Quality Discussion Thread

[MarkDiLillo]

Yep I agree that it does feel like the only scene in the book that is GRRM-esque.  It just feels very surprising to me that BS wrote it as it clearly is inserted amidst major chunks of RJ writing.  Maybe it will be obvious when I go back and reread the bit later tonight though, who knows?  Like I said, not everything BS writes is terrible, but most of it is pretty bad that I've seen in the WoT.

 

Fionwe is stating it as fact that when (unless he knows something)...it is not fact.  That's why I was trying to get him to explain where he's coming from rather than just repeat his opinion in a manner that sounds as if he has some kind of inside information.

 

If Brandon wrote major chunks of 37 I would be extremely surprised, but I can see his touches in some of the events.  He seems to want to deliver what the fans want often times while RJ never seemed to willingly do that.  I had assumed that RJ gave in to set the record straight since this was the end, but I suppose it could just be touches of BS that I noticed.  Things like showing Tam finally fighting and Lan commenting on how good he is, making sure we know the exact order of who is the best swordsman amongst Lan, Gawyn, and Galad, etc.  Those felt like moments that were delivered purely to satisfy fans.  And as I mentioned before, the entire behavior of Demandred felt really weird and felt like the author finally wanted to deliver on one of the Forsaken being as awesome as we all wanted him to be.  But we haven't seen much of Demandred before so it's hard to say.

 

I could believe that BS wrote some scenes in 37, but I would be very surprised if the majority of that long chapter was not RJ.  Either way, if BS wrote much of 37 then it was his finest work and a true pity that he couldn't write the rest of the series in the same fashion.  Hence why I suspect that it was mostly RJ with some holes and gaps filled in by Brandon.

[fionwe1987]

 

 

 

 

I actually am curious if we can get specifics as to what BS described as the "GRRM moment".  I cant think of any moments like that in the series that were not clearly written by RJ.  Unless I am massively mistaken...

Its Birgette being beheaded. 

 

How sure are you?  I can definitely see that being a moment that you can describe as a "GRRM moment", but I would be very surprised if BS wrote that scene.  VERY surprised.

 

It was the Birgette scene. And many other parts of Chapter 37 were clearly Brandon too. I've had many problems with Brandon's work, but your take seems to be, "If I enjoy it, its Jordan, otherwise its Brandon". 

 

Do you care to actually explain how you KNOW its the Birgette scene or are you just going to pretentiously state that it's that scene without reason over and over again?

 

I know it by the process of elimination. And stop being snippy because people called you out on your tendency to blindly equate stuff you don't like with Brandon.

[Gavin Doyle]

One of the problems, of course, is that whatever RJ did write in the last three books wasn't written in leisure or allowed to simmer in his mind for weeks as he puffed on a pipe and pondered whether to change a word from 'tempest' to 'storm.' In his heroic efforts to get as much of the story down for us as possible there likely wasn't the usual opportunity for second thoughts, self-editing, and such. There wasn't time to trash mediocre scenes and start from scratch. Etc etc.

 

 

Compounding the issue, Sanderson was loathe to change anything written by RJ (regardless of quality). It may actually have been a better series of books if Sanderson had just treated anything written by RJ as a suggestion/guide rather than as holy text.

 

 

I guess I'm talking to some of the above posters who think the best material was clearly written by RJ... When in fact the opposite could be true. We haven't really seen much of RJ's miserable first drafts. Except maybe in the last three books...

[MarkDiLillo]

I know it by the process of elimination. And stop being snippy because people called you out on your tendency to blindly equate stuff you don't like with Brandon.

 

So in other words, you don't "know it" and the way you're stating it as an absolute fact is complete rubbish. It's your opinion and a guess the same as anyone else here. So how about you do yourself a favor and start qualifying your opinions like the rest of us instead of stating them as if you somehow have inside information and are qualified to make a factual statement?

 

As for my so-called tendancy to blindly equate stuff I dont like with Brandon...that's a sad cheap shot that I often see on internet forums.  Boil down 100's of posts of discussion on a topic to a quick one liner and fire away.  It's not even worth responding to beyond that.

