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TWoT is kind of a bad example because they weren't even trying to make a good show; they just wanted to hold onto the rights. I haven't seen the Dragonlance cartoon, but if it had been live action, I probably would have. I mean, I watched the preposterous Dungeons & Dragons movie. Also, I never watched Avatar. I did see The Last Airbender live action movie, even though it was terrible. See the pattern there? And I watch more animation than a lot of people. Whatever their assessment of the quality of Batman v Superman, most people agreed that seeing the big two heroes onscreen together for the first time was a big deal. Not a one of them said, "Whatever. They've been together in tons of animated projects." My point isn't that animation sucks, mind you. It's that live action has more impact; it inspires more excitement and awe. If Stormlight was animated, sure, I'd watch it with great interest. Because I love The Stormlight Archive. If there was an anime version done, it would get the prized position of 5th or 6th anime I've watched with any interest in my entire life. And I'd pitch it to my friends and try to get them to watch it, and most of them wouldn't. But those same friends are absolutely in love with Game of Thrones. Most of them will never read the books, but they just can't wait for new episodes of the show to come out. If someone approached a Stormlight adaptation with the same seriousness as HBO's adaptation of ASoIaF, I could absolutely talk all of my friends into a frenzy of excitement for it to be released, if they even needed my encouragement. I'm sure that The Stormlight Archive would make a great anime, but not many people would care. A live action version could become a cultural sensation, just like Game of Thrones. As for the side question, I'm pretty sure that only Elantris and the first Mistborn trilogy have been translated to Japanese,but I'm really not sure.

I just finished The Moontide Quartet by David Hair and The Dagger and the Coin by Daniel Abraham. The mere fact that both series are complete is a decent recommendation in the world of fantasy (which is not to say that I don't constantly begin reading series that have no end in sight, but it's nice when I know that I can read the whole thing when I begin). Moontide is four volumes, and Dagger and Coin is five, but I'd say that they're roughly the same length, altogether, because the Moontide volumes are each somewhat longer. The Dagger and the Coin is definitely a series in the vein of A Song of Ice and Fire. You could love it and hate ASoIaF and vice versa, but they share certain elements. For example, the fantasy elements are rarely central to the action, and when they are, they usually aren't big, bold, and extravagant. There are a whole bunch of fantasy races that long-gone dragons bred from humans thousands of years before, so the story is populated by a whole bunch of interesting looking characters. They are, however, all just basically people. There is some magic, but it's not emphasized much. None of the main characters can do magic, and its only real practical use is healing. The action is driven by bankers' economic schemes as much as war and intrigue, but it still manages to be an exciting, engaging series. Now, The Moontide Quartet certainly has a lot more magic. It is its own fantasy world, but the cultures are very clearly based on existing ones on Earth. Magic has only been around for about 300 years, after what was more or less a hippie cult accidentally discovered it, and some of the first magi conquered an empire and started a religion around it. One of the magi who devoted himself to peace and learning instead of lording over everyone else built a bridge between two continents separated by a sea too rocky to cross by boat, but it only emerges from the tides every 12 years. So, of course, the religious magi use it wage "holy" wars against the other continent instead of for cultural exchange.

I've seen a lot of people make that argument, but I really don't think that's the problem with shows like The Shannara Chronicles. That's not to say that it couldn't be true, but I can't point to a single fantasy show that had strong characterization, an engaging plot, good acting, etc, and also did nothing to downplay the fantastic elements of their stories. As far as I can tell, the problem with Shannara Chronicles wasn't that unabashed high fantasy doesn't work on TV; it's that it was a bad show. I think the problem is that people producing TV shows think that if they have a fantastic world, they have to shine a spotlight on it all the time and make the show about this amazing world that they've created. If producers would back off on the dramatic symphonic soundtracks heralding panoramic shots of splendor and just focus on a good story and good characters, I think a pure fantasy story would work just fine. Look at, say, The Walking Dead. It's a drama first, but it never shies away from being a post-apocalyptic zombie show (except in the 2nd season). No, it's not all zombie chases followed by zombie fights followed by [insert additional zombie movie cliche here], but there are zombies around in the background all the time, and the settings constantly remind us that we're in a world with zombies. Stormlight certainly isn't magic, magic, more magic, and now a monster!

