I feel like this trilogy was very divisive, and for me it was definitely a miss overall. I am going to share with you my misgivings about the series, if you feel like reading please do, if you feel like spouting off on a tangent please don’t, if you are just going to say you like it at least say why. Anyways, here are some concerns I had with the trilogy:
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The extended writing style. These books were full of filler. Considering how much stuff actually happened the series should have been 2 books long, not 3, nearly every paragraph was longer than it had to be, and its even worse given the pacing and character development in the books, which I will touch on next.
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The trilogy was never finished. Traviss didn’t even finish her story lines. What happened to Telcam? When and why did Parangosky give ONI control to Osman? How did Jul take over from Telcam? These were the storylines that actually mattered for Halo 4, that the fans cared about. Why were these not wrapped up? Instead of following the main storyline, that of Telcam against the Arbiter and ONI messing around with things, the final book totally ignored this conflict and went off on a tangent in an attempt to lambast the Spartan 2 project and assassinate Halsey’s character. Why did Traviss introduce Chol Von? Telcam could have just as easily played Chol’s role, and if he had than we would know what had happened to him. It’s not like she was establishing a new important character, spoiler alert, Chol got blown up in the end.
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The Halsey hate and Spartan 2 lambasting is hypocritical nonsense. It really is. Here is the worst example. At the end of the book in his suicide note BB’s human donor says how ashamed he was to be a part of the Spartan 2 project, shames Halsey, yet at the same time pays tribute to and honors Parangosky. What? The woman who not only passed off on the Spartan 2 program, but also passed off and the way less moral Spartan 3 project? Say what you will about Halsey, but Fall of Reach showed us she only did what she had to do because millions were dying in the Insurrectionist wars, she cared about the candidates to such a degree that later on she tried to take them away from the war. Ackerson did not care, one bit. He could have been perfectly happy to throw a thousand orphans (also kidnapped) at an impossible objective and have them all die. But this isn’t about Ackerson, we know his problems. This is about Parangosky, the woman everyone loves (including BB) who not only signed off on the S2 program, but also the hideous S3 program. How does that make any sense? The only explanation I can think of is that Traviss knew absolutely noting about the S3 program and had never read Fall of Reach.
-Additionally Halsey would never have lied to Naomi the way she did (You father is never coming for you he wants you here, etc), and Traviss shoehorned in that line to give Naomi a legitimate reason to hate her, which is just pathetic writing (doing something a character would never do, to give another character motivation) -
Val and Maz I mean Mal and Vaz. I know a lot of people won’t agree with me on this, but as the two real main characters in the story, Mal and Vaz were as dry as cardboard. The worst part is that they were way too similar to warrant being separate character. Everything Mal did in the story I could have seen Vaz doing, and vice versa, even the final reveal of Staffn to Naomi, Mal coul dhave done that just as easy as Vaz if they had wanted to. After 3 books the only differences I see between the 2 characters is that one is Russian and likes hockey and one is a superior officer, who never uses his ability as a superior officer. They have the exact same skills so why are they 2 characters? The only reason I can think of is so they would have a buddy. The story should have focused more on the other, more interesting characters, in my opinion.
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Where on Earth were half the characters during the finale?
This is a rhetorical question, I know where they were, on a ship. Ms. T poorly utilized the characters she developed, Phillips was the most interesting but he barely has a line in the last Half of Mortal Dictata. Before you say “There is nowhere he would have been useful” than Karen T should have made the scenario with him in mind, or not established Phillips in the first place.
So overall, when people say to people that you only dislike these books because of Halsey hate, know it isn’t true. There was a lot wrong with these books, Ijust posted some very glaring flaws. Honestly it feels to me like Travis just mailed these books in for a paycheck… you are welcomed to your opinion, of course.