[Guest PiotrekS]

Its actually so bad that I dont even want to finish the book and I just want to hear what happens in summary form now.  :(

I feel for you, Mark. That's why I went to the spoiler forums in the first place, having lost my enjoyment  of the books themselves after having to force myself through TGS.

 

I literally cannot picture the thought process of somebody who was willing to sit through CoT but didn't enjoy tGS. "Plot movement" trumps style once a series has crossed into double digit books, and the last three books have had plot movement in spades. 

 

Let me explain myself a little then, without forcing you to picture my thought process too well, as the process is messy and the experience might be unpleasant.

First, I don't care much about plot resolutions.

Second, TGS contained Hinderstrap and fragments such as this one: "She felt it each time she thought of what this woman was doing to the institution she loved. " or "Egwene was all Ajahs" and plenty more. I don't care if it was written by Brandon or RJ. If such phrases were foodow7 products, I'd have spent half a day in the toilet. Sorry if somebody likes that style of writing. For me it was torture, especially the cheesiest plotline possible- Egwene's one.

 

 

[fionwe1987]

 

I know it by the process of elimination. And stop being snippy because people called you out on your tendency to blindly equate stuff you don't like with Brandon.

 

So in other words, you don't "know it" and the way you're stating it as an absolute fact is complete rubbish. It's your opinion and a guess the same as anyone else here. So how about you do yourself a favor and start qualifying your opinions like the rest of us instead of stating them as if you somehow have inside information and are qualified to make a factual statement?

I don't know what gave you the impression it was inside info. Where have I ever claimed access to such things?

 

As for my so-called tendancy to blindly equate stuff I dont like with Brandon...that's a sad cheap shot that I often see on internet forums.  Boil down 100's of posts of discussion on a topic to a quick one liner and fire away.  It's not even worth responding to beyond that.

Its not a cheap shot. In this very thread, you said you enjoyed Chapter 37 a lot, and therefore doubted Brandon had much to do with it. Which we know is false.

 

We know for a fact that he wrote in Bela's death. We can be fairly certain several Egwene and Mat sections were him, and Birgette section was him too. We also know that RJ's combined writing for all of aMoL was 50K words, and this chapter was much longer than that, and anyway, RJ also wrote the ToG sequence, and several Egwene scenes from tGS. Chapter 37 was hardly all RJ. 

[MarkDiLillo]

And at the same time I said that if he had written it then he did such a good job with it that I didn't notice on my first read through.  And I hold to that.  Literally the only thing that feels off about 37 is Demandred and the level of fan gratification that was delivered.  If Brandon Sanderson wrote the majority of 37 then it really saddens me that he couldn't put forth that kind of writing through the rest of the series.

 

Aside from that, the more I think about it the more there are some major plot pieces left unresolved.  Verin's letters being a clear big one.  The Lanfear plot felt really shallow, Moridin plot was almost non-existent, the Black Tower plot was weak (with a scene pretty much admitting from Brandon that he wished RJ had left him some idea where he was going with it), a couple key prophecies were just flat out not addressed, and Nakomi or whoever completely blows my mind.

 

One thing that really bugged me was how overboard and ridiculous BS got with Rand in ToM and then explaining it away in aMoL.  We literally ended ToM thinking that Rand has ascended to a Jesus-like status with some new type of powers.  He had some strange light covering his mind protecting him, he channeled light, he could spot darkfriends by just glancing at them, he drove other darkfriends insane by seeing him use his power, and he annihilated a shadowspawn army on his own with seemingly god-like powers.  And then in aMoL...its kind of like "OOPS HE WASNT SUPPOSED TO BE THAT POWERFUL HES JUST REMEMBERED HIS FORMER LIFE".  So that weird "light" surrounding his mind shouldn't have been there...Rand was still insane - he just accepted it and therefor was able to deal with it.  He never had any kind of super powers that drove darkfriends insane and allowed him to destroy the army at Maradon - he just was being super sneaky and had his little angreal and apparently the darkfriends watching him kill the shadowspawn were mentally ill.  Oh, and finally...he couldnt really see darkfriends with any kind of magic powers.  He just used a trick to intimidate them all and any who got real scared he assumed were darkfriends.

