Another spoiler from the new novel I am confused about and hope we get more incite on in Shadowlands:
Spoilers
In the book we have Thrall go to Hyjal to meet Tyrande and she is all mad, rightfully so, and basically says the Horde got off easy with no punishment after what they did to the Night Elves and tells Thrall that words mean nothing and to bring her Sylvanas’s head…
Okay but like… Why isn’t Tyrande looking for Sylvanas? Why is she just chilling in Hyjal? Why wouldn’t she be like find Sylvanas and tell me where she is or bring her to me so I can kill her?
Another thing! Sira ends up turned over to the Alliance and put into the Stockades in Stormwind. Tyrande goes to speak with her along with Shandris, and Maiev I think. Anyways, Tyrande almost kills her and all that. My question is if Tyrande isn’t answering Stormwind’s missives, giving Anduin the finger basically, why would she just up and go to Stormwind? Seems strange to me. Also why does she get mad at Sira and try to kill her when in the Night Warrior scenario she wants Sira and Delaryn to fight the Val’kyr and come back to the Night Elven side?
I am confused.
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I think your mistake was expecting good writing, or even consistency, out of a videogame tie in novel.
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Not sure how to spoiler text, so I’ll be as vague as possible.
Historically speaking, WarCraft has never been a setting in which consequences for actions are a thing. Biggest testament to that I can think of off the top of my head is Alterac. A literal nation that was shattered during the Second War and no one bothered to even try to reform it save for one attempt by Deathwing himself as part of a plot.
But that’s okay, because it turns out all the surviving nobles of the kingdom were evil and all just straight up sided with the demon worshiping Shadow Council.
Genn Greymane is another example. Man sealed off his nation at the height of the Scourge Plague, fought a Civil War over that fact, but when the Worgen curse descended on Gilneas, nobody really brought up the fact the reason the curse ran rampant through the populace is due to Greymane being an isolationist. Indeed, that’s never played into his character at all since.
Doomhammer (You knew I was getting to him eventually). Authorized the creation of the original Death Knights. Desecrated Churches and Elven Runestones to forcibly mutate Ogres. Abandoned his forces at Blackrock Mountain after assassinating…excuse me…“fighting an honorable duel” with Anduin Lothar. Most damning of all - despite being literally shouted about being one of the “Good Orcs”…had Gul’dan dead to rights and let. him. live.
Got a city named after him.
So yeah, WarCraft is by no means concerned with consequences.
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I’m gonna defend my man Greymane here. The Worgen curse was not his fault, that was on Arugal and Alpha Prime. Arugal thought he could control the Worgen, Genn believed him, surprise he couldn’t.
Arugal ended up becoming a puppet to Alpha Prime, the first Worgen, who then began his mission of turning every person in Gilneas into a Worgen so that he could then go attack Teldrassil and kill Malfurion. I don’t see how that is Genn’s fault.
But overall I do agree with your post it does seem that people don’t pay for their actions which gets old after awhile.
He believed Arugal in the first place, and opted not to monitor the situation. It makes Genn from being incredibly indifferent to comically inept.
Man was the ruler of the greatest Human nation opposite Lordaeron. A lot of WarCraft 2’s Alliance narrative is trying to court Gilneas (and even then they don’t join up until the war is effectively won). He sealed up his country before the Scourge could advance into it. He was poised to march out and take the entire Eastern Kingdoms for himself.
And he squandered it all, resulting in the modern Greymane being nothing more than the Wrynn Family’s pet Dog.
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Well this is because Blizzard has a hard on for Stormwind and the Wrynn family. That’s not Genn’s fault he is now Anduin’s lapdog.
They did the same with Varian and all his human potential where the Night Elves “needed” Varian to save them. Rolls eyes
This is true, but in this light, it’s pointless to examine or judge the actions of any character. They all do whatever Blizzard wants them to, often in the service of contrived narratives and in defiance of their previously-established character traits. It’s not Anduin’s fault that he attacked Undercity without gasmasks, either.
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To say nothing of laying siege to a city deep within Horde controlled territory without controlling said territory beforehand. It’s a good thing Sylvanas decided to just be cute with the Blight and not recall the forces in Silverpine and Gilneas and have the Blood Elf military - including Silvermoon’s garrison - just teleport into the courtyard via the Translocation Orb.
