Have wondered if I should be doing the same thing, but sometimes I just can't pass up a good rhubarb.
Its not character driven, because Phasma isn't really in it. The only two "characters" are Imperial stooge #357u68968, and literally the most generic Rebel/resistence member someone could make. I honestly don't even remember now if the book named those two. I gave Thrawn shit for not having Thrawn as the main character, and I generally liked that book. Phasma doesn't even have good writing, or an interesting plot or side characters to make up for the huge problem of not focusing on the title character. Factually, it definitely does. Unless Wookiepedia has overlooked some cyber vandalism of its article, Imperial Shithead Pilot is just as much of a one dimensional, mindless asshat at the end as she was in the beginning, same with her idiot family. Again, its fine if you like that. I obviously can't stand it. The Jedi Academy books are still coming out, the latest one literally less then a month ago, and they're made for grade schoolers . They're also almost certainly more complex and better written then Inferno Squad, and probably have much better characters. I think you might have been looking into a mirror when you typed this Oh, wow, a bunch of junk came from Phasma. Lets try to go for quality over quantity. Plus, since the character of Phasma isn't even really in the book, the actual book is really just an overly long wiki entry anyway, told in the form of a couple of idiots having a pointless interrogation scene. At least the wiki cuts out the bullshit.
You really don't understand what "main character" means, do you? Fair enough if you think so. Repeating a wrong statement over and over again does not make it any less wrong. Unlike you, I actually read the book and know the score. If you want to read it yourself and point out where I went wrong, I'll hear you out. I was actually referring to the old Kevin J. Anderson books (I was being sarcastic, if you couldn't tell). As I've pointed out before, I'm the only one who read the book and am basing my case directly on the source material with all its nuances. Therefore, I can factually say that you're wrong on every level on this point. You want to use the source material to make your case, fine, but otherwise, there's nothing to refute since there's no argument being made.
And I suppose Lord of the Rings isn't actually about the Lord of the Rings! He just gets talked about a lot and is kind of scary.
Or almost all the Sherlock Holmes stories have Watson as the main character, since it's his POV and they're presented as his own writings.
First, on a more positive note, the first two stories in From a Certain Point of View were pretty good. The Captain Antilles one was a bit better then the stormtrooper one, but I liked both of them. It doesn't mean "the character that a bunch of assholes are telling stories about". I knew you were being sarcastic, although I didn't know that you got the book series wrong. As for the book series in question, that was the Young Jedi Knights book series, and in my opinion they were good. Not fantastic by any means, but the books were solid reads, especially for what they were (thats how you do a slightly younger screwed book series, not just produce the Star Wars version of Romeo & Juliet in the style of Twilight). They are much better then Inferno Squad, and they definitely had better written characters, with a few of the characters being fairly important in the universe overall long after the YJK series ended. No, you can't unless you can prove that Wookiepedia is incorrect, I know what happened. Just because I didn't read the poorly written shit directly past the first few chapters is irrelevant. The writing was fucking terrible, actually reading the book would only be detrimental to the already horrendous story. There is a difference between a title that is a phrase and a title that is a proper name. Phasma was promoted as being a book about Phasma. Her name and image are on the cover. Its like if the Harry Potter series was actually about Dean Thomas, with Harry getting barely any mention, or if the movie Solo was actually about IG-88 and you only see Han Solo once or twice, out of focus in the background. There isn't a self titled Sherlock Holmes story, plus the original Holmes stories are actually well written. Also, Sherlock Holmes books are pretty explicitly about the mystery of the story, they aren't really about Sherlock himself. Phasma is supposed to be about Captain Phasma, but its not.
Well, ok, making Solo about IG-88 would probably have resulted in a much better film then what we got, but my point still stands. It wouldn't be a good Han Solo film if he wasn't the lead character.
Aaaaaand you're wrong again, he was talking about The Jedi Academy trilogy, the second set of books in The New Republic era following the Thrawn trilogy. Just reading Wookiepedia article is not going to actually give you everything you'll get from reading the book. Just because a book isn't told from a certain character's perspective, doesn't mean the book isn't about that character.
It depends on how Han Solo is referenced in the film. I can learn a lot about characters by how other characters react to them Also, Solo is a good film and I wouldn't change it for the world. What it comes down to is perception and expectation. I work hard to not have preconceptions because that has worn me out in frustration with this franchise, especially in the books. Thus, if someone says a book is about Phasma, I'm going to go in expecting to learn something about Phasma, not that she is the key player in all things. Please note, this is just me. I don't engage media the same way as many and don't expect others to understand. But, likewise, I find attitude towards media to be becoming increasingly narrow in focus and that doesn't strike me as a positive way to engage with something is supposedly suppose to be entertaining and enjoyable.
