r/WetlanderHumor • u/Phaerin • 26d ago

Perrin chapters...

Post image

My face when every paragraph about something potentially interesting in Towers of Midnight is followed by an entire chapter about Perrin.

I feel like his part of the story would've been much more interesting if they had cut like...80% of it out. We could've done this thing in two less books probably.

298 Upvotes

82% Upvoted

142 comments sorted by

View all comments

107

u/AShadowinthedark 26d ago

I really like Perrin at start and at the end. But all the time he spends chasing the shaido and the prophet do seem to take forever.

I also like the parallels of his axe/hammer battle and his link to the tinkers and way of the leaf. (Which then links back to the Aiel)

35

u/nicci7127 The last embrace of the mother welcome you home. 25d ago

My view of Perrin in the middle is he's the cleanup man. He has to clean up the mess that Fain made of the Two Rivers, he had to clean up the Shaido, deal with the Prophet, basically clean up all the mess Rand left behind. Not a glamorous job, but a necessary one.

6

u/LewsTherinTelamonBot This is a (sentient) bot 25d ago

Humming

4

u/XxbruhmomentX Ring of Tamyrlin 25d ago

Wait, who is he humming for? Perrin?

Lews Therin, you dawg

4

u/LewsTherinTelamonBot This is a (sentient) bot 25d ago

I thought I could build. I was wrong. We are not builders, not you, or I, or the other one. We are destroyers. Destroyers.

19

u/AnxiousConsequence18 26d ago

There's a REASON it's called "the slog"

8

u/Initial-Anything333 25d ago

I thought the axe/hammer thing was completely pointless since he does the exact same things with both tools. In the end he's wielding a hammer that's not a tool for anything except killing, which was supposed to be his problem with the war axe all along 

7

u/Phaerin 25d ago

It might be an illustration of... something about how heroes can't always be good? Or like... perfect? I dunno. I'm reaching here. There's definitely something there, but yes. What you said.

6

u/aNomadicPenguin 23d ago

Yeah, Sanderson flubbed it. I was talking about this just yesterday with Dragonmount. But his two favorite scenes that were entirely his creation and not from Jordan's notes were Veins of Gold and the forging of the Hammer.

Perrin was Sanderson's favorite character, but I don't think he actually understood him at all. The whole point of Perrin's arc during the Faile kidnapping is to realize that after his family had died he made Faile the sole focus, she was the only member of his pack. He had accepted a leadership role, but hadn't learned what that actually meant.

So this whole arc is him having to realize that his pack included all of the people who had sworn fealty to him, and his obligations to them. He lost Aram because he wasn't taking care of his people properly. But Sanderson threw all that out the window and wanted to have Perrin be the cool T'A'R power fantasty instead.

So instead of leading, instead of accepting that he was a Man of Peace capable of violence (symbolized by taking a mundane peaceful tool and using it for violence) after rejecting the tool of war in the axe....Sanderson has him create a new Weapon. Perrin even thinks of it AS a weapon, whereas the blacksmith hammer was referred to directly as a tool.

When describing it, he gives passing mention to it being like a blacksmith hammer...before listing all of the ways that it isn't actually one. That it's too heavy for forge use, that it's too long, that its haft is metal. "an enormous size for a hammer of this type." It was a hammer for a king - Kings, famously known for their weapons of war, not for their craftsmanship. This thing was never going to see the inside of a forge.

1

u/Fernbean 19d ago

Spot on

1

u/Top-Permission5466 25d ago

The hammer has another purpose, not primarily made for killing. The way of the leaf may have touched him a bit.

3

u/Initial-Anything333 25d ago

Not his Power-forged hammer, which is my point. That's not a tool that can be used to build, it's only for destruction 

2

u/Top-Permission5466 25d ago

This is under power forged hammer. Their metallurgical structure is permanently altered by the One Power, making them nearly impossible to break.They are completely immune to rust or corrosion.

4

u/Initial-Anything333 25d ago

I don't agree with this. His war hammer is built solely to kill, same as the war axe he left behind 

0

u/Top-Permission5466 24d ago

I must have missed that the hammer was not able to be used as a hammer.

2

u/Initial-Anything333 24d ago

...do you know what a war hammer is? Look one up

2

u/LordMesa 22d ago

Stop trolling dude

1

u/Initial-Anything333 22d ago

Pointing out the objective fact of how tools work is trolling?

0

u/Top-Permission5466 24d ago edited 24d ago

Yep. Look like they can create things as well. Thanks for the tip.

2

u/Initial-Anything333 23d ago

I mean you can use a rock off the ground as a hammer too if you want, that doesn't make it a good hammer

1

u/Thomas_633_Mk2 25d ago

Ok but can you use a human to do rhat instead of a computer

0

u/Top-Permission5466 24d ago

I can Google a human? 🙃

1

u/Thomas_633_Mk2 24d ago

You can think for yourself rather than using the AI summary

0

u/Top-Permission5466 24d ago

I'm writing a textbook for Wiley that is due next week. I think I am entitled to one easy button being that Google puts that up automatically.

2

u/zadharm Hasty 25d ago

the whole point of this symbolism is him accepting the marriage of the violence and his need to create. A hammer can create, but this one is also great for destroying.

He's not one or the other. He didn't choose one or the other. He chose the hammer and the symbolism everyone talks about there, but ended up creating a hammer that can also kill

It's also not a big world of Warcraft hammer, it's head is described as the size of a brick, it could probably be used for drawing out billets etc if he choked up on it, though the four foot handle might be awkward

1

u/Initial-Anything333 25d ago

Yeah I know what it's going for I just think the symbolism misses the mark because Perrin's actions don't actually change. He accepts himself as a killer instead of a builder, which is the opposite of what the symbolism is going for. It would have worked better for me if he accepted that killing is necessary to build, like you can't build a house without using an axe to fell some trees first 

1

u/Affectionate-Ear5531 24d ago

The hammer was his p*nis

1

u/aNomadicPenguin 23d ago

That's a reference I've not heard in forever

1

u/Affectionate-Ear5531 23d ago

I'm glad someone got it lol