Why WOULDN'T he? Those eyes? That hair? He's FABULOUS.
Why WOULDN'T he? Those eyes? That hair? He's FABULOUS.
Mister E: Came back.
Walter is hotter. Roland's got nothing on him, so that can't be it.Originally Posted by Mister E
"It's his eyes, Roland thought. They were wide and terrible, the eyes of a dragon in human form" - Roland seeing the Crimson King for the first time.
"When the King comes and the Tower falls, sai, all such pretty things as yours will be broken. Then there will be darkness and nothing but the howl of Discordia and the cries of the can toi" - From Song of Susannah
I'm wondering this:
I hope the comics will provide more insight into TMIB, either through the main stories or through the Robin Furth stories in the back of the issues.
I think this story is not Roland's first loop. I also don't recall (no book handy) anything to make me believe that every loop starts in exactly the same place.
"...that Siren which called and sang and promised so much and gave, after all, so little." ~ Ray Bradbury
It would be nice for more insight, but to me it seems pretty obvious that it wasn't until later where Roland was effecting his plans that, that is what was causing the hate in Walter towards Roland.
"It's his eyes, Roland thought. They were wide and terrible, the eyes of a dragon in human form" - Roland seeing the Crimson King for the first time.
"When the King comes and the Tower falls, sai, all such pretty things as yours will be broken. Then there will be darkness and nothing but the howl of Discordia and the cries of the can toi" - From Song of Susannah
I was under the impression also that Walter partly wanted to help Roland and that perhaps he himself was even an instrument of not only anti-ka but of ka as well...
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Where in the saga (including the comics of course) does something Walter says or does leads you to this impression?
This is definitely true and he even knows it. Look at what he says when he meets Callahan in the Way Station.
"It's his eyes, Roland thought. They were wide and terrible, the eyes of a dragon in human form" - Roland seeing the Crimson King for the first time.
"When the King comes and the Tower falls, sai, all such pretty things as yours will be broken. Then there will be darkness and nothing but the howl of Discordia and the cries of the can toi" - From Song of Susannah
Spoiler:
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Being abused doesn't equal hating everyone. There are plenty of people who were abused as children and grow up to be perfectly fine. It's something deeper than that IMO.
Being abused doesn't equal hating everyone. There are plenty of people who were abused as children and grow up to be perfectly fine. It's something deeper than that IMO.
My post was somewhat tongue-in-cheek. I guess the point I was trying to make was that I think King tried to simplify the Flagg character way too late by giving him a backstroy at the end of the series. Yes, there must be more to it, but King would like us to believe that Walter is siomehow human and missunderstood. Sorry, King, forgot my violin.
And that's a bad thing because...?
IMO, Walter's backstory was one of the few good things King did with the character in the final book.
A hound will die for you, but never lie to you. And he'll look you straight in the face.
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because it was so straightforward and oversimplified. As if he was trying to patch something up in a hurry. Like an example out of a magazine on Popular Psychology for Housewives. Totally unlike (and unworthy of) any other study of a character/soul Mr.King had ever undertook in the past.And that's a bad thing because...?
just the opposite for me: one of the few - maybe even the only - things that made me feel really disappointed. (though it does occur in King novels towards the end - a wish to patch something up in a hurry, I mean.)IMO, Walter's backstory was one of the few good things King did with the character in the final book.
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
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Maybe King could have spent more time on Flagg's past had he decided to give him more than one chapter in the entire 800+ pages of the last book. (Or three chapters in the final 1300+ pages of the last three.) But that's another argument entirely.
My only problem was how brief it was. It was probably three sentences. I mean, look at Harry Potter 7, whereSpoiler:
But if the problem was that Flagg had a bad childhood...well A.) Lots of these people do, and B.) King used it a couple of times in his works. Blaze, for example (one of my favorite Bachman books), had "bad childhood" written all over it, and Jack Torrance having an abusive childhood was a major focal point of his character. Besides, its not as if King did something cliche like "My parents didn't give me enough attention." Flagg was raped. Not many villains can say that.
Considering King was all but pulling down his pants and taking a huge crap on a character whose legacy started when King was in college, the least he could've done was imbue the character with a shred of humanity and give a glimpse at who he was before he was spreading his brand of evil across the world.
I don't see how fleshing out Flagg's backstory could be more disappointing than the Crimson Geriatric, the total abandoning of continuity from the related books, and of course the emo spider with bad bowels.
A hound will die for you, but never lie to you. And he'll look you straight in the face.
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Couldn't dissagree with you more. First of all, I haven't read anything in the final DT book that changes any of the previous connections made with the series; if anything, King leaves alot of these loose ends open for more potential fleshing out in later DT-related works. In my opinion, that is a far cry from simply "abandoning" something.
Here is why I dislike the Flagg "paragraph" in book seven: this character has been portrayed in every other subsequent book, DT or not, as a demon-like character. A wizard, an entity, almost a 'force', if you will, rather than a person. I anxiousely turned every Flagg-related page throughout the series waiting to see what next would come in his master plan, I got chills everytime he popped up again after a seeming demise, and I was awestruck with the genious linking-together of everything Flagg has done throughout King's writing career. Flagg was a very powerfull being that darkled and tincted, he was everywhere and everyone, he had so many faces and names, and he always seemed to be a step ahead of the game, which made him a very delightfully evil villain (I would even argue that Flagg is King's best character)
Now, put all of that mistery and mystique up against what we get in DTVII: a lost little abused boy who learned magic tricks. What? What?! That may have worked, if King had done this switcheroo a long time ago, but the entire series long, Flagg has been spoken about as if he and Roland would ultimately have a showdown, not to mention that Flagg would at least have a fighting chance. Look, I'm just saying that it was very dissapointing, alright? Flagg was a very powerfull wizard, or so we thought; his character was written in a way that made him gave this magestic quality, and after being built up for so long, to see him re-written as merely Walter,Spoiler:is more than just poor writing, it's contradictory and confusing. Frankly, I was pissed when I first read that section of the book. I asked around on the .net community if that was truly "it" to Walter's legacy, and indeed it was confirmed to me. A huge dissapointment.