The Surges are a lot different from the metal powers. It's one thing to be able to push on metal; it's something else entirely to be able to alter gravity. If you had access to every single Surge, along with the extra abilities granted by all of the interactions, you would pretty much be a god. Actually, it might be interesting to discover just what would happen to someone that did get access to every single Surge. They would probably need an enormous amount of Investiture to power every Surge simultaneously, but they could probably do some absolutely insane stuff.

The problem that I have with an anime adaptation is that it has a specific "feel" that distinctive to anime, like it's a genre all its own. Anime that is very clearly telling a high fantasy story doesn't come off as high fantasy to me. It comes off as anime. Sure, if you're a big anime fan, the distinctions are probably pretty clear, but that doesn't change how the majority of the potential audience are going to view such an adaptation. I think it's kind of like how fans of electronic music can name 200 different genres, but to everyone else, it's all just techno. The primary objection to doing a Stormlight series is that the effects, sets, makeup, etc, would be too much for a TV budget. Basically, you need a CGI-heavy summer blockbuster's budget, and that can't be sustained for an entire season (and, of course, a movie is just too short to tell the story). The solution to that is pretty simple: wait, and the technology will get better. A show like Game of Thrones couldn't have happened even 10 years ago. I bet that the stuff they're doing with the dragons in current seasons wouldn't have worked 5 years ago when the series started. Technology is changing very quickly. There isn't enough of the series out yet to start thinking about an adaptation, anyway, so just give it time. If people are clamoring for a new, awesome live-action fantasy series in like 2030, then it will probably be Stormlight's time to shine.

If they stick with the plan of having the team change up every season, Roy would definitely be a good addition. I'd really like to have Constantine join up. There were rumors of that, but later someone involved in the show said that his Arrow cameo was all they had planned for the character, so perhaps not. Flash has been really padding out their supporting cast with characters who will probably become speedsters (Wally West, Patty Spivot, Jesse Quick...), but none of them have gotten powers yet. It's too bad: any one of them could be a good addition to a Legends team. Wally West, in particular, would be good because he's another Flash in the comics. Possible story arc: Barry loses powers temporarily/is put out of commission for some other reason, and Wally takes over as the Flash-->Wally quickly begins to feel superfluous once Barry is back in business-->Wally joins up with the Legends team, 'cause they're totally down with having their very own Flash.

There are two ways I can see the Lift novella going: 1) It gives us an insight into what she's doing immediately after her interlude, as this won't really be covered when she gets her own book. The Nightwatcher stuff won't be covered because that will be important for her flashbacks. 2) The Nightwatcher stuff is covered because it's time we found out about the Nightwatcher, and the flashbacks in Lift's books won't cover that. Rather, Lift will be a very different character when we meet her again, years later, and the flashbacks will cover what's happening after her WoR interlude and how she changed as a character. If the second is the case, that will strengthen my suspicion that all of the flashbacks in the second arc are going to take place during the first 5 books and are going to dramatically change our perspective on what happened during that time.

