Who is Dónal Finn on The Wheel of Time?

The second season of The Wheel of Time premiered this week on Amazon Prime Video, and fans were in for a surprise: the character of Mat Cauthon, the roguish scamp from Emond’s Field, is now played by actor Dónal Finn, whereas in the first season he was played by Barney Harris.

What happened? If you’ll recall, Mat barely featured in the final two episodes of The Wheel of Time season 1, staying behind in the city of Tar Valon while his friends entered the Ways with the Aes Sedai sorceress Moiraine. In The Wheel of Time books by Robert Jordan, Mat goes with the others; the show had to change things when Harris couldn’t film those last two episodes.

Why wasn’t he able to film? We still don’t know exactly, although we know that Harris filed a legal complaint to dispel false rumors that he couldn’t return to set because he refused to get a COVID-19 shot. In the complaint, Harris says that “[i]t has been a very difficult time for me and my family for highly personal reasons.” That’s probably as close as we’ll ever get to an answer as to what happened. It’s important to respect Harris’ privacy.

Why is Barney Harris no longer playing Mat in The Wheel of Time?

Dónal Finn is off to a strong start as Mat. Talking about the role, he sounded enthusiastic about diving right in. “I was in Morrocco at the time, filming a different project, and then I came straight to Prague to do a reading,” he said. “Then there was a costume fitting and then they cut my hair and before I knew it, I was on the set.”

Hopefully Finn will stick around to the end of the show! New episodes of The Wheel of Time drop Fridays on Amazon Prime Video.

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