 

...ya that really annoyed me.

 

The quality of writing in chapter 37 was certainly not the problem though IMO.

[neverspeakawordagain]

One thing that really bugged me was how overboard and ridiculous BS got with Rand in ToM and then explaining it away in aMoL.  We literally ended ToM thinking that Rand has ascended to a Jesus-like status with some new type of powers.  He had some strange light covering his mind protecting him, he channeled light, he could spot darkfriends by just glancing at them, he drove other darkfriends insane by seeing him use his power, and he annihilated a shadowspawn army on his own with seemingly god-like powers.  And then in aMoL...its kind of like "OOPS HE WASNT SUPPOSED TO BE THAT POWERFUL HES JUST REMEMBERED HIS FORMER LIFE".  So that weird "light" surrounding his mind shouldn't have been there...Rand was still insane - he just accepted it and therefor was able to deal with it.  He never had any kind of super powers that drove darkfriends insane and allowed him to destroy the army at Maradon - he just was being super sneaky and had his little angreal and apparently the darkfriends watching him kill the shadowspawn were mentally ill.  Oh, and finally...he couldnt really see darkfriends with any kind of magic powers.  He just used a trick to intimidate them all and any who got real scared he assumed were darkfriends.

 

...ya that really annoyed me.

 

The quality of writing in chapter 37 was certainly not the problem though IMO.

 

How on Earth did you get that Rand lost his super-powers in aMoL? The thing with not being able to see Darkfriends was a real power -- it's just that Moridin didn't believe it. The light covering his mind was the pattern fighting against the Dark One -- that was explained pretty clearly in the whole "balance" conversation in aMoL. I honestly have no idea why you'd think all that stuff was abandoned in aMoL; it was very much in force (especially in Moridin's dreamshard). The only time it was remotely hinted not to be the case was when he left the battlefield after dozens of channelers tried to capture him, but that was probably just an abundance of caution on his part. 

[MarkDiLillo]

I got it because there were multiple attempts by the author clearly designed to explain his miracles as non miracles.

 

1)  Moridin made a completely out of character comment about Wieramon being scared of Rand and then proceeded to explain to Rand how he did his own trick.  Clearly the author explaining to us how Rand did what he did.  If not, then why did Moridin say that?

 

2)  Rand was shown to have been sneaking his little fat man angreal around with him and mentioned that he had it at Maradon.  A clear attempt by the author to show that Rand does not have access to unlimited power and is entirely mortal and what he did at Maradon was something any mortal AoL Aes Sedai could have done with the aid of angreal.

 

3)  The whole scene where Rand tries to go out and blowup an army again but fails.  Reinforces that he is not god-like and was really just using his newfound AoL memories with an angreal at Maradon.

 

It just all screams of a band aid designed to correct or straighten out some things from ToM.

[fionwe1987]

I got it because there were multiple attempts by the author clearly designed to explain his miracles as non miracles.

 

1)  Moridin made a completely out of character comment about Wieramon being scared of Rand and then proceeded to explain to Rand how he did his own trick.  Clearly the author explaining to us how Rand did what he did.  If not, then why did Moridin say that?

Because the author wanted us to understand that there's a reason why Moridin and the other Foresaken aren't in awe of Rand. They have ways to explain what he does.

2)  Rand was shown to have been sneaking his little fat man angreal around with him and mentioned that he had it at Maradon.  A clear attempt by the author to show that Rand does not have access to unlimited power and is entirely mortal and what he did at Maradon was something any mortal AoL Aes Sedai could have done with the aid of angreal.

Not any one, though. Only an extremely skilled channeler. And only completely clueless people believed Rand had unlimited power. 

3)  The whole scene where Rand tries to go out and blowup an army again but fails.  Reinforces that he is not god-like and was really just using his newfound AoL memories with an angreal at Maradon.

Yes... and? Nowhere in ToM are Rand's power's godlike. They're mysterious, and without explanation. But its not like its stated he'd become the Creator!

It just all screams of a band aid designed to correct or straighten out some things from ToM.

