2x08 What Was Meant to Be

I suspect non-book readers will mark this a couple of points higher. Pretty much the only things it got right was Egwene freeing herself (important that she did) and Mat blowing the horn. The latter partially resolves an absolutely unnecessary travesty earlier in the season, with Uno. Still a ridiculously dumb decision. There are some good alternative routes that leave the same outcomes (Mat stabbing Rand, in this case causing the incurable wound) but most of it just fails from a book-reader's perspective. You might think that Perrin killing Bornhald is a fascinating plot point but the whole point of Bornhald's death in the book was that Perrin wasn't the one to kill him and Dain's vendetta is for nothing.

As for Moiraine and Lan's story this season. This is where I put on my filmmaking hat to understand why they bothered with what they did with them because obviously none of that happens in the book. However, for a television adaptation, they need to teach the audience about stilling and the warder bond and they don't have a lot space to do it before they actually should become plot points.

What confuses me is I swear I heard rumours this season was supposed to be Book 2 and 3, but it's basically Book 2 with a few accelerated character introductions. If there are only 6 more seasons, they've got to cover 12 more books... (admittedly one can be done in about 2 episodes probably since barely anything happens in it, but still).

A great season finale with an epic battle and lots of magic from all the best chanellers ;) It is good that all the Two Rivers friends are reunited. Lan and Moiraine renew their bond as well. There is a lot of plotting among the Forsaken too, as Lanfear seems to be rather passive in this episode (apart from throwing Moiraine and Lan out of the Ways into the middle of the sea and contacting the antiquities dealer, she doesn't seem to be doing anything substantial here), but Ishamael decides to have Rand gentled and uses Sureth's army to have the shield on him. The ships are finally brought down by Moiraine, what allows Rand to attack Ishamael and kill him with his heron-hilted sword. I hope the baddie is gone for good but you can never know with these Forsaken especially if you haven't read the books. At the end of the episode, another Forsaken appears and it looks like they do bicker among themeselves. Maybe our heroes would take them down one by one.

• Rand goes to rescue Egwene and uses his powers to defeat Turak's entire court, then proceeds to the Tower where the confrontation with Ishamael takes place;
• Perrin's wolf is killed by one of the Whitecloaks who attacked Falme and he goes into a rage and a killing spree;
• Mat is offered the cursed dagger but he overcomes the temptation and instead of touching the dagger, he uses it to construct some kind of a spear (I was wondering how the dagger didn't fall off since the red binding material didn't seem very strong but Mat was able to fight with it without the dagger ever falling off the pole) and it is him who gets to blow the Horn of Valere and summon the heroes, what makes him believe in himself and understand that he is not destined for the darkness;
• Elayne and Nynaeve's role was the smallest in the episode, they only tried to look for Egwene and rescue her but Elayne got hit by an arrow and Nynaeve couldn't find it in herself to use her skills; only later Elayne does something significant as she heals Rand from the dagger wound Mat caused him, trying to kill Ishamael;
• Egwene rebels against her handler again and is about to have her hands cut off (I wonder why Renna haven't cut her tongue before since from what she said earlier the first punishment for disobedience in battle was for damane to have her tongue cut off, and then her hands, Renna went straight for the hands?) when the blast kills all the sul'dam and damane on the Tower. She puts an a'dam she found lying about and tortures Renna for all she had done to her before. Egwene finally kills Renna, letting her suffocate as Renna threatened to do to Egwene before. It is good that Egwene freed herself from being a damane, but somehow sad that she resorted to killing her handler, proving that she can be cruel too, just like her tormentor. And Renna did release her after all. Nynaeve was also capable of torturing the captured sul'dam when she and Elayne wanted to get information about Egwene's whereabouts. The same with Moiraine, when she speaks to Lan about being ready to kill thousands of innocent people to protect Rand. So it looks like our heroes believe that the end justifies the means?

The episode was visually stunning, especially the last scene with the figure of the dragon magicked by Moiraine, that appears all over the Tower where Rand is with his friends.