#wot analysis

[onaperduamedee]

In my delusion that every major character in WoT should have an assigned Forsaken as a nemesis, Balthamel/Aran'gar should have been Siuan's.

First, Balthamel was a historian, Aran'gar an infiltrated agent while Siuan is a veritable encyclopedia of White Tower knowledge and a former spy master.

Second, we see Aran'gar most in Salidar where she would provide a great counterpart to Siuan as an agent of disruption in the rebel Aes Sedai and as a negative influence on Egwene, Siuan's student.

Third, her new incarnation is meant as a punishment from the Dark One, but Aran'gar found joy in her new identity and body, which is an interesting mirror to Siuan's struggling post stilling, with her appearance as much as her sense of self.

I can imagine Siuan desperately trying to find who is responsible for the murders in Salidar while battling an invisible influence on Egwene, unable to spot Halima as a threat bc she most likely uses low-level compulsion à la Rahvin in Andor.

[made-in-manetheren]

Guys

Guys.

Loial surviving is genuinely not a pipe dream. Look at this.

So we knew already that his humming was Treesinging. The tune continues, with the same echoey resonance we heard when he did it in Falme, after he stops singing and roars before swinging at the floor.

Now, it's not clear if this is something he does to gather his strength or even simply honor the Two Rivers or more. But Treesinging is a power that bends earth and stone and trees to ogiers' will, and it's how Waygates operate, and the Ways are alive--grown, not built. We don't know a lot about how Treesinging can affect the Ways beyond activating and locking Waygates, but not much else can affect the Ways at all.

Then he falls, and the camera angle does not move as it shows that. In the lightning flashes, we get 3 consecutive looks at what Loial is falling toward.

I have maxed the brightness on my screenshots but made no other edits.

Flash #1: you can see Loial bottom-center-ish (feet pointing at the bottom of the screen). Way down below, directly below, there is another pathway.

Flash #2: this is where the Treesinging becomes interesting to me. Look at the curved path right below him.

It's moved.

And Flash #3: again, it's more dramatically curved, right below Loial.

I've flipped through these 3 photos several times to mark the movement (and prove to myself that I wasn't imagining it). Maybe I'm off-base here or maybe the Ways just move like ripples and this changes nothing. But.

I can't stop thinking that it looks like he called another path of the Ways to him. That it's rising to catch him.

🧐

What if?

[rationalnerd62]

Wheel of Time Screentime, s1e6

In this first season of the Wheel of Time, "The Flame of Tar Valon" is quite an outlier. Except for the 5m10s cold open, the entirety of this episode 6 is told from Moiraine's PoV. After seeing her distant and secretive for more than half of the season, it was refreshing to discover the humanity of her character.

It is thus not a surprise to get more than 50m of screentime for Moiraine, as she was, well, everywhere. Our Amyrlin Seat, Siuan Sanche, comes 2nd with about 31m of screentime. The characters that follow, Maigan and Leane, were heavily helped by their background role in the two Hall scenes, which lasted 11m13s and 5m03s respectively.

All of our EF folks got between 8min and a bit more than 13min, which may seem small in comparison to Moiraine or Siuan screentime, but is not far from what they all had in episode 4 (from 6m30s to almost 14m per character) or episode 5 (from almost 7m to a bit more than 14m per character).

The gender balance in this episode is, well, vastly different from previous ones. Due to the focus on Moiraine and, to a lesser extent, on Siuan, and the number of women-only scenes, women obtained about 1h47m more screentime than men. No wonder it made me gayer. Side note: during the first five episodes of The Wheel of Time, men had a total of 8h20m of screentime, compared to 5h34m for women. With episode 6, the difference of screentime decreases from 2h46m to 0h59m.

I would usually stop a screentime breakdown on that note, but since I'm a queer and this episode was literally a childhood dream coming true, I will allow myself a deviation in a (huge) follow-up part, which I will call:

The Case for a Siuraine Endgame.

