Fantasy for the Ages

Foundation. Dune. The Wheel of Time. The Witcher. We're in an exciting period of high quality production adaptations of sci-fi and fantasy fiction works. And we're cheering for them all, because we've seen many previous adaptations of much loved works in the past, with some being great, while many were not. We shall not even give The Shannara Chronicles the benefit of our attention, so bad was it...

Finally, will the real Matrim Cauthon please step forward. These two chapters are delightful, introducing us again to the Mat we got an early glimpse of at the beginning of The Eye of the World, but not enough to truly get to know before some pesky dagger made a mess of things. And now, for the first time in the series, we get Mat point-of-view chapters. We think you're going to come to love this...

Egwene and Nynaeve have been given a mission - the Hunt for the Black Ajah. But that isn't the only hunt we deal with in these chapters. We've got some brothers hunting for where their sister has been all these months. We've got an ornery Red Sister hunting for secrets, particularly regarding a particular young man from the Two Rivers. We've got our girls hunting for Healing. And finally, we have...

What if you could have any weapon you wanted, from across the breadth of Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature and Film? What would you choose? Would you go for power? Diverse abilities? Absolute awesomeness? Zach and Jim use this episode to pick their top five choices, each, for the weapons they'd gather for their personal arsenals. See what you think! Join us on Discord for more conversations w...

So, our poor girls. They've been so wronged. Returning to the Tower after months of trials thanks to that nasty Liandrin, instead of the warm reception they expected they've been treated as runaways and are awaiting punishment. And punishment they shall have - but wait, there's more. With Aes Sedai, there's always more, and we get a huge dose of this through these three chapters. And they learn th...

Finally on September 2, 2021 the long awaited trailer for Amazon Prime's The Wheel of Time series dropped. Well, just a teaser trailer - a longer one is to come - but still, this was amazing! Two full minutes of wonderful content, revealing SO MUCH. So much in fact that we easily spent over 90 minutes talking about it in this episode. Our excitement for the show becomes pretty obvious. We hope you...

Time to catch up with some of our core characters, not yet touched on in this book. Here we rejoin Egwene, Nynaeve, Elayne, and Mat (and others) at the end of their cross-continent journey to Tar Valon. Will the girls be welcomed back to their training? Will Mat finally be healed from the dagger? Will Nynaeve still be tugging her braid? Tune in for all this, and more! Join us on Discord for more c...

And they are back! Jim & Zach welcome back to the podcast their lovely ladies, Judy and Rachel respectively, to discuss with them their impressions after finishing for the first time Brandon Sanderson's The Well of Ascension, Book 2 in the original Mistborn Trilogy. And the women don't pull any punches. While they loved the first book in the series, reviews were... mixed, this time. They didn'...

Rand is gone. Where, how, when - no one's quite sure. Now it's up to the rest of the group to figure out what's next. Oh, and remember how Perrin's got this thing going on with wolves? Yeah, that's about to get a whole bunch more real. And then there's some more stuff with dreams... or shall I say Dreams? OK, too much to highlight in a little intro. You've just got to listen. One of our longe...

Continuing on into The Dragon Reborn, we return to the action in the aftermath of Rand's spontaneously, Power-generated earthquake, only soon to discover that the earthquake was only the opening act. We've got significant dreams, monsters and mayhem awaiting. And wolves. Got to love the wolves! Let's see where these chapters take us. Join us on Discord for more conversations with a growing communi...

We're back with another installment of our Rate a Magic System Series, this time exploring the world of Harry Potter.  Is Harry safe?  Will we be gentle?  NOT!  Zach's longtime friend Sam joins us, a genuine Potterhead, to bring a level of credibility to our dive into this wizarding world.  Let's us know what you agree (or disagree) with! Join us on Discord for more conver...

In celebration of our 50th episode, rather than another Wheel of Time episode, we went with something special. We reached out to Twitter and our Discord, as well as our own recollections, and gathered a whole bunch of awesome moments from Fantasy and Science Fiction content, and then used our incredibly objective (not) approach to rank these into a Top 50 of all time. Take a listen - see what you...

It's time to start another Wheel of Time book! Here we go, The Dragon Reborn, Book 3 of The Wheel of Time. Our story picks up a couple of months after the epic conclusion of The Great Hunt. Half the party is off to a new location, but we pick up with Perrin, Rand, Moiraine, Lan, Loial, Min, and a bunch of Shienarens still not far from Almoth Plain. Waiting. Just waiting. Waiting for what? We'll fi...

