#david charleston bad metaphor syndrome

[ladyknightliveblogs]

Listen, I love the Battle of Hoth, but this chunk of book just keeps going forever.

I swear to god, every time Luke is saying goodbye to his dudes before a space battle, it’s SO GAY. The bit with Biggs in the last book and now Han, I just….ugh. so gay.

THE MOST GAY: “The young commander began to walk away as memories of exploits shared with Han rushed to his mind. He stopped and looked back at the Falcon, and saw his friend still staring after him. As they gazed at each other for a brief moment, Chewbacca looked up and knew that each was wishing the other the best, wherever their individual fates might take them.”

THE. MOST. GAY. THING. TO EVER HAPPEN. IN STAR WARS.

GOD LOOK AT THEM

Even with Chewie there to be like “yeah, those bros...no homo-ing their best wishes through long, lingering glances.....just dudes being pals.....”

Listen, minus the incest, Han, Luke, and Leia is a really great canon ot3 and you can’t stop me from saying that.

Also gay, but now with robots!!: “Artoo whistled and tooted a good-bye, then turned to roll down the ice corridor. Waving stiffly, Threepio watched as his stout and faithful friend moved away. To an observer, it may have seemed that Threepio grew misty-eyed, but then it wasn’t the first time he had gotten a drop of oil clogged before in his optical sensors.” 

Gay robots with bad syntax: what more could you possibly want from this series?

“But above all this activity and noise a strange sound could be heard, an ominous thumping that was coming nearer…” Listen, I know I use too many commas in my writing, but would it kill them to put a comma after their conditional clause??

Oh god. Okay, here we go: 

“There must have been a dozen of them resolutely advancing through the snow, looking like creatures out of some uncharted past. But they were machines, each if them stalking like enormous ungulates on four jointed legs. Walkers!”

There is so much happening here i cant even decide where to start. Ungulates???? The exclamation point on the one word paragraph. Dinosaur and ungulate similes within two sentences of each other.

Ungulates though.

The next paragraph is even wooorseeee:

“With a shock of recognition, the officer identified the Empire’s All Terrain Armored Transports. Each machine was formidably armed with cannons placed on its foreside like the horns of some prehistoric beast. Moving like mechanized pachyderms, the walkers emitted deadly fire from their turnstile guns and cannons.”

Listen, my dudes, are they ungulates, dinosaurs, or elephants? You have to pick one.

“For a moment, Luke thought of some of the simple tactics a farm boy might employ against a wild beast.” Whatever works for you, babe.

“whoea” is not a spelling I’ve sen before, but you do you, my man.

I love that Rebel is capitalized every time. Lends authority and…idk weight? to the organizaion?

!!!! Rogue Two has a name?? His name is Zev!? Who knew…

Every time they refer to lightsabers as “laser swords” I both die a little inside and laugh uncontrollably.

“Luke dropped hard to the snow and became unconscious.” I’m not sure what it is about the phrasing of that that’s so damn amusing, but…became unconscious. Sure.

I feel like the Hoth bit of the movie takes way less time than it’s taking here in the book. Not that I’m complaining–I love the battle of Hoth–but it feels…slow. The pacing is off. And I’m wondering how much of that is because visuals are so much quicker than words…

Anyway, I’ve an essay in me about how certain stories are better suited to certain mediums, but today is not the day for that essay.

I’m...really glad that they eventually standardized that the droids are referred to by their numbers in narration and their phoenetic spellings only in dialogue. Because every time I see “See-Threepio” written out, I die a bit. It’s so ridiculous.

and by “eventually” I mean “by the time they got around to the Force Awakens novelization and not a moment sooner.” 

[ladyknightliveblogs]

I was trying to stay off my computer, but still needed to liveblog, so have some more notes from my phone.

"for which Owen, a stolid man of the soil if ever there was one" listen, afaik moisture farmers don't really do much with soil per se? Do Earth epithet for farmers still apply on Tatooine?

Why does simply adding "unit" after "refrigerator" make it 99.99% more Sci-Fi?