[Some minor book spoilers ahead]

In the book series, Moiraine and Siuan canonically have an intimate relationship during their time at the White Tower. If you have never read New Spring, or if that relationship went completely above your head (which is fine, honestly), you can either (re)read that prequel (it's a very short read) or take a look at this thread. Put on some gay googles if needed, but New Spring felt like the gay cousin in a more traditional Fantasy book family.

What isn't in the books, though, is whether that relationship continued after New Spring. While Moiraine and Siuan are still very close to each other after being raised to Aes Sedai, one ended up running away from the Tower (for politics) while the other got stuck in it (also for politics, kinda). They then only talked once in the main book series, in a few early chapters of The Great Hunt. Both of them have a main male love interest by the end of The Wheel of Time. The quality/development of those relationships is another story in itself.

As a result, making Moiraine and Siuan explicitly and canonically in a long-term romantic relationship is a decision made by the show. Did they take from the books? Yes. Did they have to do any of that? Not unless they wanted to. Sure, it would have been nice in 2021 for them to acknowledge that such an intimate relationship existed between Moiraine and Siuan at some point in their past, but they could have stopped at that acknowledgment, making it queer enough to check a bullet point in some diversity list. Honestly, as far as I'm concerned, this is what most movies and TV shows still tend to do: have a character canonically LGBTQ+, and then too often it's either never mentioned again, or it becomes their whole personality trait, or their partner is mostly irrelevant to the story.

So far, the show is doing more than that, and this is not even just about episode 6. Despite Siuan Sanche only being present for one episode, her introduction and her relationship with Moiraine were built up during the three episodes that came before.

Ep3 had this very short but very sweet moment of Moiraine whispering her lover's name while being sick and unconscious from the Trolloc poison. In my breakdown for this episode, I called it the "unconscious but gay" moment.

Ep4 gave us Lan asking Stepin for news of the White Tower and of the Amyrlin Seat ("Still seated. Not any fonder of Moiraine, though. I heard her threaten to fetch you two home personally."). With Lan being often careful about his words, asking about the Amyrlin Seat is not innocent: he knows of her relationship with Moiraine and the plans they have made together regarding the Dragon Reborn.

While the discussion between Alanna and Moiraine in ep5 started about the Warder bond, it quickly switched to the Amyrlin Seat. This was the first time non-readers heard her full name, Siuan Sanche. Only those watching with subtitles could have made the connection with the name whispered by Moiraine in ep3. This episode deepened the known tensions between Moiraine and Siuan, with Alanna even commenting on Moiraine taking the Seat from her.

Then ep6's cold open showed us a young Siuan Sanche and her moving relationship with her dad, until their home gets burned down due to Tear's hate of channelers. It is then hard to see young Siuan, who went to the White Tower after losing pretty much everything, as the powerful enemy Alanna mentioned in ep5. In fact, if the Amyrlin Seat had been an opponent similar to Liandrin, I doubt we would have taken the time to learn about her childhood.

It is quite the whiplash when the Flame of Tar Valon finally turns her attention to Moiraine in the Hall. The 2m20s that followed were freaking tense. Moiraine fails to find adequate answers for the Amyrlin, who insults her by mentioning her noble blood. As Siuan's father told her in the cold open, "if any of them bastards tries to shame you, you show them who you are", and the Amyrlin did not take lightly Moiraine's refusal.

Of course, this was just for show. Book readers knew they were at least friends, and non-book readers may have guessed from the importance of that cold open. But still. Later in that episode, after a fun minute of Lan "You masked your bond" Mandragoran and Moiraine "Goodnight Lan" Damodred, Lan departs on a "Give her my love", to which Moiraine reacts with one of the cutest expressions ever.

It takes another minute for Moiraine to open that portal to meet Siuan, and we then get some delicious 6m7s of continuous screentime with only the two of them.

In the context of queer relationships in mainstream medias, 6m7s in continuous is a fuck ton of time, especially for such intimate scene. Considering this was a 57m episode (taking out the recap and credits), this means more than 10% of ep6 was given to develop Moiraine and Siuan’s private relationship. We got to see two middle-aged and powerful women in an interracial relationship, one of which is the lead of the show (so far), who have loved each others for probably around 25 years, despite the 20 years Moiraine has spent on the road. After two years without seeing the one they consider their partner and equal, their reunion was sexy but not sexualized (take that, male gaze!), and both finally got to talk about the secrets, doubts and dreams that have been nagging at their minds. It made those characters beautifully human and vulnerable, a welcomed contrast from what has been shown of them so far.

