Ialais Spy

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

17 hours ago, Watchcry said:

Ishnah has wanted to be in the ghostbloods since she first met Shallan.  It's totally her..

Therefore it isn't, because it's too obvious.

[ftl]

"Too obvious" is tricky, because while it might be obvious to people on forums picking over every detail, it might be very much NOT obvious to people who just read through once. So something being "very obvious" here might read more like being "well-foreshadowed, obvious in retrospect but never saw it until it happened" to a lot of people.

[Karger he/him]

On 8/27/2020 at 4:27 PM, jamskinner said:

But not boring.  There needs to be a bit of fantasy in a fantasy book.

I personally would find it quite boring.  It has been done to death really.  In fact it seems like the most obvious possibility.

Edited August 30, 2020 by Karger

[jamskinner]

2 hours ago, Karger said:

I personally would find it quite boring.  It has been done to death really.  In fact it seems like the most obvious possibility.

Really.  When has it been done before?  I personally don't care who it ends up being as long as it isn't formulaic or based on checking the right boxes.

Edit: What do those who oppose a shallan identity being the culprate think about Brandon lending suspicion to one of her identities? He obviously doesn't have a problem inferring it could be one.

Edited August 30, 2020 by jamskinner

[Karger he/him]

2 hours ago, jamskinner said:

Really.  When has it been done before?  I personally don't care who it ends up being as long as it isn't formulaic or based on checking the right boxes.

Off the top of my head.  Young Justice season 1 and Captain America in secret empire both did this trope.  At the time it was actually done pretty well(they were both conditioned ahead of time in ways that made sense at least using comic book logic) but given we know Shallan can't trust herself and Shallan knows she can't either it is not like a viewer would not easily be able to figure that one.

[jamskinner]

51 minutes ago, Karger said:

Off the top of my head.  Young Justice season 1 and Captain America in secret empire both did this trope.  At the time it was actually done pretty well(they were both conditioned ahead of time in ways that made sense at least using comic book logic) but given we know Shallan can't trust herself and Shallan knows she can't either it is not like a viewer would not easily be able to figure that one.

If its so easy tell me whats going to happen.  Also please explain your examples and how they are the same.  Just naming them does nothing.

[I Am A Fish he/him]

Spoiler

@Toaster Retribution, Would you mind putting an apostrophe in the title after, Ialai. Sorry for bothering you.

On 8/27/2020 at 1:27 PM, jamskinner said:

But not boring.  There needs to be a bit of fantasy in a fantasy book.

But the best fantasy works are the ones where things make sense. One of the reasons Brandon's writing has become so good, is the fact that he works really hard to portray things irl realistically.

[Karger he/him]

2 hours ago, jamskinner said:

If its so easy tell me whats going to happen.  Also please explain your examples and how they are the same.  Just naming them does nothing.

My point is that this is the conclusion that everyone including Shallan jumped to.

Quote

We didn’t do this, Veil thought. We decided not to kill her, right?

As such is would seem kind of silly for them to just decide.  Yeah that is what happened.  Also how do you keep going with that plot.  Any other conclusions afterward would be red hearings.  Basically the entire story would be "Shallan wastes time when she knows the answer but is repressing the information."  I personally find that quite silly.  In both examples (spoilers for both I suppose)

Spoiler

The character trying to solve the mystery is culpable without knowing.  The reason I accept it in both cases is that in hindsight both Roy Harper and Steve Rogers were acting slightly out of character.  They took actions that made sense but were probably not their best choices.  Roy who is the eldest and most professional of the cast gets somewhat more angry then he should when denied the promotion that will allow him to enter the area he wishes to compromise.  He is also very certain that their is a mole despite having no real evidence beyond hearsay(retroactively it is implied he suspects).  When the truth finally comes out he instantly guesses the truth but is unable to earlier because he does not wish to acknowledge other possibilities.  He also clearly has been manipulated over the course of the season.  In the second example Cap maintains his ethical behavior and leadership but is at the same time acting in ways that escalate conflicts without actually solving the problem thus weakening the people who he will later oppose.

However Shallan does not act in ways we don't understand.  She is often surprising but he motivations always make sense.  In addition a hollywood portrayal of a very real condition would turn off a lot of readers including myself.

[GriffinMaze]

My off the wall guesses are: another personality of Shallans or Adolin

[jamskinner]

My new theory is it was a spren.

[jamskinner]

4 hours ago, Karger said:

My point is that this is the conclusion that everyone including Shallan jumped to.

As such is would seem kind of silly for them to just decide.  Yeah that is what happened.  Also how do you keep going with that plot.  Any other conclusions afterward would be red hearings.  Basically the entire story would be "Shallan wastes time when she knows the answer but is repressing the information."  I personally find that quite silly.  In both examples (spoilers for both I suppose)

  Reveal hidden contents

The character trying to solve the mystery is culpable without knowing.  The reason I accept it in both cases is that in hindsight both Roy Harper and Steve Rogers were acting slightly out of character.  They took actions that made sense but were probably not their best choices.  Roy who is the eldest and most professional of the cast gets somewhat more angry then he should when denied the promotion that will allow him to enter the area he wishes to compromise.  He is also very certain that their is a mole despite having no real evidence beyond hearsay(retroactively it is implied he suspects).  When the truth finally comes out he instantly guesses the truth but is unable to earlier because he does not wish to acknowledge other possibilities.  He also clearly has been manipulated over the course of the season.  In the second example Cap maintains his ethical behavior and leadership but is at the same time acting in ways that escalate conflicts without actually solving the problem thus weakening the people who he will later oppose.

However Shallan does not act in ways we don't understand.  She is often surprising but he motivations always make sense.  In addition a hollywood portrayal of a very real condition would turn off a lot of readers including myself.

