A. The Final Empire
I liked the basic idea behind The Final Empire. It begins with evil having won for a change, and offering a dark setting that was a nice change from the generic fantasy realms and fairy tales. The sky is constantly cloudy, ash dropping like gray snow from numerous active volcanoes while nights are always misty. The archvillain is worshiped as a god, and his minions have become the new aristocracy, tormenting the rest as subhuman slaves for millennia. The good guys are your typical team of rebels who aim to overthrow the villain and free mankind from his horrible empire.
The gimmick of the setting is allomancers, people who can do all sorts of supernatural stuff with metals and alloys. Each character is of a certain type and consumes metals in powdered form, which function as mana points. So basically we have specialized wizards who cast spells with powder metal instead of magic potions. It is sort of like the metal benders in the Avatar cartoon, although each metal here has a different use. You can also say it is like the Nen users in the Hunter x Hunter manga/anime.
Here is a simple list to make your lives easier while reading. The title in the branches is the name of the class associated to that skill.
The annoying part is how in order to learn all the above, almost a third of the book is spent on a sort of a training session. Pages after pages of the characters talking and explaining how each one works can get very tiresome, even when it is taught in a natural way to Vin, and by extension to the reader.
Aside from the very long infodumps, another third is spent on a very slow build up that is not very interesting. There is a lot of effort placed on fleshing out the characters and the setting, which is a very good thing, but not many interesting things happen in the meantime. You are learning about the characters and the world, with nothing much happening to them or the world.
The last third is where all the fun takes place in, and it moves way too damn fast. Many important things happen very close to each other, not giving you the time to get invested before something is over and gets replaced by something else. It is exciting but it doesn’t allow any of the events to last enough and feel important in the grand scheme of things. So basically the book is very slow to the most part and then becomes too fast. It would be way better to take some parts from the training session and throw them in-between those important events, just for the sake of having some downtime.
Pacing issues aside, it takes a lot of suspension of disbelief in order to enjoy the battles, since the heroes grow in power way too fast, while the villains are doing some pretty classic blunders. You basically have a thousand year old god that is matched in power and fooled by a bunch of rookies in a couple of years.
The bad guys in general are written to be as satanic as possible, so the reader will hate them right away. Very one sided, especially when the good guys are given way more decent characterization. Especially Vin, the main heroine who changes from a nobody, to a spy amongst nobles for the sake of the rebellion. Constantly doubting if all the nobles deserve to be killed created an interesting dilemma thanks to a kind-hearted prince named Elend.
Not that the good guys were portrayed properly; lots of things still make no sense, which are the result of the author caring only about fleshing out the setting and the superpowers, instead of letting it play out in a plausible, organic way. As soon as the explanations are over, he wraps up everything in a hurry. Also, the way Vin met and fell in love with Elend feels like a cheery silly fairy tale in a grimdark setting. It’s completely out of place and there simply for the sake of forced drama.
As a whole, the first book is a very interesting read in terms of atmosphere and superpowers. It’s also a slow training session, followed by a rushed showdown full of convenience that takes away most of whatever the build-up was promising. In terms of intrigue and action it is very exciting as a casual read, in terms of writing it resorts to some pretty annoying plot conveniences, just for the sake of the heroes surviving and finding out important information literally out of nowhere.
B. The Well of Ascension
I liked the basic idea of The Well of Ascension, as it’s about the aftermath of the evil boss’ defeat. Just like in real life, when the dictator falls, it’s not all fun and games afterwards, since there are many who try to take over the empty spot. There are also lots of commoners who still worship the defeated evil god and even feel his absence is what will destroy the world. Which by the way, turns out it is true, as the villain was protecting the world from the return of the Deepness, an entity living in the mist. We have two threats happening at the same time, as the heroes need to defend the city from heartless warlords and prevent the Deepness from returning.
The concept of allomancy is also expanded further, as more metals and alloys are introduced to keep battles and superpowers interesting. There are still training sessions as the characters experiment on these new additions, and thankfully they are much shorter than in the first book. At the same time there are far more battles between allomancers, using more tricks instead of the old tactics, thus the action has increased without feeling repetitive.
