Suzannah and the Chap storyline - love it or hate it? *spoilers*

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Originally Posted by CyberGhostface

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Originally Posted by Letti

It's okay to see that King has ruined the books for you (I am really sorry about that) but to say he failed... it's simply not true.

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Whether or not King succeeded is very much a subjective thing. Just because so many people hold a certain opinion does not make it objectively true. For example, The Shining is considered one of the best horror films ever made. I think it's a disaster. Is that opinion "simply not true" because I hold the opinion of a minority?

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Yes, basically...your opinion is negated by the overwhelming opinions of others thus your new opinion is now that it is "one of the best horror films ever made". Congratulations on your new found assimilation. :grouphug: :P

hey, hey, wait! bears are with Cyber on the Shining subject!... they can't assimilate us all

Ya' think? :borg: :evil:

positive

they don't call us "bears" for nothing

our name is le-... er... multitude

Maybe I'll be alone with my opinion here, but I think Mordred was bascially a very very good idea. Why? Because when it came out, I was annoyed by the fact that everything was way too easy for Roland and his Tet. Thinking of the first books, the 5 and 6 looked as if the danger was gone. I really liked the way they were constantly on the run, avoiding letal creatures (lobstrorities), bad health...
So when everyhting started to be very easy for our fellows, I got bored. Then appears what is supposed to be a really nasty and tough oncoming enemy.

I hated how he was introduced (the mysterious demon in the ringstone was in fact in every ringtsone, being either male or female, named Mia, knew the Prims personnaly, had a sad "I wanna be mom story..." RIDICULOUS) and all th story going along with the pregnancy. Well, I liked the early beginning when Mia appears to be a new side of Susannah's personnality, and the danger it induced. I also liked the idea of pregnancy, but not the way it actually went on.

After all this, I must say I really enjoyed Mordred's come and go. I really enjoyed the mix between his maturity and the fact that he was very childish in the same time. I liked his quick-learning, how he had to handle his two forms, and how he felt miserable.

In the whole Mordred story, there is something that I didn't like at all, like you guys. I just can't stand the way Flagg died. To me it never happened. I'm in a total denial of that scene, even if the horror was pretty enjoyable. As you guys said, it was a far-too-awesome character to end up like this.
I have an additionnal thing to say: I really dislike the fact that the Man in Black, Walter, Randal Flagg, Maerly (Maerlyn for Christ sake) were merged in a single character. So you can imagine my disbelief when this character that made me shiver on his first appear in the story, died like a low man in the hands of Mordred.

Apart from that, I loved Mordred all along. I loved him true. How heartbreaking he was, the worste (best) part was when he drank his own blood to find comfort...
I also loved the idea of this jealous monster walking on the trail of the family that rejected him. He was so powerfull, so relentless! What a fight coming ahead! I thought of a fight with all the Tet against him, as a child, with massive damages for our 5 friends. I thought he would use his mind control on Jake to make him do wrong things. I imagined all the difficulties such a nasty boy would create.

So as he was chasing Roland, I liked every bit of Mordred's story. Only when he started to get ill after eating the ludicrous Limpy, I smelt the old not-so-good smell of a lame ending. And I thought "oh no, let's what I think is going to happen...not happen, please". But it did!

As we say in french: La montagne a accouché d'une souris : The mountain gave brith to a mouse. And that, my friends, was soooo desapointing.

Conversely, I always felt Flagg's death would be anticlimatic and sort of bland. King has always given me the impression that he thinks evil is stupid and I believe he's outright said so a few times. However Flagg died it was never going to be in a blaze or explosive way or anything like that. His death was to be as pathetic as his life, imo.

I don't understand why so many people find his death so pathetic in the first place. I mean the son of the Crimson King and Roland killed him. He didn't die in a car accident and he didn't fall out of the window. Yeah, I know it would have been much more enjoyable for most of you if he had died in a nice fight but to see his death pathetic? For my part I don't get it.

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As we say in french: La montagne a accouché d'une souris : The mountain gave birth to a mouse. And that, my friends, was soooo desapointing.