Nope. Just to explain them.

 

You'd be right if you said that the lack of explanation (and the lack of Rand PoVs) in ToM was an attempt to raise the tension, the give fans something to speculate about during the wait between two books. But in this case, at least, there's no contradiction.

[Werthead]

I'm really glad that type of thing didn't happen earlier in the series; it's what made me stop reading A Song of Ice and Fire after the first book and a half. If characters are just going to be randomly dying everywhere, I'm not going to let myself make any emotional attachments to any of them, and then what's the point of an epic fantasy series? 

 

As it is, I don't think I'm ever going to be able to do another WoT reread, because knowing that Egwene dies in the end will make it impossible to read any of the scenes involving her in earlier books since she just ended up dying anyway and all the effort I put into caring about her was a waste.

 

An odd approach. It's possible to form emotional attachments to characters and this to add to the experience of reading when they die: it hurts, showing you are invested in the story and the writer was successful in drawing you into the series. Egwene's death in particular comes after fourteen novels of her being around and having lots of storylines and doing important things, and her death is the catalyst for Rand's victory (or the most notable one). Egwene earns her death scene as much as any of the characters in ASoIaF earn theirs.

 

The use of character death in ASoIaF is more effective, however, as they come early in the series and raise the stakes. There is tension if you don't know if the character you are reading about will live or die. WoT gave way too many characters invincible plot armour earlier in the series, and whilst many of the deaths in AMoL are effective it also feels a little obvious to hold back on major character deaths until the last 300 pages of the entire series (and let's be honest, apart from Egwene, some of the villains and arguably Gawyn and Siuan, most of the deaths were of second and third tier characters at best).

[neverspeakawordagain]

Let me explain myself a little then, without forcing you to picture my thought process too well, as the process is messy and the experience might be unpleasant.

First, I don't care much about plot resolutions.

Second, TGS contained Hinderstrap and fragments such as this one: "She felt it each time she thought of what this woman was doing to the institution she loved. " or "Egwene was all Ajahs" and plenty more. I don't care if it was written by Brandon or RJ. If such phrases were foodow7 products, I'd have spent half a day in the toilet. Sorry if somebody likes that style of writing. For me it was torture, especially the cheesiest plotline possible- Egwene's one.

 

Ah. Well, I guess, if I'm reading something for prose style, then I'm reading Nabokov, not a fantasy novel. Hinderstap was terrible, but I took that as BS' growing pains on writing Mat, which he got better with as time went by but never quite mastered. As to the Egwene stuff; agree to disagree -- I loved the White Tower reunification, and Egwene was easily my favorite female character in the last three books, after having mostly been indifferent to her earlier in the series. Her death really, really pained me in aMoL, because she was really the only female character I truly hoped would live to see the other side of the last battle -- I much rather would have seen Nynaeve, Cadsuane, Aviendha, Elayne, and Tuon die in the most ignoble ways possible than see Egwene die. 

[neverspeakawordagain]

I got it because there were multiple attempts by the author clearly designed to explain his miracles as non miracles.

 

1)  Moridin made a completely out of character comment about Wieramon being scared of Rand and then proceeded to explain to Rand how he did his own trick.  Clearly the author explaining to us how Rand did what he did.  If not, then why did Moridin say that?

 

See, to me, that was a very clear example of Moridin refusing to believe that Rand could possibly be as powerful as Rand actually was, and Moridin making up some kind of logical explanation in his own mind for something to keep himself from having to face the truth. 

[fionwe1987]

 

I'm really glad that type of thing didn't happen earlier in the series; it's what made me stop reading A Song of Ice and Fire after the first book and a half. If characters are just going to be randomly dying everywhere, I'm not going to let myself make any emotional attachments to any of them, and then what's the point of an epic fantasy series? 

 

As it is, I don't think I'm ever going to be able to do another WoT reread, because knowing that Egwene dies in the end will make it impossible to read any of the scenes involving her in earlier books since she just ended up dying anyway and all the effort I put into caring about her was a waste.

