[Calamity spoilers] Calamity reactions thread

[Galavantes]

So just to ring in on this from my own interpretation/opinion, and curious your thoughts on it. When Calamity kept saying over and over that they were to observe and learn, then return. That they were not allowed to interfere, it sounded a lot like asimov's robotic laws. That they break down for Calamity's people kind of like this:

 

Do Not Interfere

Observe

Learn

Return

 

When he was first born into our world, he was so overwhelmed by sensory information he freaked out, and it was implied he took actions. He stated

 

"You are worthless, as a whole. You will destroy yourselves, and I will bear witness. I will not shirk my duty as others have. We are to watch, as is our calling. But I must not interfere, not again. The acts of youth can be forgiven. Though I was never truly a child, I was new. And your world is a shock. A dreadful shock." He nodded, as if convincing himself.

 

So he got born in to our world, had the worst experience of his existence, and then lashed out, doing something. What that is? No clue, but it was interference. Now you have someone "new", with the rational of a new born, with unlimited powers who felt it was hurt by the people of the world. Think of the Hulk in the movie "Incredible Hulk". Anytime he attacked the soldiers is when he was shot at. He literally only responded to any "pain" inflicted on him, and any collateral damage was due to his tantrum. He is being hurt, does not know why, does not know his own strength, and just wants the pain to stop so lashes out. This brings us to the next step:

 

So his prime directive was not to interfere, but the moment he got here, he did exactly that. Well who's fault is that? Can't be his. He was just doing what he was told. It was the humans who made him do it. They hurt him. They are bad people. They should be punished. But he can't interfere. He isn't allowed. He is however supposed to observe. Well he is going to observe humans destroy themselves like the bad people they are. Then his earlier interference will be justified. They made him interfere. He is a good extradimentional entity. He does what he is meant to. It has nothing to do with his feelings being hurt, and wanting to see the humans punished for what they did to him. He didn't make a mistake, its their fault. So he will learn to confirm they are bad to the core by destroying themselves, and he will get to leave to go home with the knowledge of a job well done. Then he will get to return.

 

But wait. He is still here, and has been here for a long time. Why aren't humans wiped out already? They are bad, they can't move beyond that. If they move beyond it, then it means He will have to move beyond his pain and be sorry for breaking the rules. That even though justified, he still made a mistake. No, no, that can't be it. It will happen, they will all wipe themselves out. Then David shows him. Shows him with absolute clarity and fact, that the darkness in humans. The darkness he is so convinced was the reason he was hurt upon entrance into our worlds, wasn't there to begin with. It was just an accident on all sides. That the destructive nature that he thinks is prevalent in everyone, is him. That he is as subject to pain as humans. And just like humans, he has the equal chance to rise above it or be consumed by it. That he chose to be consumed. There were plenty of other versions that were able to rise above it and go home. But he wasn't able to. All his suffering since his birth was not at the hand of these evil humans, but from himself. He never grew up. So it was being faced by this, that he realized he so completely failed his directives. He interfered massively, and completely missed what he was supposed to learn for years. That he, who was so convinced he was right, to the point he defined all his actions from that sole premise, turns out was wrong. Having what you feel is your entire life view thrown out the window, is very very jarring. So all he could do is curl up underneath the sense of his whole world being turned upside down for the second time in his existence, and he left.Turns out his job was done long long ago, he got a big fat F, and he just didn't want to face it. 

 

Now I am not saying whether or not he was justified based on my interpretation. Just that this is what and why I feel he did what he did. I feel this was very much in homage to Mister Mxyzptlk. Hopefully I articulated my thoughts well, and I still say this is my own interpretation. Could very well be like skaa is saying, and his weakness got negated. This is just what I took out of it. 

 

edit: I realize i did pretty much just repeat what I already wrote, but I hope I fleshed it out further to explain why I felt he left, which was the original intention of this post while the last was to explain why I thought his species was not here to destroy. 

 

 

This has been my exact interpretation as well. I actually really like Skaa's theory that Calamity was forced out of our universe by his weakness, but Pathfinder's explanation was my own head canon when I read it. 

