"Wheel of Time" Episode 7 Review

by Chelsea House, GGR Chief Media Correspondent

Warning Spoilers Ahead!

Over the river and through the woods, and into The Ways we go! This episode packs A LOT into its’ meager 60 minutes, and I have a few things to say. So, let’s go ahead and jump in!

Our friends are stumbling through The Ways in hopes of quickly getting to The Eye of the World. This is of course, after a conversation about Mat and whether they can go back for him, which turns out to be a hard no. Loial mentions Manchin Shin, or “The Black Wind”, for the first time.  Due to her presence, the power cannot be used in The Ways because it will attract her. There’s also the explanation of why Loial had to join them on this journey. Ogiers know how to translate the markers and have been guides through these paths for years. (As a side note – in the books, they can also open The Ways by using the Ogier Song, so it would be really cool if we got to see that at some point). As our team goes along, Perrin, with his sharp eyes, notices that one of the markers has been damaged by what looks like claw marks. They discover the origin when a trolloc appears. Rand grabs Egwene, and Egwene uses the power to push the trolloc into the abyss below. 

True to Loial’s warning, Manchin Shin shows up with all of her dark magic, and she immediately begins to whisper to each character, forcing them to come face to face with their deepest fears. Nynaeve steps in and uses her power to create a bubble of protection while Moiraine opens the nearest gate – which is definitely NOT The Eye of the World – and they escape to Fal Dara. I’m going to pause for a moment because I wanted to give a huge nod to the cold opener. 

The cold open of this episode shows a very pregnant Aiel woman in the heat of battle. It’s quickly apparent that she is in labor and is looking for a safe place to rest while she gives birth. This scene is such a breathtaking nod to the strength of women, the resilience of a mother, and the ability to show true humanity. As a mother of two, my body hurt watching this woman slice and dice her enemies in between contractions. With. No. Epidural. Not even a meager Advil. My lady seamlessly fights only the way an Aiel can, which in the books is absolutely legendary, all while her body is trying to push out a human being. Hats freaking off. As a side note, it’s like poetic justice she’d doing this to men, because I feel like this is what every woman wishes she could do in the height of contractions. Our warrior does eventually get stabbed in the side, causing her to lose a lot of blood, and is helped by Tam, Rand’s father, and her supposed enemy. When the baby is born, she slips away, leaving Tam with a newborn in his hands, and probably a lot of questions, and possibly the audience with a lot of questions. The choreography is stunning to watch here. Magdalena Sittova does a great job not overacting, but still getting the point across. A big thumbs up from me.  

Back to The Ways and Manchin Shin – I really didn’t mind the way both were displayed. I felt like it was a quick scene for sure, but it also was a clever way of giving us a more personal look at the characters through their insecurities. Another way of character building without 100s of pages to do so. It’s also the first time our rag tag team gets to face a large dilemma together since the Two Rivers. Some interesting take aways here – 1. Moiraine is struggling with whether Mat is The Dragon or not. Her biggest struggle is that he has a darkness inside of him. 2. Egwene shows her loyalty to Moiraine when they discuss at the beginning whether they should go back for him or not. Both her and the Aes Sedai believe that Mat made his choice. Which I really don’t disagree. 3. We get the first impression that Perrin has more than just friendly feelings for Egwene, both in the way he looks at Rand and her when they cuddle, and when Machin Shin tells him he wanted Laila out of the way because he loved another woman more. I’ll get more into that later. 4. Perrin seems to also be slipping more into doggo mode. I don’t really know how else to say that? Now we get to Fal Dara. 

They enter the city and are met by what appears to be some friends of Lan. He is called “Dai Shan” and he is told “welcome home.”  Moiraine greets Lord Agelmar (Thomas Chaanhing) and his sister Lady Amalisa (Sandra Yi Sencindiver). She lets Agelmar know about the trollocs in The Ways and says he should probably block up their Waygate.  Also, there’s apparent trouble in paradise as Amalisa has been possibly requesting help from The White Tower in regards to the spread of The Blight. (Fal Dara is the last stronghold before The Blight) There’s a quick pan to the Waygate and a man walks out. He looks familiar, but who could he be? Geez, that’s a lot in just a few scenes. Agelmar welcomes the team to stay as long as the need to rest and regroup. 