I came to realize that assuming that new canon SW books are going to be entertaining and enjoyable is unrealistic. Some of them are entertaining and enjoyable, but its almost a happy accident at this point when it happens. They're marketing tools that get 1/10th the focus and effort that the old EU had, while also being even more restricted, even in areas the movies will never touch. I figured that since Phasma was a minor character we'd get an actual book about her, with real character development. Instead its just a story of a couple of morons we'll never read about ever again, and some worthless side stories that take place in Phasma's life but don't really matter. Its the book equivalent of anime filler, and I definitely blame the people in charge of the books more then the author. Sure, the author is to blame for the terrible side characters and the focus on them, but the book people don't really let any book do anything important with the movie characters, even the unimportant and/or dead ones. The cartoon/book original characters get to be used a bit more, but no one was going to be allowed to write a real Phasma book since, I don't know, Episode XIII might resurrect her as a force zombie and reveal she was actually Palpatine's illegitimate daughter so they don't want to have to deal with books contradicting that. My big problems with Phasma are how she's not the main character, and how she's pretty much unimportant to the actual story of an idiot interrogating another idiot. You could chop out the storytelling sections and the book would still work as a complete story, and a badly written one at that. If it was written as well as Thrawn was, I'd be kinder to it. But, it wasn't, so the flaws it shares with Thrawn are a much bigger issue for it. The only Star Wars movie I refuse to own is Solo, and I even own the prequels and really enjoy Rogue One. But, to each their own I guess. I personally would rather watch grass grow then ever watch Solo again. Yep, that was a screw up on my part. But now I'm even more confused, because that trilogy is very solid. Sure the sun crusher is a bit stupid, but overall its a very good trilogy, probably better then 2/3rds of the new canon books, and especially better then Inferno Squad. Reading it doesn't add anything significant. Like I said the book is written terribly, actually reading it all the way through would probably show that its worse then I think. You get everything you need by reading summaries, the fact that I experienced how bad the book was written just solidifies that its a terrible story written horribly. Even if it had been a terrible story written with average writing quality, it wouldn't help. That's basically exactly what it means. They may be the topic of the book, but its not a book about them. Thrawn wasn't about Thrawn, it was basically about a random imperial officer who just happened to know Thrawn, but the story quality managed to compensate for the fact that the book focused on the wrong thing. Phasma has nothing to make up for it not focusing on Phasma, its just pointless stories told by a rebel cliche to a imperial cliche. At least Thrawn had an actual plot going through it, and not just a crappy framing device.
It's funny because I prefer those stories. Some of my favorites are those style about characters who get to look from the outside in on the bigger characters. I would recommend avoiding SW books from now on. Funny enough, I feel that way now about Rogue One, which strikes me as even almost as unnecessary as The Phantom Menace. It was well done, creatively crafted and matter very little to me in the end. Solo at least let me care more about Han than I did before, which is saying something since I thought very little of him. IDIC everyone!
Okay. Why not? Framing a character from an outside perspective is a very common literary technique. In any event, in the main story (Phasma and the others journey across her homeworld), Phasma is the central character. She's the one leading, making the decisions, pursuing an end goal. The point of the novel is explaining to us who Phasma is, where she came from, why she does what she does in the movies. That's what what defines a protagonist character. There are certainly side characters who get their own material (Cardinal and Siv), but that's business as usual in novels, movies, and the like. As was clarified, I was talking about the trilogy of novels, not the YA series (good memory though, that Anderson wrote both). Not a huge fan of either (although I probably came to the YJK books too old to appreciate them). I have yet to hear a reason why the book wasn't about Phasma beyond "other characters had story arcs" and "she wasn't the POV character," neither of which are valid arguments (see above for reasons why it is about her, for example). Agreed that the Conan Doyle stories are really good (baring the occasional fluke that any long-running series will have). You're missing the point though; while mysteries like Sherlock Holmes do tend to be more plot-driven, no one would deny that Holmes is the main character, despite only two of the stories being told from his POV (and all but four being told from the perspective of a side character). Use Great Gatsby if that works better for you as an analogy. The point is, Phasma not being the POV character has zero bearing on whether the book is about her or not (and, for the last time, there is no reason to believe otherwise, unless you have something you haven't brought up yet. I actually like both movies, but I prefer Rogue One, oddly enough (esp. considering that the outlaw fringe is my favorite aspect of the franchise); I guess that the story felt more organic, while Solo felt like the plot was checking things off a list. I guess that the more dramatic angle made connecting with the R1 characters easier to do then with the Solo ones for some reason.