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Although I don't agree with it I think it's an incredibly good phrase.

Well, I wasn't expecting a huge fight with a handful of explosions and glimmering spells flying all over the place. I just thought that the oh-so-great Mearlyn, servant of Farson and traveller of all the worlds, wouldn't die like a low-man... I don't mind Mordred winning the fight, but it felt very dull to me. That's just how I felt, I cannot give any logical nor rationnal explanation.

Maybe that's because I was then thinking that no real enemy was left around to seriously try to stop Roland. Maybe I overestimated Flagg who just happened to be another humbug... I was just hoping he would be tougher...

Now you say his life has been pathetic, I think you're right, but I just don't like it, again, because I thought of Mearlyn like a man of power... I'll just have to get used to it I guess.

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Originally Posted by Brice

Conversely, I always felt Flagg's death would be anticlimatic and sort of bland. King has always given me the impression that he thinks evil is stupid and I believe he's outright said so a few times. However Flagg died it was never going to be in a blaze or explosive way or anything like that. His death was to be as pathetic as his life, imo.

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I couldn't agree more!! I think the end of W&G illustrated it perfectly (in my mind) What kind of showdown could Flagg and the Gunslinger really have? Flagg was an all powerful Arch-villian Magician and Roland had guns!!! They were really no match for each other, except for in some contrived, conventional scenario. Just MHO

Mordred was an awesome idea--the son of Roland, also the son of Rolands arch enemy? Cool idea, but he wasn't used enough imo, and his death was too quick and anticlimactic.
Delacroix "I thought he would use his mind control on Jake to make him do wrong things. I imagined all the difficulties such a nasty boy would create."

Yeah, I thought that as well. It was a bit annoying how mordred never met eddie nor Jake. I wondered how the it would go down. And with Jake and Mordred both being kids, it would have been interetsing to see how they talked to each other and maybe even tried to convince the other to join them.

I hoped there'd be a second encounter between Susannah and Mordred. During the time period when Roland and Jake were in the Keystone world, following Eddie's death, she was left alone (apart from the breakers). At the time I was hoping we'd get to follow her thread more, rather than just getting a quick overview concerning her train trip and the monsters under the castle. It seemed to me that would be a cool moment for Mordred to attempt a bit of vengeance. She was comparatively alone, grieving and vulnerable. After all, she was the one who had hurt him the most at that point. (Not that I'd want him to succeed in killing her. I didn't mind her final outcome in the book, although part of me wishes she'd reach the Tower, but the same goes for the rest of the ka-tet.)

On the other hand, I guess it's good King went for something I didn't expect. I would have preferred to have had a more step by step POV from her during that thread though, Mordred or no Mordred. I understand why King may have glossed over it. The book is big enough as it is!

I agree that Mordred was way underused. The same for all the major villains in the book, with the possible exception of Sayre. He was a great villain but ultimately a top henchman and his ending was fitting. Besides his personality and mannerisms seemed a bit too close to that of Walter. (His ending was NOT fitting in my opinion. Or at least not when it happened.)

I would have liked more of an actual emotional connection between Mordred and the ka-tet, besides the obvious, biological one. We never got (like Serpent Raptorsaid) much interaction (or any, really) between Mordred and Eddie, or Jake. It just feels like there was a lot of unexplored territory there: The book tells us about Mordred's jealousy and lonliness over the ka-tet but we never see any examples of it besides Mordred watching them and feeling bitter. We did glimpses of Jake feeling a little jealous of Mordred for his connection to Roland, but we never saw Mordred resenting Jake for essentially "usurping" his place as Roland's son. (Whether it was coincidence or not, I love that meaning of Jake's/Jacob's name in that context). We never saw Eddie give Mordred much of a thought at all (or vice versa). Given Mordred's psychic abilities, it would have been interesting to see him invade the ka-tet's dreams, but we never saw anything like that. The whole issue with Mordred seemed like it had a lot of possibility that was never realized.