 

An odd approach. It's possible to form emotional attachments to characters and this to add to the experience of reading when they die: it hurts, showing you are invested in the story and the writer was successful in drawing you into the series. Egwene's death in particular comes after fourteen novels of her being around and having lots of storylines and doing important things, and her death is the catalyst for Rand's victory (or the most notable one). Egwene earns her death scene as much as any of the characters in ASoIaF earn theirs.

 

The use of character death in ASoIaF is more effective, however, as they come early in the series and raise the stakes. There is tension if you don't know if the character you are reading about will live or die. WoT gave way too many characters invincible plot armour earlier in the series, and whilst many of the deaths in AMoL are effective it also feels a little obvious to hold back on major character deaths until the last 300 pages of the entire series (and let's be honest, apart from Egwene, some of the villains and arguably Gawyn and Siuan, most of the deaths were of second and third tier characters at best).

Indeed. I would add that the many character "revivals" removed some value from the ending. Faile, Galad, Lan... all these people seemingly "died". Then they were shown to be alive again. Its kind of cheapened the end a little. For a cataclysmic, world-ending battle, the body count among the major characters was less than it could have been. In fact, I felt that Perrin's character arc, in particular, was ill served with Faile's return, and Faile's own heroism given a less fitting end.

 

Think about it: Isn't "was last seen riding away to divert thousands of Trollocs from getting their hands on the Horn" so much more evocative of the desperation of this battle than "was last seen having survived a Trolloc charge with a broken leg"?

[MarkDiLillo]

Fionewe:

 

1 - I dont buy that one at all.  If that was the goal behind Moridin spouting off how Rand did something then it was done very poorly.  It reminded me of the dialogue in a bad movie where the bad guy proceeds to announce how the good guy did some amazing trick before their final confrontation.

 

2 - Yes, a very skilled and powerful channeler.  I dont know that people felt he had "unlimited" power, but when you combine that scene with the darkfriends clawing their eyes out, Brandon saying it is very significant that he was channeling Light, his actions at the White Tower meeting Egwene, and Egwene mentioning that she felt he could have broken a shield without a problem....it paints a pretty clear picture that Rand is very much more powerful than he once was and indeed has some type of new mystery powers that he can use against the shadow.

 

3 - You're right...but almost all of his mysterious powers are explained away in aMoL and its shown that his "powers" are merely the result of being ta'averen and causing only good things to happen around him.

 

I think you're right that a lot of it was designed to raise tension, but it was overdone to the point that most people misinterpreted it entirely and the author had to correct it in the next book and say "hey waitasec...I didnt mean for rand to turn into superman, I just meant for him to receive his old memories back fully and that gave him a couple tricks up his sleeve".

[fionwe1987]

 

Let me explain myself a little then, without forcing you to picture my thought process too well, as the process is messy and the experience might be unpleasant.

First, I don't care much about plot resolutions.

Second, TGS contained Hinderstrap and fragments such as this one: "She felt it each time she thought of what this woman was doing to the institution she loved. " or "Egwene was all Ajahs" and plenty more. I don't care if it was written by Brandon or RJ. If such phrases were foodow7 products, I'd have spent half a day in the toilet. Sorry if somebody likes that style of writing. For me it was torture, especially the cheesiest plotline possible- Egwene's one.

 

Ah. Well, I guess, if I'm reading something for prose style, then I'm reading Nabokov, not a fantasy novel. Hinderstap was terrible, but I took that as BS' growing pains on writing Mat, which he got better with as time went by but never quite mastered. As to the Egwene stuff; agree to disagree -- I loved the White Tower reunification, and Egwene was easily my favorite female character in the last three books, after having mostly been indifferent to her earlier in the series. Her death really, really pained me in aMoL, because she was really the only female character I truly hoped would live to see the other side of the last battle -- I much rather would have seen Nynaeve, Cadsuane, Aviendha, Elayne, and Tuon die in the most ignoble ways possible than see Egwene die. 

Egwene's death was particularly effective because of all the characters, she was the one with the clearest plans for the future. All through her reign as Amyrlin, she's been the one to not just plan for the Last Battle and leave it at that. She planned a lot for after. And that makes her dying so much tougher. Though it may well by that by dying so heroically, she cemented her legacy, and assured support for her reformist ideas. After all, nothing adds weight to your ideas more than dying a legend.

