Debski Bowden Lorgar and the like....

[Scribe]

Ah ok, I get you then. I thought there was a parallel there, but I read the book in a couple sittings, and due to its subject matter and fractured (to me) layout, I kind of glazed a bit. :p

[Kol Saresk]

Oh, the layout was very fractured. It was more like Curze than Curze was! lol

[miller_gooner]

I think I must be the only NL fan with no issues with how they (and Curze) are shown in VL.

 

Going back to this, i think the portrayal was good.  When I listened to Angel Extermiatus on mp3 i remember having this horrible stomach churning feeling at the description of what the EC's were up to esp Fabius - it was just twisted.

 

I then got the same thing in VL - I felt trapped like he was wondering what the next trick from Kurze would be, I even though some of the illusions were real.  I got a massive claustrophobic feeling and got a good idea of the twisted soul inside Kurze!

[goosey_j]

As someone who actively loathes the majority of Kyme's work, I can safely say....

 

That Vulkan Lives was not bad. But more to the point, I don't agree that Kyme fell short with Kurze. To me, there was no difference between Abnett's and Kyme's Kurze (or should I say Night Haunter). Both of them were bat:cuss crazy, scuttling monsters that pretty much, at this point, had more in common with a monster than a primarch. ADB's Kurze was a little more together, but still never a nice guy.

 

Now, I don't mind the discrepancies between early and later Kurze. Time has passed and :cuss has gone down between these two portrayals. He seems to have degenerated mentally and appears to be now totally wrapped up in the 'Night Haunter' side of his persona rather than the Kurze side.

 

In fact, now I think about it, Kyme did a pretty damn good job with Kurze. To me, there felt like a there was a difference between earlier Kurze (that we saw in some of the flashbacks of Vulkan Lives), and the Kurze of the Labrynth/Unremembered Empire. In the flashbacks it seems to me that everything with Kurze at this time is just a mind game - he enjoys goading and tormenting his brother Vulkan, which reminded me very much of his attitude toward's Dorn in The Dark King. He reads as a man that feels he really, really has something to prove - like he wants to show the inherent ugliness in mankind and what it has to do get ahead in the galaxy, which is obviously something his brothers find repugnant and unpallatable. In this sense, he reminds me a great deal of Chris Nolan's Joker, with his elaborate and horrifying plans and schemes, that exist only to prove his point and try and break the soul of those that decry him.

 

By the time we get to torture maze/Unremembered Empire Kurze, that bit of his personality is well and truly dead. He is, I think at this point, truly mad.

[fission]

Nice done Goosey.

I totally agree with you.

 

In a way Curze/Haunter has the escuse of a sort of dual personnality.

People sometimes evollve, so I suppose semigod who see his world fall apart can change.

For me the main problem to depict primarchs by different author , is their phisical skills. And their wonderful charisma too.

Not the same I know but sometimes the picture of their aura seems bizarre. Sometimes "angelic" and sometimes "nearly human "

[Excessus]

Dembski Bowden Lorgar...it sounds so natural as a name, hihi

[Brother Heinrich]

http://i1162.photobucket.com/albums/q532/mv8830/9e467b25-d19b-4837-8e9e-5f5da7820113_zps8b1a0138.jpg

 

Vulkan lives was right up there with Mechanicum and Furious Abyss, I only slogged through it to make sure all the character threads in Unremembered Empire made sense. I'm with a good number of my fellow Night Lords on the side of disappointment with Curze's portrayal. Even Dan Abnett's job in Unremembered Empire fell short of the mark. I don't want to sound like a drooling fanboy of AD-B's work, but honestly the guy knows how to write endearing evil. The whole theme of the Heresy is shades of truth. Painting primarchs in bold colors of "GUILLIMAN GOOD. ANGRON BAD." is for 40k, history is told by the victors and often history gets over-simplified.

 

The beauty of the HH novels is that they finally show us the character of these formerly mythic beings, we see all the flaws and foibles of the demi-god sons of the Emperor. You see Guilliman as this genius tactician, who is pragmatic to a fault, and you see how even he could have fallen in Unremembered Empire just through 'trying to do whats best for the Imperium." With Sanguinius you see the duality of being exemplars of humanity while being eaten away by the darkest of curses. You see the Lion as almost as paranoid as Perturabo with wild mood swings and an unpredictable temper. In Angron you truly see the tragedy of the hand that fate and the cruelty of his father dealt him. With Perturabo you see the wondrous mind that dreamed of glorious monuments to humanity subsumed by duty to his father and the war he built him to fight.

