IF creative director Karin Fong discusses the magic and mysteries woven into the making of the title sequence with Salon

Prime Video's epic fantasy series "The Wheel of Time," based on the books by Robert Jordan, is not your average Chosen One story. For one thing, there's confusion about who the so-called Dragon Reborn is among five possible candidates. And then there's the pesky little detail that this person may not be a savior at all – but someone destined to destroy the world. You only have to watch the show's stunning opening credits sequence to grasp the double-edged nature of power in this universe.

The main titles begins adrift in blackness before light ignites into a horizon, becoming a single white thread that starts to fray and then snaps. A riot of vibrant threads then burst across the darkness leaping and twisting, eventually weaving into a giant cosmic loom on which we see pictured seven women, one by one in a signature color, arrayed like the spokes on a wheel. But their presence is fleeting; their essences swirl together, transforming into the show's titular wheel – a dragon curled around to consume the other end. But that too fades back into the distant glimmer of the horizon before it all blinks out into darkness. 

There you go: the breaking, making and then unmaking of the world in under two minutes. 

It's an unwieldy concept to tackle, but speaks directly to themes in the series. Amazon Studios turned to design production studio Imaginary Forces – an aptly named company – to encapsulate the series' interpretation of power, order, chaos, eternity.

"I love it when the universe hands you these things," Karin Fong, director at Imaginary Forces, told Salon. "There's a very famous line from the book, 'The wheel weaves as the wheel wills.' They're weaving this form of power in a way, and the idea that spells could be woven or magic is woven. So the idea was to imagine the wheel as a cosmic loom. This turning of the wheel was destiny, was time and endless – no big deal. [laughs]"

Check out Karin's full discussion with Salon here: https://bit.ly/3Jzh4rM