"I don't think that man exists anymore. He died about the same time as your father." 1. You don’t THINK he exists but you know he died? Nice cover, Owen. 2. This line always punches me in the gut because from the same point of view that has Vader killing Anakin, this is also true: that Obi-Wan died with the rest of the Jedi, and that Ben took his place, sad and alone and careful and tired.

"...he scanned the rapidly darkening horizons for something small, metallic, three-legged, and out of its mechanical mind." Hey, you leave R2 alone, he's seen some Shit (tm). He’s allowed to be a lil crazy.

wtf tusken raiders are cyborgs? Wtf. Who knew.

"As [the raiders] traded vociferous opinions in a language consisting mostly of consonants..." idk I love this sentence look how absurd it is I LOVE IT

“[Each Bantha] was as large as a small dinosaur.” damn George, back at it again with those David Charleston metaphors.

“urged on by their anxious, equally outrageous mahouts.” There’s a lot going on here. One, the use of the word mahouts. Two, that George is calling the sandpeople and their banthas outrageous. Third, the use of the word mahouts.

Threepio calling Leia's hologram "melodramatic" like please...you're one to talk, buster.

survival school is a thing on Tatooine idk why I'm surprised. More amused really, tbh.

OMG LUKE BBY NO YOU CAN'T JUST FAINT IN FRONT OF THE TUSKEN PLS CHILD. Remember your survival school training that you had, come on kiddo. The raider didn't even hit him, he just keeled over. Like...pls son. Pls.

“A lost breeze idled absently down the canyon. Far off to the west, something howled. A rolling, booming drone ricocheted off canyon walls and crawled nervously up and down a gorgon scale.” Here he is, the love of my life, making the most DRAMATIC entrance POSSIBLE.

"It was tall but hardly monstrous." Well, I’m glad Obi-Wan isn’t monstrous, that’s nice to be assured of.

"Hints of extreme climates other than desert, of ultimate cold and humidity, were etched into that seemed face.” Alright, y’all can stop complaining that he looked “””too old””” in comparison to Bail Organa in Rogue One, this boy has been through Some Shit (tm) while Bail was busy Senatoring comfortably, so listen. 

“A questing beak of nose, like a high rock, protruded outward from a flash-flood of wrinkles and scars. The eyes bordering it were a liquid crystal-azure. The man smiled through sand and dust and beard, squinting at the sight of [Luke].” I cannot believe. I love him so much. I love that he has a giant Merriman nose and a Belgarath beard. I love him. I love him so much.

Artoo "conveniently forgetting" he also was scared by the roaring pls child.

"A smile of perverse youthfulness split that collage of wrinkled skin and beard." I love that every smile so far has been "boyish" or young in some way because he's not a fucking old as balls dude, right? He's like...50? But weather happened and he looks ancient but he's not he's wonderful listen, I love him.

"can't seem to remember owning a droid" what did R4 do to you, Obi-wan, that you so easily forgot him? Heheh. Also, just like...no one wiped Artoo's memory, shouldn't he know Obi-wan? Or be able to tell him "yo you gave me to Bail after Anakin self-destructed what up old buddy"? And tbh, you'd think Obi-wan would remember such a vital friend and droid as Artoo. @Lucas, sort this out.

Unless he's just pretending not to remember because he doesn't want Luke knowing?

Its a fucking dragon call Obi-wan PLS “It’s not too hard. Just takes the right attitude, a set of well-used vocal chords, and a lot of wind. Now, if you were an imperial bureaucrat, I could teach you right off.” OBI-WAN PLS CALM YOUR SASS I CANNOT HANDLE THIS?? I LOVE HIM SO MUCH?? HELP ME?

Luke is disappointed in 3PO because he's "defeatist" bby good luck curing him of that programming...

"I regret that I am unable to present my father's request to you in person. My mission to meet personally has failed." Thanks for telling us twice,  Lucas. God, he needs a good editor.

"Do no fail us, Obi-wan Kenobi. Do not fail me." Wow okay, that's a little demanding there, Leia, it's not like you know each other well? Was this to get across the commanding 'princess' part of the character?

Though I will say her confidence that the Empire would capture her but get nothing out of her is amazing and painful, like, she KNOWS they are going to torture her, she KNOWS and she's not scared. She's just...going to handle it. Because she needs to. And that's. ..so much.