I haven’t seen a military fiasco on that scale since Game of Thrones decided the Infantry line starts BEHIND the artillery.
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Did that actually happen in GOT? I think the last episode I watched was Arya getting her final revenge on Walder Frey.
It’s kind of ironic how a franchise so concerned with factions at war can be so inept at writing the logistics of a single battle.
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Yup. Also sending the Shock Cavalry out at night, against an enemy that sees in the dark.
Season 8 was just a masterpiece, let me tell you. Makes me glad I wrote off the books years ago (Literally ran out of people to root for).
I’m still mad about season 8 whenever I see anything about it
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How bad are the books in relation to the series?
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I long ago wrote off Martin’s work as “Fantasy Shlock”. Take every trope common to fantasy writing and subvert it. That is how George R.R. Martin do. It’s fatalistic and nihilistic in its outlook, how otherwise intelligent people get worked over by a stupidity bat due to noble ideals and morals. Martin saw Spaceballs’ “Evil will always triumph because Good is dumb” line and took it as gospel.
Books hooked me in college with the opening prologue featuring two members of the Night Watch encountering White Walkers. Three books later that was their only real appearance more or less. The premise got me through three books so it’s not like it was bad writing, it’s just as the plot crawled along the cracks in the narrative became more and more apparent. And the characters themselves - those that weren’t dying every other chapter, that is - were just growing more and more unlikable. The fact Martin blew through so many characters he had to resort to making the (attempted) child murdering man who was sleeping with his own sister a focus character (As the books chapters are from the perspective of individual characters and it jumps around) really was the final nail in the coffin for me. I understand his character gets more depth, but Jamie Lannister is not someone I really want to read about when our introduction to him is throwing a kid off a tower.
From what I understand, Sansa is much better in the show as opposed to the books. She’s quite possibly my least favorite character in literature. She’s the traditional fantasy tale audience stand-in, and Martin puts her through hell in the first three books and she never maddeningly loses her idealism in spite of actual assaults on both body and mind.
It’d be inspiring if it weren’t there solely for Martin to trot out some new horror to inflict upon the character. A giddy “Ha-ha, stupid trope. Look at how I subvert your expectations! Are you shocked, dear reader? I’m sure you are.”
But I digress, I could rant about the books and the overall story till I’m even more blue in the face. Sufficient to say I’m not a fan of that particular franchise and I’m not exactly heartbroken that popular culture dropped it like a bad habit.
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Not really much to add other than I agree. I used to be super into the books, read through the 5th and watched the show but after season 8 I just dont really care about any of it.
I’m also at a point where I simply dont care for needlessly miserable and nihilistic fiction anymore.
I’ve said it elsewhere but if I were given a choice between say Tangled or TLOU2 or GOT or any other fatalistic piece of work I’d rather watch Tangled.
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My feelings of ASOIAF was summed up in the Epic Rap Battle between Tolkein and Martin.
"We all know the world is full of chance and anarchy
so yes it’s true to life for characters to die randomly
but NEWS FLASH the genre’s called FANTASY
it’s meant to be UNREALISTIC you myopic manatee."
It basically felt like the fantasy genre version of the “Crime Game Sandbox” game genre. Everyone is rude, short lived, unlikable, nihilistic, ‘that’s Chinatown, Frank’ world where only the worst characters make it to the end scene that just left me disinterested and unattached to anything, so I didn’t really care about anything happening and had no further expectations.
If it wasn’t for Rory McCann’s charisma as The Hound and his chemistry with Maisie William’s Arya (prior to her becoming a cyber death ninja) during the “Arya and the Hound” subplot I wouldn’t have anything good to say about the series anymore.
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I’m just gonna assume the last lines she says are like a corrupted shade or something because I won’t accept that she became a Disney villain
The pragmatist in me feels like it has something to do with the idea of purging the Night Warrior from her given what we’ve seen and heard from the first Night Warrior.
The nihilist in me remembers how much Blizzard flat out hates Night Elves and their players
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I forgot about the Night Warrior thing making her extra mad, hopefully that’s it. I wish Tyrande could’ve just been mad without a ritual that apparently corrupts you so that you need to be cleansed of your anger but whatever
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