But the show doesn’t even stop there. When Moiraine brings Egwene and Nynaeve to meet the Amyrlin Seat (”Siuan Sanche waits for only one woman. And it’s not you.”), the focus of those 3m35s is on the Two Rivers girls meeting the most powerful Aes Sedai in the world. But when Siuan talks about deserving something different (”stay home, love the people you love, grow old with them”), it’s a direct reflection of her life with Moiraine and the sacrifices they both had to make because of the pattern. That star-crossed lovers theme comes back and forth during most of the scenes Moiraine and Siuan share.

The last moment they have together is the 5m3s long exile scene. The oath in itself takes about 2m of that time, and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen wedding vows shorter than that for queer relationships in mainstream media. And yes, I’m talking about wedding vows: there was a time where women would vow to love, honor and obey their husbands in Christian wedding ceremonies. While the original vows are archaic and misogynistic, the parallel is at least funny if not very interesting, considering Moiraine is directly swearing to Siuan Sanche (”daughter of the river, clever as a pike, strong as the tides”). Moreover, while “By the Light and my hope of salvation and rebirth” is commonly used in the books to swear the Three Oaths (and the rebirth is a direct callback to Siuan’s earlier “In this life or the next”), I don’t recall “or may the Creator’s face turn from me forever and darkness consume my soul” being used in the books except for when Siuan swore to Gareth Bryne in TFoH. Also quite interesting considering Siuan and Gareth later relationship in the books.

Which brings me to my next point: how Siuan was developed in this episode 6 compared to other recurring characters in the show:

In term of screentime, Siuan is about 5min behind Liandrin, who appeared in 5 episodes this season (1, 3, 4, 5, 6). She’s above Alanna and Logain, who appeared in 4 episodes, and above Stepin, who appeared in 3. She has more than twice the screentime than Thom, a significant character in the books that met Moiraine in tEoTW but still hasn’t seen her in the show. Meanwhile, Siuan had a stunning 25m48s of shared screentime with Moiraine in a single episode. This is half of Moiraine’s screentime in ep6, and 45% of the episode.

That ranking would probably change if considering speaking time. @far-dareis-me has been doing some Wheel of (Speaking) Time analysis, and I am looking forward to see how Siuan’s speaking time would compare to Liandrin’s or Thom’s for example.

So, what does this tell us overall?

Siuan is an important character in the books, and will also be one in the show, and not just for her relationship to Moiraine. While her introduction in the cold-open does serve her relationship with Moiraine (see Moiraine quoting Siuan’s father during her oath), it tells a lot about her own poorer background (in contrast with Moiraine’s noble one). She also has an active part in the search for the Dragon, and her discussion with Egwene and Nynaeve tells us we may see them interacting with the Amyrlin again as they move to the Tower to be trained.

The show spent a significant amount of time on building and developing Moiraine and Siuan’s relationship, which they did not have to do to follow the books storyline. We know they cut a Loial scene in this episode, and that the ending had to be changed because of the deal with Mat. They could have reduced Moiraine and Siuan’s time to develop more other characters. Moiraine did not need to be there when Siuan was talking to Egwene and Nynaeve. That exile scene could have been shorter (and those vows didn’t need to be that long). Those 2m25s of Moiraine prepping herself to see her wife girlfriend could have been shorter. But the fact that the show kept all those moments and gave this queer storyline the time it deserved means something, especially in comparison with what other mainstream shows tend to do.

The storyline of Thom, who [book spoilers] is Moiraine’s male love-interest in the books, has been modified enough that he did not meet Moiraine when he was supposed to. They may meet later on, sure. But how could this meeting even compared to the 25+ years of love the show gave us for Siuan and Moiraine?

