boonboon

Ahh, why are you dragging me into this? I warn you, formatting will make your head hurt. Depends on the definition of 'kindness', I think. I don't remember any examples of his 'unkindness', at least after WoR. I remember though that he was the only person hesitant about killing singers before the 'Human are Voidbringers' reveal. “I’ve seen war, Brightness. I’m a soldier. Problem is, Ideals have expanded my focus. I can’t help but see the common men among the enemy. They’re not monsters.” If we focus on 'his art', then yes, but I think the 'passionate' part is the most important. And there are multiple instances of Shallan mentioning passion regarding Kaladin. Bolding mine. 1. "He stared into her eyes. So intense. She felt a shiver meeting that expression. This was a man of passion." 2. "It was … kind of a full sketch of Kaladin’s face, with passionate eyes.." 3. "Passionate, with an intense, smoldering resolve. A leashed anger that he used, because he had dominated it. And a certain tempting arrogance. Not the haughty pride of a highlord. Instead, the secure, stable sense of determination that whispered that no matter who you were—or what you did—you could not hurt him. Could not change him. He was. Like the wind and rocks were." Kaladin: 1. "The men nodded as they saw her drawings, though only Kaladin seemed to catch what she’d been doing. He looked from the drawing of the shamespren to her hand, then raised an eyebrow at her." 2. "Smile. I need you to smile. I need what happened to be all right. Something that can simply roll off me. Please. “Well…” Kaladin said. “I’m glad we … took a stab at this anyway.” He smiled. It was all right. Just another day, another infiltration." 3. "It was sometimes difficult to treat Shallan’s personas as three distinct people, but it was what she seemed to prefer." 4. Not only humor, Kaladin also shares or, at least, understands her scientific interest. The 'crem strata' scene in WoR, the 'luckspren' scene on the honorship in OB. 5. Wdym can't see her through his Tien hangups? Kaladin knows exactly how broken she is, he gets it completely. Yes, he wasn't aware that her coping method causes even more problems, but Adolin wasn't too, not until Shallan explicitly told him. Adolin: I'll quote a post from the same thread. It's also suitable for the 'listens her' part. "Though he might listen to the words she says, he also has exhibited many times he's tone deaf to noticing how she's feeling (e.g. when she was distressed about learning the sword and disassociates into Radiant; when she's distressed over learning Kaladin killed Heleran), and I would even argue that their most intimate conversation - where Shallan admits to her fractured personas and Adolin tells her he killed Sadeas - shows tone deafness as well, despite the fact that he seems to come to the correct conclusion (they are both lying to the world.) He turned a topic which was very personal and distressing to Shallan into a conversation about himself. Is that really listening?" This one is very debatable with plenty of wiggle room and different interpretations, I'll just mention a few things, you prob know them anyway. There are some arguments about Adolin treating Veil as a different person (e.g. becoming drinking buddies with her, or saying “You’re not my wife.” to her in RoW) and involuntarily putting a pressure on Shallan to fulfill her "Alethi Brightness" role, therefore inhibiting her reintegration. And Kaladin does not explicitly encourage her, but we have two parallels hinting that Kaladin is helpful (beneficial? I don't know) for Shallan's mental health. 1. "The Girl Who Stood Up"/The honorship scene parallel in OB, where standing Shallan = strong Shallan, sitting Shallan = weak Shallan. And it is Shallan, because she "needed to draw that." Adolin's POV: "Just ahead of him, Shallan seemed to change. It was in her bearing, the way she stopped resting lightly on one foot, and stood solidly on two feet instead. The way her posture shifted." 2. The bar scene / Kaladin's 4th ideal scene with Syl in RoW. “I’m not sure if I can help,” Kaladin said. “I can barely keep a handle on my own problems these days.” “You being here helps,” Radiant said. She held to him, and shook as she spoke. “I’ve forgotten the Words. I’m supposed to help you, but I can’t. I…" “You are helping,” Kaladin said, “by being here.” It's a personal preference, but I'm not very fond of Shallan's sudden off-putting obsession with sex. I'd like to think it's only a part of her "Brightness Shallan" persona she plays for Adolin. Kaladin deserves something a bit more tasteful (Syl's chullhead vagina, for example )

I have some thoughts on this monologue, but I'm not sure I can properly convey them. Let me just say I partially agree with the first part of this post and bring up a quote from there. Though I think we are going to have to agree to disagree anyway.

