‘The Wheel of Time’ Leads Prime Video to Dominate Streaming Charts in September

The Wheel of Time Season 2 premiered in September, leading Prime Video to victory in the streaming wars for the month. The series is one of the most ambitious fantasy adaptations in the works right now, but it hit some major stumbling blocks early on, and even some die-hard fans were losing faith. Fortunately, Season 2 is spelling good news for the show and the streaming service that it calls home.

The Wheel of Time was front and center on this month’s “Streaming Wars” update – an ongoing data-tracking project at FanSided which uses a variety of data including views, subscriber growth, social media impression and more. It wasn’t Amazon’s only hit last month, but it certainly helped lead the charge. Other outlets such as CBR have noted that the scores from viewers on sites like IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes have been on the rise this season, and critics have been very pleased as well.

As for the number of views the show is getting, there is not a lot of hard data available to the public for us to judge. The Wheel of Time was one of Prime Video’s most-watched shows of the year when it premiered in 2021, but Amazon has not published any exact ratings for the show this season. Still, if social media is anything to judge by, plenty of people are not only watching the show but obsessing over it.

The Wheel of Time is based on a series of epic fantasy novels by author Robert Jordan, and was one of the first to the punch in the scramble for the “next Game of Thrones.” Jordan was a friend and contemporary of George R.R. Martin, publishing the first book in his series just a few years before A Game of Thrones. However, his series is much longer, with 14 novels in total. Jordan wrote the first 11 novels in the series as well as a prequel, while he left behind extensive notes and outlines for another author to finish the series after his death in 2007. That author was Brandon Sanderson.

The series is acclaimed for the size and scope of its fantasy world as well as the depth to which it is developed, including the history, culture and geography. That gives the TV series plenty of material to work with, but also hard choices to make. Back in 2021, executive producer Marigo Kehoe told PopCulture.com that the show would not be taking the approach of adapting each book into its own season. Instead, she estimated that all 14 books would be covered in 10 seasons at most.

For that to happen, the success will need to continue. The Wheel of Time Season 2 finale premieres on Friday, Oct. 6 on Prime Video. The show has already been renewed for a third season. Jordan’s original book series is available now in print, digital and audiobook formats.