 

Every Primarch has his grandeur and his failings, as they say in the series, they are humanity magnified. That's why the portrayal of Curze rubbed me in such a wrong way. It feels like only AD-B is really trying to convey that duality with him. It's easy to fall back on the cliche Curze of old "Cadvaderous Talons, Black hair, strikes from the shadows, has shark teeth, hisses and screetches, twirls his mustache of evil" but to give that Character true depth, that is the challenge and the chance that these writers have been given. My favorite Heresy Novels are the ones that leave me wondering whether I absolutely love a Primarch or find him horrifying in the extreme. The way Kyme portrayed Curze, and even Abnett to an extent, was as some petulant child who doesn't like that everyone else is all pretty and sleeps soundly at night. With the bar that the series has set so far, that kind of shallow portrayal is inexcusable. 

[Kol Saresk]

Funnily enough, I actually liked Dan Abnett's because it was just the darkness and the insanity, none of the faux nobility or the pretending at being a creature who sins so others won't have to. He was the Night Haunter. Then again, I have to admit that I was always a bigger fan of the "true" Night Lords, than the Sahaalites.

 

Don't get me wrong, I like those guys too. :D

 

That was the thing I loved about Xarl, he was honest. He didn't care why others did it, he just knew why he did it and didn't try to hide it. He didn't do it because he thought it was "noble" or some form of vindication, and he didn't hide his nature by blaming Uzas. He was honest about the monster he was.

 

But, I do acknowledge the loss of duality. I think that is AD-B's great strength. He is able to give everyone something to like. All the fans of Curze can look at Curze and enjoy in him. The Night Lords of First Claw, we get the idealist, the honest monster, the old soldier, the monster beneath and the monster without. Every stereotype of Night Lord fans were cast into single characters, with the strict line between "puritan" and "radical" being not just broken, but shattered into non-existence. And it was awesome!

 

Kyme's was just....... Well like I said in my review, Curze has always been someone who puts his work on display. He leaves it where it can be found. But the whole point to Vulkan Lives was him just fading away into darkness, being remembered only as a myth of something that just faded away. It doesn't fit the persona, not even a shallow one. Curze has always lived towards his death, shielded by the certainty of "It's not my time".

 

Sevatar makes this statement(paraphrased) "If it isn't his time to die now, then why have we had to resuscitate him thirty-nine times?"n But at the same time, that's how you know of Curze's certainty. He is fighting so hard that they were able to resuscitate him thirty-nine times.

 

But then you get "I'm going to torture you where no one will ever know about it. Because neither one of us are leaving this ship."

 

That's not truly Curze. Look what he did at Tsalgualsa. "Sons, watch as I die. Do not avenge me. Let her go back to the Imperium to tell them of my death." Even after Talos killed her, the recording still made it back to the Imperium. And if the clip of the holo-recording we got from Throne of Lies is anything to go by, Curze just didn't stand there and let his head be cut off, but he charged. He play-acted fighting. He put on a show.

 

That is Curze. Everything from his methodology to his tactics to his very way of thinking involved showing. Khar-tann City. Nostramo. Tsalgualsa. Macragge. Only the Iron Labyrinth break this cycle.

[Wade Garrett]

Remember, though, Xarl met his end tackling a Genesis Company Champion in a straight up fight to rescue his injured brothers.

 

I'll concede there's more of the monster in Talos, Sahaal, and even Curze than they want to admit. But at the same time Xarl, Lucorphyeus and Uzuas can't quite be rid of that annoying streak of courage and honor.

[Kol Saresk]

Xarl also killed that Champion. Vindication through death.

 

Besides, the pack watches after the pack. If you don't watch for the people around you, it should be no great surprise when they are the ones who contribute to your death.

[Brother Heinrich]

I like the delineation of 'Sahaalites' Kol, before you know it all of us Night Lords are going to have inner sects like the Inquisition, Sahaalites, Talosians, Malcharites, Acerbians... lol

[Kol Saresk]

I'm trying to think of a catchy one for Cyrion. Cyrians?

[No Foes Remain]

I'm trying to think of a catchy one for Cyrion. Cyrians?

No, he doesn't need one. I always hated him. Yet I will always hate A DB for how Uzas met his fate as I fell sorry for the poor sod.

Also by you little list of First Claw, Kol, who is Variel then?

