Serity

Analysis of Mistborn Era 2 I wanted to spend a little time dissecting the political and religious ideas of the series. While this essay is somewhat critical, I hope it isn't taken as a condemnation. I thoroughly enjoyed the suspense, magic, mystery, and emotional drama of the series. However, I didn't feel like I had anything particularly insightful to say about those elements. Scadrial and American History The elevator pitch for Mistborn as a meta-series is that it takes a fantasy world and shows how it progresses through history. So what does Era 2 tell us about Sanderson's concept of progress? My argument is that his view of history is informed by his perspective as a white American author. Revolution In Era 1, we see the medieval feudal setting common to most fantasy books. The land is ruled by a despot; the heroes are a band of criminals who bring about his overthrow. Then, after averting the apocalypse, God rebuilds the world, and the next Era is inaugurated by the Words of Founding. The heroes of Era 1 are the founding fathers; names and statues of characters from Kelsier's crew adorn the landscape. The government is rebuilt as a constitutional democracy. The parallels with the American Revolution and founding of the United States are straightforward. Capitalism By Era 2, the Elendel Basin is coded to resemble 19th-century America. We have industrial capitalism, and inequality of wealth seems to be more important than inequality of title in this society. We have railroad-driven expansion into a barren desert populated with sheriffs and outlaws, which resembles the American West and the Western genre. However, unlike real American history, there is no enslavement of Africans or genocide of Indigenous peoples. In real life, these two elements provided the material wealth to kickstart American capitalism. In Mistborn Era 2, the original accumulation of wealth that got the Basin started was literally a gift from God. Unfortunately, this resembles how some people talk about America, downplaying the role of slavery and genocide and instead talking about America being "blessed." So we see Sanderson inadvertently creating a world that resembles a whitewashed version of American history in his effort to imagine how another world would change over time. This is interesting because, like many fantasy writers, he seems to want to reject Tolkien's Eurocentrism, as illustrated by his much more diverse characters and settings. However, as an author he is still writing from his own perspective, informed by his own life, and thus can't fully escape Americentrism. Political Reform In addition to the above portrayal of material progress, Mistborn Era 2 also illuminates Sanderson's concept of political progress. In the original series, the heroes were all criminals, and they (successfully) sought to overthrow the monarchist system. However, in Era 2, all the characters are instead ruling class and integrated with the liberal capitalist government. Wax, Wayne, Marasi, and Steris are all police officers, wealthy capitalists, aristocrats, and/or political representatives. The kandra also align with the status quo, as they serve the god that created this system. Therefore, in Era 2, progress is no longer revolutionary. Instead, the heroes' activities consist of defending the status quo and making incremental reforms from the top down, as we see with Wax and Steris' political careers. All reforms, such as the enfranchisement of the Outer Cities, workers' rights, and limitations on police powers, come from within the liberal democratic system. Characters who offer a more radical critique, such as The Marksman or Paalm, are villains. Even Kelsier is ultimately rejected by the main characters. Marasi decides that his method of working from the shadows is no longer valid and that she will instead seek political appointment and election within the Basin government. It seems that Sanderson's view of progress runs from monarchy to liberal democracy, but there's nowhere to go after that. Liberal democracy is the end of history. It will be interesting to see whether this reading is challenged by anything that happens in Era 3. Given the unresolved conflict with the Southern Scadrians, as well as the presence of aerial bombers, missiles, and weapons of mass destruction, it's possible that Era 3 will continue to follow an American perspective of history into a 20th-century, Cold War setting. Harmony and the Problem of Evil The other aspect I thought was interesting was Mistborn Era 2's theology. The portrayal of Harmony seems to elucidate the problem of evil; i.e., that it doesn't make sense for God to be both all-powerful and morally good, and for evil to still exist in the world. In fictional works where God is canonically real, this problem might be restated as: If God is all-powerful and morally good, how can the author preserve the conflict necessary for the plot? Sanderson resolves this problem by making Harmony less than all-powerful and less than perfect. Indeed, his power seems to vary inversely with his morality. In the early books, Harmony is kind of a dick; he manipulates the characters, withholds emotionally devastating secrets, drives Paalm to suicide, and traumatizes Wax. He justifies this with lines about free will, but that doesn't seem to be a satisfying solution for Wax. By contrast, in The Lost Metal, God has grown as a person. He says things like "I'm trying to be better," keeps fewer secrets from the characters, and even apologizes to Wax. However, this moral improvment coincides with a sharp reduction in his powers. Autonomy's influence blinds and restricts Harmony's ability to act, thereby preserving the conflict. It's interesting that Sanderson as a writer seems to acknowledge that in order for conflict to exist, God must be either morally flawed or restricted in his powers, despite the fact that Sanderson is not an atheist in real life.

I noticed this as well. The passage where he/him pronouns are used is: "Formless--who had been hiding deep inside these last few days--stirred. She'd thought him forgotten, but he had been waiting. Watching..." I don't think this can be chalked up as a typo, since both "he" and "him" are used. However, this is the only time he/him pronouns are used for Formless. Elsewhere, it/its pronouns are used for Formless, and when Shallan "becomes" Formless later in the book she/her pronouns are used. My personal theory is that Formless had he/him pronouns in an earlier draft of the book, but Brandon changed his mind on that and happened to miss this instance while editing.

