#white sand spoilers

[lunaticbookblog]

White Sand Vol 1-3 by Brandon Sanderson

These were available so I skimmed them in one day. My opinion on graphic novels has not changed; I still find them visually overwhelming and difficult to read. Just overall not my thing. (The exception being The Sandman, but that’s a different story).

Can’t say I absorbed much of the plot, but the art is good. The first style reminds me of the way scenery used to be animated in “old” movies like The Aristocats. The second style felt more modern. Starker lines, fewer details. An art style I don’t like as much, but it made it MUCH easier to focus on the written words. The third art style strikes the best balance between interesting art while not being so overwhelming with the details as to detract from the words.

This felt a bit like Star Wars and Cosmere crossover. Got strong Tatooine vibes. Overall, I found most of the characters a bit annoying until the last half of volume 3. However, this is the introduction of Khriss, so worth checking out for her backstory, and for more info about another Cosmere planet (Taldain) and magic system. If you’ve read Mistborn Era 2, it adds some context. Surprised Sanderson included a stay at home dad character, which was a fun surprise. Whoever drew Baon in volume 3 knew what they were doing and I’d like to thank them for their service.

Of them, volume 3 was the most interesting. Worth noting that there is an Omnibus version. After doing some comparisons with a friend, they are not identical. There is some different dialogue throughout. And the Omnibus includes other things, like Khriss’ notes.

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Realized upon that hometown events' guest characters are those who are close with SSR card main characters. And I'm not saying because they are family or close friends.

Jamil - They could picked either of Jamil's parents yet decided upon Najma. Why? Because he and his parents' relationship are complicated and Najma is someone that he is close to the most and can be himself without worried about hierarchy. They even have typically sibling relationship where Najma mess with him but never outright cruel to him. (Love how she stole the shawarma)

Epel - Well Epel is a family man and he is close with each of the family relatives. I'm sure the reason it's Marja is because she is involved with the sled competition more than his family even looks like her the most (once he gets old). I mean it's hilarious how Idia fangirls Marja because she is inspiration of his favorite character.

Leona - they could have picked Farena since Cheka was already present but they picked Kifaji which is surprising given the last two are family members yet the guest character is the Twisted version of Zazu (but still interesting to have another twisted version of a Disney character). The reason is probably because he isn't close with Farena despite his brother caring about Leona that much but knowing his overblot backstory, he despise him since he is the heir and how people praise him while they badmouthed Leona. While Kifaji and Leona aren't really close, he is one of the few that Kifaji treated him well without discriminating him especially from the chess game. Kifaji is basically like a parent or an uncle to Leona and given Leona's family issues, he is close to someone than any of his family.

Deuce - knowing well about what he said about his mother, it's obvious that his mother is the guest character. Not to mentioned, the only person he is close to the most. Since he left the gang to leave a better life and how he treated everyone disrespectful and no known relatives except for his grandmother, his mother is closest person he has and how he'll do everything for his mother.

Vil - so far one of the two overblot boys (with Azul being the other one) are the ones without family problems (Idia seems to have caring parents but the family business is complicated for chapter 6 and 7 reasons). Obviously Vil will have his own father be the guest character because he is a great dad to Vil who doesn't abuse nor neglect him. Vil even talks proudly about his father.

So based on that, it's not just relationship towards the SSR but also how they are close to one another without ill-intentions nor trauma. So I have feeling the next hometown events will be similar to which the SSR closest to be the guest character.

Like for example, Azul's guest character could be his mother because he proudly talks about his mother and how he is happy that he married her divorce lawyer. I can picture tweels' guest character to be either their parents.

Now the only issues on who is closest to are the Lilia, Silver, Riddle's, Shroud brothers', and Malleus'.

Lilia and Silver are eachother's relatives and doesn't seem to have anyone they talk to outside of the family (Baul and Zigvolt don't really count especially when Baul ready debuted and felt they would be Sebek's guest characters). We already seen through the Shroud's parents and I doubt that Idia has someone close and Ortho is extroverted but I'm not sure what their hometown is like besides Styx. Do they have other children or anyone close to?

Malleus's family is complicated and we know about Senate. So he would likely have his grandmother.

Riddle for obvious reasons...

So this is just my speculation.

