I’ve been on a bit of a Death Gate kick so I wanna talk (for a long time apparently wow) about the romances in the series, especially the treatment of women in the romances
Loved all of this. Orla/Alfred is probably my most favorite romance in the books, as I feel it gives both of them growth, and delves into Orla’s character pretty well. Also that it showed how they are both pretty similar in a lot of ways, actually? They’re very passive people that know that things within their societies aren’t correct, but are also hesitant to change it. Orla tried to do so, and it only resulted in some of her people getting sent to the Labyrinth instead. Alfred tried in other ways, such as with Bane, and it failed him hard. Honestly, them vowing to go together and take their exile by Samah just- It showed how far they’d come! And then the authors ruined it by killing Orla off because why not. (I am very bitter about this STILL).
Haplo/Marit go through their own growths, too, and yeah, Marit paralleled Haplo’s own journey very much. Just, I really really wished they hadn’t imposed the weird husband/wife thing with her and Xar? It didn’t? Really need to do that?? They’d already done this with Iridal/Sinistrad, and Orla/Samah, so it was, pretty redundant by this point. Also that whole rune-binding scene was awkward, and kinda made me dislike both of them for a while. I liked Marit afterwards, but that scene totally soured me on everything. (Also, if Xar had that ability, why didn’t he just use it on Haplo before? IT’S VERY CONVENIENT, WHY DIDN’T HE? Answer: the authors just pulled that out of nowhere.)
Pryan relationships were the most uninteresting of the bunch, especially with how sudden these relationships were. And I liked Aleatha and Drugar, but again, SUDDEN. I’d rather it have been a friendship instead of one-sided romance, but well, Pryan likes its romance.
Jonathan and Jera is actually something I wanted to write about one day - dunno, there’s a lot to build off of I think. Also, “Haplo found her attractive too, and blamed Alfred for him finding a Sartan attractive.” Well, there was that one section in Fire Sea where Alfred was dancing and Haplo was -entranced- so hey, maybe, haha.
The King and Queen of Arianus I hadn’t thought about too much, but I’m starting to get intrigued now. It was a rather nice surprise happy ending for them both, wasn’t it?
Heck yeah, I always thought there was more that could have been done with Orla after the fourth book and instead they just killed her, like???? All that character development and focus on her character, making her the most developed female character up to that point, and she just gets killed offscreen???????? But yeah those are some good points about Orla
THE WEIRD RUNE-BINDING THING WITH XAR AND MARIT. Like, it was doubly weird because they’d already established that the Patryns had a “marriage” ritual and then it was weirdly retconned, like “oh well this is even MORE intimate even though we already said that that ceremony was already ridiculously rare” and also, yes, it would have made so much more sense for Xar to do it with Haplo, but then they couldn’t have given it all those uncomfortably sexual vibes (well, they could have, but then it’d be gay and uncomfortably sexual, not to mention vaguely incestuous) and obviously that wouldn’t do.
Honestly Aleatha and Drugar would have been awesome as just a friendship, and I prefer to read it that way, viewing Drugar’s feelings as primarily friendship even if there’s a crush involved there, too. It worked for their character arcs to give Drugar a crush on her, but also meh, you know.
Jonathan and Jera have a lot of potential tbh, it just isn’t fulfilled because Jera dies. I would have liked to see how her character could have been expanded otherwise, and her relationship with Jonathan, too. And lol, I think there’s an actual line where Haplo’s like “Jera would be a good partner in the Labyrinth, wait, what did I just think, damn you Alfred” and it’s like. Okay then.
And idk I just really like the King and Queen, their story made me smile a lot even though it was so small :)
Man, I’ll always be so bitter about Orla’s story though, just so much potential thrown to the wayside because the authors had written themselves into a corner with her (at least I’m assuming). I don’t totally resent that she was a tragic character, just… they could have done it better?? I once read a fanfic where it still went through with her death, but instead of being trapped in the Labyrinth with Alfred, she had been exiled by herself, with no hope of ever getting back. So she was stuck in a bad place with no support, cut off from everyone, so the circumstances of her death I thought made more sense there. BUT, that’s fanfic, and the book authors instead just wrote her off in such a lazy way, arrgghh.(But an AU where she lives though, ah, that would be something).
Haha, it would’ve been very uncomfortable with Haplo and Xar with the rune binding, which is why I very much believe they came up with that at the very last minute. They should’ve just not inputted it at all, because it also makes one of the few highlights of Elven Star just… not seem as important anymore. That Haplo flashback to the marriage ritual was one of my favorites, but now there’s RUNE-BINDING for SUPER BONDING, and it’s like, man whatever. I’m just looking at the rune-binding as something Xar mostly made up for his own purposes (which he apparently used plenty of times), or something that was a more invasive corrupted version of the marriage ritual (which is already called a binding ceremony anyway). Because I love that marriage ritual and I wanna keep it with the vows and everything plz.
I forgot to mention this before, but yeah, the Haplo/Alake was all the NOPE for me. lol Haplo, why you gotta do this? I guess it foreshadowed that Xar, which he imagined telling him to take advantage of the situation, is a huge creeper. Moment of weakness for him, I’ll get past that for Haplo, but STILL THAT WAS WEIRD.
Johnathan and Jera situation kinda catches my attention since we never see Jera again after Fire Sea, and I keep kinda wondering why Johnathan was basically the chosen one/messiah for that world. Keep playing with the idea that they interact again after Haplo and Alfred leave, and maybe that’s why we don’t see her afterwards? (It’s a plot bunny that keeps teasing me).
And lol, I think there’s an actual line where Haplo’s like “Jera would be a good partner in the Labyrinth, wait, what did I just think, damn you Alfred” and it’s like. Okay then.
Haplo just constantly blames Alfred for these vague moments of attraction it’s hilarious. And they’re always just randomly thrown out there too. Or when just thinking about Alfred in general. Pretty sure in Serpent Mage he compared the color of his runes to Alfred’s eyes please. (I could swear he did this in Elven Star, too, comparing the sky to his eyes before). Haplo, you and your Alfred obsession.
Yeah, it’s not really so much Orla’s death that makes me :/ as much as the wasted potential there. Like, come on. After all the attention and development in the fourth book, you’re just gonna kill her offscreen? Weird choice.
“One of the few highlights to Elven Star” EXACTLY lol, Elven Star is honestly my least favorite one, it felt so disjointed from the others? It pretty much felt like it was there to 1. Introduce Pryan as a Thing that Exists and 2. Set Haplo up for the beginning of his character development in Fire Sea. I mean, it’s got themes of its own that it explores, like every book, but… yeah, not my favorite entry. But the binding ceremony was one of the few details that I liked, and then, like you said, they kinda threw that away for RUNE-BINDING. DOUBLE MAXIMUM SOUL-BONDING. I could almost see Xar having just made it up except that for some reason it seems to be an established part of Patryn culture, which is ALREADY weird considering the regular binding ceremony was made out as super rare already. Yeah, I’ve never liked that explanation, that’s for sure.
Haplo/Alake is a world of NOPE like. ‘Nuff said there tbh. Do not pass go, do not collect $200.
Also I REMEMBER THAT LINE ABOUT ALFRED’S EYES and being just. Did I just read that? He’s so obsessed with Alfred, it’s insane. I think my other favorite instance of that kind of thing is when Haplo starts thinking about names and their meanings in the sixth book, because Marit’s just told him that there are like a million Rues or whatever, and suddenly Haplo is all affronted that Alfred has never told him his true name. Even though he had no reason ever to do so??? lmao it’s fantastic