I’ve finished Glass lands and Thrursday war a while ago now and I didn’t have any immediant problems with them.
Then I come here and you could proberly guess what I saw.
I’m going to re-read these books but I want to know what I’m supposed to be seeing.
It was mostly to do with the massive amount of characters hating Halsey right?
P.S I’m Australian so that might have affected my judgement.
Some key points that ive picked up from the numerous threads (im in the process of reading Glasslands atm):
The Elites are basically made out to be blithering idiots when it comes to things that dont involve killing things.
Halsey is treated like garbage by pretty much everyone.
ONI has become some super evil, super powerful organization that doesnt need to answer to anyone for some reason.
> Some key points that ive picked up from the numerous threads (im in the process of reading Glasslands atm):
>
> The Elites are basically made out to be blithering idiots when it comes to things that dont involve killing things.
>
> Halsey is treated like garbage by pretty much everyone.
>
> ONI has become some super evil, super powerful organization that doesnt need to answer to anyone for some reason.
I also felt this is all true
Read the original trilogy and then read the karen travis novels.
Not to mentioned she just ignorantly wrote on things because she didn’t do her research.
Says That an engineer has never been captured when we got virgil from ODST and at least a dozen from FS
Ignored that halsey had an AI with her at onyx
-Ignored the trillions of sentinels guarding onyx
etc.
You then have her going out of her way to make halsey look bad despite everything halsey doing being approved.
Don’t forget the UNSC recovering from near extinction in less then 5 years to some how be stronger and better then the covenant despite the covenant only loosing a handful of backwater colony worlds whereas humanity was almost completely eradicated, almost all of the engineer’s disappearing with no explanation, etc.
And this thread is pretty well written about her stuff: https://forums.halowaypoint.com/yaf_postst190971_Halo-Universe-Post-Bungie--Glassland-s--The-T.aspx
Karen Traviss is just a really terrible person. If you disagree with her or criticize her, you are a “Talifan”. If you like the Jedi, you are either a -Yoink!- or someone with the mentality of a slave holder. She really likes to invoke Godwin’s Law in her work, except it usually has a hard time making sense within any context.
As for her literary “talents”, TV Tropes does a good job deconstructing her work on Glasslands. A lot of what is mentioned there seeps into her other work. I’ve heard some rumbling about her Gears of War novels, but Bias is more well versed in those then I am. Star Wars fans don’t much like her either because of the Jedi-hate above, her fetishistic love of the Mandalorians as perfect, noble warriors, who have committed genocide by the way, killing off main characters for no discernible reason and overall showing a lack of knowledge on what she writes about, one example being her further messing up the number of clones and droids during the Clone Wars. We think we have it rough with Spartan-II numbers, try Traviss and the clones.
R@pe camps were the main issue she introduced into gears.
She really seems to like the element of dehumanization
> R@pe camps were the main issue she introduced into gears.
>
> She really seems to like the element of dehumanization
Wasn’t there something about weapons manufacturers in Gears that she had characters in Gears hate despite those weapons being the very reason people are still alive?
And come on, who doesn’t love 10 year olds being given hormones so they can get pregnant? Although it sort of makes her criticism of the Spartans a bit hypocritical.
I completely lost interest in gears after the first game so i didn’t retain much info on it.
Thats what i find odd about her as in gears she was so aggressive and nasty (even for that universe) yet in halo she created this situation to be upset about which doesn’t compare.
There’s also the fact the Elites kept Brutes around to work on their farms and ships, despite the fact that, y’know, they attempted to overthrow the Elites, and are supposed to be at war with each other.
And then the Elites act shocked when the Brutes betray them… again. Simply idiotic.
> And then the Elites act shocked when the Brutes betray them… again. Simply idiotic.
And was it just me, or did she completely drop the Brute thread without any explanation? One minute they’re attacking, then nothing. I don’t remember it saying anything about them being defeated or escaping. I don’t have the best memory, so I could have just forgotten something.
Either way, if she was going to have something as dumb as Elites still allowing Brutes to live on their home world, she should have done something more with it. Perhaps they could have been only pretending to serve the Elites while actually working for Brute leadership as spies and saboteurs.
Let us remember that the elites can forgive the brutes for being involved in the civil war and eating the councilors but don’t give humans any quarter for surviving 30 years of war and being innocent.
> R@pe camps were the main issue she introduced into gears.