 As Amalisa leads Moiraine to her chambers, she lights a torch with The Power. The Aes Sedai says she wishes to see Min, the seer, while she’s in town. Finally! Amalisa asks why they were in The Ways and Moiraine reminds Amalisa of her many years of studying at the tower, she hopes that she can still be discreet. The reason for the question? Moiraine wants The Tower to look for Matt, specifically the Red Sisters. This part I struggled to understand. I get that Matt is dark, and that if he is The Dragon, Moiraine fears he will join the Dark One instead of fighting him. What I don’t understand, is that Moiraine is not a rash person. She’s very calculated and well thought out. She has to be to be a Blue Ajah. This decision seems super impulsive, especially when she knows the Red are quick to gentle if given any excuse. I would just think that she would want to actually see him channel first? 

The gang take a walk in the city. Egwene tries to comfort a still very troubled Rand (troubled from Manchin Shin’s words), and Perrin tells Nynaeve that he thinks he saw Padan Fain. The back of the head definitely looks like the guy who walked out of the gate.  Nynaeve reminds Perrin he’s dead. Moiraine leads them into the local tavern where we get to meet Min (Kae Alexander). The Aes Sedai asks her for visions, which Min feels is really invasive since they don’t know what she is. Moiraine, proving to be the perfect FBI agent reminds her what would happen if the Aes Sedai stopped keeping her secret. Min, being not a great barmaid, drinks the drink and gives the four of them a reading. Perrin’s eyes are gold with blood running down his chin. Rand is holding a baby. The girls have a white flame and a ring of gold. Min also confirms that the visions are clear – meaning they are important to the pattern – and that they are all four linked. She also lets Moiraine know the Amyrlin Seat will be her downfall. Some take aways from this scene: 1) I absolutely loved how they showed Min’s visions. They were just so well done with the lighting, contrast, and CGI work. 2) I think Kae Alexander makes a great Min so far! She’s just the right mix of feisty and calm. 3) As a Barber, I can’t ignore the fact that I am a little unsure of which makeup artist thought that was the best hairstyle for her. Petty? Maybe. But I’m pretty sure a bobby pin would have sufficed. 

Fast forward a little and everyone is now sitting in a common room of some sort back at the castle. Moiraine explains that they leave in the morning, and after some coercion from our ever trusting Two Rivers folk, she explains that Min is a Seer and she wanted to see if she could tell who The Dragon was. She wanted to know for sure so she could save everyone else from their inevitable death should they get caught in the battle between The Dragon and The Dark One. Nynaeve stubbornly concludes that they will make their own decision which causes Moiraine to walk off with Lan.  Egwene states that she wants to do whatever she can to help protect their people. Rand and Perrin are on the fence, and Nynaeve gets called out for the fact that if Moiraine wasn’t the one asking them, she would go without hesitation because of her position as a Wisdom. 

The conversation turns a bit when Rand gets in a tiff with Egwene about how Matt has it so hard and Egwene doesn’t give him the benefit of the doubt which spirals into Perrin jumping up to defend Egwene and Nynaeve putting her foot in her mouth by telling Rand and him to stop fighting over her like she’s a prize to be won. This whole scene just felt so awkward for me. I was beginning to accept the relationship between Rand and Egwene, but this whole spoke in the wheel with Perrin I just don’t understand. First and foremost, his random marriage still has no ground or purpose, and now we’re complicating that storyline even further by saying Perrin always loved Egwene and only married Laila because Rand and her got together? I just feel like poor Perrin can’t catch a break on the series. I enjoyed the platonic relationship that was developing between him and Egwene. It was a great support that yes, you can have friends of the opposite gender that are supportive, loving, and there for you without romantic attachments. But no. Apparently, we can’t have that. We have to ramp up the drama and fill episode space with cheap storytelling. I do understand some felt that this helped explain Perrin a little more, but I feel like this just made his character more convoluted. Rand backs off and walks out of the room followed by Egwene, and Nynaeve seems super upset that she was a part of this awful High School drama. 