Maybe the show is just cruel. After all, they’re giving some mostly sweet development to another couple we know is doomed. But, in my opinion, with all the pieces they put on their board, it would be very strange (and disappointing) to devote so much time on Moiraine and Siuan’s relationship if they have no intent to play the star-crossed lovers card as much as they can.

Let’s just hope that this trope ends up as beautifully as Aragorn and Arwen’s relationship did (or Fitzsimmons for the Agents of Shield veterans), and not as a queer remake of Romeo and Juliet.

As always, here’s a link to the data. Sorry for the long rant, but it needed to come out.

[far-dareis-me]

Wheel of (Speaking) Time: 1x01-03

Inspired by @rationalnerd62's excellent wot screentime posts, I spent my weekend tracking speaking times across the Wheel of Time episodes released so far (because numbers are fun, and I too am a nerd). I'm working on compiling data into pretty charts, but today I'll start with the first 3 episodes, since they were released together.

First, a couple notes on how this data was taken:

Short pauses (less than 3s) are included in speaking time only if the focus remains on the speaker during the pause. Otherwise the timer is paused. This is just to give me a standard for when to stop recording time.

Verbalizations (grunts, screams, etc) are included only if they are explicitly called out in the subtitles, and there is a clear focus on a single speaker. So [screaming] while focused on Nynaeve shouting down a trolloc is counted, but [grunting] while a group of characters fight is not. Time starts when the subtitle appears and stops when it disappears. Note: typically these don't add up to more than ~5sec of screen time per episode, but when they do it's usually because the character is not speaking and their verbal reactions are important (ie, Shaiel's fight in the Blood Snow).

Only named characters with >5s speaking time (total) are included, for the sake of my sanity and readability of the graphs. There are several two rivers characters with only a line or two who don't make this cut.

Obviously this misses a lot of non-verbal characterization, especially for characters like Perrin or Lan, who say a lot without having to say a word. But taken in conjunction with screentime, I think it paints a pretty interesting picture. Pretty charts below the cut!

WoT Screentime: e1 | e2 | e3 | e1-3 | e4 | e5 | e6 | e7 | e8 WoT Speaking Time: e1-3 | e4 | e5 | e6 | e7 | e8

(note: x-axis time is listed in minutes:seconds)

Episode 1: Leavetaking

Episode 1 introduced us to quite a few Emond's Fielders, and aside from Moiraine's voiceover, the primary speaker is Rand. The rest of the Emond's Field 5 trail behind, and a selection of Two Rivers folk round out the cast. Some interesting tidbits:

Lan is by far the quietest of the main cast, challenged only by Perrin. Both have only slightly less screentime than Moiraine and Mat, so they really just don't talk much.

Though Egwene had more screentime, Rand has nearly 30% more speaking time.

Over a third of Moiraine's speaking time is a voice-over, either during the episode's intro or outro.

Episode 2: Shadow's Waiting

Episode 2 narrowed the focus to the main cast, with only a few side characters introduced. The cast largely stays together this episode, with only a couple asides, but Egwene and Mat do the most talking.

Despite the mains (minus Nynaeve) all having very similar screentime, Moiraine dominates this episode's speaking time. This is due largely to her explaining so much to the rest of the group (especially Egwene) and talking to the Whitecloacks.

Perrin, again, is very quiet this episode. Lan is too, until Moiraine passes out, at which point he takes on her exposition duties.

Rewatching this episode with an eye for speaking time really drove home how aware Mat is of everyone around him. Most of his speaking time he is talking not for his own benefit, but because people just really need someone to say something. It broke my heart a little, especially knowing how quiet he gets later this season.

Episode 3: A Place of Safety

Episode 3 gave us several new characters, but the focus was undeniably on the events in Breen's Spring.

Dana took top billing, giving us an introduction to Darkfriends and the Forsaken. Thom nabbed second, despite his significantly lower screentime

Mat and Rand's development was definitley the focus of this episode- in addition to their speaking time being substantially higher than the other groups, they also had the most screentime.

Nynaeve does an impresive job trying to make up for her absence from the previous episode (by flirting with I mean taunting Lan)

Episode 1-3 Overview

Overall, the top 10 speakers in these first few eps make a lot of sense- 7 mains, and the 3 biggest support characters. There is only one difference in this list compared to screentime; Thom instead of Marin.

