[KeithF]

I get that plenty of the characters don't care about 'saving the world', and that all the small squabbles are realistic. It just seemed pointless to spend so much time on this particular set of squabbles in the penultimate book. The Bolkando subplot was similar but handled much more quickly and sensibly: they try to screw the Bonehunters' allies over for a quick buck, they fail and get clobbered, the sensible queen and her legion join up, the end, all over in a few dozen pages. We didn't get fourteen different POV characters with interchangeable motivations just for that one subplot.

[worry]

There's that word again.

[cerveza_fiesta]

I kinda liked the conclusion of the barghast subplot.

The description of everybody freezing to death from their own POV was effing great first-off. The part where barghast whassisname leader-guy chops at somebody and his hand shatters off...totally awesome.

Thought it was totally fitting that they should end like that. An entire race of people who were so concerned with their own petty infighting and personal glory that they just glossed over the overwhelming and obvious threats to their existence from all sides, when they should have been listening to reason the whole time. In the end all the effort expended in the minor power struggles availed them naught and they weren't able to save themselves from themselves.

The only ones who did listen to reason (the strahl) are in horrible shape and still have enemies and elements working against them even though they temporarily avoided mass-death.

Good analogy for the current human race vs. climate change deal. We're all so concerned with the politics and economics and arguing fine scientific details that the glaring obvious "we're totally screwed" fact is consistently glossed over. If there is an environmental disaster on a mass scale, the ones who are left are not going to be in very good shape either.

This post has been edited by cerveza_fiesta: 31 May 2010 - 02:47 PM

[Cartographer]

cerveza_fiesta, on 31 May 2010 - 02:45 PM, said:

I kinda liked the conclusion of the barghast subplot.

The description of everybody freezing to death from their own POV was effing great first-off. The part where barghast whassisname leader-guy chops at somebody and his hand shatters off...totally awesome.

Thought it was totally fitting that they should end like that. An entire race of people who were so concerned with their own petty infighting and personal glory that they just glossed over the overwhelming and obvious threats to their existence from all sides, when they should have been listening to reason the whole time. In the end all the effort expended in the minor power struggles availed them naught and they weren't able to save themselves from themselves.

The only ones who did listen to reason (the strahl) are in horrible shape and still have enemies and elements working against them even though they temporarily avoided mass-death.

Good analogy for the current human race vs. climate change deal. We're all so concerned with the politics and economics and arguing fine scientific details that the glaring obvious "we're totally screwed" fact is consistently glossed over. If there is an environmental disaster on a mass scale, the ones who are left are not going to be in very good shape either.

Agreed 100% on the analogy part. The Barghast got what they deserved, IMHO.

And Tool definitely is in my list of favorite characters from the series. Despite the pointlessness of the Barghasts plot in light of the 'bigger picture', for me the story was extremely tragic, and in many ways, easily relates to real-life. Too few people care about the things that really matter, after all, while the rest of society blindly blunders forward caught up in what they believe is right. And once again. Tool.

I never was really a fan of the Barghast, and (back to the topic), I can definitely say that Hetan's hobbling made me dislike them even more so. Add that onto their extremely arrogant/ignorant ways, and what they did to Tool (not just his corpse, but everything in general), and I will once again say this. The Barghast got what they deserved.

[worry]

But Hetan was a Barghast. So did she get what she deserved?

[Soulessdreamer]

worrywort, on 01 June 2010 - 05:28 AM, said:

But Hetan was a Barghast. So did she get what she deserved?

Frankly, yes.

not because anyone deserves what happens to her but because she knew what was coming and did nothing which totally went against what we had seen of her character previously).

Not only did she know what would happen to her but she knew what would happen to her kids and still she allowed it to happen.

She had what three days to run or prepare some lectric cool aid or plan to go down fighting but no she violated all the trust and faith tool and her kids had place in her by mmekly submiting.

She was complicit in her own hobbling and the intended murder and rape of her children...... so, yes.

TTFN

[worry]

Gotcha, she deserved what happened to her, despite the fact that nobody deserves what happened to her. And clinical depression caused by the loss of one's spouse is the loophole.

[Soulessdreamer]

she got what she deserved in that she surendered to what was going to happen and made the same decision for her kids which was a betrayal of the worst kind.

she deserved the consequences of her discision even while simultaniously not deserving as a human being as a woman to be mutalated and raped.

Thats as clear as I can make my thinking/reaction to this scene.

TTFN

[cerveza_fiesta]

Can't agree with you on that.