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Delacroix "I thought he would use his mind control on Jake to make him do wrong things. I imagined all the difficulties such a nasty boy would create."

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I never even considered that. I just got a horrible image of Mordred trying to force Jake to kill Oy. I'm *glad* that didnt happen.

I didn't mind the idea of Mordred at first. In the end though I thought he was a waste of a character.

I actually really liked the whole

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Mia/Susannah thing. It gave Sai King a break on the whole wheelchair thing... and allowed her character not to remain stagnant.

I'm a bit late to the party, but I like Mordred. I'm glad King strayed from using him to create tension between Eddie/Roland, and reading about how involved Flagg was in creating Mordred was great. It sort of made sense--I recall he got a lucky lady pregnant in The Stand, plus there was Sylvia Pittston in Tull. Its been a while since I read the last novels, but I've started a re-read to incorporate TWTTK. Once I get to book 7 I'll be paying more attention to the fine details regarding Mordred's regression if you will. I'm certain King managed to give plausible explanations as to why Mordred didn't outright use the same powers on the ka-tet that he did on Flagg.

...resistance is futile! Sorry, just had to throw that in there from the earlier discussion of assimilation! I'm late to this party as well, but I disliked the whole Susannah/Mia/Chap/Mordred story arc. Not because it was unexpected, just that it was sometimes confusing and it seemed as if it didn't amount to much in the end.

Also, the retcon to The Gunslinger seemed a bit contrived as did the whole Susannah/Mia posession and switching bodies. Somehow, the demon from The Gunslinger preserved Roland's semen (and allowed it to be mixed (somehow) with that of the CK's seed) and impregnated Susannah with it. I knew on my first read of The Wastelands that Susannah was impregnated by the demon and that it would not bode well for the ka-tet in the future, but I never expected this crazy explanation. I applaud King for doing the unexpected, but it just seems contrived.

Additionally, I'm confused as to the biology of Mordred. Wouldn't he be more human than demon? His DNA is a mixture of the CK, Roland, and Susannah (or Mia, which is also confusing since Susannah was the one who was actually impregnated by the oracle and Mia just took posession for the birth). The CK is himself 50% human, Roland is 100% human, and Susannah is 100% human. Not sure about the math here, but that doesn't leave much demon for Mordred. So, who is really pregnant here, Susannah or Mia?

I guess I'll have a better picture once I get back to book 6 and 7 on my current re-read (I'm on 3 right now). Maybe you guys can provide a better explanation. Mia was a spirit of the Prim made mortal by Flagg, correct? How does her biology come into play, did she just birth Mordred since Susannah was impregnated? Ugh.

I think the things that are unclear are intended to be unclear.

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Originally Posted by Brice

I think the things that are unclear are intended to be unclear.

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Boo, you're no fun. :unsure:

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Originally Posted by BigSchu22

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Originally Posted by Brice

I think the things that are unclear are intended to be unclear.

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Boo, you're no fun. :unsure:

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Oh, you SO clearly do not know me. :lol:

Seriously though, I do. In the case of most of the big things that are vague I really do feel that was the intent. That is having read the series several times, the gunslinger itself somewhere around 30 times, and discussed the series here (and on the sites that were around before it) for several years.

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Originally Posted by Brice

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Originally Posted by BigSchu22

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Originally Posted by Brice

I think the things that are unclear are intended to be unclear.

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Boo, you're no fun. :unsure:

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Oh, you SO clearly do not know me. :lol:

Seriously though, I do. In the case of most of the big things that are vague I really do feel that was the intent. That is having read the series several times, the gunslinger itself somewhere around 30 times, and discussed the series here (and on the sites that were around before it) for several years.

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Point taken, sir! :)

I still think that makes Mordred > 80% human? Not such a good plan there.

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Originally Posted by Brice

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Originally Posted by BigSchu22

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Originally Posted by Brice

I think the things that are unclear are intended to be unclear.

