Timewaster's Guide Archive

Agreed, I think it really captures the feel of his fight scenes.

Here's my question:  If we have Kaladin vs. Vin, is there going to be some sort of weird interaction between their powers?  If the Cosmere is all one complex magic system, there might be more going on than just a beatdown.

Now there's an interesting question. Maybe it's one we'll get answered someday, as more of the overplot starts to be revealed... I personally would love to start seeing some more overt interaction between the various shardworlds.

truly, Ranier Wolfcastle was the definitive Radioactive Man.

Visual tropes are as common as any. Once you know to look for 'em, you see 'em everywhere. Other examples are the use of white or black hats in westerns to denote good and bad guys (which was then turned on its ear in the 60's, but that only worked because it was a trope), or the use of cigarettes to denote an attitude of apathy (which is part of being "cool"), or even the type of weapon a character chooses to arm themselves with (revolver=cowboy, big guns=overpowering force, small guns=stealthy, etc).

Being able to recognize and manipulate visual tropes is an effective way for an artist to establish hints of character in a design. Accessories, fashion, body types, body language, all of them carry subtle hints based on shared popular culture.

Of course, when that crosses into cultures that don't share the same tropes, it can fall flat or even miscommunicate. Then the fun really starts.

 

That's interesting... of course I'm aware of most of those visual tropes, but up until now I hadn't really realized how prevalent they still were. I'm going to have to start keeping an eye out for those. In fact now I'm interested to see how many I'd find when taking a survey of the covers of the books I own...

All that being said, the shorthand of goggles=steampunk has really started to annoy me. I see way too many drawings and covers that have nothing to do with steampunk but still get labeled as such because someone wears goggles in them.

As an aside, the word "goggles" starts to look really funny when you type it too much. Goggles goggles goggles...

Sorry, I meant a source for Brandon stating he's not dead.

I'm midway through a reread of Elantris at the moment and I didn't spot anyone resembling Hoid helping Sarene (and I'm pretty unhealthily obsessed with Hoid, aheh.) Was that one of the appearances that Brandon's just given word-of-god confirmation on?

I don't remember where this is, but there is a quote that I am thinking of that talks about someone taking a dawnshard and climbing steps meant for heralds, which implies that they can be separated from the heralds (or was this the creation of the herals?).

On the other hand, I do recall Brandon explicitly saying that Talanel is not dead.

Yeah, I seem to remember that too. Can anyone find a source?

Vin would still win, if she had atium.

Honestly, Vin could  beat just about anybody if she had  atium. Yo have to deny her atium i you want most fights to be interesting.

Fortunately I don't think that's usually a problem, given how rare it is. You'd have to set the fights at a pretty narrow window in her character arc if you wanted her to have ready access to atium.