"You fought in the Clone Wars!? But that was so long ago!" "Um, yes," Kenobi acknowledged [...] "I guess it was a while back." THIS JOKER PLS like Luke just called him old as balls and he's like "yeah sure buddy" god I love him

"What's a duck?" GOOD LORD, SMOL DESERT SON, PLS.

Lucas is really down on this...the Emperor was corrupted not the corrupting force. Which is weird, like....everyone knows the emperor is evil this was never in question at any point in any of the movies...

Oh no, never mind, I read that wrong. To help the corrupt emperor not to help corrupt the emperor, my bad. Okay but still.

"Early man suspected its existence, yet remained in ignorance of its potential for millennia.” Okay, but if you think about us, the present, as ‘early man’ that's making it sound like this is future fantasy which is hilarious to me because “a long time ago, in a galaxy far far away.”

"The old man suppressed a smile, aware that Luke’s destiny had already been determined for him. [...] Likely it had finalized even before the boy was born. Not that Ben believed in predestination, but he did believe in heredity--and in the Force.” I mean. Is it destiny then, or is it you, Obi-wan? You’re the one guiding him onto this path, does that not make it partially your fault?

OH MY FUCKING GOD LUKE JUST... OKAY. GUYS. I THOUGHT THIS WAS JUST A REALLY INCONGRUOUS PAGE BREAK/SCENE CHANGE, BUT WE GO FROM OBI-WAN TELLING LUKE THAT HE MUST DO WHAT HE FEELS RIGHT AND LUKE GOING “Right now I don’t feel too good...” TO LEIA GETTING FUCKING TORTURED BY VADER IN HER PRISON CELL. PLS.

TELL ME AGAIN THESE TWIN BABIES DON’T HAVE A FUCKING FORCE CONNECTION FUCK

"The metal door which began moving aside was as thick as her body--as if, she mused bitterly, they were afraid she might break through anything less massive with her bare hands." Pls, Leia, they have a right to worry about that. You are Strong.

"gliding smoothly, as if on treads" space heelys #confirmed for Vader

[ladyknightliveblogs]

“In the seat next to him, Chewbacca was growling and grunting like a poorly tuned speeder engine.”

Wookiees across the galaxy slowly take offense at that metaphor and congregate to rip George’s arms off.

[ladyknightliveblogs]

We went to the eye doctor today, and I was taking liveblog notes on my phone, so here, have literally three pages’ worth of the book. All these notes from three pages.

"The burnished conference table was as soulless and unyielding as the mood of the eight Imperial Senators and officers ranged around it." David Charleston strikes again. This isn’t a metaphor, George, this is a disgrace.

"Though his uniform was as neatly molded and his body as clean as that of anyone else in the room, none of the remaining seven cared to touch him. A certain sliminess clung cloyingly to him, a sensation inferred rather than tactile." pls don't touch your coworkers anyway??? Regardless of slime levels? Also ALL THE REST OF YOU ARE ALSO SLIMY SO PLS. also, clung cloyingly?? George no.

They insist on calling Vader "the Sith Lord" like...he has a name. Does he just not like Vader? Like when Palpatine picked it for him was he too scared to be like "why can't I be something more ominous and dramatic like Darth Maul, he had a cool name" and so he got stuck with Vader and has since cultivated a fear in the ranks of anyone actually saying it so that he doesn't have to hear it?

"...a thin, hatchet-faced man with hair and form borrowed from an old broom and the expression of a quiescent piranha." THE METAPHORS YO I CAN’T HANDLE IT tho it did its job, I suppose...you know its Tarkin. You just...you know. 

quiescent piranha tho. Not a school...just one fish.

No where has he explained what a grand moff is. Yet.

Oh wait I guess it's "governor of numerous outlying imperial territories" but if he's a governor shouldn't he be, like...governing? Not gallivanting about in the Death Star?

fave things: they keep calling the Death Star plans "tapes" because this is 1977 and digital didn't exist even in the galaxy far away...

[ladyknightliveblogs]

“taller than a tall man”

well that there sure about sums it up