I can also think of reasons why it's perfectly consistent for Calamity NOT to have a weakness in the traditional sense of normal epics. I'd love to hear what WoB will be on this.

[natc]

On that previous subject about Prof's weakness, I wonder what Steelheart's full weakness is . . . just someone not afraid of him bypasses his powers, but doesn't negate them completely. So there must be a more specific trigger in mind that involves not being afraid of him.

Edited February 19, 2016 by natc

[The Sovereign]

On that previous subject about Prof's weakness, I wonder what Steelheart's full weakness is . . . just someone not afraid of him bypasses his powers, but doesn't negate them completely. So there must be a more specific trigger in mind that involves not being afraid of him.

 

I wonder if it is actually something like, someone who doesn't fear him and views him as a hero. The whole, everyone is the hero of their own story motif...

Edited February 19, 2016 by Iron Eyes

[turklemuffink]

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.

Edited February 19, 2016 by kingrah

[turklemuffink]

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?

Edited February 19, 2016 by kingrah

[Pathfinder]

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 him 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 that he gives and takes powers by supposedly causing genetic mutations in the cells of the epic's bodies and when he takes the powers back he's just fixing the mutations? Then inheritance (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 was given to understand that genetics did not come into play. That an epic inheriting their parent's ability was very rare. The only reason we saw it play out that way was Tavi, who was unique, and David who arguably did not inherent it from his father. Just his alternate dimension father happened to have the same power. As to why it was important to make that distinction, was for it to make sense for David to be able to get some of Prof's stuff from his cheek. I know very little about genetics, but I was given the impression getting mitochondrial dna from a sample was much different/harder than just getting a skin sample from a wound. 

[theuntaintedchild]

I think my big letdown with this book is that it isn't part of the Cosmere. Which is silly because I knew the series wasn't going into it. Regardless I let myself get anxious and almost had high hopes that Invocation was the name of a shard and that he was a shard from some parallel universe. (i.e. The Cosmere) I think I just have a real love for the way the Cosmere novels are put together like seven jigsaw puzzles all mixed together in a ziploc bag at a yard sale. (How's that for an Epic Simile David?) I just get so excited when I find a piece that will help me see the larger pictures. Calamity ended up being something completely unrelated...like a satsuma. I finished it and I was like...What's this satsuma doing in my bag of Cosmere goodies?! Oh Well it's still an unexpected Satsuma (which in all fairness is still pretty awesome)

[Edgedancer]

His weakness was that he would fail even with his powers. So his powers played a part in his weakness, and therefore has a small affect. Think of the Kool-Aid weakness. When touching Kool-Aid her powers fizzled, but they didn't completely negate until she drank the Kool-Aid.

I'm still not sure if that flies with his weakness being entirely based on his perception. Alright, it triggering while he was succesfully teaching Tia how to use his powers I can buy at least somewhat but how could he perceive Tavi's powers as a representation of his own failures before he even perceived what her powers are?

Either his powers trigger his weakness objectively, in which case we have two seperate triggers or if it all is the same weakness and steems from Prof's active perception at the moment, then Tavi should not have been able to tensor away the forcefield bubble without Prof knowing what was up with her.

Edited February 19, 2016 by Edgedancer

[Voidus]

Actually, it was. This is what you said first:

Then you proceeded to acknowledge that Limelight's weakness was based on perception, which is a clear contradiction of what you said.

 

I meant Weaknesses in the general sense, not the personal sense. Weaknesses are activated based on the objective reality of their existence, in some cases that's the objective existence of a certain perception but it's still the fact that that perception objectively exists, not the other way around.

 

 

You will have to rephrase that for me. Not sure where that "objectivity" issue came from, and why that matters as to whether Calamity had an Epic weakness or not. Do you or do you not agree that Calamity's weakness is similar to Prof's? If not, why not?

Because if his weakness is that humans are good, that's objectively true well before he even arrives on earth, his weakness would be instantly activated and he'd die before he did anything. No, of course I don't, what personal emotion could he possibly be fearing? For all the reasons I already mentioned.

