Prime Video has a quick S1 recap and a sneak peek of Season 2 of Wheel of Time at New York Comic Con.
New York Comic Con is happening this weekend and the folks at Prime Video took the opportunity to reveal the shortest sneak peek teasers for the second season of its epic fantasy series Wheel of Time, based on the novels by Robert Jordan. The new season will not premiere until sometime next year, but the streaming platform is so confident in the series that it has already been extended for a third.
(Spoilers for S1 below.)
As I’ve written before, the series revolves around Moiraine (Rosamund Pike), a member of a powerful, all-women’s organization called the Aes Sedai. Magic, known as the One Power, is divided into male (said) and feminine (Saidar) flavours. The latter is the province of the Aes Sedai. Long ago, a great evil called the Dark One caused the… said tainted so that most men who show they can channel that magic go crazy. It is the task of the Aes Sedai to track down such men and strip them of their powers. There is also an ancient prophecy about the Dragon Resurrected: the reincarnation of a person who will save or destroy humanity.
As in the book, Pike’s Moiraine befriended a group of five young people – Egwene (Madeleine Madden), Nynaeve (Zoë Robins), Rand (Josha Stradowski), Mat (Barney Harris in S1) and Perrin (Marcus Rutherford) – whose small village has been attacked by monsters called Trolloks. The two women (Egwene and Nynaeve) showed great promise as future members of the Aes Sedai. But Moiraine also suspected that one of the young people (especially the men) might be the Dragon Reborn. Joined on this quest by her guard and companion, al’Lan Mandragoran (Daniel Henney), Moraine had to avoid, among other things, the Children of the Light, also known as Whitecloaks, during her travels.
Ars Senior Technology Editor Lee Hutchinson and Senior Technology Reporter Andrew Cunningham are mega fans of the book series and devoted themselves to summarizing each S1 episode in great detail, as well as giving candid reviews of how well the series handled adapting the source material. . Their overall verdict after the S1 finale: Despite some huge differences from the books, the series was mostly entertaining, although they would have liked the show to have spent more time on the story to allow the main characters to develop more fully. And they hated Mat (who will be played by Donal Finn in S2), even though the book version is a fan favorite. Still, as Andrew noted, “If my biggest complaint about your show is that there’s no… enough I don’t think that’s a bad place to get out of your first season.”
A lot has happened in S1, way too much to summarize here. But the big news (for those unfamiliar with the books) is that Rand was identified as the Dragon Resurrected and went into hiding to avoid his fate and/or harm his friends, but not before he might accidentally kill the Dark One. released. We learned in the finale that an armada of ships is headed ominously their way. Moraine was captured by the Dark One and either silenced or shielded to prevent her from channeling, leaving her in a tight spot. And Perrin helped excavate the flaming Horn of Valere, which plays a major role in the second book in the series.
The NYCC teaser loops through a series of lightning-fast moments from S1, and the new footage kicks off at around :23 seconds, with a desperate voiceover from Moraine. “We haven’t defeated the Dark One,” she says as images of our protagonists in danger flash past. “We have released his strongest lieutenant. Maybe he’ll wake the Forsaken. You have no idea of the power they wield.’ In the Books, the Forsaken were channelers who allied themselves with Shadow in the War of Power and used their powers for evil. They were subsequently locked up with the Dark One, and the prospect of their return doesn’t bode well for our beleaguered protagonists.