Definitely don't think she betrayed anybody. First off, she's pretty effing sad cause her love was killed. If she fought, they would have brought in some dudes and hobbled her anyway. If she ran, they would have caught her and still hobbled her, especially if she were traveling with 3 kids.

I think she recognized it was a sure thing after tool's death that she no longer had allies and no real option. Recognizing suicide as the pussy's way out, she chose to bear the dishonor. Didn't like it mind you, but she bore it.

Doesn't make her personally deserve it ever though...and that scene still disturbs me.

The scene just contributed to the barghasts' deservedness of what happened to them as a race. They have lost sight the bigger picture so completely that they are collectively willing to squander as great a resource as Hetan (great warrior and leader) and sacrifice basic human morality just to take revenge on Tool - which of course they were all too chicken to do while he was alive.

Definitely sticking with my barghast = human race analogy. Not any subsection in particular, they're kind of a collection of the worst parts of a lot of human civilizations.

[L'oric]

I saw the entire Barghast storyline as a failing of Tool's, but I can certainly see a bunch of fault Hetan's way. Still doesnt mean that Hetan got what she "deserved" though.

Tool was a horrible mortal leader. Since I love him as a character so much I hope he gains some measure of wisdom still. I don't see anyone but Draconus being able to stand up to him and talk some sense into that young whipper snapper.

Sincerely

[worry]

If she didn't deserve what happened to her, do they "as a race" deserve what happened to them? If she's a victim of their brutal, warlike culture, are they not all victims of their brutal, warlike culture? If Hetan is the exception to the rule, isn't that rule just as awful for everybody else? If the Barghast did deserve it, what lesson is to be gained from that? Don't deserve it? Do the most dysfunctional deserve the least sympathy, the most antipathy? I suppose that makes Draconus a hero. And no doubt there were petty squabbles, cruelty, and indeed brutality among Kallor's subjects.

[L'oric]

worrywort, on 01 June 2010 - 05:14 PM, said:

If she didn't deserve what happened to her, do they "as a race" deserve what happened to them? If she's a victim of their brutal, warlike culture, are they not all victims of their brutal, warlike culture? If Hetan is the exception to the rule, isn't that rule just as awful for everybody else? If the Barghast did deserve it, what lesson is to be gained from that? Don't deserve it? Do the most dysfunctional deserve the least sympathy, the most antipathy? I suppose that makes Draconus a hero. And no doubt there were petty squabbles, cruelty, and indeed brutality among Kallor's subjects.

Not that this was asked of me specifically but I would like to give my opinion on it. Does a race deserve to be wiped out because of their wanton self destructive morality? No in and of itself. If you see their destruction as an oppurtunity to regrow from a sprout into something less twisted then the answer is a yes. Sometimes the forest must catch fire in order for the forest to expand and stay healthy for the centuries to come. I think enough of the barghast are alive to maintain their identity in the near future and maybe that will be enough in the long haul.

I can't bring myself to think of Draconus as a hero. Just because some of his actions might become or are heroic does not make him one. Will he and Tool face each other? I hope so and I hope the meeting is much like Travelers and Karsa's but with some enlightenment coming to both of them. Though from the last couple scenes from Draconus I see him as more knowledgeable about existence and its whys and wheretofores than he was before his time in the sword.

Sincerely,

[foolio]

Soulessdreamer, on 01 June 2010 - 08:07 AM, said:

worrywort, on 01 June 2010 - 05:28 AM, said:

But Hetan was a Barghast. So did she get what she deserved?

Frankly, yes.

not because anyone deserves what happens to her but because she knew what was coming and did nothing which totally went against what we had seen of her character previously).

Not only did she know what would happen to her but she knew what would happen to her kids and still she allowed it to happen.

She had what three days to run or prepare some lectric cool aid or plan to go down fighting but no she violated all the trust and faith tool and her kids had place in her by mmekly submiting.

She was complicit in her own hobbling and the intended murder and rape of her children...... so, yes.

TTFN

I am going to have to agree with soulless dreamer. I think something else that is damning to Hetan is that she was part of the ruling class and stood by while these horrible acts were used as a tool of intimidation and horror upon others prior to her being the victim. She was a member of the ruling elite for a while leading up to this, so in effect I think she is somehow complicit on how horrible the barghast were. She was also clearly a horrible politician, not that there is anything wrong with that. But to go from being the daughter of clearly a popular leader to someone with no alies whatsoever shows that she was either out of touch or just amazingly crappy at tribal politics.