[MarkDiLillo]

 

I'm really glad that type of thing didn't happen earlier in the series; it's what made me stop reading A Song of Ice and Fire after the first book and a half. If characters are just going to be randomly dying everywhere, I'm not going to let myself make any emotional attachments to any of them, and then what's the point of an epic fantasy series? 

 

As it is, I don't think I'm ever going to be able to do another WoT reread, because knowing that Egwene dies in the end will make it impossible to read any of the scenes involving her in earlier books since she just ended up dying anyway and all the effort I put into caring about her was a waste.

 

An odd approach. It's possible to form emotional attachments to characters and this to add to the experience of reading when they die: it hurts, showing you are invested in the story and the writer was successful in drawing you into the series. Egwene's death in particular comes after fourteen novels of her being around and having lots of storylines and doing important things, and her death is the catalyst for Rand's victory (or the most notable one). Egwene earns her death scene as much as any of the characters in ASoIaF earn theirs.

 

The use of character death in ASoIaF is more effective, however, as they come early in the series and raise the stakes. There is tension if you don't know if the character you are reading about will live or die. WoT gave way too many characters invincible plot armour earlier in the series, and whilst many of the deaths in AMoL are effective it also feels a little obvious to hold back on major character deaths until the last 300 pages of the entire series (and let's be honest, apart from Egwene, some of the villains and arguably Gawyn and Siuan, most of the deaths were of second and third tier characters at best).

 

Ya I actually prefer the WoT style over GRRMs style.  I really disliked getting attached to a character and wanting to read more from his perspective and then having him killed.  I agree that leaving ALL of the deaths to the last 300 pages wasn't necessarily the best approach either though.

 

I personally just didn't enjoy reading GRRM very much.  I could appreciate his style and quality of writing though - just found it hard to enjoy for very long.

[neverspeakawordagain]

Indeed. I would add that the many character "revivals" removed some value from the ending. Faile, Galad, Lan... all these people seemingly "died". Then they were shown to be alive again. Its kind of cheapened the end a little. For a cataclysmic, world-ending battle, the body count among the major characters was less than it could have been. In fact, I felt that Perrin's character arc, in particular, was ill served with Faile's return, and Faile's own heroism given a less fitting end.

 

Real life does not have happy endings. Entertainment like the Wheel of Time exists to allow us to vicariously believe that happy endings are possible. If I want to read stories of good people dying, I'll look in a newspaper. 

 

That said, I totally wouldn't have minded Faile dying, because she was a terrible, terrible character.

[fionwe1987]

Fionewe:

 

1 - I dont buy that one at all.  If that was the goal behind Moridin spouting off how Rand did something then it was done very poorly.  It reminded me of the dialogue in a bad movie where the bad guy proceeds to announce how the good guy did some amazing trick before their final confrontation.

I don't feel the same way, sorry.

 

2 - Yes, a very skilled and powerful channeler.  I dont know that people felt he had "unlimited" power, but when you combine that scene with the darkfriends clawing their eyes out, Brandon saying it is very significant that he was channeling Light, his actions at the White Tower meeting Egwene, and Egwene mentioning that she felt he could have broken a shield without a problem....it paints a pretty clear picture that Rand is very much more powerful than he once was and indeed has some type of new mystery powers that he can use against the shadow.

But it was significant. Its extremely significant that a ta'veren is able to direct his nature into particular results. It is very important that the Dark One's influence has become so strong that the balance is to have Rand achieve all these good results. How is this trivial?

3 - You're right...but almost all of his mysterious powers are explained away in aMoL and its shown that his "powers" are merely the result of being ta'averen and causing only good things to happen around him.

"Merely"? Its the perfect explanation. It doesn't violate the rules of the series, yet shows what Rand has truly become capable of. I think entirely too many people invested into ideas of Rand having some special new powers. That was not even hinted at.