This is a somewhat spoiler-ific discussion and rating of some of the top moments from science fiction and fantasy books and movies that hit you in the feels, wrench your heart, touch you to the soul. We each brought our separate ideas, pitched them to each other, and debated until we sorted a top 10. Not everything we discussed made the list. Listen and see what you agree with. We didn't deeply di...

We've arrived at the end of the second book of The Wheel of Time. What an awesome book! And to fully reflect on what we've experienced so far, we've brought special guests on with us for this episode: Rob, host of the Malkier Talks Podcast (and numerous other WoT Fandom content out on YouTube) and also Gleeman Twitch and Mandi Kat, the fantastic duo of The Gleeman's Apprentice Podcast. The five of...

And here we are, the epic and incredible conclusion to The Great Hunt. You were blown away by the content of the previous few chapters, but wait - there's more. So much action! Intense! Technically, this still leaves all four paragraphs of Chapter 50, but we've got something special in mind for that next week. We think you'll like what you hear in this episode, a real thrill ride. Join us on Disco...

We return to our "Rate a Magic System" series in this episode, this time covering the magic of the stand-alone (at this point) novel "Warbreaker", by Brandon Sanderson. This is our fifth magic rating episode, but the first whose book/series was specifically selected by request of our patrons. Zach had to cram to finish the book in time for recording, but he got it done - and so did we. Enjoy! Join...

The guys make their move on Falme. So do the ladies. And so do the Seanchan. Chaos ensues. Oh, and Ingtar drops a bombshell. 'Nuf said - enjoy this coverage of these incredible chapters! Join us on Discord for more conversations with a growing community of fantasy fiction fans: https://discord.gg/jMWyVJ6qKkAccess our patron-only content, unlock the opportunity to listen and chat during live record...

Everything is zeroing in on Falme in this episode. Rand and the crew are moving closer to the city, with various reasons drawing them in. Nynaeve and Elayne are in Falme, seeking to save Min and Egwene. Min is no helpless woman though, working on her own plans. As for Egwene? Not so good. Give a listen, and see what's up. Join us on Discord for more conversations with a growing community of fantas...

Zach and Jim get together with guests Charles and Dylan of the Friends Talking Fantasy Podcast to dive into the Grimdark fantasy subgenre, exploring what it is all about, why you ought to consider giving it a try, and debating whether authors may push the limits of literature too far in writing this particular type of fantasy fiction. Our guests were wonderful, and we think you'll get a lot of bot...

Here we reconnect with our core ladies, Egwene and Nynaeve, training in the White Tower. They've made solid friendships with Min and Elayne.  Is that a good or bad thing?  That's for you to decide, based upon what happens to all four of them in the adventure of these chapters. Oh, and one more thing.  We have a Liandrin sighting.  Boo!  Hiss! We reference Jim's participati...

Stuck in the situation of needing to follow Fain, Darkfriends and Trollocs across the continent as fast as possible, but having found the Cairhien Waygate blocked, our friends head to the next closest Waygate, and we get an up close and personal encounter with some power ladies and some larger than life characters. Things don't go as hoped, our group is blocked again, leading them to choose yet an...

Here's an episode we're thrilled to bring to you, one that was a long time in the works. Both Zach and Jim succeeded in encouraging their significant others to read Mistborn: The Final Empire, not their typical type of reading material. Both being finished, we sat down with them to discuss the experience, hear their thoughts, and learn if they are ready for more. Come enjoy their insights. NOTE: T...

Continuing on in The Great Hunt, we see what happens when our company discover just where Fain and the Shadowspawn have gone. Our protagonists are in for an unpleasant surprise. Speaking of surprises, our second chapter covers what next happens to Thom, and what it leads him to has series-long ramifications. Oh, and then let's throw in a little content from clear across the continent, because - wh...

Just a single chapter for you this time, but it's a doozie! We continue out trek through The Wheel of Time's The Great Hunt with this experience in Lord Barthanes manor, where some of our characters attempt misdirection while others literally go on a hunt - but Rand ends up feeling like the hunted. WoTionary w Special Guests Fantasy for the Ages, Gleeman Twitch & Master of the Deck: https://youtu....