The undisputed biggest jabbermouth is of course Moiraine. This does make sense as she is the lead, and the source of most of our verbal exposition. But being passed out for nearly the full runtime of episode 3 didn't even make a dent in the lead she gained in the previous two.

Mat, Rand and Egwene all came out of the first bloc with very similar speaking times, all within 1.5min or so of each other. These three are all pretty close in screentime as well. Lagging just behind are the rest of our main cast. Nynaeve, was absent for almost all of episode 2, setting her back a bit. Lan and Perrin though are both pretty quiet characters, and it definitely shows in their speaking time. Rounding out the top 10 are Dana, Thom, and Tam, 3 key characters who gave us a lot of info in their limited time.

I think once the season is over, it'll be interesting to take a look at what percent of their screentime each character spends actually speaking. Based on just this preliminary data, I'm guessing it will align pretty closely with how quiet a character is described to be in the books.

Gender Balance

Finally, I took a look at the gender split on speaking time. And despite Moiriane's prominent role, it's really quite remarkably even. Over the 3 episodes, 49% of speaking time is from women vs 51% from men.

Honestly this close of a balance in speaking time is astounding for any show, but especially in fantasy. And given that the screentime for these episodes sits around 40% women to 60% men, I think it's safe to say we can officially debunk the claims that WoT favors women or doesn't give enough time to its men (I'm shocked. Utterly shocked).

Anyway, I hope some folks will find this interesting, and thanks again to rationalnerd62 for the inspiration and compiling screentime data!

My data is posted here, and I will be adding times for the remaining episodes as I compile them over the course of the week.

[rationalnerd62]

Of Wokeness And Gender Balance

Or what we can learn from screentime and speaking time about the balance between men and women in the first season of the Wheel of Time.

New article on thegreatblight.com! In which I’m using screentime and speaking time data to talk about the gender balance in the first season of the Wheel of Time.

A lot of fun graphs (in my opinion, but I always think graphs are fun), some comparisons with other Fantasy franchises like LotR and GoT, and the constant reminder that Moiraine really carried that show.

Hope you will find this interesting!

[rationalnerd62]

Wheel of Time Screentime, s1e7

A shorter post for the penultimate episode of our first season. Screentime for this one was mostly easy to track, as we had a lot of group scenes. The exception was for the Dragon Reborn reveal toward the end, where shots were vastly changing every one or two seconds.

Nynaeve takes the lead for the first time this season. Not much of a surprise: she benefits from several EF4 scenes and from her time with Lan. Rand and Egwene follow, both benefiting for their scenes in common. Rand is slightly ahead, mostly due to his time with Min and the Dragon Reborn reveal.

Moiraine is last of our main cast (minus Mat, who only appears for a few seconds in a flashback), but that was expected after ep6.

Not much to say about the gender balance in this episode. Men have a bit more screentime than women, but this is the smallest difference between them since the first episode of the show.

Here’s a link to the data. Yes, this is a new sheet, and yes I got a tiny bit self-conscious when seeing how pretty the WoT Speaking time sheet looked like. I know maths, but I got zero graphic skills, my bad ahah. Please go check out far-dareis-me’s speaking time analysis, though, looking at both speaking time and screentime really gives a fuller picture of an episode.

I’m traveling tomorrow back to France, so it’s unsure when I will have the time to do this work for the finale episode of this season. If I disappear for a few days, no worries, the data will come at some point.

Edit: a reblog made me realize I had messed up Min’s voice only time. Correcting that changed her rank, sadly. She only got about 5min, but her character is so fascinating it definitely felt longer!

[far-dareis-me]

Wheel of (Speaking) Time: 1x06

I love this episode so much. I mean I loved all the previous episodes as well but this one... I mean it's like it was made expressly to send me into fits.

As always, this episode's data is here, and please please go check out RationalNerd's screentime analysis for this episode because (1) it is excellent and (2) it makes a fantastic case for siuraine endgame that I want to shout at the heavens about.