I agree that he wasn't a womanizer by definiton, I just didn't like the reasoning. I think it's dishonest to say "he couldn't relate to the Alethi women and their Alethi ways", because he's definitely treated them poorly. Especially considering that he treated Shallan the same way and the only thing that kept them together was her clinginess due to her childhood trauma.

It wasn't Adolin acting like a complete retard around women It was just whole ten warcamps of non-relatable Alethi women and their Alethi ways Different books indeed

Hard agree. The distinction makes even less sense if we take into consideration how Kaladin's Windrunner oaths would contradict each other if taken at face value, but there's obviously more than that. And even if we speculate that Brandon's final idea is "promise is the next level of oath, because it's less restrictive", one still has to prove himself worthy of trust in his promises by fulfilling/staying true to his oaths, perhaps? Because one of the downsides of promises is that you can give them left and right without any consequences (I wonder why Adolin is so eager about them). And I, personally, wouldn't trust Unoathed Adolin with anything. There's one particular character though.. Frustrating that it's hard to properly analyze anything, because BS has proven in RoW/WaT that he's willing to butcher his books/ideas/characters sacrificing all the consistency.

but ao3 fanfics are not canon?

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Two main characters are being drawn toward each other, with an obvious point of conflict hanging between them, that can lead to interesting scenes/development. Should the readers expect the arc to be resolved in any meaningful way? Nah, get hundreds of bloated incoherent POVs with useless infodumps instead.

Great thread and analysis. As an expert, what do you think about Sanderson trying to convince readers that forced Shallan/Adolin marriage is a good thing? From my perspective, Shallan is portrayed as a girl with "daddy issues" (roughly). Clinging to Adolin, being reluctant about killing Mraize, because "yes, he's drinking and beating me threatened me and my family, but he's not so bad.", etc. And I know that, sometimes, meeting a good partner can help in healing childhood traumas, but I honestly don't see any of that in S/A scenes. Adolin looks much more like a "yes guy" than someone who really understands and accepts Shallan.

Roshar is doomed.

we have edgedancer at home edgedancer at home:

I think the most tragic one is that Adolin is alive in WoK and he's still alive in WaT. This symmetry could've been easily avoided.

My main takeaway from the series is that if you have messy hair you can do whatever you want and everything will work out.

I can see where you're coming from, but is it really the best way BS could think of to show their love and independence? Through meaningless proclamations of love, physical attraction and complete absence of any conflict. Surely he's more capable than that.

I kind of believe that it's supposed to feel underdeveloped and underwhelming. Yes, you never know with his romances, but none of them are that sappy, superficial and sex-driven. It has to be bad on purpose, right? Kaladin/Shallan WaT monologues are a bit worrying though. Why does BS outright lie in them?

Mmm, alright, I revoke my statement.

Why put "the sign of the nine" in OB then? Why does Adolin drift away from Dalinar and sides with Taravangian in RoW?

There's no way Adolin wasn't supposed to become OC. Gavinor is a last-minute change.

So with Kaladin and Shallan being in the same place and time, are we... That's it? Oh, okay.

It seems to be his favorite thing to do with romance. The same happened with Wax/Marasi and the-same-but-1000-times-worse with Shallan/Kaladin. BS just sets up expectations and then ignores them without ever addressing. Or addresses them, but very briefly, leaving a bad taste in the reader's mouth. Oh, or ignores them for the next three books and then briefly addresses in the form of a very cringe and forced band-aid monologue. He's either straight up trolling or doesn't understand what he writes.

Adolin reviving Maya with two months of morning katas was epic too. Adolin's shift in a few weeks from saying "You are not my wife" to Veil, to "Shallan, I know it's you, they are all you." was pretty epic also. Don't mind me, just passing through.

Hard agree. It's laughable that BS decided to subvert it with cringe Shadolin fanfic.

I wish I had stopped reading after TWoK/WoR. OB killed SA and my trust in BS, WaT burned the corpses. Adolin's full arc and the love triangle are genuinely the worst things I've ever read. Half the scenes seem like they should be important, but they never amount to anything.

If one were to agree that Shallan married Adolin for the wrong reasons and Adolin is most likely going to become Odium's champion, then Shallan's pregnancy could resemble something similar to Allriandre/Ruri in TLM. Quote from TLM's 3rd epilogue: