I’ve been reading the books since they came out. I have first edition hardcovers of almost every book. Not on purpose, I just wanted the book as soon as it came out and young broke me was willing to spend the money. I honestly wasn’t even aware that fandoms existed. I never knew about the Billy Zane movie or whatever it was. I still haven’t seen it. I didn’t know about the conventions or panels or anything like that. I just loved the books. I reread them incessantly.

Then while on Reddit, I stumble into the /r/wheeloftime subreddit. I got involved enough that I was a moderator. I’m still an honorary mod there. Then we found out there was going to be a TV show. There were tons of debates about if it was even possible to translate this to film.

The show came out and I absolutely, 100%, HATED IT. I’m certain I spent 3x as long ranting about it as I did watching it. But… my wife actually watched. and liked it. I cut back on my rants because I was ruining it for her. She’s not a fantasy fan in the first place.

Then for completely unrelated reasons, I was banned from Reddit for 6 months cause Reddit. It’s not that hard to catch a ban. Ironically, I ended up moderating the sub that led to the sitewide ban. So I went to Twitter. I found all of these people that absolutely LOVED the show. I saw all these new people diving into the books and sharing what they were experiencing.

I watched all these people experience the Longing (the time between books) and constantly talking about finer points of lore and what fit where between the show and the books. I found out that there were entire reference books I’d never heard of.

I had a complete epiphany.

I realized that I had this picture in my head of what The Wheel of Time was. The nice thing about WoT is that it speaks to SO MANY PEOPLE. We all have our favorite scenes, our favorite characters, and our favorite lands.

I wanted to see the books on film.

Rafe, however, knew that was absolutely impossible specifically because of people like me. It was never going to be ‘exactly’ what I’d pictured. And really, what would be the point of doing it ‘exactly’ like the books. The fan base are people that have been voraciously reading for decades. So for almost every single scene… he changed the POV of the scene. If you know WoT, that changes everything. Everything is first person.

He focused on what WASN’T shown in the books. Pivotal and important moments that had only been referenced, but not explored.

Through the SHOW fan base, I found out about JordanCon. My life changed forever. It was such an indescribably wonderful experience that I cried most of the way home because I wouldn’t see those people again until next year. A grown-ass man was crying his eyes out because I was leaving my family that I didn’t even know about 3 days earlier. I understood why we welcome people to JordanCon with “Welcome Home.” I’m crying right now just thinking about it. “Is it April yet?”

It finally clicked for me what Rafe was doing. You can’t replace or replicate the book experience. It’s always going to be colored by your personal life and POV and it’s never, ever, going to be “What you imagined.” He was giving us MORE. More content. More of the world. He was giving us a taste of the world. First taste is free. He was addicting an entirely new generation. MILLIONS more copies of the books were sold. Enough to warrant a new audio version, and that sold too.

I now look forward to my annual mecca to JordanCon. Seeing my family carries me through the whole year. Seeing so many other views on the world I’ve lived in for decades has rounded it out. I have #WoTSkies friends that look out for me. People that go out of their way to make sure I’m okay.

Saying that The Wheel of Time is LITERALLY Life Changing isn’t an exaggeration. It’s just a fact. The best family in the world with the small cost of admission of Watching a television show, listening to a book series, or reading a book series. My life was changed for the better because of this show.

Season 3 was some of the best television of the year. It just kept getting better and better. Now, Prime made the incredibly short-sighted decision to cancel the show as it was truly hitting its stride. It’s absolutely unreal that they canceled a show that can turn haters into eager advocates in 3 seasons.

Hopefully, another service out there actually likes money and a feral fanbase that will not only watch it, but advertise it, and buy merchandise for it.