fermionsnotbosons

Good for her, well done! Not as pretty of a tattoo as a well-drawn organic molecule, IMO, but publishing is hard and worthy of celebration when you succeed.

I have an Astell & Kern SR25 MKII DAP (digital audio player) and I use it quite frequently. The sound quality far surpasses what my phone can produce when connected to any of my speakers or headphones.

It plays FLAC files and any other audio file type you can think of. And it acts as an offline music library when needed (64 GB of memory plus a 1TB microSD).

The better the headphones/speakers I use, the more it outshines anything coming out of my other electronic devices. I use it almost every day.

Miserable Old Bigots?

I was thrilled with it too! The threads really came together in a satisfying way. And it was nice to get a solid (but not too complete) win for our heroes. Rafe knew just what we needed to feel satiated (he wrote this episode with another person, whose name eludes me).

For me, every episode has been better than the one before it this season, and only 1 or 2 episodes from season 1 are actually on par with the average for season 2. The new character introductions have been on point, especially Aviendha today, and the Forsaken are WAY more intriguing and scary in the show than they were in the books.

The problems I have involve too little screen time for Mat (I want book 3 Mat ASAP), and not enough swordplay for Rand and Lan. But other than that, I am loving the show.

Yeah, fades are more easily killed by everyone in book 6 onward, I think. Maybe it's related to the introduction of the gholam.

I feel the opposite, but not because Lan isn't an amazing badass. It's because fades are hardcore, and wasn't it 3 fades he fought (he chopped one's head off while two more emerged from the shadows, I think) instead of just 2? I think the fades were just about right power-wise or maybe even nerfed a bit, to be honest. Lan could take 1, would struggle with 2, but 3? He did a pretty good job killing 2 of 3, tbh.

When they played this live last year it was incredible. It's a real crowd energizer.

If a 'Wheel of Time diehard' includes someone in the middle of their 6th reread, then I guess I contradict your assumption. I thoroughly enjoyed the 1st season, even with its minor flaws, and predict the 2nd season will be even better. I generally enjoyed the plot deviations and saw them as improvements.

If anything, a WoT fan that is honest with themselves should a) be able to overlook minor flaws, since the books have plenty, especially book 1 and b) realize that plot deviations are a must because an at most 8 season series cannot follow all of Jordan's arcs and details faithfully - combine, rearrange, and cut is absolutely required.

To me, the heart of the story is there, the characters are well-acted, and the music is great. Sets and writing were good in season 1 with some room for improvement, IMO.

I am actually pleased that you think the world-building "borrowed bits and pieces of different Earth cultures and threw them in a blender." That's completely intentional and follows from the metaphysics and history (e.g., the Age of Legends and subsequent breaking of the world) in the books. It might not be everyone's cup of tea though, sure.

Finally, with a small sample size of friends and family I am having a much easier time getting them into WoT than I did GoT (the last fantasy show I really got into). Reasons (I am paraphrasing their words) include:

More accessible color pallette and atmosphere

Less gratuitous violence (especially towards women)

More magic and "fantasy" feel

Refreshingly not a standard medieval setting

Being able to share it with more people in my circle has obviously enhanced my enjoyment. They are all super pumped after seeing the season 2 trailer.

In addition to the great suggestions others have already provided, check out Emma Goldman's writings if you haven't already. They might appeal to you and she has some interesting takes.

Here's a good starting point: http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/goldman/GoldmanCW.html

Question: who is the little girl holding 'the Dark One's' hand at the darkfriend social?

I have no idea and am wondering if anyone else does. Unraveling the Pattern points the girl out in his trailer breakdown on his youtube channel. It's really hard to see in the original trailer without brightening the shot a bit.

Oh yeah, haha, that shot of Selene against his chest gave me chills! I look forward to seeing how they handle their time together on screen. It would be interesting if the show alters the relationship dynamic a bit to add some more reciprocation (from Rand) and overall nuance to it. In the books the dramatic potential felt very underutilized, and just kind of 'haha, look at this naive farmboy not knowing how to handle a woman that knows what she wants' - which to me just seems so cliche and uninteresting.