from her noble Aes Sedai bearing, to her fierceness in battle, to her chemistry with Kalu, and I can’t stop thinking about what a disservice the plot does to these characters. I was shocked when Ryma was taken, fully assuming that she and Besan would die heroic deaths, sacrificing themselves so that Nynaeve and Elayne could save Egwene and hopefully prevent more Aes Sedai from falling into the Seanchan’s clutches.
That fate is clearly what Ryma and Basan intended. Ryma has watched her sisters be killed or taken by the Seanchan, she knows the danger of being sensed channeling, and she has seen just what the damane can do. So someone please explain to me why she didn’t have a better plan to avoid capture than hoping that the Warder bonded to her won’t hesitate even a moment to kill her at the last possible second. A woman who knows medicine as well as or better than Nynaeve could have a vial of poison around her own neck in case she is taken. An Aes Sedai who knows that drawing too much of the One Power can burn you out or even kill you could use that fact as a weapon when faced with the only alternative that would be worse than those two. Instead, this incredible pair of talented, brave, self-possessed people seem to falter at the last moment, and the audience is robbed of one powerful (though still tragic) moment that could have taken the edge off the horrible things that are happening everywhere else.
Nynaeve could still have struggled with her guilt over not trying to help. She and Elayne would still have been on their own in their quest to save Egwene. Nothing in the plot demanded that Ryma end up this way; the only reason to include it in the story is to show just how horrible a fate this is… but we already know that, because we have been watching Egwene, and because of the revelation of what happened to the Blue Sitter who is on the other side of Egwene’s cell wall.
Now, the facts of the a’dam and the damane comes from the books, and unless the show was willing to completely change or remove it from the narrative altogether, there is no way of avoiding the brutality of what it means, of the fact that it is an enslavement of the mind— of the soul, if you will—as well as the body. In a series that has a lot of violence and torture in it, the damane are still probably the darkest thing in the entirety of The Wheel of Time books, even more so because, though there are Darkfriends among every group of people, most of these horrors are being perpetuated by people who believe that they stand in the Light. It is horrific the way Eamon Valda is horrific, not in the way that Ishamael and Lanfear are horrific.
So yes, if the a’dam is going to be included in the show, its existence shouldn’t be sugarcoated or shied away from. But we have already seen Egwene’s experience; Ryma’s doesn’t bring us anything new. The revelation that the woman in the other cell was once a Blue Ajah Sitter communicates everything we need to know, and much more effectively because of the quiet, broken sadness of it all. And if Ryma had been allowed to make her sacrifice that would have been more powerful too, as we would see what a sister was willing to do to save herself and others from enslavement.
It also seems relevant to point out that Besan and Ryma are Black, and so there is the added context for the viewer of seeing the brutal murder of a Black man and the brutal enslavement of a Black woman, whose trauma is lingered on in a way that reminded me of the way historical dramas tend to linger. There is an ongoing social conversation as to when such lingering is warranted and necessary, when it is effective and when it is gratuitous, that I don’t feel qualified to speak to in a larger sense. However, The Wheel of Time isn’t actually in conversation with the history of our real world, and so this scene in particular seems gratuitous and potentially traumatizing for people of color who aren’t expecting to see (even accidentally) racially coded violence in this fantasy story.
There is of course a place for depicting real violence, rape, and other trauma in stories. Egwene’s journey in particular and how she will be affected by her experiences as a damane in the books has some interesting parallels to Rand. However, it is also very common for fantasy to use such violence in an attempt to show the audience that this story is “serious.” If not handled with extreme care, it can quickly cross into trauma porn, and unfortunately, the entirety of this season has struggled with the questions of what aspects of the source material to spend a lot of time on, what to cover quickly, and what to skip altogether.
As a result, despite doing many good things, the episodes have often felt disjointed and confusing, and have now also made a significant jump in the way it presents violence to the viewer. This entire episode almost never let up, leaping from the murder of Liandrin’s son (also a murder that served no thematic purpose, since the conversation between Lanfear and Liandrin would have been just as moving without the dragged-out murder of an elderly man) to Egwene’s ongoing torture, to the absolutely confusion of whatever was going on with Lan, Alanna, and the boys.
As mentioned above, the confrontation scene between Mat and Min was really good, but I felt like it was drowned out by everything else. I wanted to spend time in the emotions that they were both experiencing, but everything else in the show being turned up to eleven made Mat’s hurt feelings seem less important than they should have been. Mat is sad his friend was only pretending to be his friend; meanwhile Egwene is literally having her humanity stripped away. Oh and Rand’s doing… something. I think.
All in all, I’m disappointed with this episode, and deeply worried about the final two. I’m hoping the show will pull up a little bit, and that we’ll have more time for interesting developments, for Elayne and Nynaeve to sneak and plan and stage a heroic rescue, for Perrin and Aviendha to joke and hang out, and for Mat to just be on screen a lot more than he has been. And also for Siuan and Moiraine to get some time alone together and Siuan to kiss all Moiraine’s pains away, if only for a minute.
Okay, I know I’m not going to get most of that, but let a person dream. And keep Lanfear out of there.
Facts and Easter Eggs:
- Eyes Without Pity is the title of the 29th Chapter of The Eye of the World. It has nothing to do with the Seanchan, and is actually more about Perrin than Egwene. In it, Perrin, Egwene, and Elyas are pursued by a murderous army of ravens that belong to (work for?) the Dark One. If caught they will be horribly pecked to death, and Perrin contemplates mercy-killing Egwene rather than let her suffer such a fate. But they escape, and Perrin faces a crisis around the idea that he would murder his friend. This kicks off his ongoing struggle with his own capacity for violence the way Layla’s death does in the show.
- Treesinging is a talent which some Ogier posess the ability to sing to trees and plants to make them grow. They can also use tree singing to make a tree grow a beautiful, high-quality wooden craft item without harming the tree. Loial is considered to be one of the most talented tree singers to be born in a very long time.
- In the books, Barthanes is one of Moiraine’s cousins, and a rival of King Galldrian. I like that they gave Moiraine a nephew, and that they made Galldrian a Queen. I agree with Moiraine, I think he’ll make a great king. If he doesn’t get murdered. People get murdered a lot in The Wheel of Time, especially if they’re connected to Rand or Moiraine.
- In Rand’s dream, Lanfear calls Ishamael “Ishy,” which is one of fandom’s nicknames for him.
- Favorite Quote: “We’re not better off without you, Rand, I promise you that.” “We’re not better off without you either, Mat.”
- Runner Up: “There are many paths to walk through the night.”
Sylas K Barrett has one good takeaway from this episode, which is Mat and Rand reminding each other that they belong with their friends. If season 3 happens, I’m hoping that discovery will shape how the Two Rivers folks (and the new additions to their group) handle their lives and their separate journeys.