 

 

Except that's not the only "show" for that. Heck, the scene of Prof's defeat is almost a mirror image of the scene of Calamity's defeat (the only difference is that David and Megan are joined by Prof this time in activating the enemy's Epic weakness). Every instance of David defeating an Epic via his Epic weakness can be seen as foreshadowing of how Calamity was defeated. Lastly, there were several clues about Larcener's weakness, meaning it didn't really come out of the blue as you imply. On the other hand, your interpretation of "Calamity just gave up" had absolutely no foreshadowing whatsoever.

That some people can't see those simple connections is frankly not my problem, but it is sad that they are not able to appreciate the book more because of this.

The whole point of Profs defeat is that they're redeeming him, if you think that's the mirror then you agree with my point, not that he's destroyed. Now if you argued that it was mirrored by Steelhearts defeat you might have a point but it's noticeably dissimilar from everything about Steelhearts defeat. Every instance of an Epic being redeemed can be seen as foreshadowing of Calamitys redemption, and since this is explicitly stated to be the better goal I'd say it was far better foreshadowing than using the weakness to kill was.

 

If you're trying to convince anyone then it absolutely is your concern, and given that you obviously don't see the equally simple parallels to redemption I don't really think you should be criticizing.

 

 

Alright. Let me rephrase my statement: I concede that Brandon sometimes hides the consistency of his magic rules in order to have something to show in future books (and perhaps so that his fans can theorize about how the inconsistencies can be resolved), but when I find an opportunity to interpret a Brandon novel so that its magic already appears consistent without the need for a future book, why would I not embrace that interpretation, at least until I get a good argument that an apparent inconsistency (that needs to be resolved in a future book) exists?

If that's how you choose to read the books then that's fine, everyone has their own way. But personally? Because if you don't embrace that idea you get to think about what you might be missing, where the foreshadowing may come from, what might happen next, how everything might fit together.

 

 

1. Yes, and the powers came from Calamity's species. 2. So what? Besides, he clearly states that he was not the first of his kind to be sent. 3. Again, so what? All Gifters give people powers. How does being an Omni-Gifter change whether or not he has a weakness? 4. So because he has all the Epic powers he must not have an Epic weakness? Your blatant disregard for the Second Law is showing again.

1. Yet the only ones we've seen using them are humans and so have no basis to speculate about how his species acts when using them.

2. So it's another thing that makes him unique compared to all Epics we know of, so it's another reason to suspect he might be different.

3. He's the source of them all, you don't think that makes him different? Compare gifters to those they gift powers to, notice some differences? Yet another reason to speculate that logically there should also be differences between Epics and the one who gifted them.

4. No, he has every power so he's different, from the evidence I then assume that one of the differences is that he doesn't have a weakness. Shards are near omnipotent and not limited by their magic system, the second law isn't universally applicable to everything, it's a guideline for writing not an absolute law that must be adhered to in every single line of every piece of information in a book.

 

 

There might be some rules that don't apply to him, but there also has to be some rules that apply to everyone including him, or else this particular magic system becomes irredeemably inconsistent. All three books of the Reckoners series have shown Epics being defeated by their Epic weaknesses. Giving Calamity an Epic weakness is consistent with Sanderson's Third Law.

Except it was clearly explained why other Epics have weaknesses, it's his fear that causes them, they get their powers from him, we don't know where he gets his power from so it's irrational to assume that the same limitation applies.

 

 

Interesting.

Almost every page of every Reckoners book (except the pages of the Epilogues) involved David and/or the Reckoners either talking about the atrocities of an Epic, or talking about how to defeat an Epic, or carrying out a plan to defeat an Epic (sometimes failing, sometimes not), or actually defeating an Epic.

Two of the three Reckoners books are named after an Epic that was defeated in that book.

A multitude of instances involving the bullying done by Epics is shown in every book.

The main character of the book, David, whose name is a reference to another famous story you may have heard that also involved defeating a powerful being, took down several Epic bullies on his own even before he officially became an Epic hero.

