#when a character is that smart and ahead of the game they’re kind of awful/troublesome as a main pov character

[loveoaths]

alright, i finished Star Wars: Thrawn: Ascendancy: Chaos Rising, and i have Thoughts. aside from the copious amount of colons in the title, it was… fine. it is the most Zahn of all the thrawn novels, and all my old criticisms of the thrawn novels are applicable here, too: no character development; same-old space mystery plot that ends in a naval battle with one or two creative maneuvers; women with the strangest character motivations you have EVER seen; etcetera.

i talk (read: rant) about this way too often, but i truly do feel that thrawn novels would benefit by letting him be wrong more often. he’s a military genius, but he sucks ar politics and people — so put him in situations that force him to engage with politics and people!!! he would be so much more interesting if we saw thrawn trying to apply his military know how to, say, a grounded chiss-regency era style plot. give me a thrawn wounded by a reckless battle maneuver and now stuck on mandatory medical leave somewhere and, OOPS WHAT’S THAT? ALL HIS POLITICAL ENEMIES FINALLY HAVE HIM IN THEIR TERRITORY AND STAGE A POLITICAL ASSAULT ON HIM? and now thrawn, mr genius mcsmarterson, has to lean on all those friends and allies he’s made to survive a political maelstrom. ar’alani, thalias, and samakro and their families are roped into keeping his stupid ass afloat and helping him play the political game, or at least shield him as much as they can from his own ineptitude. and at the same time thrawn is trying to sniff out enemy subversives influencing chiss society and planning a naval attack on the chiss fleet, and he has to juggle all of these problems while while also trying to remember which tiny fork to eat his salad with? and if he doesn’t pick the right fork the visiting syndicure will make him harikari on the SPOT???

now that would be a fun thrawn novel. hot damn.