I believe it has been stated that the manga intentionally blacks out the face of Mrs. Rosehearts because she is viewed as the source of Riddle’s trauma. It keeps her in this shadowy, untouchable status and maintains the idea that the darkness of the past still impacts us in present day. I anticipate that this will hold and become the pattern for each OB boy’s flashback sequences. (We’ll soon see!)

If that’s the case for the manga, then it makes sense for the game to do something similar by purposefully keeping the faces of figures who play a significant role in each OB boy’s trauma a secret. That means likely no Mrs. Rosehearts, similar to how we did not meet the Viper parents in A Firelit Sky nor Farena/Falena in Tamashina Mina. However, some parents are clearly still fair game since they do have a good relationship with their son (Mrs. Ashengrotto and Azul, for example.). We see an example of this with Eric Venue showing up in Tapis Rouge.

It makes sense to meet family members whom the SSR boy has a good relationship with; running into a family member that stresses them out would kill the fun and easygoing vibes of the hometown event and would instead present an interpersonal issue that runs too deep to be resolved in a satisfying way before the event’s conclusion. Imagine a hometown event in which we have to stay over in Riddle’s home and we witness his parents fighting?? 😔 I don’t think that’s something that could be “fixed” in like 5 parts… Of course, not every family is perfect and that’s valid. It’s just not the scope or the perspective that TWST hometown events want or are equipped to deal with.

I feel like any of the Ocatrio’s family are pretty fair game? Despite how sketchy they are, Azul, Floyd, and Jade seem to be on good terms with all of their family members (well, maybe excluding Azul’s biological father) and learned many important things from them. I am, once again, asking TWST for a Coral Sea hometown event… 🤚 ✋ *holds out hands*

I’m sure that the characters who don’t have obvious family members to meet/yet to be revealed will have some other substitution? Probably a new character that’s twisted from another Disney character (similar to Kifaji). Maybe we’ll see a new noble fae that Lilia knows, Silver’s guardian fae that blessed him at birth, or prominent STYX staff (like maybe twisted Pain or Panic?).

For Malleus, his only living relative is his grandmother, sooo… I guess he’ll introduce us to the reigning monarch if he’s the SSR of a Briar Valley hometown event 😂 Malleus does what Leona won’t…

[thedragion]

savantism is so cool, the dichotomy of gaining power but also gaining a dependency

OH! SAND MASTERY! the way to gain power is to over master, to push beyond your abilities, to hold more Investiture.

Sand Mastery is built on the same basis as Savantism

[itsallaboutthebirds86]

WBN has had countless moments I would consider masterpieces, but the last five minutes of The Clearing was the first that actually made tears come to my eyes with how visceral and horrifying it was holy SHIT

[bigfuckingfrog]

the clearing interlude had my jaw DROP at that ending holyyyyyyyy shit

[stimwyrms]

A man powerful enough to freeze the whole of Vaugarde in time. Very little is known about him. THE KING STIMBOARD (Greyscale Edition)

credits: 💧 🛡 💧 ✊ 👑 ✊ 💧 🛡 💧

[ids in alt]

[lamaery]

Shard Roller Disco: Autonomy (she is just messing around in too many systems by now...) Music? eeerr, let's go classic Funky Town by Lipps Inc.

More Shard Roller Disco AU: Roshar Nalthis Sel and Scadrial Scadrial 2 Threnody Roshar 2 (row spoilers) Roshar 3 Bonus Dawnshard (spoilers)

[my-acethetic]

I truly spent about 80% of Yumi and the Nightmare Painter thinking that branderson liked his dayside/nightside planet concept from White Sands so much he decided to reuse it lmao.

Pleased to find out that wasn't the case but I still think it would have been funny if he, like the majority of the fanbase, decided to pretend that White Sands never happened.

[luchibelle-throughthecosmere]

What everyone cannot stop thinking about: Zellion

What I cannot stop thinking about:

Khriss

Khriss

[thestormlightnetwork]

HOW DID THE FUSED GET SAND FROM TALDAIN WTF

[good-night-space-kid]

“Despite being New Jersey there are actually some nice white sand beaches along the coast” wait until I tell you about the sand mining and ecological destruction that makes this possible

[cosmeme-collective]

Finally read White Sand for the first time tonight (1999 short story version). I'm convinced Tress's story is related to Kenton's. The fact that sand/spores consume water when in a host and can be controlled like tendons is very telling. Anyone else?