[Brother Heinrich]

Here's a thought on classification:

 

Sahaalites - believe in the purity of the legion, no mutants or corruption, fight the long war and through fear create an empire worthy of their father's ideals (Talos and Malcharion would fall under this category I believe)

 

Sevatarians - believe there is no such thing as a noble Night Lord, you do whatever you have to win a fight, for fighting is all there is. Simple survival and the fulfillment of their primal urges is all that matters. (Xarl and Lucoryphus embody this philosophy)

 

Acerbians - believe in using the powers of corruption for temporal gain. They make deals and pacts with demons, and give worship to one of the 4 Gods in the hope of attaining greatness. (The Exalted, Ruven, Cyrion, and Uzas all fall in this category) 

[Hyaenidae]

Remember, though, Xarl met his end tackling a Genesis Company Champion in a straight up fight to rescue his injured brothers.

 

I'll concede there's more of the monster in Talos, Sahaal, and even Curze than they want to admit. But at the same time Xarl, Lucorphyeus and Uzuas can't quite be rid of that annoying streak of courage and honor.

 

That's brotherhood, not courage and honour. I might hate someone I'm downrange with, but he's still my brother, and I would've died to protect him. I still would.

 

I like the delineation of 'Sahaalites' Kol, before you know it all of us Night Lords are going to have inner sects like the Inquisition, Sahaalites, Talosians, Malcharites, Acerbians... lol

 

Call me a Mercutionite, then.

[Wade Garrett]

I'm creating my own faction, the Ophionates.

 

We consider ourselves a military force that's picked up a few ganger traditions along the way, not vice versa.

[Kol Saresk]

I'm trying to think of a catchy one for Cyrion. Cyrians?

No, he doesn't need one. I always hated him. Yet I will always hate A DB for how Uzas met his fate as I fell sorry for the poor sod.

Also by you little list of First Claw, Kol, who is Variel then?

Variel is just two bats short of a belfry. Bah-dum-bum-tish.

[No Foes Remain]

I'm trying to think of a catchy one for Cyrion. Cyrians?

No, he doesn't need one. I always hated him. Yet I will always hate A DB for how Uzas met his fate as I fell sorry for the poor sod.

Also by you little list of First Claw, Kol, who is Variel then?

Variel is just two bats short of a belfry. Bah-dum-bum-tish.

I sighed and smiled at the same time.

[Kol Saresk]

It's a talent. I make Deadpool look like comic gold.

[Balthamal]

Hmm where would Mercutian fall under then? Don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of all 1st Claw because the whole is so much greater than the sum of the original parts, but Mercutian is still my favourite, even if he does have to lug around a Bolt Cannon (ADB makes new weapons for kicks)

[Brother Heinrich]

Hmm where would Mercutian fall under then? Don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of all 1st Claw because the whole is so much greater than the sum of the original parts, but Mercutian is still my favourite, even if he does have to lug around a Bolt Cannon (ADB makes new weapons for kicks)

Maybe him and Malcharion could fall under their own "Warrior-Poet" category.

[Balthamal]

 

Hmm where would Mercutian fall under then? Don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of all 1st Claw because the whole is so much greater than the sum of the original parts, but Mercutian is still my favourite, even if he does have to lug around a Bolt Cannon (ADB makes new weapons for kicks)

Maybe him and Malcharion could fall under their own "Warrior-Poet" category.

 

Yeah seems like where he'd be best placed but that's part of ADBs genius. In a Legion of murders rapists and monsters (and Mercutian does murder and butcher along with 1st Claw) he has genuine nobility and honour

[Brother Heinrich]

 

 

Hmm where would Mercutian fall under then? Don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of all 1st Claw because the whole is so much greater than the sum of the original parts, but Mercutian is still my favourite, even if he does have to lug around a Bolt Cannon (ADB makes new weapons for kicks)

Maybe him and Malcharion could fall under their own "Warrior-Poet" category.

 

Yeah seems like where he'd be best placed but that's part of ADBs genius. In a Legion of murders rapists and monsters (and Mercutian does murder and butcher along with 1st Claw) he has genuine nobility and honour

Indeed, I love that duality, Mercution has nobility, a form of honor, values brotherhood, and conducts himself in the manner of the old legions. However in Void Stalker you see him murdering children for fun.

[Hyaenidae]

I saw him murdering, not murdering for fun. Or with glee. It was a job, and he did it.

[Brother Heinrich]

I saw him murdering, not murdering for fun. Or with glee. It was a job, and he did it.

Maybe it's time for a re-read then, I recalled them all persecuting the cleansing of Tsagualsa with relish.