Moiraine and Lan have a touching conversation where she confesses that she feels like she’s taken everything from him. She states that there’s more to this life than their mission. He reassures her by saying she’s given him something to live and die for. She encourages him to say some goodbyes before they leave in the morning, and then also lets him know she likes The Wisdom. Which is shocking since The Wisdom gives her the hardest time. Lan, taking Moiraine’s advice, is followed by a stalking Nynaeve down some alleyways to a house. He enters and is embraced like a family member as they sit to eat dinner, all while Nynaeve peeks in the window, at least until he invites her in. They have a lovely family supper time and they end, as most dates do, at a bedroom door. There’s a long moment of romantic tension, until Lan – the ever romantic – finally says goodnight. He goes inside his room, begins to undress, and is interrupted by a bold Nynaeve coming through the door. She asks “Do you want me to go?” And Lan answers her with a kiss. I freaking LOVE that they sped this story up with them. My favorite romance in the book was theirs, and it took like three books to finally see it bloom. I love that they teased you for a minute –are they, or aren’t they? - and then just went for it. 

Rand is off target practicing, and not doing so great, when Egwene comes to talk to him. They make up and he tells her she has to go to The Tower to become and Aes Sedai, and he will come to be her Warder. How presh. 

Nynaeve is about to leave Lan when he wakes up. She asks why he was called “Dai Shin”, and Lan explains it is the title given to future Kings of Malkier. So we’re finally getting some backstory. He also explains that it doesn’t really matter now because Malkier was taken by the Blight a long time ago. The man who treated him like a son was the same man who smuggled him out of the palace and brought him to Fal Dara after his family was slaughtered. The continued conversation is so beautiful and organic. The two of them getting to know each other a little better and learning to understand each other. Lan asks her to stay, and she smiles. Also, the music they picked for the background of this scene could not be more perfect. 

Rand, having trouble sleeping, has a flashback of Tam feverishly rambling after he was attached by the Trolloc. Tam is talking to Kari (his wife) and saying that he found a baby on a mountain that was so hot. Much like a familiar cold opening scene? Rand heads back out to the shooting range and keeps seeing flashbacks while he is now hitting all bullseyes. He flashes back to the dark friend at the tavern who said he couldn’t break down the door, but now he’s using the one power to break it down. To when he recognized The Tower, and it turns out he was actually the one who pushed the trolloc in The Ways with The Power, and Manchin Shin is telling him that He is the Dragon Reborn. Rand goes to find Min and they have their first at length conversation. She confirms that he is in fact that baby who was born on the mountain. She also says she sees three beautiful women in his future. And she confirms that he won’t make it back from The Eye. 

Egwene goes to Nynaeve’s room where they talk about their previous nights. Then Perrin comes in and they realize that they don’t know where Rand is. The screen flashes to Rand knocking on Moiraine’s door and tells her that it’s him, Lan rushes to Nynaeve’s room and states that Moiraine has masked their bond – aka she’s left. Egwene immediately understands where Rand has gone. Then the screen flashes to Moiraine and Rand starting their journey through The Blight. 

My last and final takeaways from this episode: 1) I’m going to say it again – I love how Nynaeve and Lan’s relationship has blossomed over the series. It feels a lot more organic than the books did. It’s been so satisfying because their backstories have been shared with each other, in other words, the way the audience has gotten to know them is while they’re getting to know each other, which is awesome. 2) With Rand meeting Min – her vision of him with the three beautiful girls also includes her in the books! And Egwene is nowhere to be seen with those three women. I think introducing Min has brought back the question of what the heck are they going to do with their relationship as these other ladies meet Rand? They’re important characters in the book, so you can't just cut them out – but they’ve also been vamping up Egwene and Rand instead of letting that fire burnout. I’m just curious to see how that unfolds. 3)I’m not really sure how I feel about the Rand reveal. It just didn’t feel deserved to me? We’ve been building on the whole “Who is it??” all season long and then it feels like a cheap shot to just be like “Surprise!! It’s Rand.” In an episode where SOoo much was already packed into it, I almost feel like the timing was even off. Like maybe because of the amount of information – that bit just tips the episode from being almost too much versus feeling like the cherry on top that they were going for. 4) With the last episode coming, I do feel like this episode does set us up for something that could potentially be epic, even with the weaker points. I’m excited to see what happens. Until next time.