So I've picked up Shadows of Self after rereading Alloy, and I'm currently about a 3rd of the way through the book. Before starting it, however, I made the mistake of reading the blurb on the inside of the dust jacket. Most of it was fine--dry, wouldn't convince me to buy it, but it's a Sanderson so I already know I want to--but then I got to this last paragraph: First of all, this undercuts pretty much the whole drama of the first part by telling us who the murderer is. Wax's investigation--tracking down Idashwy, etc.--all becomes kind of uninteresting when there's no suspense because the inside cover already as much as told us a kandra stole her powers with Hemalurgy and then did the murder. Second, I might be wrong but I didn't think these books were marketed to a specifically Christian audience. So what brilliant marketer thought "Hey, you know what we should tell people who are deciding whether to buy this book? That it's a metaphor for Christian mythology." After the previous books, especially Hero of Ages, handled religion in such a mature and thought-provoking way without seeming to pick a side, I had hoped for better than the book coming out and saying "Hey, angels and Lucifer are real. We all know this, right?" I mean, that would be like Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows saying "Harry, like our Jesus, died to save the people of his world and was returned to life to triumph over the devil Voldemort." Having similarities to Christian mythology is fine, but when you pull them out that explicitly you're alienating everyone who's not a Christian. Anyway, I just thought the whole thing was weird. I know it's probably not Brandon's doing, but I'm still disappointed. I usually love buying Brandon's books in physical form because the production value is so high, but this one I'm a little embarrassed to have on my shelf. Did anyone else notice/get bothered by this?

My bad.

The point he's trying to make is that even though he changed the version Sazed read, we the readers still got the unaltered version in the epigraphs, so presumably all the epigraphs are likewise unaltered.

I find it odd to think that Ruin would alter the logbook, and the only thing he changed was the color of the mist spirit, a detail that no one who read the logbook even noticed. The logbook already served Ruin's purposes by convincing Vin to release the power, he had no need to alter it. If anything, I would think he would have altered it to make the mist spirit in the logbook look more like Leras, not less.

Here's a question that came up in the Mistborn forums: Is the mist spirit mentioned in Alendi's logbook the same as the one that Vin encounters? I ask because the one Vin meets is confirmed to be Preservation's shadow of self and is described as being the same color as the normal mists, whereas Alendi's repeatedly describes the mist figure he saw as black or dark (Ruin's colors).

I'd say it makes sense for the mist spirit in Alendi's logbook to be Ruin. I doubt Brandon would have included multiple references to Alendi's mist spirit as dark, black, and shadowy if it was of Preservation when Ruin's theme color is black. I suppose the atium explanation also makes sense, although I hope this gets resolved more clearly in the futre. Adding this to the Questions for Brandon thread.

Rereading Well of Ascension, I came across the passage where Alendi's logbook described the mist spirit which followed him. On more than one occasion he describes it as "black" or "a thing of shadow." Elsewhere it has been stated that the black mists are Ruin's essence, yet everyone seems to concur that the mist spirit that Alendi saw was the same as the one Vin saw (Preservation, that is). Is this a simple slip-up, or am I missing something?

Don't the Shin refer to soldiers as "those who take"? I wonder if this is somehow related. Maybe the soldiers in the squad had heard of the phrase and thought "the Takers" would be a cool squad name.

I'd say the theory that makes more sense is that the Parshendi were fighting these battles in an attempt to keep the Alethi occupied so they wouldn't be completely destroyed. They assumed if they spent a few years fighting small, insignificant battles in the plains, eventually the Alethi would get tired and go home. They just didn't count on just how much Alethi like their wars. So in conclusion, no, they didn't really need to go after those particular gemhearts, they just provided a convenient neutral ground to keep the Alethi engaged without devastating the Parshendi.

Good question... They're obviously magical in some way since they require a highstorm and are changed by bonding with spren. We probably won't fully understand this until we learn more about the creation of the Listeners, but one guess comes to mind is that Odium created the Listeners and gave them the ability to bond with spren to change forms. During the desolations, he used this to give them the Voidforms by bonding with his spren, but at other times, they were able to bond with other, non-Odium based spren (I seem to recall that in one of the Parshendi chapters, it was stated that in order to gain access to artform, they would have to attract creationspren), allowing them to gain a multitude of other forms. So this is still a magic system, technically, but since it isn't as powerful as the surges or the voidforms I wouldn't really think of it as part of the 30.

I assume that there are ten Voidforms or "forms of power" since those were apparently rare and significant, and the rest of the forms are just innocuous ones like art form and scholar form.

Don't have a page ref. since I was reading the eBook version, but the quote is "He Pushed, throwing himself into the air. He reached a good height, then Shoved on the rails behind him, shooting forward. A careful Push below, a continuous Push behind. The wind roared around him..." The way it's phrased seems to me like he is shooting straight forward along the rails using two continuous pushes, one for lift and one for thrust, rather than the bounding flight we've seen elsewhere when there isn't a continuous length of metal to push on. Additionally, in chapter 8 of The Final Empire, when Kelsier first teaches Vin about steel and iron, both of them were referred to as "hovering" in one place, rather than jerking about.

But... Each book has five parts...