Flagg wasn't supposed to be the sympathetic character, and for King to really think it would be accepted by everyone to change what Flagg was that late in the game is beyond me.
Well...fuck. I just lost my entire reply. I'll just have to reinstate the basic gist I suppose.
1. I agree with you that Flagg is one of King's best characters, and that King really fucked up when he killed him off. Probably one of the worst things he's ever done. As for "Flagg has been spoken about as if he and Roland would ultimately have a showdown, not to mention that Flagg would at least have a fighting chance", I never, ever (and never will) disagree with that Flagg should have fought Roland. Flagg's backstory (and a little bit of his monologue regarding Gabrielle and wanting to reach the Tower) was the only thing I liked about the chapter.
2. I understand where you're going with the "Making Flagg out to be weaker than the way he was originally written". I suppose (like most things) it comes down to a matter of opinion. For the most part, I happen to enjoy it when villains are given sympathetic backstories. Not all the time (such as making Dracula a romantic hero) but I feel that humanizing Flagg was a good thing. King had already hinted at it with his scene in Book 5, so there was a bit of leverage prior. And I always assumed that he was once a human who had become corrupted even before the final DT novels.
3. As for King forgetting prior material...well, for starters, he took out Insomnia and said "Don't take this seriously, folks. Its a mind trap. The turtle's song was muddled. Fiddle-dee-dee." and all but admitted that he was throwing out most of the continuity. "I can't work with this, so I'll just give the fans some silly garbled explanation and they'll eat it all up." Peter Straub himself apparently achknowledged that the continuity of Black House was discarded. And Eyes of the Dragon...since Flagg is dead, having a story where Dennis and Thomas confront him is pretty moot. Since Flagg is dead, the only way we could see it would be a flashback story where Flagg would probably have to kill them off or at the very least run away at the end. And although he's tying up some loose ends in the comics, its still pretty sloppy (to me at least) that he didn't wrap them up in the first place with the final three books.
A hound will die for you, but never lie to you. And he'll look you straight in the face.
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Well, I do agree with what you have said, then. I guess the only thing we don't agree on is whether or not it was a good idea to give Flagg a backstroy. The bottom line is this: in my opinion, when you give such an iconic character too much humanity, you have just stripped him of what made the character great to begin with; you have stripped him of his power. That is my opinion, I think King did exactly that with Flagg, and I will never understand why he destroyed such a wonderfully written character.
I have a feleing that Walter hates everyone who makes any real problems for him.
And for my part I love it that we could get a glance into Water's backstory. It didn't disturb me at all.
Roland would have understood.
It didn't really disturb me, it just angered me
How is that possible?
Roland would have understood.
How is it impossible for him to be angered by a writing decision he didn't like?
A hound will die for you, but never lie to you. And he'll look you straight in the face.
My Collection
no, not fleshing out itself, but the way it was done - I tried to make it clear in my post, judging by what I've read from you in this thread, we agree here. not on the following, though, but that's another story:
...the Crimson Geriatric, the total abandoning of continuity from the related books, and of course the emo spider with bad bowels
Ask not what bears can do for you, but what you can do for bears. (razz)
When one is in agreement with bears one is always correct. (mae)
bears are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We've been discussing this a lot but it seems to me King spent a bit of time "humanizing" all the villains in the story. Perhaps that was the point. Flagg was just a man...sure, a talented man but just a man after all.
It is perhaps a lesson in the power of "word of mouth" and the idea that people rarely live up to the hype about them.
The kindness of close friends is like a warm blanket
Well, isn't that just dandy,
Flagg was written as a powerfull force of nature in every other book except DTVII, and I am supposed to buy this? Had the Flagg character been written in a much vaguer style, then mahybe I would by that his whole thing is just smoke and mirrors, but even the comic books show Flagg with at least somewhat amount of real power. Why is this suddenly gone from Walter when we meet him in DTVII?
Now, if these things can be explained later on through the comics (Which they won't), then I will accept whatever explination that King givces, but to simply change the character completely and not explain anything about it is careless, and wishy-washy of the writer.
"written" being word of mouth right?
I know there was a bit of demonstration of his power in The Stand, but it was mostly just tricks.
Then he uses the doors in the Tower series...not sure what text ever made it seem like he was any more than he actually was.
The kindness of close friends is like a warm blanket
His ability to change appearance is more than just mortal disguises such as masks and costumes.
In W&G, he is able to dissapear completely in an instant. If that was a parlour trick, then I am impressed. (Btw, if he were merely projecting his own image, or something similar, why did he gasp when he was shot at in the first place?)
Roland clearly says that Walter is a wizard, and he even questions whether or not he is even human at all. Flagg obviousely must have demonstrated some awesome abilities for Roland to even question Martin's mortality.
In the comics we see that he uses magic to literally physically change his appearance, and he even opens up portals to walk through. That's some really impressive smoke-and-mirror effects!
Can human begins become wizards?
Andway he was a wizard in the Eyes of thr Dragon, too.
Roland would have understood.
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