When watching Rogue One I was amazed at how well I did connect with the characters given their initial presentation. However, I had an even more connective experience with the Solo characters. Not only that but it gave me more interest into Han as a character. As much as I greatly like the expansion of the Rebel forces and the space battles, I enjoyed the characters more in Solo.
That all just comes down to personal preference, I guess. I can tolerate books like that, but they have to have a story that I find compelling, and writing that I consider good. That's why I like Thrawn, because it compensates for its bad choice of focus by being strong in other areas. For me, Phasma doesn't do that. Uh...no? Whyt would I do that? Sure, I avoid some books that I definitely have no interest in, like the YA BS, that recent book about Padme, etc. But I'm going to at least glance at the general audience SW books that have subjects that I'm at least hypothetically interested in. Since they only produce about 1-2 actual books a year, its not like I use up too much time, especially compared to the old EU that was prolific and filled with books I wanted to read. I like Han well enough, I've loved some of the EU books focused on him, but I just hate what they did in the film, from his stupid backstory to all the pointless "origins" and a plot filled with characters I couldn't stand (except Lando, I'd be up for a solo Lando movie). For me, if we're not getting that story from Phasma's viewpoint, then we're not getting the story. Its more efficient to read that from the wiki, since while its still basically someone telling you the story its shorter, its better written and you can avoid all the BS with the pointless side characters. Yeah, I definitely misunderstood what books you were talking about, but since I like both series and consider them pretty good my point still works of them being better then a lot of the new canon. They are totally valid arguments. Again, the book isn't about her, its about two morons that will never be mentioned outside of the book (unless the author of Phasma writes another book, which I hope doesn't happen but Disney has very low standards when it comes to employing authors for SW books so they probably will hire this author again). If the two morons had just been characters in Phasma's story, then it would have been fine (well, they still would have been crap, badly written characters, but from a story structure standpoint it would have been acceptable). As it is, its false advertising and just a terrible decision. I want to know why I should give a shit about less interesting boba Fett analogue, and I want to get inside her head and experience her story. I don't want to read about two idiots telling crappy stories in a book called Phasma. It isn't about her, period. Unless it is told from her POV, including her thoughts and with her being the story, its not about her. It was deceptive, the book should have been called Random Imperial and Random Resistance Cliches have a Chat about things that kind of (sometimes) relate to Captain Phasma. As it is, its just a worthless waste of paprer, money and everyone's time that can easily be skipped by reading the wiki and losing nothing by experiencing the information that way (Its actually even better, since you don't actually have to read a bad book to get the few relevant pieces of information from that book). Also, none of this addresses that the book is just shit regardless. Like I said, I forgave Thrawn for having most of the same problems as Phasma because it was well written and had a compelling story. Edit: Just noticed this response, it was originally misquoted as a quote from my post so I didn't notice it With how horrendous Inferno Squad is, there is nothing to miss but bad writing. Also, none of my conclusions contradicted the novel. Idiot Cultish Pilot begins and ends the book as a brainwashed Imperial toady with no real motivation except "What does the Empire want me to do". Even characters like Darth Vader and Tarkin had motivations and thoughts outside of blindly serving Palpatine (in the tie in material at least), because most writers know you can't have a compelling main character that is just basically a tool for the Empire with no outside stuff. Hell, in the EU Mara Jade was literally called the Emperor's hand and in books taking place before Palpatine's death even she, at the time a literal tool of Palpatine, had her own thoughts and motivations. Once again, its fine if you like Inferno Squad and its characters. I just happen to find it an infuriating, badly written book that only isn't the worst book ever published under the SW brand because Lost Stars exists. We all like different things, and I'm getting tired of arguing about a book that doesn't even deserve to exist, much less take up so much of my time. I'd prefer to go back to never thinking about it, outside of the times where I'm specifically thinking about the worst SW books.
Because they don't seem to bring you any joy. Yeah, definitely a personal preference thing. Because Rogue One defines pointless to me in terms of story presentation. Han, at least in this film, felt like a person rather than the caricature that books could present.