turklemuffink

This may be a stretch but, what if the bondsmith spren are somehow related to the moons? Here's what I'm thinking: Roshar has three moons: one big blue one (Nomon) personified as male in Wit's tale, one green, (Mishim) personified as a female, and one violet (Salas), who is female. (In Wit's story at least- I know other cultures think of them differently). And in all cultures they are thought of as siblings. So, could Nomon= The Stormfather, Mishim=The Nightwatcher, and Salas=The Sibling? 1. Foreshadowing in OB: In OB the inside cover art is of Ishar, the founder of the bondsmiths, and prominently, right behind him are the three moons! That seems a bit... interesting considering that there can only be 3 bondsmiths, and those are the only things that appear in 3s in that image. Looking at the other inside cover art, they all show Heralds surrounded by things that are related to their order. Maybe there's a big clue in plain sight? (Or too obvious idk). Also the moons got brought up a LOT more in OB than in the other books, which is interesting since it's Dalinor's book in which we learn a lot about bondsmiths. 2. Stormfather and Nomon: Moons can have a huge impact on weather and tides which is something that was discussed in a previous thread. It's possible that the moons themselves are causing the storms and since Nomon is the biggest moon, perhaps he is the main cause of them? Storm father? Also, in Wit's story, Tsa gets pregnant by Nomon and has a little blue baby which is kind of a connection to "father", albeit a bit fanciful. Interestingly, that story happens in Natanatan which is where the storms hit first. Lastly, the Stormfather refers to the other spren as his siblings. What other trio is thought of as three siblings? (The moons) (At this point I will acknowledge that this is a theory in progress since the Stormfather does refer to himself as the spren of the storm, not the moon.) 3. Mishim and the Nightwatcher: The obvious connection is that Mishim is green so that reeks of cultivation, (haha) BUT if I'm not mistaken, Mishim is the third moon to rise. Perhaps "Nightwatcher" is related to her watching over the inhabitants of Roshar in the quietest and darkest part of night? It's also kind of telling that you can only visit the Nightwatcher at night, when the moons are in the sky. Not exactly water-tight but there might be something related in there. AND in Wit's story she's crafty and tricky which definitely fits the Nightwatcher. 4. Salas and The Sibling: There's a lot of talk of whether one of the bindsmith "godspren" is related to Odium or not. Some say perhaps whatever The Sibling is was here before Odium came, some say she must be connected to Odium the way that the Nightwatcher and Stormfather are connected to Honor and Cultivation. The same thing is said about the moons- were they all there before or are they connected to the shards? So... what if the godspren and the moons are the same thing? The violet light of the moon and the voidlight leads many to pair Salas with Odium, and so why not with his godspren? 5. Odium-spren and bondsmiths: One of the biggest questions about the Odium godspren, though, is why would there be an Odium bondsmith spren that would be working against him? Here's another stretch: The godsprens seem to have their own personalities so is it possible that we have a rebel spren on our hands? Presumably Odium was the old god of humanity, so if there was an Odium spren, she was humanity's godspren. Maybe she cared enough to side with the humans and went against Odium's wishes when they went to Roshar. Maybe she helped convince Honor and Cultivation that the humans were worth saving and was on their side from the start? Who is to say a new moon didn't just appear in the sky when the humans came in order to talk with the other two? 6. Bind spren NOT related to Odium: Above I mentioned an alternative to the three godspren theory. In a way, if this were the case it would strengthen the moon theory. If the spren are something inherently part of Roshar and they have nothing to do with Odium/were there before his arrival, the only big group that exists in threes outside the gods are the moons. This also brings me back to the moons and the bondsmith spren being referred to as siblings. Why would an Odium spren be the Stormfather's sibling? In my opinion, the godspren theory seems a little too obvious and there are some logical leaps and assumptions that need to be made if it were true. I think the three bondsmith spren have always been a part of Roshar. So what's with the violet light and moon? Coincidence? I doubt it. What if Salas has always provided a type of stormlight, (now called void light)? It seems to be the light and storm that most affect the parshmen, who are the natives to the land. Maybe Odium simply exploited or corrupted something that was already there. Actually, I haven't been able to shake something that one of the Parshendi (Eshonai I think, maybe Venli?) said in WoR: they said something about "This direction feels right to me, all the other storms seemed wrong" when talking about the everstorm (also something about the map looks like there was probably once a storm that way- look at the Reshi Isles). Maybe the violet is associated with something that wasn't originally nefarious. ANYWAY that's a lot of theorizing about different topics and I'm fairly new to the boards so feel free to rip this apart. I don't have a lot of evidence, but for some reason I have a feeling the moons are more important than we think.

Ok, so here's a thought (and maybe I'll get shut down) but what if the bondsmith spren are actually the moons?? Hear me out: 1. The image of Ishar in oathbringer has the three moons very prominently behind him with Nomon in the center. 2. There are a lot of references and stories told about the moons which has to mean they are going to be important somehow. 3. Perhaps the stormfather was originally Nomon and then became what he is now when Honor died. It's possible that such a large moon might cause strange weather patterns and tides. Perhaps he's the father as in he is causing the storms. I don't know if there are any allusions to connect the storms and the moons but it might be possible... AND maybe a loose connection but the blue child born to Tsa who became the first blue Natan person- His father was Nomon (father) and the storms do seem to hit natanatan first.. Just saying. 4. The moons are constantly being personified throughout the books. What if the third moon is the sleeping sibling? Or maybe, the nightwatcher is the third moon (she seems pretty crafty) and salas is sleeping? This might be a stretch, and some parts of the theory are a bit loose but... I dont know. What do you guys think? Am I crazy?