I think you're right that a lot of it was designed to raise tension, but it was overdone to the point that most people misinterpreted it entirely and the author had to correct it in the next book and say "hey waitasec...I didnt mean for rand to turn into superman, I just meant for him to receive his old memories back fully and that gave him a couple tricks up his sleeve".

It was overdone only in that we didn't get his viewpoint earlier. And I think the battle at Maradon was a little ridiculous, for just Rand and an angreal. It was fine, otherwise.

[MarkDiLillo]

Indeed. I would add that the many character "revivals" removed some value from the ending. Faile, Galad, Lan... all these people seemingly "died". Then they were shown to be alive again. Its kind of cheapened the end a little. For a cataclysmic, world-ending battle, the body count among the major characters was less than it could have been. In fact, I felt that Perrin's character arc, in particular, was ill served with Faile's return, and Faile's own heroism given a less fitting end.

 

Think about it: Isn't "was last seen riding away to divert thousands of Trollocs from getting their hands on the Horn" so much more evocative of the desperation of this battle than "was last seen having survived a Trolloc charge with a broken leg"?

 

The only one I agree with is Faile.  Her death would have added another much needed punch of realism to the story.  I really liked the endings for most of the rest though.  Especially Lan...the guy we thought was most dead managed to pull through and somewhat be the crux of the whole story.

[fionwe1987]

 

Indeed. I would add that the many character "revivals" removed some value from the ending. Faile, Galad, Lan... all these people seemingly "died". Then they were shown to be alive again. Its kind of cheapened the end a little. For a cataclysmic, world-ending battle, the body count among the major characters was less than it could have been. In fact, I felt that Perrin's character arc, in particular, was ill served with Faile's return, and Faile's own heroism given a less fitting end.

 

Real life does not have happy endings. Entertainment like the Wheel of Time exists to allow us to vicariously believe that happy endings are possible. If I want to read stories of good people dying, I'll look in a newspaper. 

 

That said, I totally wouldn't have minded Faile dying, because she was a terrible, terrible character.

I disagree that that is the purpose of stories like WoT. And disliking a character is a terrible reason to want them dead.

[MarkDiLillo]

And ya, honestly if you scaled the battle at Maradon down a few notches then I could buy the rest.  Maradon really just made it clear that he was beyond a normal channeler now.  The exact textual descriptions said that the asha'man was seeing more weaves an anywhere he ever has before and it was as if he was an army of channelers.  Very misleading.

[fionwe1987]

And ya, honestly if you scaled the battle at Maradon down a few notches then I could buy the rest.  Maradon really just made it clear that he was beyond a normal channeler now.  The exact textual descriptions said that the asha'man was seeing more weaves an anywhere he ever has before and it was as if he was an army of channelers.  Very misleading.

I could just be that Naeff meant he'd never seen one person weave so much at once. That didn't come through, of course. It could have been like Leanne being shocked at Egwene throwing up twelve humungous columns of fire. Barring what Rand did at Maradon (which we don't have a good description of anyway), that holds the record for the largest number of big weaves spun at once, IIRC. Rand could simply have been doing something similar.

[neverspeakawordagain]

I disagree that that is the purpose of stories like WoT. And disliking a character is a terrible reason to want them dead.

 

From my favorite author, a quote you'll probably enjoy: "Some people -- and I am one of them -- hate happy ends. We feel cheated. Harm is the norm. Doom should not jam. The avalanche stoppin its tracks a few feet above the cowering village behaves not only unnaturally but unethically." -- Vladimir Nabokov.

 

For "great literature," however you define that, I think that idea holds. But for The Wheel of Time -- which is, at its core, a children's story; I started reading it at age 15 when A Crown of Swords came out, and I already felt I was too old for the series -- it doesn't. This story is written in the tradition of medieval romance tales like the Arthurian legends and the works of the Pearl Poet, where virtue is always rewarded and vice is always punished. The Wheel of Time is, at its core, an extremely, almost unimaginably detailed world created to house a simple morality tale. Under those circumstances, disliking a character isn't just a good reason to want them dead; it's basically the only reason. 

[MarkDiLillo]

lol

 

youre right in everything you said but how you jump to that conclusion in your last sentence boggles my mind.