There are many lessons that young adolescents can take from the Reckoners series. I only pointed out one that I thought was pretty neat. But you chose to attack that and claimed that you don't see how the books teach that the powerful can be defeated. You say that such an important message is just filler and comparable to candy-eating. You accuse me of implying that kids should physically hurt bullies, as if defeating the powerful can only be done through violent means (something that Calamity's defeat clearly contradicts).

You might think that everything you've said above is good, but I don't. Huh... so "good" is not "clearly objective" after all, eh? It appears people can disagree about what is good, and that we can only hope to convince another person to see the good that we see.

Firefight wasn't defeated she was Redeemed (And in my opinion so was Calamity, which makes it two of three that were redeemed), which again is my point, the tone shifts from trying to win the minor victory of killing an Epic to the greater victory of redeeming them so that people can see that there are good Epics. It is literally the entire plot of Calamity.

Those bullying Epics have their motivations revealed, it's not about defeating them it's about understanding them and in the later books even about helping them. Steelheart wasn't even as evil as he wanted people to believe, he was just afraid that people wouldn't respect him so he pretended to be worse than he was so that they'd fear him. If your message is just how to defeat a bully you don't go to great lengths to show the motivations of the bully. The story of Perseus and Medusa doesn't go into detail of how Medusa was actually just petrified of being lonely and so she kept frozen adventurers with her to keep her company, it's a simple: Monster bad, hero good scenario.

I'm not accusing you of anything, just pointing out that there are far deeper messages than that of defeating bullies, yes it's a surface problem and one directly referenced by Davids name but that's not the point of the series, the entire point of the end is that these bullies actually aren't all bad. So I'm sorry if you feel that I'm attacking you, I'm just sharing what I believe the messages of the series are, and more importantly what I think we should take from it.

No, but whether or not people adhere to a certain definition of good certainly is. David didn't convince Calamity to change his definition of good, he convinced him that people fit into his already existing definition.

[skaa]

@Voidus: First of all, I will admit that I've been unfairly downplaying the role redemption in the books. Megan was redeemed. Prof was redeemed. In my zeal to express my point, I've fallen for the trap of trying to negate every little thing that you said without regard for truth, and I was wrong to do that.

Nonetheless, I still think my main point stands. Let me try a different tactic.

---

Option 1: In writing the ending of Calamity, Brandon utterly failed to do one simple thing that he had no trouble doing in Elantris (which was his first published book!): When making an antagonist have a change of heart, make this change sufficiently clear. Crumpling to the ground and vanishing is not a sufficient sign of a change of heart for Calamity. Brandon could have made Calamity send the protagonists safely back to the ground. Brandon could have made Calamity take away the powers of truly psychopathic Epics like Obliteration. Brandon could have made Calamity utter one word of remorse, one word of goodness. But he didn't. Brandon Sanderson, award-winning novelist, mentor and inspiration to many writers, wrote a sub-amateur level ending to a book series.

Option 2: In writing the ending of Calamity, Brandon used the magic system in ways consistent with the Laws of Magic that bear his name. He doesn't always follow those laws in other books (because an expert knows when he can break rules), but he decided to follow them in this case. He made sure that the aspect of magic that he used in solving a problem was sufficiently explained beforehand. He used a limitation in the antagonist's magic power. He made sure that this limitation is not something out of the blue by placing hints of it beforehand.

I choose Option 2. Now, I'm not saying that Brandon can do no wrong, or that Calamity was a perfect novel. The book was not perfect, as can be seen by the many Sanderson fans disliking it. But even so, I think choosing Option 1 is a bit too much. Calamity is not a perfect story, but I daresay Brandon put more thought into the ending than Option 1 implies.

Edited February 20, 2016 by skaa

[natc]

I haven't read this wall of debate in its entirety yet, but I don't recall myself saying Calamity had a change of heart specifically. Staring down your worst nightmare (in this case, having interfered too much on the basis of being utterly wrong about everything) is usually grounds for people to either curl up in fetal positions or just up and bail.