Re: a Stormlight game, I think the mechanics could be very difficult to work out (though not impossible). Just think about the controls necessary to pull off all of the various Windrunner lashings, some of which are fairly complicated but would still need to be possible to use in real-time battles. That's one Order out of ten. Now consider how one would deal with Lightweavers' powers. It's almost like a totally different game. That could be really cool, but a lot would go into it. Now, back to the original topic, I think movies are not the right way to adapt SA at all. But if it had to be done that way, some major streamlining would be needed. WoK, for example: I would open with a shortened Szeth scene. The Kalak scene at the beginning would have to be cut. As important as it seems to be to the overarching narrative, it would have to come via flashback in a later movie, when the whole story is coming together better. Kaladin's introduction would have to be totally different. Somehow, exactly what is going on would have to be established in the dialogue without it seeming like a whole bunch of ridiculous exposition. Kaladin's flashbacks would have to be seriously trimmed. The whole trip to the Shattered Plains in the slave carts would have to be cut down to just a couple of scenes that mainly serve to introduce Syl (this also would probably be a good time to cut in a lot of Kaladin's flashbacks). I wouldn't cut any of the main POV characters entirely, but Shallan's part would have to be seriously abbreviated. I think the segue to her arc would be someone on the Shattered Plains (Dalinar or Adolin, most likely) mentioning Jasnah, then cutting to her in Kharbranth, interviewing Shallan. It would probably seem like that part is about Jasnah, not Shallan, but it should still be fine. Beyond that, everything would have to be seriously edited down, and the interludes would have to be cut entirely, except some of Szeth's. A lot of the mysterious stuff that is drawn out over the course of the book would need to instead come out all at once. Even then, it would be really tough to get it down to just 3 hours, but it might be doable. Now, a TV show--that would work much better. The problem, of course, would be the need for a huge effects budget, but who knows what will be possible for a Netflix- or HBO-level budget, say, ten years from now? Personally, I'm not keen on an animated adaptation, but I would still watch it, if that's what it ended up being.

That may not necessarily be a woman in the picture, either. It's very stylized, and while it does look pretty feminine, it could be a man with long hair.

I don't know. I always thought of Bavadin as being a man, but I can't remember any masculine pronouns being ascribed to him, now that I think about it. Really, there haven't been a lot of references to Bavadin at all.

Bavadin, maybe?

I dunno. Why not just get an account? Amazon is useful.

There's an even longer preview on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Brandon-Sandersons-White-Sand-Hardcover/dp/1606908855/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1459518386&sr=1-1&keywords=white+sand+brandon+sanderson Note that in Brandon's introduction, he says that he originally conceived of Taldain as a planet Of course, we don't know if this is still the case in the latest edition.

Actually, it looks like the blog that Botanica posted on the first page of the thread was actually just the text from my Dynamite link, so I guess it has been posted. Still.

I haven't seen anyone post Dynamite's press release yet, and this is very exciting--at least for me--because of that one little face in the upper left hand corner of the cover... http://dynamite.com/htmlfiles/pressrelshow.html?display=PR03171641745

If you had asked me before last week if I thought Vandal Savage was a bad villain, I'm sure I'd have said no. But I noticed that the time pirates episode was probably my favorite so far, and there's no Savage to be seen. That is rather telling about the quality of the character. This is especially true, given that I should be mad at the show for setting up situation after situation where Jax and Prof should merge and Firestorm the tar out of the antagonists, but they apparently just don't think of it. It's pretty obvious that they just didn't have the budget to do Firestorm on top of the episodes other effects, but couldn't they have come up with a one-line excuse for why it couldn't happen? Like have Rip Hunter say, "We don't know the nature of the damage to the timeship. If there is a quantum core leak, the Firestorm reaction could interact with it and set off a detonation that would ripple through all of space and time!" Whatever. Just give us some reason, no matter how flimsy, that an old college professor thinks that wielding a laser rifle and a beret is a better way to deal with a dozen+ professional criminals than turning into a living nuclear reaction. And, yet, I still really enjoyed the episode.

