Spoilers follow for The Wheel of Time’s fifth episode, “Blood Calls to Blood,” which premiered Friday, Dec. 3 on Amazon.
“Blood Calls to Blood,” the excellent fifth episode of The Wheel of Time, is all about dealing with the fallout of last week’s episode, “The Dragon Reborn.” The show provides its first spectacular look at the Aes Sedai stronghold Tar Valon and begins reuniting the Emond’s Field characters.
It’s hard to say who had the worst time getting to Tar Valon. Mat’s condition has continued to deteriorate as he falls into hostile paranoia, begging for reassurances that he didn’t murder the family he and Rand sheltered with and asking Rand to put him out of his misery if he descends further into madness. Logain’s appearance is brief, but his imagined cackling at Mat provides a powerful demonstration of Mat’s fears while his fate gives Rand good reason not to head straight to the White Tower. Also, the detour provides fodder for Rand’s highly relatable griping that a night in Tar Valon costs more than a month at Emond’s Field’s Winespring Inn.
And what a city Tar Valon is! Inspired by Morocco’s Marrakech, it’s a bustling metropolis filled with dazzling sights and sounds and quirky features like a guy getting his head shaved in an open market. The vistas showing the Dragonmount are magnificent and the ornamentation of the White Tower is particularly spectacular. It provides a compelling set for the building Aes Sedai intrigue.
Despite Nynaeve’s contempt and mistrust of the Aes Sedai, the Wisdom’s demonstration of staggering power in the aftermath of the fight with Logain’s army means she’s now going to be forced to join the organization. While she puts up a brave front, Moiraine provides a great summation of how formidable her sisters are when she says “Do not underestimate the women in this tower. Each of them has her own goal, her own agenda, her own pride and ambition.”
But Moiraine’s been away for two years on her quest to find the Dragon Reborn and her knowledge and influence in the White Tower isn’t what it once was. The group is beset by internecine conflict led by Liandrin, who continues to do an excellent job as an antagonist to Moiraine. Their debate over Nynaeve shows a rivalry that if not rooted in respect at least demonstrates neither woman underestimates the other. Liandrin might not be subtle in her manipulation of Nynaeve, but she is effective by playing into Nynaeve’s desire for independence.
Egwene and Perrin seemed to be having the easiest time of things after Shadar Logoth until Eamon Valda shows up. The Tinkers’ desire to protect them is touching and their attempts at passive resistance in the face of the White Cloaks’ ruthlessness provides a powerful parallel to both historic and recent demonstrations of brutality doled out in the name of justice and order. It’s a mystery how Eamon knew Egwene could channel, considering we’ve already learned men and women can’t see each other’s weaves, though it’s possible that he’s just got the conviction of a zealot without actual evidence.
In the foreshadowing department we have both Rand thinking he recognizes the Dragonmount and the Ogier Loial identifying him as an Aeilman. The Ogier are effectively Robert Jordan’s version of Tolkien’s Ents, long-lived creatures constantly baffled by the pace of human life. Hammed Animashaun does a great job with Loial’s delivery, quickly establishing just how knowledgeable and powerful he is as he describes being chased by a mob as an annoyance and matter of factly insists that he knows more about Rand’s heritage than Rand does himself.
But the best performance of the episode once again goes to Peter Franzin as Stepin. He has a haunted look as he dons Kerene’s ring as if it had the weight of the One Ring itself, and Moiraine’s statement that he’d deliver the ring to the White Tower without planning for anything after that shows she understood his pain perhaps better than anyone else did.
There are hints of Bruce Willis’ speech in Looper about finding redemption through love in Stepin’s discussion of how much Kerene meant to him, helping further build out the complexity of the Warder/Aes Sedai relationship. His grief ripples through to Lan and Moiraine, a grim reminder of the danger of their work and how lucky they are to still have each other.
from IGN Reviews https://ift.tt/31t5GfD
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