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

I know that yuu going for every event just so the player can experience the event from their pov, but I do wonder if in game, yuu are just tired of being dragged places. the first few times probably were fun! they got to experience different places in a world they don't know! but after the second time, I feel like it would get exhausting, especially considering some kind of chaos follows them onto their trips. I can imagine yuu desperately trying not to go on trips only for luck to constantly be against them haha

Yeah, most likely! There's always some convenient excuse that amounts to Yuu and Grim being present yet insignificant 99% of the time.

The most egregious example of convenience that comes to my mind is how Yuu and Grim went along to the City of Flowers/Fleur City.. Crowley claimed they might be able to gain more knowledge of how to get Yuu back to their original world from this conference for talented young mages. (That topic never comes up again in the event.) Depending on who you ask, you might find fans that say it's a missed opportunity that the ONE event where being magicless is an advantage, they didn't give Yuu a bigger role in saving the day and instead relegated to them to off-screen involvement.

I feel like Yuu actually doesn’t mind traveling to places beyond NRC! (After all, as large as the school’s campus is… surely it starts to feel samey after a while, a change of scenery would be welcome.) Most events which involve travel typically give you the chance to pick between two dialogue options to express your own interest in tagging along (though it is typically Grim who first expresses wanting to go).

There’s really no down sides to it either—they don’t have to pay for transportation, food, or housing so every trip is basically a free vacation and a chance to experience extremely different countries and cultures!! The set-ups can be super swanky too due to how affluent some of the students hosting them are (Kalim, Leona, now Vil). No jet lag either, since the Mirror of Darkness instantly teleports them to wherever they want to go. That’s the dream life 😂 And while it’s true that problems sometimes arise during these trips, they’re often small personal conflicts that Yuu and Grim don’t need to intervene in or help with. (Someone insulted Deuce’s mom, competing against the delinquents/RSA in a race, helping the fireworks guy, seeing who wins Catch the Tail, etc.) It’s definitely more relaxed overall than Crowley knocking on their door every few weeks to personally ask them to fix problems.

I guess it really depends on the type of Yuu you have in mind (assuming we’re talking Yuusonas and not the generic in-game Yuu)? I can see why constantly going on trips might be exhausting if you picture Yuu as being more introverted, or perhaps more short-tempered or tired due to whatever else they have on their plate. It would suck if they didn’t actually enjoy their travels…

[cerealbishh]

i... think they were really teasing the frank/victoria romance this episode and i don't like it

[whitetyger123]

So is TwinSoul from Lumar then? He has to be, right? Is he a spore eater for roseite? If so why isn't it killing him? And he has great control over it, so maybe I'm way off base, but it takes water to use, and just seems really similar!

[power-of-fluffy-boys]

I want to talk about the part in Oathbringer when Dalinar first opens Honor's perpendicularity and says "I am Unity." The capitalization of Unity always struck me as odd. At first, I thought Unity was in the same vein as Honor and Ruin, but now I want to draw a different parallel.

Between Unity and the Survivor.

Dalinar was commanded by Honor to "Unite them.", and Kelsier was commanded by Preservation to "Survive."

So what's up? Have they become some kind of avatar of their shards? Maybe. I don't know.

What I do know is that Autonomy is known to create avatars on different worlds to rule in her stead, possibly through a similar mechanism.

I also know of someone who knows all the shards personally and sometimes goes by a name that is a regular noun: Hoid, the King's Wit.

Now, the King's Wit is a position within the court of Alethkar and presumably has a long tradition, so maybe Hoid isn't Wit in the same way Dalinar is Unity, though there's no reason he couldn't have been the first Wit as well.

It should be noted that there is an obvious candidate for the Shard whose avatars might be called Wit: Whimsy.

But there's one more link in this chain, and that's the Dawnshards. The Dawnshards are commands that Adonalsium used to create the Cosmere, and people holding a Dawnshard are said to become that Dawnshard, so there is precedent for a deity commanding someone of something that then changes them.

Maybe changes their Identity, even.