Not to get off topic too much but a lot of people don't enjoy social justice portrayals either in their books or other forms of entertainment.  Not to many seem to care about that though.

[Karger he/him]

1 hour ago, jamskinner said:

Not to get off topic too much but a lot of people don't enjoy social justice portrayals either in their books or other forms of entertainment

What does that even mean?  Sure sometimes the existence of fantastical people, events, nations, or psychologies can be enjoyable.  Wakanda for example could not exist according to our current understanding of social sciences yet I loved black panther.  That is different from saying that artists who refuse to indulge in silly negative portrayals of stigmatized people cannot produce good material.  Ruling out the idea that Shallan has a secret murder personality because the idea of DID actually working like that is ridiculous does not prevent me from enjoying Brandon's material.  Also given that Brandon himself has publicly stated he is going to try and portray it accurately deciding not to do that for a SHOCKING TWIST would be unfair and harmful.

[jamskinner]

2 hours ago, Karger said:

What does that even mean?  Sure sometimes the existence of fantastical people, events, nations, or psychologies can be enjoyable.  Wakanda for example could not exist according to our current understanding of social sciences yet I loved black panther.  That is different from saying that artists who refuse to indulge in silly negative portrayals of stigmatized people cannot produce good material.  Ruling out the idea that Shallan has a secret murder personality because the idea of DID actually working like that is ridiculous does not prevent me from enjoying Brandon's material.  Also given that Brandon himself has publicly stated he is going to try and portray it accurately deciding not to do that for a SHOCKING TWIST would be unfair and harmful.

Short version.  We dont' need, what I would call political correctness, injected into every aspect of life  including entertainment.  If another author did a story and did not perfectly adhere to the settled science of DID I am not going to care.  This is not that I don't care about people or their problems but that we shouldn't take every little thing as a personal affront.  If some bald guy is portrayed in a poor way am I going to take personal affront? 

Now think about current political events.  Hence why off topic.

By the way have you read the lightbringer books by brent weeks.

 

On 8/27/2020 at 4:45 PM, LuckyJim said:

The people forming bonds with beings of conceptualized thought, giant swords and power armor, and ancient gods aren't enough?

But seriously, having a secret personality being the spy feels really gimmicky, and I'd rather Shallan's character development be more focused on her and how she learns to deal with her condition rather than just some new personality twist.

Nope.  We need machine guns, tanks, and corndogs.  Did I mention the corndogs are canibals?

Edited August 31, 2020 by jamskinner

[Karger he/him]

11 minutes ago, jamskinner said:

If another author did a story and did not perfectly adhere to the settled science of DID I am not going to care

Would it not matter if that author said "I did my best to show DID accurately researching its effects on day to day life and talking to members of that community" and then gave a ridiculous media portrayal of it?  Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is an excellent piece of artwork.  It just does not portray DID and if the author had claimed it did he would be doing harm.  There is a difference between showing something that is clearly not meant to be a realistic portray and monetizing other people's pain after researching it.

11 minutes ago, jamskinner said:

This is not that I don't care about people or their problems but that we shouldn't take every little thing as a personal affront. 

I don't think me being unOK with harmful stereotypes fits into that category.

Quote

If some bald guy is portrayed in a poor way am I going to take personal affront? 

I don't know.  Do you find that problematic?  Why? 

3 minutes ago, jamskinner said:

Nope.  We need machine guns, tanks, and corndogs.  Did I mention the corndogs are canibals?

You do not need to double post nor are you supposed to.  You can edit your previous post if you need to.  Also would that not make it more realistic?

Edited August 31, 2020 by Karger

[jamskinner]

2 minutes ago, Karger said:

Would it not matter if that author said "I did my best to show DID accurately researching its effects on day to day life and talking to members of that community" and then gave a ridiculous media portrayal of it?  Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is an excellent piece of artwork.  It just does not portray DID and if the author had claimed it did he would be doing harm.  There is a difference between showing something that is clearly not meant to be a realistic portray and monetizing other people's pain after researching it.

You do not need to double post nor are you supposed to.  You can edit your previous post if you need to.  Also would that not make it more realistic?

 

If the above happened most people wouldn't even know, just like most people reading this series don't know.  What percent of readers have any idea that shallan has DID?

Like I said you are worrying about if someone's   comment does not perfectly reflect the authors intent.  It doesn't matter. People put out ideas just for fun. And as you know,  brandon didn't originally plan to adhere perfectly with the science.  He decided to do it with the last two books.  And even then, its a fantasy book.  Not a medical journal. People post for fun.  Maybe not the people doing theories but everyone else.

[I Am A Fish he/him]

On 8/30/2020 at 7:16 PM, jamskinner said:

If the above happened most people wouldn't even know, just like most people reading this series don't know.  What percent of readers have any idea that shallan has DID?

Like I said you are worrying about if someone's   comment does not perfectly reflect the authors intent.  It doesn't matter. People put out ideas just for fun. And as you know,  brandon didn't originally plan to adhere perfectly with the science.  He decided to do it with the last two books.  And even then, its a fantasy book.  Not a medical journal. People post for fun.  Maybe not the people doing theories but everyone else.

So, either you're saying that your theory was stupid, or you're saying that nobody cares if DID is portrayed accurately, or maybe both?

Edited September 1, 2020 by I Used To Be A Fish
Me Being Stoopid

[jamskinner]

On 8/30/2020 at 8:22 PM, I Used To Be A Fish said:

So, either you're saying that your theory was stupid, or your saying that nobody cares if DID is portrayed accurately, or maybe both?

Sure.

[Robot]

I'm honestly a bit scared that he changed his original vision of Shallan to better or more accurately portray DID.