SPOILERS FOR THE WHEEL OF TIME BOOK FOUR: THE SHADOW RISING, AHEAD!
The Wheel Of Time, Amazon Prime’s best epic fantasy series that hardly anyone seems to know about, is returning for its third season sometime soon, by the looks of it. With showrunner Rafe Judkins and stars Josha Stradowski and Madeleine Madden scheduled to take the stage at CCXP in Brazil this Saturday to discuss season three and drop the release date (confirmed by Judkins over on his Instagram), and a new poster dropping this morning, there’s excitement in the air as it feels suddenly plausible that the Dragon Reborn might be back on our screens early in the new year.
The poster – our first look at season three since the short video celebrating a wrap on filming early this year – is beautiful, which is something I haven’t necessarily been able to say of previous posters for the series…not that they were ever bad, but they were “floating head” posters, and I felt like the show’s marketing team could have cooked up something a little more visually arresting to entice audiences, who made The Wheel Of Time Prime Video’s most watched original series debut of 2021 but didn’t show up as strongly for season two in 2023 despite much better reviews for the season, in large part because the marketing was non-existent. The actors and writers literally couldn’t talk about the show or promote it at the time due to the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes, and Amazon did virtually nothing to fill the void. We don’t know how season two performed in the eyes of Amazon executives, but with season four yet to be greenlit, I think it’s safe to assume that they’re waiting for season three to come out first and do well before they commit to continuing the sprawling story; which was planned to run for eight seasons, condensing fourteen books worth of source material.
So the marketing can’t suck this time around – and if this poster is anything to go by, I’m cautiously optimistic that it won’t. So let’s discuss the poster itself.
The image seems obviously designed to eventually double as a book cover for The Shadow Rising, the fourth volume in Robert Jordan’s saga, which The Wheel Of Time season three will be adapting (having consolidated most of the relevant parts of books two and three into its second season). Depicting Stradowski’s character Rand al’Thor walking through a steel forest of standing spears in a desert at dawn, carrying Rosamund Pike’s Moiraine Damodred in his arms, the poster follows through on the promise made in season two to shift focus away from Moiraine, the series’ protagonist throughout its first season, and onto Rand, the books’ protagonist, who has reluctantly accepted that he is the “Dragon Reborn” destined to save the world or destroy it, and must now complete the vague prophecies written about him centuries before his birth if he is to defeat the Dark One at the Last Battle and prevent the very fabric of reality from being torn apart.
The poster transports us to one of the books’ harshest settings, the Waste, home to twelve warring clans who collectively make up the Aiel. Rand is, as the show has already revealed, the son of an Aiel Maiden of the Spear named Shaiel, who died giving birth to him on the field of battle during the Aiel War, in which a coalition of Aiel clans under the command of Chief Janduin of the Taardad invaded the Westlands to exact vengeance for the killing of a sacred tree (long story). Janduin is Rand’s father, making him half-Aiel. Wait, didn’t I say that Rand’s parents are both Aiel? I’ll let the show explain that.
In The Wheel Of Time season two, we met Aiel Maiden of the Spear Aviendha (played by Ayoola Smart) as she led an expeditionary force back into the Westlands to find the prophesized savior of the Aiel, the Car’a’carn or “Chief of Chiefs”, who turned out to also be Rand al’Thor. In season three, presumably just as in the books, Rand will decide to follow her into the Waste and help his people in their hour of need, against Moiraine’s wishes. His journey will take him to the ruined city of Rhuidean, built in ages past by Aes Sedai to house a treasure trove of powerful tar’angreal (magical objects) and the secret histories of the Aiel. But in the Waste, Rand will encounter opposition not only from the Dark One’s most powerful minions, but from leaders of the Aiel who dispute and challenge his claim to be the Car’a’carn, including a hotheaded clan chief and an ambitious Wise One (the Aiel equivalent to an Aes Sedai) who join forces to take him down.
Eagle-eyed fans will have noticed right away that Rand is sporting some new tattoos on his arms in the season three poster, which have great significance but are kinda a spoiler, so I won’t give away too much. Let’s just say, the process of obtaining those tattoos is an arduous one, and comprises one of the most memorable sequences in the entirety of Jordan’s saga, a sequence I hope The Wheel Of Time can do justice, as I firmly believe that it could single-handedly put the show on the map, so to speak. If not, The Shadow Rising still has plenty of other outstanding moments that could also do the trick (it is regarded by many fans as the best book in the series), some of which I’m looking forward to even more, but that particular sequence has the potential to be uniquely brilliant on every level. I already know Stradowski’s gonna kill it; it’s just a question of whether the show’s writing, direction, cinematography and production design are able to match the energy he’s going to bring.
Oh, and as for why Rand is holding Moiraine in his arms, well, I have my theories. Which I will not be sharing at this time, because again, that would require spoilers and the source material is just obscure enough that I don’t feel comfortable revealing everything that happens even though it’s been over thirty years since The Shadow Rising‘s publication. I envy those of you who will be watching the season with fresh eyes, completely unaware of what’s coming. Because everything I’ve seen thus far – i.e. this poster – tells me it’s gonna be great.
What do you think of the poster, and what are you hoping gets revealed or shown during Saturday’s CCXP panel? Share your own thoughts, theories, and opinions, in the comments below!