As far as the pacing goes, the second book begins with a much faster pace and far more epic and complicating situations. Instead of a few thieves and urchins learning about superpowers and preparing for war, here we have a story full of intrigue where the politicians are continuously arguing, warlords try to outsmart one another, spies and assassins are hidden in the shadows waiting to strike. There are far more mind games and plot twists.
Though this doesn’t last long, since the plot slows down when the opposing sides come to a standstill and try to resolve their issues by talking. If you are not fond of really long and slow-paced debates then you will find this part extremely boring. It is also meaningless, since everything is resolved cheaply through superpowers.
There is still a lot of attention going into fleshing out the characters. The ones from the first book get further developed, despite having their initial conflicts resolved, thus remaining interesting instead of rehashing the same issues. Because of the sociopolitical crisis, they also feel far more real and practical than naive idealists. Still, Vin keeps getting stronger and manages to overcome lots of problems by using a new alloy all the rest were not aware of yet. The first book had Atium doing the same thing but at least the heroes eventually got some of that and fought on equal terms. This doesn’t happen here and makes Vin to feel like a superman who can beat whole armies by herself. Pretty much all the mind games were resolved with raw power, which is quite disappointing when the build up implied that the resolutions would be a lot more intelligent that that.
As for the whole issue with the Deepness, it was a pile of crap. All of a sudden the characters turn to plot devices as they were brainwashed to follow the commands of some demon. It was simply WAY too convenient and nobody seemed to be able to prevent the obvious doom.
C. The Hero of Ages
The Hero of Ages offers a new interesting idea. What would have happened if the hero of prophesy is not really the savior most believed but rather a tool for a major catastrophe? The mystic power that is supposed to save the world, ends up being the catalyst for its destruction. Everyone is panicking as the various territories are torn by earthquakes, volcanoes, and storms.
As before, more metals and alloys are added to again keep things fresh. Other concepts are also added and expanded, such as the origin of all the inhuman creatures (koloss, kandra, and inquisitors), a new source of superpowers, as well as the advanced form of mistings called savants. There is still incentive for the reader to tolerate those annoying but otherwise intriguing training sessions.
This didn’t prevent the action scenes from feeling rather redundant by now, and the author keeping them interesting only through more power-ups. Vin is just unbeatable by now and every opponent is just prolonging the inevitable by messing around with easily avoidable weaknesses. This ends up being one of the biggest problems in the story, as the superpowers are controlling the plot, instead of cunningness and personal charisma. Brains, drama, ideals, they don’t matter, having the most hax powers is all you need. Since the heroes grow stronger all the time, it feels anti-climactic to see them using raw power all the time, instead of stealth or mind games. I mean, it’s quite exciting to see all the damage they can do thanks to the increased powers but it’s still a cheap way to solve everything.
The pacing is very slow and the plot is mostly dedicated to explaining the mysteries that were escalating in the previous two books. At the expense of very long dialogues, by the time it’s over all questions are answered. There is still a lot of focus given to the characters, although by now the main ones like Vin and Elend have nothing major to resolve and fix all their problems with brainless superpowers. There is a swift towards developing minor characters, such as Demiu and Spook, which helps to keep things interesting, but not by too much since they are still minor and don’t affect the plot. They are busy trying not to let anyone kill each other, something which is out of place considering there is a common enemy that wants to kill them all and they are fighting each other over who gets to be the next ruler.
The ending was pretty anti-climactic, even when Sanderson tried to make it a philosophical debate instead of a dragonball showdown. There was nothing worthy of a debate. The Avatar had a philosophy behind every element, Star Wars had a philosophy for the Force, allomancy has nothing because nobody uses it for anything else other than a tool of war. It doesn’t exist naturally within the setting since there are no professions such as builders or messengers using superpowers in their daily activities.
What I mean by that, is how it’s out of place with the way people live, or civilization thrives. Sanderson spent countless pages in explaining them with science and completely disregarded any mundane uses they could have outside of war. They end up being plot devises for resolving problems with raw force, or keeping things fresh by constantly introducing more metals, and making the explosions bigger, while having nothing intellectual behind them. That’s why the debate with the Deepness was hollow and the ending left me completely uninterested.
As a whole the trilogy is full of interesting ideas and fleshed out characters, yet feels very artificial because it’s too focused on mechanics and power up battles instead of natural interactions.
