On the rediscovery of old pastimes

It is a good time to be a fan of fantasy. Apparently they started making a TV series based on the Sword of Truth series without telling me. Legends of the Seeker is available on Hulu up through episode 8 as of now. Now I don't make a habit of watching television shows, especially not before a series is finished. It's usually too much of a time investment for something that might turn out to be utterly disappointing. Given the fact that this is a fantasy series the only other shows I can even remember to really compare it to are the old Kevin Sorbo - Conan and Xena shows. Well these are definitely a step up. Of course it has been years since then so I would hope that production values have gone up.

The show certainly isn't quite up to Heroes production levels but it's good enough to please me. I've only ever been a modest fan of the SoT series (Terry always seemed to be borrowing a little too much from the Wheel of Time for me), so I'm sure I'm not as picky as other fans but that's not going to keep me from nitpicking a little anyway.

Spoiler alert!

So knowing that Rahl is Richards father I can't help but think that they should have cast someone older to play the ruler of D'hara. I guess that actor could be in his late 30's but he seems more mid-30's to me, a little young to have a 23 year old son. Even if I could forgive the age discrepancy the guy just doesn't seem all that menacing. He's more Snape than Voldemort if you'll excuse the cross-creation analogy. Meh, maybe he'll get scarier as we go.

The cheesy explosions are bothering me a little bit too. Seriously, I know it's only TV and there are budget concerns and whatnot but I've seen smoother FX transitions on stop-motion lego you-tube videos. Get some new fire effects too, the wizards flame wasn't bad but whatever they were using at the end of the 2nd episode for the battle at the boundary was weaksauce.

My last nitpick may be minor but exemplifies the problems with screen adaptations of novels. Kahlan just doesn't seem regal enough. Sure she looks good and fits the description fairly well (am I the only one who really thinks her hair ought to be a LOT longer though?) but the TV version doesn't strike me as a character used to being in command. In the same vein the Gar's seemed to ugly, I know, I know, they are supposed to be ugly, but remember our boy Richard is going to be dragging one around for a long-ass time once this gets going (if it gets going...), and I'd rather it be something a little easier to look at.

That last bit brings up another concern. Are they really serious about this? I mean it took an hour and a half to get through just the first little bit of the first book. How much of the series are they planning to do? A season for each book? It seems like they would need that much time. And what will that mean for the plot? Books aren't written with a neatly tied up mini-story every chapter, how will audiences react?

I don't know how it's going to turn out, and to be honest I'm more exited about it because of what it means for the Wheel of Time. Red Eagle Entertainment is now talking about making a live-action movie with Universal based on The Eye of the World to go along with some new video games and I hope they are paying attention to the mistakes being made in Legend of the Seeker. Of course this is the same group who let us down with the New Spring comics. Seriously, who puts out the first 5 of an 8 part series and then stops? That's just rude!