This isn't really that accurate. While every episode hasn't done as well as the shows premier episode, it was consistently in the Nielsen top 10 through its whole run and had comparable viewers to "massive successes" like Severance and Shogun. Season 2 and season 3 of WoT were reported to have higher viewership in total than season 1.
There are multiple points of failure for WoT.
1. Amazon definitely did not market this properly.
2. They added plot lines that were unnecessary to drive the actual plot.
3. The finale's of seasons 1/2 were some of the weaker episodes. They didn't hit the emotional beats they needed to. They were working so hard to make this an ensemble show from the start, they failed to realize that the story does have a central focus, and failed at that. There were ways to make an ensemble story early, without weakening the actual central focus, but they didn't go that route.
4. The show continually made choices that were "less emotional" than the book. Either the writers didn't understand human emotions, or they figured they'd written themselves into a box previously and couldn't write themselves out of it.
5. They hired a huge star to play a role, and then couldn't let the story pivot away from her when necessary. Please see point 2.
6. They tried to make the show a political drama before it really needed to be. And by doing so, got some initial shock ratings because it was well written (episode 6 was really well done overall for non book readers) but it wrote them into a box because it was interesting thing, but it was also something that really really needed to be toned down.
7. The writers really really didn't understand the story.
8. The delays between seasons (you can blame covid but that doesn't explain the gap between s2-3)
9. This isn't specifically a wheel of time issue, but they did not have enough time to really tell the story. Wheel of Time is constantly critiqued as a story for its length. That length also drives in my opinion the best character building/arcs/world building in fantasy. Rand's story makes me bawl every time I read it.
Mat has one of the weakest endings, and even he has some amazing moments. I dont think you can tell this story properly in 8 hours of TV. But shows don't get 20 episodes a season anymore. But thats what it would've taken to do this properly with those side tracks they took. Moiraine's choices in book 5...
10. They had a huge built in market of this show. AND NEVER USED IT. There were zero merchandising things. No Great Serpent rings. No Aiel Halloween costumes. No Asherandi. No Horns. Please see point 1.
Easier to forgive a big budget show, if you're selling merch.
11. The actual combat in the show was really poorly choreographed with a singular exception. The cold open of episode 7 showed exactly what the combat should look like. And they never did it again.
