Wheel of Time Episodes 1-3: Not Game of Thrones, But That’s Fine

Game of Thrones was a pop culture anomaly that, much like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, every other studio is attempting to recreate the success of. Much like how other interconnected universes from DC, Universal and Sony have not quite come together in the same way that Marvel has, the arms race to find a high fantasy series with political intrigue to adapt to screen to tap into the success of Game of Thrones has not achieved the success that the original has. Sure, MTV attempted to adapt The Shannara Chronicles and Starz adapted Outlander but no show besides Game of Thrones has permeated into the general pop culture in the same almost universal way.

That said, Wheel of Time is not Game of Thrones. It probably will not have the same profound cultural impact of the show that, debatably, led to the existence of this massive budget series adaptation, and that’s perfectly fine. In fact, the original series of books that started in 1984 is closer in tone and structure to Lord of the Rings than it is to Game of Thrones. It is an adventure fantasy story with a quest at its core. It was never going to be Game of Thrones because that is not the style of story that Robert Jordan’s books set out to tell. Had the show set out to become a vastly different story from the source material, it would cease to be the story that was a New York Times bestseller multiple times over.

The pilot batch of episodes does have its issues. It is high enough fantasy that it is unlikely to convert people who do not already have a love for the genre. If someone loves fantasy as a genre, this show will scratch that specific itch with a vast, expansive world filled with monsters and magic. The visuals are both beautiful and impressive with a mixture of practical and computer-generated effects that merge seamlessly. On this technical level, it is enough to keep audiences interested through just how the show looks and feels while the semantics of why anyone should care about anyone or anything in this world are ironed out.

There is an old television adage that a viewer should never judge a show by its pilot. There are plenty of classic shows that have had a pilot that ranged from “fine” to “unwatchable” that went on to become pop culture mainstays. Famously Seinfeld had a pilot that looked nothing like the show as audiences came to know it and both 30 Rock and Star Trek shot two pilots after the first one was rejected by the network. It is a cultural touchstone and a kind of relic of network television that feels like it should be discarded as streaming shows tend to get a “straight-to-series” order, meaning that the show gets picked up and immediately the entire run of the season goes into production at once. This changes the writing and production processes into one where everything can be worked on at one time and (ideally) the creatives behind the show do not necessarily need to care about ratings going forward.

That said, the first episode feels like it was made without knowing that the rest of the show was going to happen. Regardless of how one feels about the book, it feels more like a sizzle reel than a cohesive episode. It feels like a marketing tool to keep viewers hooked in, and it does that pretty well, but at the same time leaves the audience questioning what the actual point of what they watched was. In that way it is similar to the pilot of WandaVision where, had it not been for some other outside factor beyond the show, there would be a massive drop-off of viewership. For WandaVision it was brand loyalty, for Wheel of Time it is the sparse offerings within the genre where one will settle for watching this. Fortunately, the second and third episodes do begin to get into deeper character development and build in the lore of the world to keep the audience hooked.

The show is worth a watch for anyone who likes fantasy in any capacity because it does create this world in an interesting way that is worth watching. If someone is not a fan of high fantasy, maybe this show is not for them because the character moments so far are not enough to look past the genre.

Rating: 7/10