>
> She really seems to like the element of dehumanization
The “rape camps” were never really discussed on the Karen Traviss novels. That was the comics, which Traviss had nothing to do with.
> > R@pe camps were the main issue she introduced into gears.
> >
> > She really seems to like the element of dehumanization
>
> The “rape camps” were never really discussed on the Karen Traviss novels. That was the comics, which Traviss had nothing to do with.
Either way, for her to -Yoink- about the Spartans and Halsey and never raise any eyebrow at the camps is rather hypocritical. And she actually did have a hand in the comics.
Or the spartan IIIs
> > > R@pe camps were the main issue she introduced into gears.
> > >
> > > She really seems to like the element of dehumanization
> >
> > The “rape camps” were never really discussed on the Karen Traviss novels. That was the comics, which Traviss had nothing to do with.
>
> Either way, for her to -Yoink!- about the Spartans and Halsey and never raise any eyebrow at the camps is rather hypocritical. And she actually did have a hand in the comics.
Depends on how much freedom Traviss had in dealing with the Birthing Creche. I know the morality of it comes up a few times. Another things she doesn’t really address is Adam Fenix, a man who help wipe out most of Humanity on Sera. Yet, he is hardly given the harsh treatment that Halsey gets.
Anyway, looking at how 343 treated Halsey in Spartans Ops (and I know you made a topic about this after episode 10) that 343 may have directed the “Halsey hate” we’ve been seeing.
In the end, both Glasslands and Thursday Wars feel like low points for Traviss, to me. I loved her Gears work, I’ve heard praise for her original works, but her Halo work is really lacking.
Wait, wait, wait. Were the Elites that bad?
Isn’t Telcam the only Elite made out to be an idiot? I recall most of the Elites to be quit noble and Jul came across as one of the smartest Elites I’ve ever seen.
I’m sure if we were able to see the Arbiters point of view he wouldn’t have appeard to be so blind to the situation as the ONI thought.
And wasn’t the Arbiter (although in a very bad situation) written to be very respectible and wise?
I REALLY need to re-read this book!
> Wait, wait, wait. Were the Elites that bad?
>
> Isn’t Telcam the only Elite made out to be an idiot? I recall most of the Elites to be quit noble and Jul came across as one of the smartest Elites I’ve ever seen.
>
> I’m sure if we were able to see the Arbiters point of view he wouldn’t have appeard to be so blind to the situation as the ONI thought.
>
> And wasn’t the Arbiter (although in a very bad situation) written to be very respectible and wise?
>
> I REALLY need to re-read this book!
The problem with Jul(and ONI, they pretty much share the same line of thinking) is that he has it in his head that Humanity will never accept peace with the Elites and will eventually destroy them. His entire reason for joining up with the Abiding Truth is to get warriors and equipment to bring the fight to Humanity and wipe them out, even in the dismal state of affairs the Elites find themselves in. He doesnt seem to be able to grasp the fact that the people in charge of Humanity want peace, not more war. But, instead of waiting and seeing where the Arbiter can take things, he decides to unbalance the Elites position even further than it already is by splintering off and try to cause trouble. Jul and the Abiding Truth are basically just Sanghelian versions of Parangosky and ONI.
The viewpoints of both parties is just so tremendously flawed its laughable. ONI wants to stop the Elites from regaining their strength and finishing off Humanity, and the Abiding Truth want to stop Humanity from regaining their strength and finishing off the Elites. The fact that neither side has made any moves to support this way of thinking doesnt seem to phase either party at all, and they just carry on with their completely ridiculous and made up problems that they feel they need to solve with bloodshed.
Short version: Jul really isnt as intelligent as you seem to think. Thats not to say he’s an idiot, he clearly has a talent for tactics and strategy that we see in Spartan Ops, but his entire original thought process that got him to where he is now was flawed from the get go.
Not to mention that ONI is giving the human haters supplies to over throw the arbiter knowing full well that they will aim for humanity afterwards. So ONI is pretty much setting the conditions up for the elites to rise and be a threat again. Instead of doing the smart option which would be supporting Thel and working for"peace".
Frankly, I just want to know what happened to the “growing number of human sympathizers amongst the Sangheili youth” that the Halo 3 co-op character N’tho ‘Sraom belonged to. Could’ve been a cool way to look at a potential culture clash on Sanghelios. After all, the youth has a tendency to rebel against the norm, but I suppose Traviss and 343i think everybody should think the same.