Disney released a high-res picture of the big Spider-Man shot from the trailer: https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/ggkqttuhz5tyo9zvlcwi.jpg I assume that what we saw in the trailer wasn't 100% finished, so they wanted us to have a still that was to give us a better idea of what the movie will look like. I could tell from the trailer that the eyes were mechanical, but a lot of people couldn't. This image actually lets you see how they work like a camera shutter. I think the design is really interesting, in that I think that the most obvious inspiration is the original Steve Ditko design. The spider insignia uses the modern leg configuration, where four bend upwards and four bend down (in the original design, they all bent down), but it's compact in a way that suggests Ditko, to me. IT's actually somewhat smaller than Ditko usually drew it. I've seen a lot of people say that this is the Alex Ross version, but Alex Ross based his on John Romita Sr's, and that one was very close to the Ditko original. The difference is that Romita started to splay out the spider legs on the insignia to make it look more dramatic. That began the evolution to the modern design. Romita and Ross' legs are more fluid and curvy, while the Civil War insignia is actually geometric (which I've never seen in any design).

Maybe all of the... radiantspren (hey, why not?) are different. Wyndle, for example, doesn't seem to have forgotten anything from his existence in the Cognitive Realm, even though all of the other radiantspren seem pretty stupid before their bond progresses. Syl could be only as special as any other Windrunner's spren, who are, in turn, only as special as all varieties of radiantspren are. In other words, Windrunners' spren are special because they are similar to a known form of spren, Edgedancers' spren are special because they don't forget, and we don't have enough information yet to distinguish what is special about the others.

You've got to listen to more Faith No More of you're thinking that they're bouncy 90s metal. While not nearly as odd as Mr Bungle, they are really eclectic. Fur example, check out this Butter Bacharach cover: https://youtu.be/8sSw-vQUst0

I want to know the reasoning that made you ask that question (the Sel and Threnody one, that is).

I keep forgetting that I have The Builders, but I remembered today and read it. Great little book, I have to say. It's like grimdark Redwall.

I would recommend not doing that. It gives too much away. I think it would be a much better idea to read it when things are more established and you know more about what is going on but not so late in the progression that it is totally boring because events in the main series are much cooler. I read it after reading the whole series, and I didn't like it much at all. I had a friend who read the series after me, and I told her to read it after book 4, and she enjoyed it. I think that's probably the best time to read it, myself. Recommending reading the prequel first is basically telling someone that you think they'll get into the series quicker if they read some spoilers first. Actually, that may be true (there was a study recently that found that people they spoiled a movie for gave it better reviews than those who went in blind), but that's still basically what reading New Spring first is. Some people just aren't going to get into it, I guess. I started reading after it was all complete, and I loved it. Finished the whole thing in 40 days and reread it before 6 months was out. The friend I referenced above took about a year to read it. She wasn't as into it as me, but she still enjoyed it, despite some frustrations with it.

Second trailer is out! https://youtu.be/2Cn3DVV0LHY

I wouldn't read too much into that Reddit comment. It was said in response to someone who had specifically referenced Renarin, using him as an example of a character who is guaranteed to survive for the next three books, since he gets a flashback book in the back 5. So, yes, Brandon's response used Renarin, specifically, as an example of someone who could die but still have a flashback book, but he only did that because he was using the same example as the person that he was responding to. I think Renarin has about an equal chance of dying as any of the others. I'd think you would be eager for Renarin to be the one to go, if someone has to. After all, Brandon said that a character can be dead and still have a book that tells their story through flashbacks but also through their continuing influence on other characters. If Renarin dies before his book and Adolin is still alive, you'd better believe that Renarin's book will be very heavy on Adolin POVs. Personally, I think that if at least one of the main characters in the back 5 is guaranteed to be dead during their book, it would make the most sense for it to be one or both of Heralds. Their flashbacks would probably be very informative, and they would likely still be around, in Damnation, even after they died. I'm certainly not keen on reading a book where most of the POVs involve a character being tortured endlessly, but if the battle against Odium has progressed considerably by that point in the story, maybe Damnation won't even be a giant torture chamber anymore. They would still be sidelined by their deaths, but perhaps they could do some behind the scenes work in the Cognitive Realm or something.

Check out this picture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mink#/media/File:Mink_with_crayfish_at_Wascana_Lake_in_Regina_Saskatchewan.jpg I'd say that minks, while undoubtedly not native to Roshar, wouldn't have trouble finding plenty of food.