[Unstoppable Force]

Mizzy is now an epic? But how? If Calamity is gone(Who gives people powers, chooses the epics?) How does Mizzy become and epic?  Are we to assume that now that Calamity is gone, that there are no more new Epics?  This left me very confused.

 

Overall, I enjoyed the ending, though I think we could have used about 50 more pages for the Calamity meeting and tying up strings with Prof & Reckoners when they get back to earth.  Instead of Obliteration just warning David, It would have been nice to see about 10 pages of the team drawing a plan together to defeat Obliteration + Crew, to show everyone the Reckoners continues, but with them using their abilities to help eachother. 

[carlucill]

Mizzy is now an epic? But how? If Calamity is gone(Who gives people powers, chooses the epics?) How does Mizzy become and epic?  Are we to assume that now that Calamity is gone, that there are no more new Epics?  This left me very confused.

 

Overall, I enjoyed the ending, though I think we could have used about 50 more pages for the Calamity meeting and tying up strings with Prof & Reckoners when they get back to earth.  Instead of Obliteration just warning David, It would have been nice to see about 10 pages of the team drawing a plan together to defeat Obliteration + Crew, to show everyone the Reckoners continues, but with them using their abilities to help eachother. 

I think she was sort of a "proto-epic" like David. During firefight I remember her tossing David around and exhibiting super strength. My assumption was that either she was doing a great job of suppressing her powers, or that she had faced her fears but wasn't using them. Now that Larcy boy is gone she doesn't have to worry about the darkness/stigma involved in being an epic and can kick some butt to her heart's content.

Edited February 20, 2016 by carlucill

[+Slowswift]

I loved this book with the exception of the ending, though I do love that we now have conformation that the Faithful were literally waiting for Superman.

 

Edit: I don't understand, however, why David gets the Steelheart powers if he was almost made into a water-powered Epic in Firefight. 

 

I love that one of my original comments about Steelheart being a stand-in for Supes really turned out to be in the right vein. I also loved the part about discussing Prof's weaknesses... I think BS must have put a few of those examplese in the book specifically for sharders here.

 

I was going to say, "Is nobody going to talk about David's dad being Superman?"

 

Overall, while I enjoyed Calamity immensely, I still prefer Firefight. I'm not going to say why, as everyone else basically just said it for me. 

[Edgedancer]

I was going to say, "Is nobody going to talk about David's dad being Superman?"

 

Overall, while I enjoyed Calamity immensely, I still prefer Firefight. I'm not going to say why, as everyone else basically just said it for me. 

Well, David's innitials are D.C. so the powerset isn't all that suprising after all.

[Voidus]

@Voidus: First of all, I will admit that I've been unfairly downplaying the role redemption in the books. Megan was redeemed. Prof was redeemed. In my zeal to express my point, I've fallen for the trap of trying to negate every little thing that you said without regard for truth, and I was wrong to do that.

Nonetheless, I still think my main point stands. Let me try a different tactic.

---

Option 1: In writing the ending of Calamity, Brandon utterly failed to do one simple thing that he had no trouble doing in Elantris (which was his first published book!): When making an antagonist have a change of heart, make this change sufficiently clear. Crumpling to the ground and vanishing is not a sufficient sign of a change of heart for Calamity. Brandon could have made Calamity send the protagonists safely back to the ground. Brandon could have made Calamity take away the powers of truly psychopathic Epics like Obliteration. Brandon could have made Calamity utter one word of remorse, one word of goodness. But he didn't. Brandon Sanderson, award-winning novelist, mentor and inspiration to many writers, wrote a sub-amateur level ending to a book series.

Option 2: In writing the ending of Calamity, Brandon used the magic system in ways consistent with the Laws of Magic that bear his name. He doesn't always follow those laws in other books (because an expert knows when he can break rules), but he decided to follow them in this case. He made sure that the aspect of magic that he used in solving a problem was sufficiently explained beforehand. He used a limitation in the antagonist's magic power. He made sure that this limitation is not something out of the blue by placing hints of it beforehand.

