‘Game of Thrones’ was not a perfect show. ‘The Wheel of Time’ makes it look like a masterpiece.

Here’s a shortlist of the attributes that the many big-budget, epic-scale medieval, sci-fi or fantasy shows trying to become the next “Game of Thrones” keep missing about what made that swords-and-sorcery saga an improbable crossover hit: humor, charisma, human stakes in addition to apocalyptic ones.

Ned Stark’s execution and the Red Wedding were conversation fodder for days, but so were Tyrion slapping Joffrey and Peter Dinklage’s unlikely sexsymbol status, thanks to the veteran character actor’s supple, wine-lipped way around a quip. We remember the dragon battles and the White Walkers, but just as indelible - and crucial to the series’ mass appeal - were the smaller, character-based moments. Cersei’s shaming. Jaime’s kindness to Brienne. Arya lulling herself to sleep by chanting the names of the foes she vows to kill. No wonder HBO’s current buzziest show isn’t the studiously cold “Westworld,” but the clammypalmed “Succession.”

Conventional wisdom rightly holds that “Game of Thrones” ended miserably, but it feels like a masterwork when compared to virtually any of the shows that have aspired to replace it. The latest production expensive enough to bankrupt Scrooge McDuck and wildly miscalculate what made its predecessor so watchable is Amazon Prime’s “The Wheel of Time,” an adaptation of Robert Jordan’s 14book series.

Starring Rosamund Pike as a member of a medieval magical sisterhood fighting an eternal war between good and evil against a backdrop of reincarnation (hence the title), it’s an epic with little sense of grandeur, populated by characters with missions but no personality. In that sense, it fulfills Jeff Bezos’s alleged demand that Amazon develop its own “Game of Thrones” - in the most unspecial manner possible. (Disclosure: Bezos is the owner of The Washington Post.)

But the fantasy staple that “The Wheel of Time” resembles most closely is “The Lord of the Rings” (which gets its own Amazon prequel series next year). Like LOTR, the action begins in the last place imaginable: an idyllic village tucked away in the mountains where the townspeople pay little attention to the wars brewing below. It’s there where four unworldly young adults are recruited by a mysterious stranger to embark on a long journey that’ll determine the fate of humanity (and several other species, like the demonic Trollocs and the ogre-ish . . . Ogiers).

That stranger is Pike’s Moiraine, one of a group of superpowered women called the Aes Sedai who strive to keep evil in check by neutralizing the aptly named Dragon, a magical being born into various human incarnations who may be steered toward goodness or destruction. In their seemingly Buddhist-inspired search, Moiraine and her companion, or Warder, Lan (Daniel Henney) narrow down the Dragon candidate to the quartet. Already eager to dedicate herself to a cause, Egwene (Madeleine Madden) trusts Moiraine most readily, in stark contrast to her scoffing once-lover Rand (Josha Stradowski). Mat (Barney Harris), who has cared for his younger sisters when his alcoholic mom couldn’t, is the sorriest to leave their hometown behind. Their friend, Perrin (Marcus Rutherford), who accidentally maims a fellow villager in the chaos of a Trolloc attack, is so sparsely characterized it’s utterly unclear how he feels about being so abruptly uprooted, yet offered distance from the site of his grave mistake.

By the end of the six episodes provided for review (of eight total), it’s still unknown who the Dragon is. (Already renewed for a second season, the series apparently feels no great urgency in its storytelling.) More pertinently, we’re given little reason to care, since magical powers aren’t exactly a rarity in this world.

With nearly every installment ending in an action sequence, the show doesn’t seem to be designed to induce medical comas like Apple TV Plus’ gorgeous but deadly dull Isaac Asimov adaptation “Foundation.” But there’s just too much portent, exposition and bad writing where engaging characters should be. Despite her most dedicated efforts, Pike’s no match for marijuana-friendly but limply grandiose lines like, “The wheel of time turns and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the age that gave it birth comes again.”