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Boo, you're no fun. :unsure:

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Oh, you SO clearly do not know me. :lol:

Seriously though, I do. In the case of most of the big things that are vague I really do feel that was the intent. That is having read the series several times, the gunslinger itself somewhere around 30 times, and discussed the series here (and on the sites that were around before it) for several years.

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Point taken, sir! :)

I still think that makes Mordred > 80% human? Not such a good plan there.

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Originally Posted by BigSchu22

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Originally Posted by Brice

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Originally Posted by BigSchu22

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Originally Posted by Brice

I think the things that are unclear are intended to be unclear.

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Boo, you're no fun. :unsure:

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Oh, you SO clearly do not know me. :lol:

Seriously though, I do. In the case of most of the big things that are vague I really do feel that was the intent. That is having read the series several times, the gunslinger itself somewhere around 30 times, and discussed the series here (and on the sites that were around before it) for several years.

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Point taken, sir! :)

I still think that makes Mordred > 80% human? Not such a good plan there.

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Originally Posted by BigSchu22

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Originally Posted by Brice

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Originally Posted by BigSchu22

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Originally Posted by Brice

I think the things that are unclear are intended to be unclear.

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Boo, you're no fun. :unsure:

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Oh, you SO clearly do not know me. :lol:

Seriously though, I do. In the case of most of the big things that are vague I really do feel that was the intent. That is having read the series several times, the gunslinger itself somewhere around 30 times, and discussed the series here (and on the sites that were around before it) for several years.

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Point taken, sir! :)

I still think that makes Mordred > 80% human? Not such a good plan there.

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Point doubly taken. :P


Maybe he needed to be more human than anything to make the choices he made. Perhaps if he was significantly less human he'd have made different ones.

I didn't care much for Mordred, either. My main gripe with it is that King fell, like so many other storytellers, into the apparently ubiquitous cliche of an unnatural demonic pregnancy. Seriously, is there any scary story where anybody just has a normal baby? For as much as King apparently liked Susannah, and as much as he seemed to want to differentiate her from other female leads, he still stuck her with this "lol magic spider demon baby" cliche. I just wasn't impressed.

DT7 spoilers

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Then killing Walter. I was never the most gigantic fan of Walter as a character—he doesn't seem to have a motive other than mischief for mischief's sake. Seems to me that by the time someone reaches the age that Walter was, s/he would have outgrown directionless mischief. I'm okay with him dying, especially in the last book of King's magnum opus, but I still thought it was mishandled. He never even got a chance to menace the ka-tet before a magic demon spider baby bit him to death. Why was that enough to kill Walter? At the end of The Stand (the version I have, anyway) he's shown to reincarnate after being blown up by a damn atomic bomb. But a magic baby plucking out his eyes and drinking his blood was the true, final end of him?

I understand the time and pacing constraints, but I also thought it was dumb that Mordred was born already knowing pretty much everything about himself, Roland, his destiny, etc. And how to speak. And what guns are. And... yeah. And since Roland unceremoniously shot him into a fire at the end of the book, why was there a prophecy about Mordred killing Roland? That shit never happened, yo, and wouldn't have even come close to happening if Roland and Suze had just elected to take the car Stuttering Bill offered them before they left Odd Lane.

Mordred and the pregnancy in general probably could've been cut from King's outline entirely and nobody would have minded. As people above correctly stated, he was just a newer, slightly more genetically appropriate version of Walter anyway.

Coffee, I was going to bring up that exact point about [I]The Stand[I], although I think he transports himself away at the last second. Eitherway, he came out alive from an atomic explosion, but was eaten to death easily.

I do think he underestimated Mordred to an extent and that surprise was a part of it, but I don't see how Mordred could over power him with his psychic trick, especially since Walter is part demon as well (I know this is revealed later in the comics, but as a powerful wizard, it still seems unplausible).

I guess we're nitpicking too much, but I agree. Take Mordred out and you're not missing much other than a questionable ending to Walter.

If I recall correctly, Walter used some device of the Old Ones oversee the semen transfer. So I took the pregnancy backstory as means to impress us with the technological superiority of the Old Ones.