I choose Option 2. Now, I'm not saying that Brandon can do no wrong, or that Calamity was a perfect novel. The book was not perfect, as can be seen by the many Sanderson fans disliking it. But even so, I think choosing Option 1 is a bit too much. Calamity is not a perfect story, but I daresay Brandon put more thought into the ending than Option 1 implies.

I don't think either is the case, I think it's something similar to 1 but I wouldn't exactly call it a change of heart, he just acknowledged that he'd done the wrong thing and is supposed to return straight away. Sticking around to actually do anything would go against the whole point of it.

[Xavien]

I'm still not sure if that flies with his weakness being entirely based on his perception. Alright, it triggering while he was succesfully teaching Tia how to use his powers I can buy at least somewhat but how could he perceive Tavi's powers as a representation of his own failures before he even perceived what her powers are?

Either his powers trigger his weakness objectively, in which case we have two seperate triggers or if it all is the same weakness and steems from Prof's active perception at the moment, then Tavi should not have been able to tensor away the forcefield bubble without Prof knowing what was up with her.

 

I think that when teaching Tia he was trying fully and failed to stop something she was doing.  Tia herself said it was an accident so they were probably testing what all he could do and he failed.  Kind of like with Abraham playing with the mercury when David dropped the slab on his head. Same thing goes with the fight with Tavi. He was fully engaged in the fight and wasn't pulling his punches, every time she got through his defenses was a mini failure so he couldn't heal those but he never failed completely. The fact that both cases involved his same power set is a red herring, they are simply such a great counter that Prof would occasionally fail to stop them and they are so powerful that if he doesn't fight back to his fullest he'd get wrecked.

 

Perception is still a very important part of his weakness IMO, how do you know when you have failed? So much about his actions was rationalization that he hadn't failed because he hadn't really tried. In the end it simply took countering those rationalizations and convincing him that he had failed.

[baby]

I just feel like if Calamity was a 100 or so pages longer, I wouldn't have any qualms about the ending and not as many questions. Ending a series with this many questions isn't a nice feeling.

[Unstoppable Force]

I think she was sort of a "proto-epic" like David. During firefight I remember her tossing David around and exhibiting super strength. My assumption was that either she was doing a great job of suppressing her powers, or that she had faced her fears but wasn't using them. Now that Larcy boy is gone she doesn't have to worry about the darkness/stigma involved in being an epic and can kick some butt to her heart's content.

I must have totally missed that one...

[skaa]

natc, on 20 Feb 2016 - 11:59 PM, said:

I haven't read this wall of debate in its entirety yet, but I don't recall myself saying Calamity had a change of heart specifically.

No, that was Voidus. Or I thought that was what he was saying, what with all his talk of redemption in the previous page. But now he's saying otherwise. Meh. I'm taking a break from all this so that I can make my planned Calamity thread.

Edited February 21, 2016 by skaa

[Webbstre]

So... I've read most of this thread, though admittedly I was searching for instances of Calamity or Megan to see if anyone was talking about what I had in mind. Now that I've registered, here's what's on my mind:

 

1- I did love the book, and the ending. Steelheart was my first non-Wheel of Time book from Sanderson (though I've since read everything in the Cosmere other than Warbreaker). The thing is, I didn't know this was a series aimed at Teens (as opposed to the other novels Sanderson writes) at my first impression of Steelheart was that maybe the writer wasn't very good and the foreshadowing was obvious until a friend told me that this was aimed at teens and was meant to be at a different level from his other books. Thus, I loved the ending for what it was: a really interesting story in an interesting world that happens to be written for somewhat younger people. Even now I'm smiling from the nice little ending with David and his father.

 

2- I REALLY want to know what Calamity's deal was. Up until the end I half-expected it to be someone with a reality-changing power like Megan's, but having changed all of reality. I was even afraid that it was going to be some kind of weird dream by Calamity and the story would be reset. Now I'm left wondering if Calamity was someone from the actual Cosmere. I hope we get answers soon.

