Amazon’s Wheel Of Time trailer promises swords, sorcery, and massive budgets

Amazon released the first, full trailer for The Wheel Of Time, and boy, does it look expensive. At this point, the studio is just showing off its massive wealth by releasing Wheel Of Time and Lord Of The Rings within a year of each other. Nevertheless, the money is all on screen.

The show stars the Gone Girl herself, the wickedly talented, one and only Rosamund Pike as Moiraine. She will lead a group of adventurers, one of whom is, get this, a prophesied savior, in a quest to save humanity. Here’s the full description:

Set in a sprawling, epic world where magic exists and only certain women are allowed to access it, the story follows Moiraine, a member of the incredibly powerful all-female organization called the Aes Sedai, as she arrives in the small town of Two Rivers. There, she embarks on a dangerous, world-spanning journey with five young men and women, one of whom is prophesied to be the Dragon Reborn, who will either save or destroy humanity.

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Obviously, that’s just the broad strokes. The Wheel Of Time is an incredibly popular fantasy series by Robert Jordan, whose books have sold more than 90 million copies worldwide. Comprised of 14 books, the series, which was continued by co-author Brandon Sanderson, following Jordan’s death in 2007, ran from 1990 to 2013.

An adaptation of Wheel has long-eluded studios. In 2007, FX dumped a slapdash pilot on late-night audiences without notice or fanfare. As pointed out by our senior writer Katie Rife, the Winter Dragon pilot was more or less a legal scheme to maintain the rights to the whole series.

But the real money here is Amazon’s “groundbreaking” use of YouTube’s 360 player and spatial audio surround sound.

Finally, you can experience the trailer the way Jordan would’ve wanted it: As a “traditional 2-D trailer in a virtual three-dimensional ‘wheel.” Viewers who “scan to the left or right will reveal there is much more to experience.”

All this is to say, if you’ve ever wanted to watch a trailer with all the grace of trying to spot your house on Google Street View, The Wheel Of Time 360 experience is for you.

We can’t imagine why anyone would ever watch the trailer this way, but it does serve as a nice distraction if you get bored during the two-minute and 15-second spot.

The first three episodes of Wheel Of Time premiere on Amazon Prime on November 19, with new episodes premiering each Friday.