Just my opinion, but if you are a parent worth your salt, nothing excuses innaction in defense of your children. Sure she was sad about tools death, but she is a miserable failure for not trying something to save her kids. I would rather die on the run or even starve to death in the wilds than subject my children to being raped and killed by my enemies....Man alive am I glad the Barghast were destroyed.


All and all I was extremely dissapointed in how lame Tool and Hetans decision making process was leading to their demise.


Flame away people

[worry]

It's easy to say she let down her kids, but being "sad" and being depressed are two different things. Would a mother suffering from postpartum depression deserve what Hetan got? And what does being the daughter of the former chief have to do with responsibility for the entire culture? Should she have traveled back in time to change whatever pathways culminated in modern Barghast tradition? I don't see how you can reconcile the two notions that the Barghast were horrible for hobbling Hetan AND she deserved it. If she deserved it, how is what they did wrong? If what they did was wrong, how did she deserve it?

[Soulessdreamer]

worrywort, on 01 June 2010 - 07:26 PM, said:

It's easy to say she let down her kids, but being "sad" and being depressed are two different things. Would a mother suffering from postpartum depression deserve what Hetan got?

They get arrested and held accountable for their actions just as Hetan is accountable for hers.

worrywort, on 01 June 2010 - 07:26 PM, said:

And what does being the daughter of the former chief have to do with responsibility for the entire culture? Should she have traveled back in time to change whatever pathways culminated in modern Barghast tradition?

She was apart of not only the culture and therefore complicit but in a position of power where she did nothing to change tradition.

worrywort, on 01 June 2010 - 07:26 PM, said:

I don't see how you can reconcile the two notions that the Barghast were horrible for hobbling Hetan AND she deserved it. If she deserved it, how is what they did wrong? If what they did was wrong, how did she deserve it?

What the barghast did was wrong but Hetan chose to go along with it. Silence is consent. And she chose to give her children to that to by not running or taking there lives.

She gave up and gave in surrendered her fate and that of her children and for a mother let alone a human that is unforgivable

@C_F you say she chose to bare the dishonour but I disagree. maybe you wuold like to see her suffering as some valiant martyrdom but it wasn't, it was a pointless stupid death in which she compromised all of her integrity, honour, trust and duty.

TTFN

[Illuyankas]

Your most cherished loved one dies. Suddenly while you're still grieving your friends and neighbours burst in and cut off your feet and rape you repeatedly for days. You're saying that because she didn't think "My husband is dead, better run and get chased down and watch my kids get murdered or raped in front of me before the same happens to me BUT IT'S OK BECAUSE I RESISTED" but instead went "My husband is dead, partly because I didn't take the bait he gave me so it's partly my fault, which makes it all my fault, and I'm so griefstricken that I have no time for all this political bullshit" she deserves - genuinely DESERVES - to be raped into insanity? Are you seriously saying that?

And opposed to the pointless stupid death she would have suffered if she'd done ANYTHING AT ALL?




I kind of feel I'm the only person who read the part where Tool and Hetan tried to abolish hobbling but the rest of the Barghast said no because they're bastards.

[worry]

Nah, I recall that fairly distinctly.

@SoullessDreamer - Women with postpartum depression aren't routinely arrested and punished. I'm not sure what you're saying there. What position of power was she in? Widow to the former, mostly hated, pacifist, non-Barghast, decidedly interim chief? And I don't think I can even let "silence is consent" sit inside my brain long enough to counter it, in fear for my health.

[L'oric]

Illuyankas, on 02 June 2010 - 12:06 AM, said:

I kind of feel I'm the only person who read the part where Tool and Hetan tried to abolish hobbling but the rest of the Barghast said no because they're bastards.

thats my biggest problem with Tool's rule of the barghast. His fist was not the iron fist of change but the soft hand of friendship and that got the barghast what it got them.

I love tool. Hetan was ok/good. But together they were worse at ruling than Laseen, and I thought she made a very poor ruler. Tool was never one for command and it showed.

Sincerely

[maro]

worrywort, on 02 June 2010 - 12:17 AM, said:

Nah, I recall that fairly distinctly.

@SoullessDreamer - Women with postpartum depression aren't routinely arrested and punished. I'm not sure what you're saying there. What position of power was she in? Widow to the former, mostly hated, pacifist, non-Barghast, decidedly interim chief? And I don't think I can even let "silence is consent" sit inside my brain long enough to counter it, in fear for my health.

It's a book Worrywort, not real life

[worry]

It's a book in real life, and we're talking about it in real life.