 

3- So... did anyone else not catch that Megan probably wasn't the original Megan? When Larceny/Calamity couldn't take her powers I didn't think too hard on it, but she did hint that every time she died she was afraid it was just a different version of herself returning to take her place. It would explain the memory being fuzzy/missing. My guess was that Calamity couldn't take her powers because she wasn't the version of Megan he gave the powers to originally. It's not a major plot point or a thread left hanging really, just a theory I'm tossing out there.

 

If there ever is a sequel I'd just like to see a side novel with a collection of short stories to kind of fill in the final bits. For example, I'd love to see Firefight's point of view every time he got sucked into the other reality and was made to do terrible things (back when Megan was bad).

[carlucill]

3- So... did anyone else not catch that Megan probably wasn't the original Megan? When Larceny/Calamity couldn't take her powers I didn't think too hard on it, but she did hint that every time she died she was afraid it was just a different version of herself returning to take her place. It would explain the memory being fuzzy/missing. My guess was that Calamity couldn't take her powers because she wasn't the version of Megan he gave the powers to originally. It's not a major plot point or a thread left hanging really, just a theory I'm tossing out there.

My understanding was completely different. Larcener couldn't take her powers because she had rejected him and "claimed them for herself," not because she was from a different world.

[NovaSeeker]

I'm with the "Calamity's defeat was psychological" camp. Pathfinder did a wonderful job of spelling out exactly what I believe Calamity's motivations and reasons were. Calamity is a being from another dimension.

 

This is not in dispute, right? We're all agreed that Calamity is not human, yes? Okay, then. 

 

Calamity was not an Epic.

 

Epics are human beings that are granted a portion of Calamity's powers. Calamity was not a human being. Calamity is The Source. Ergo, any assumptions you have about the Epic/Power/Weakness system cannot rationally be assumed to apply to him. Does Calamity have a Weakness? Perhaps. Does he react to it the same way a human being does? Who can say.

 

"Well, I can say," you respond, "Because I clearly read it on the page."

 

Ah, but I read the same pages as you, and we are having this discussion, so it seems no one can actually say for sure.

 

"But it's more awesome if David found the magic bullet that solved the problem, instead of just talking the monster to death!"

 

My friend, I would like to be the first to introduce you to a marvelous roleplaying game from the 90s: Planescape Torment. 

Edited February 21, 2016 by NovaSeeker

[XenosHg]

My feelings right after reading (and never encountering any spoilers beforehand)

That was cool. That was very interesting and captivating. And the ending was a bit underwhelming. It would feel better if prolonged just a bit, not so rushed. But as an afterthought, it feels very nice.

 

In retrospect, I like the "talking" part. Because violence is not the answer to everything. As it is repeatedly pointed out to David when he reflexively takes his gun and shoots someone immune, just in case. And it was pretty nice for heroes to say -You're wrong, see? And the "bad guy" replied - Okay, I messed up. - and then he up and left.

 

Edit 1: "Proving your worth to persuade a completely immortal monster" is not more contrived than "Killing an invincible person by assisted accidental suicide".

Edit 2: "linking powers to people is not explained" -- it's never explained. In Mistborn, there is no logical connection with which metal you can burn.

Edited February 21, 2016 by XenosHg

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

My feelings right after reading (and never encountering any spoilers beforehand)

That was cool. That was very interesting and captivating. And the ending was a bit underwhelming. It would feel better if prolonged just a bit, not so rushed. But as an afterthought, it feels very nice.

In retrospect, I like the "talking" part. Because violence is not the answer to everything. As it is repeatedly pointed out to David when he reflexively takes his gun and shoots someone immune, just in case. And it was pretty nice for heroes to say -You're wrong, see? And the "bad guy" replied - Okay, I messed up. - and then he up and left.

I like the idea of talking the bad guy down, but I thought it felt unearned. Too easy. Calamity is set up as this unbearably arrogant and hateful being, and all it takes is one visit to an alternate reality for him to say "Okay, I was wrong"? I think it should've taken more than that, because usually, people who have built a philosophy on the notion that people are basically evil aren't swayed from it so easily.