Oh yeah, one more thing. This is kind of nerdy...and I'm probably getting too technical but... I'll preface this by saying that I'm a scientist (molecular and cellular biology being two of my specialties). I was glad to see Brandon have Knighthawk reveal that the whole mitochondria thing was science didgeridoo because that kind of bothered me in the first books. (Because mitochondria aren't cells themselves but parts of cells and while they have their own DNA to an extent, I wouldn't for a second be able to believe that could make such epic changes (pun intended)). And while the whole cell cultures and genetic inheritance thing was a little more satisfying from a scientific perspective, I have some trouble seeing where this fit in with the whole ending. When it just seems that Larcener/Calamity could just give and take powers away, how did this tie into genetics? Maybe the actual method by which he gives and takes powers is by causing genetic mutations (or something like that) in the cells of the epic's bodies and when he takes the powers back he's just fixing the mutations? Then inheritance of powers by family members would only occur in babies or twins born after the mutation was introduced (therefore adult twins wouldn't be likely to have the same mutation, and children born to epics after they changed would be likely to be able to inherit at least some of their parent's powers). OR is it that people had these mutations or whatever all along and Larcener/Calamity could just activate/deactivate them at will? I think that's an interesting question, because does that mean we were hardwired for these angelic-destroying-creature things to eventually come and activate random powers within us? So then would Calamity really choose the powers? Or if he does, is it just he chooses which ones to activate in a person? I don't know! What do you think?

I agree with the majority of you about it feeling rushed. -Firefight's Reality: I also would have liked to see David and Firefight interact more. David's generally so curious, I feel like going back and talking to Firefight might have been a logical part of his planning. I felt like something was missing there (I understand why he didn't have David do that- he wanted to save the SteelFather reveal for the end and you can't really have David talking to Firefight and NOT finding out that his father is alive in that universe). At the very least I would have liked to see more interaction between the people of the different realities at the end. For example instead of just David going to meet his father, why couldn't Megan and Prof come and meet and reconcile with Firefight and Tavi? I would have liked to actually see Prof's (un-corrupted) reaction to having a daughter with Tia in another world. -Obliteration. I wasn't that surprised at all by what he turned out to be. I was actually kind of surprised by David's assumptions: I mean, why, when he knew that in Firefight's reality (where there was no Calamity corruption) they were hunting Obliteration, would he be surprised when Obliteration ended up being a psycho at the end? -Larcener. I just...I'm not sure whether or not I'm disappointed. I think I am. On the plus-side I definitely didn't see it coming, and I like the idea that The Ultimate Epic is actually essentially a spoiled child and in that way it's pretty novel and cool that Larcener ended up being Calamity. But on the other hand, we didn't even know Larcener existed until this book. At the very least a mention of him in one of the previous books might have been nice because as it is, it was really just a surprise because there was absolutely no reason for us to even suspect it might be him. I just was more...disappointed when the scene came and you were all excited to see who Calamity was and it was this whiny kind of boring character. I feel like I should have been more shocked and surprised than I was, you know? On top of that I understand that there's no way you could really have a good stand off in a battle against Calamity but I feel like there was still more he could have done to that ending. Not to mention how predictable it was that someone would just jump in and save David. Bam! Here's Prof who magically has his powers back. Bam! Here's Megan who pulled Obliteration from another reality and (somehow) forced him to take her there (no idea how). That was pretty unsatisfying too, I think. Oh yeah, and if Megan wanted her powers taken away in Firefight...couldn't she have easily figured out that Larcener existed? The whole supposed reason she went to Babylar was to find Regalia to take away her powers, but I'm sure the rumor that Regalia maybe giving powers to epics wasn't as common as the knowledge of a high epic ruling Atlanta that can easily take them away. Anyone else wonder that? -Mizzy. What now, she's all of a sudden an epic at the end? That was glossed over extremely quickly... -Another thing I haven't seen anyone mention is about Tavi and Tia. When Megan pulled Tavi through to fight Prof, there was a point when Tia saw Tavi and said something like "That looks like...." and then she doesn't finish her sentence. The way the book ended you could assume the rest of the sentence could have been something like "me" or "me when I was younger". But while I was reading the book, I had this...hope maybe...that Tia knew who Tavi was and that she had had a daughter in the Steelheart reality without Prof's knowledge and kind of...kept her secret just in case Prof went bad (or to protect her or something). In hindsight I don't think Tia would have done that but it might have been an interesting plot twist that after killing Tia, Prof had a long lost daughter he could meet to help dull the pain. He kind of has that in Firefight-reality-Tavi, but it could have been fun for Brandon to play with that in our universe. Anyone else think that while they were reading or am I just weird? Overall I just felt like there were a LOT of loose ends, especially for a book that was supposed to end the series. And on top of that, it feels like there were a lot of little plot holes here and there that are really uncharacteristic of Brandon. But yeah, I mean I still liked it. Just not as much as I wanted to.

So... This may be a WILD guess. But what if Heleran's a lightweaver like Shallan? What if he's actually Amaram?! Now hear me out; What if all the time he was away he created a new persona...brightlord Amaram? He could make it look like Kaladin killed him, releasing his control of the sword. That way everyone believes he's dead, and so can take on the full-time job of being Amaram. That would explain why he was so insistent on taking the blade back. I wouldn't put it past a Davar man to kill people in cold blood like that. I know it's a stretch, but...I just have a feeling it could be so... Any thoughts?