Sword of Truth trailer

[GreenMonsta]

Yeah well that is to be expected unfortunately. But hey I think I will give the show a chance.

[Reaves]

I missed it. Was it any good? What are your opinions?

[MrPaperCamel]

Inquiring minds want to know =).

[GreenMonsta]

Ok so I missed it on Saturday but I caught it at midnight lastnight. I almost don't know what to make of it. It is so radically different from the books that its almost like a different story. Alot of the content disappointed me in the end. I don't want to be negative but I find it hard not to be. I knew that they would be required to change things to fit in the "made for TV" format but they changed a lot of things that i don't feel were needed to be changed. Again I may be skewed seeing how I just finished my re-read of "Wizards First Rule" but man. I do encourage every one to watch so we can discuss and I am not done watching myself, I find it hard to give up on this series as of yet. I mean who knows there could be some good that comes out of it seeing how it was only the first epi.

[MrPaperCamel]

I will start searching for the episodes online, but it will probably Thursday before I can attempt to watch. Sad to hear that the first episode was disappointing, hopefully things will take an okay turn. Depending on how philosophically the show is motivated may mean I need to stop earlier rather than later. It would be nice to see an interesting incarnation of the story though.

[Comfortable Madness]

I watched the premiere episode last night.(man you gotta love DVRs) On a scale from 1-10 I would give it a 5. It was neat to watch them attempt to bring the story to life. However, they changed far too much of the original story for my liking.

[Necroben]

I watched the premiere episode last night.(man you gotta love DVRs) On a scale from 1-10 I would give it a 5. It was neat to watch them attempt to bring the story to life. However, they changed far too much of the original story for my liking.

It came on in my area last night, and I must say I was disappointed.  I could have lived with some of the changes they did make or even with totally different ones.  But, the character relationships are different, the theme didn't matter so much to me, but I really liked the character interactions.  The only thing I did like were the fight scenes,  fairly well choreographed with decent cinematography was the only thing that kept me watching.  I mean I already know whats going to happen, at least in a general way, so make me care about the characters.  Changing the story around the same plot line doesn't seem to work for me, I'll give one, maybe two more episodes then will more than likely give up on it.

[GreenMonsta]

I agree with Necro. I would have cared less if they changed the whole story but the characters are the most important part. I was devastated with how they attempted to portray some of them. For the most part I didnt even read the whole series for the story but for the characters and that is what dissapoints me the most.

[bhthomas]

I just finished watching the first 2 episodes online. I thought it was alright. As a on screen adaptation of the books they are not that good but as a fantasy show it was better then I thought. I was kind of a fan of the books but they weren't  my favorites. I can see that the stuff they cut out was important to the book but to catch the average viewer none of that stuff was necessary. Ill have to say that I liked it and i look forward to watching the whole series to see where they take it.

[Loud_G]

My wife and I just watched the first episode last night and it was VERY VERY VERY different from the book.

Peter Jackson changed some things in his LotR adaptation, but the people in charge of this project are writing their own plots from scratch it seems!

I think they took all the original ideas from the book and threw them out, making it even more cliche than the original material.

**SPOILERS?**

In an attempt to garner non-fantasy fans, I think they dumbed the story down to the reluctant hero quest.
They made Richard too young, too skinny, and too immature. The man is supposed to be an experienced woodsman, with responsibility and confidence. Not a wimpy emo-kid with angst and pathetic-ness. They took an original character idea and boiled him down to a archtype of a completely different story.

Oh, and Darken Rahl.....Wow....Way to take a creepy villain and make him totally uncreepy. One, he is supposed to be blond and good looking, to belie his evil actions. They have him kill an advisor "just to show how bad he is" instead of taking the time to develop him. The actor they got for him is too bland.

Also, when they are chasing the bad guy who isn't even there.....dumb. And the firing catapults at the boundary? What??? Darken Rahl is supposed to have power over the land of the dead and is slowly toppeling the boundary.

It also seemed like the character of the witch woman was just thrown in to appease fans. She did absolutely nothing useful for the 'new' plot.

***END SPOILERS?***

I could understand some of the changes, they made sense in order to streamline the story for visual format. However, they zipped through a good third of the book IN THE FIRST EPISODE!

They could have made 2 or 3 GOOD episodes from the time period they covered in the first.

I'm going to watch some more episodes as I am curious how they are going to dig themselves out of the plotholes they created for themselves. 

[GreenMonsta]

I agree one hundred percent with what you said. Its almost like this show is based lightly on some of Goodkinds ideas but it seems it is loosing the best parts of the story. I for one only read the whole series because of the characters, if they didnt have the great character development of Richard or Kahlan I would have stopped reading at Pillars of Creation because god knows that book was awful. I will also watch a few more epi's to see what happens but I for one dont hold out much hope.

[Comfortable Madness]

Yeah I may give it another shot but I think the end of the premiere hinted at some very awful things to come. What I mean is, as many of you have mentioned, they sped through the whole first book in order to place Richard, Kahlan, and Zed on the other side of the boundary. That's a mistake in itself but one of the very last lines is something along the lines of "This is an even darker place with much evil to combat"(not an actual quote but it was something close to that). So, it appears to me that the very weak link to the original story is about to get even thinner. I see them going across the Midlands facing various  and random evils and setting them right, which would have nothing to do with the original story. I really hoped that this would be good but....yeah I don't see that happening. I questioned before why Disney would want to do this considering some of the darker aspects of the story and thus I really had my doubts about how good it would be. It's like you mentioned before Green/PlantationMonsta, that Richard never forgets Denna and the things she did and that is an integral part of Richard's character. How in the hell is Disney ever going to portray that part of Richard's character arc?

[GreenMonsta]

Its funny. That alone is probably one of the most important things that ever happens to Richard. That and may be the whole Kahlan making him put on the collar and go to the Sisters of the Light. I mean it is so integral to the character that Richard becomes that you wouldn't be able to understand his character without it. It gives him his threshold for pain and his understanding of forgiveness. It also teaches him to turn the blade white. Forgive me if I vomit because watching this show destroy a really good series makes me loose respect for Goodkind and Rami. And that's not even mentioning that it makes me wish that it never made it this far into production. I would rather people who haven't read the books to have not heard about it at all then to be introduced to it in this manner.

[Loud_G]

Just saw episode 3 last night.....

Wow....Talk about leaving the book behind. At first I thought they were skipping way to the end where Richard is caught in the cave and we meet Denna. (made even worse by the girl being dressed in red) I got really nervous.

The entire episode was superfluous and completely made up.

The map thing was fun as an idea, but very strange within the context of the book.
They keep using that necklace in the wrong way. (though the map idea was CLOSER to the method the book used than anything else, but not close enough)

I'm still not sure how they are going to defeat Darken Rahl now. The show has opened so many plot holes....

[Loud_G]

Yikes.....Episode 4 did NOT improve my oppinion of this show. I spend most of the time gritting my teeth and flinching.

Not only because of the departures from the story, but just from the bad writing in general...I feel like they got a good cast, but that the writers need to be taken off life-support...