WoT Screentime: e1 | e2 | e3 | e1-3 | e4 | e5 | e6 | e7 | e8 WoT Speaking Time: e1-3 | e4 | e5 | e6 | e7 | e8

Charts and a lot of gay rambling below the cut!

Episode 6: The Flame of Tar Valon

Episode 6 is so gay. Y'all I know I have been screaming about this since it dropped but it was just. SO. GAY. I'm not over it. I'm never gonna be over it.

Siuan was a fricken powerhouse this episode in so many ways, speaking time most definitely among them. Moiraine may have her beat on screentime, but she spent quite a lot of her time listening to Siuan talk (and honestly, relatable). The Amyrlin came in at a whopping total time of 9:26, far surpassing the previous record and very nearly breaking the ten minute mark. (And good! Its what she deserves!!)

Overall, Siuan and Moiraine carried this episode, no one else got even close to their speaking time or screentime. Most of their scenes were together, most of them were extremely gay, and most of my heart exploded rewatching them.

Liandrin did try, bless her heart, but her repressed little self simply cannot compete with the pure, unadulterated power of gay love. RIP.

Honorable mention goes to Berden Sanche for his 1.5 minutes of speaking time that had me bawling like a baby. There are many amazing dads in this series but he gets my best dad award. I'm gonna cry just thinking about it.

The rest of the mains took a back seat this episode, but Egwene at least still had a fair amount to say as she was introduced to the White Tower. And I do think it makes sense to give her more focus than the rest in the most White Tower focused episode. Rand had slightly less speaking time, poor Perrin was knocked out almost the whole episode, and Mat was dealing with some shit so he stayed pretty quiet.

I counted Leane banging her staff as dialogue. I know it technically breaks my own rules, but it's her most iconic line, and I couldn't just leave it out!

Overview: episode 1-6

Siuan Sanche, daughter of the river, clever as a pike, strong as the tides, and queen of shooting up the rankings. In just one episode she took the 6th spot, rushing past both Perrin and Lan to do it. And she nearly caught Nynaeve (which would definitely cause some braid-tugging if she knew). Moiraine also more than solidified her #1 spot- she'd be safe even if she was passed out for the rest of the season, unless everyone else suddenly got extremely chatty. And Liandrin made it back on the leaderboard (she'd be so proud).

Other than those two additions, there wasn't much shifting in the ranks. All the mains had similarly short speaking times, so their relative positions stayed the same. I wonder if Perrin will talk enough to catch up to Siuan, he's lagging a good couple of minutes behind the rest of the main 7.

Everyone on the top 10 list has a decent lead over the rest of the cast, so barring any massive additions in the final episode, I'm betting all of them are here to stay.

Gender Balance

This episode was a significant departure in gender split, with women taking an incredible 81% of the speaking time (mostly due to Siuan and Moiraine, who had 60% of the total time). Still, that only shifts the season average to 53% vs 47% (the same difference as last episode, but in the opposite direction), so the balance remains overall.

A quick aside though- because Siuan and Moiraine had SIXTY PERCENT of the speaking time?! Blood and bloody ashes, these witches gay. Honestly, after seeing this, if they aren't endgame I'll eat my blasted hat. (or maybe I'll eat Amazon. you hear me Bezo? let them stay gay and in love or else)... I can't imagine Rafe&co spending so much of their limited time establishing these two and their relationship if they didn't intend to make it a key part of the rest of the series. And giving us such a beautiful queer relationship only to rip it away would be pointlessly cruel. I honestly thing Siuan and Moiraine's relationship provides an excellent vessel for some of the main themes of the series, and using them as a pillar of the story is a smart move. I'm saving a bottle in hopes of a bittersweet ending that sees them quietly retire to a fishing hut, to live out their days in peace, letting their love slowly soften the scars left by old battles....... ;-;

Aaanyway! There's only one episode left to cover before the finale, and I've already got the data prepped, so will write up and post it tomorrow morning!

[rationalnerd62]

New article on the Great Blight! A screentime and speaking time deep dive for the full first season, with all of our named characters...

https://www.thegreatblight.com/post/wheel-of-timing-analysis-an-s1-breakdown