Rosamund Pike just made her first public statement on the cancellation of The Wheel of Time, in true Aes Sedai fashion. The star and executive producer of the series shared a photo from the set of Season 3 in one of her many elaborate costumes during the Rhuidean sequence, where she lived through countless possible futures in a majestic desert setting. “Maybe I felt the end was coming and wanted to channel in anguish and rage at the sky,” she captioned the Instagram Story post. Pike has not said anything else personally since the show was canceled nearly a month ago. For those still hoping for a last minute change of heart, this is a bad sign.
The Wheel of Time was one of the biggest swings in the fantasy genre’s race for “the next Game of Thrones,” and early on, its prospects looked good. Pike led the charge with her existing star power and her enthusiasm for the source material — a 14-book series by author Robert Jordan. She was an executive producer and she played the central role of Moiraine Damodred, an Aes Sedai on a mission to fulfill the most important prophecy of this age.
Sadly, The Wheel of Time faced an uphill battle from the time Season 1 was filmed. Production was heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, forcing changes to the story itself that took a long time to correct. Season 2 was still facing some pandemic-related challenges, and was also forced to re-cast a main character.
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Still, along the way some changes were clearly not caused by production issues alone. The show made big changes to the source material that weren’t popular with many existing fans, and these had ripple effects on the story and worldbuilding. On top of that, the shortened runtimes of the streaming era meant that the show was forced to condense a lot of material. It aimed to cover about two novels per season, meaning it had only four episodes to cover each novel.
Still, the show had amassed a following of its own made up of new fans and long-time readers, and they have been hoping for a glimmer of hope. Many petitioned Amazon to reconsider the cancellation, or called on other streamers to pick up the show. These fans took it as a good sign that Pike and others associated with the show had not made public statements on the cancellation. Pike’s mournful post on Instagram seems to be another hint that the show is truly over now.
The Wheel of Time is streaming now on Prime Video, but no new episodes are on the horizon. The novel series is available now in print, digital, and audiobook formats.
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