The Lion's Return - The Good, the Bad, & the ...Closet?

foreign [Music] ER podcast episode 65 I'm your host Brad this is my co-host Eric how's it going and we're keeping this intro short because I have a lot of things I want to talk about and I don't have much of a plan so without any further Ado we're going to have a discussion on the new lion book arcs of omen's finale 40K lore in general primarks we're talking about a lot is the point so let's jump in sounds good so I think first off we're not gonna like focus on like spoiling stuff but there are going to be spoilers no more first off I'm very aware that 10th edition is coming out well okay so I had thought about this and we could talk about 10th edition that was just you know there's a bunch of news that went on and be two weeks late or next week we just make [ __ ] up and then we'll be three weeks early we'll just guess ahead yeah for those of you wondering why we're not talking about 10th edition stuff yet today for us is May the 3rd if you are watching this on YouTube and I launched this on the correct day that is like nine to ten days ago yep we're not going to be first I'm giving you any information we're not even going to be like in the top hundred the information available for 10th edition has doubled everyday warcom has released an article we're rapidly approaching and I mean we just can't do that kind of turnaround and just kind of boring to talk about stuff that is going to be late anyways they just showed off synapse today to you this is old news very cool stuff I have thoughts I had a lot of interesting thoughts on specifically today's article with the Tyranny and stuff but but once 10th edition is like solidified and like there's not like oh every day there's new stuff then we'll talk and to give you like the only piece of information that matters the screamer Killer looks like he went to the barber and said give me the wharf so now he looks like war from Star Trek you'll never be able to unsee it and it is the worst head they have ever put on any model okay so 10th edition isn't gonna happen on this episode we're gonna talk lore and Laura that's old too so uh before we get into this episode's lore as a reminder the book club for the infinite and the Divine the 40K Book Club episode where we're going to be spoiling a book in detail we'll be coming out on the week of June 6th you have that long to read that book we will not hold back on spoilers on that book it's going to be great to talk about though all right but to lay down the ground rules for this discussion finally I will not spoil anything of the plot of this book after The First Act I'm giving myself the First Act to talk about things because I need content to talk about and I think that's kind of the stuff that I vaguely know like I haven't read the book and just like being reading some more calm articles here and there I feel like that's not gonna be a huge spoiler for anybody that's even interested in it at all there is almost nothing in this book that could be considered a spoiler other than for the plot of this book that is because I am going into this discussion with it in mind that you have read the warcom article at minimum for the end of arcs of omen it's available online for free to everybody it is current 40K lore it was advertised a hundred billion times to everyone when the lion came out and everything else they really hyped it up and then gave everyone The Cliff Notes version of this poorly written series and aren't you glad you didn't pay 65 for this trash yeah I think we'll have like a link in the show notes or whatever if you somehow missed it go read that but yeah this book takes place before that so congrats you know everything after this book I did in enjoy reading the article and it's like okay plot plot plot this is what's happening then at the end it's just like and we don't care about the section anymore we're gonna jump to the other side where tyranids are doing something it's like okay cool nothing has any meaning great nope not in 40K which we can get into in this discussion But Eric before I explain to you the book I have read the book I finished it 25 minutes ago based off what my phone says hey man that's like pretty stellar you did your homework on time I know I really wanted to finish the book comfortably and instead I decided we had to record a day early because I forgot it was Date Night ha I can't believe you forgot about our date night on Wednesday yeah yeah okay so you've got thoughts on how to do this I mean I I haven't read the book so you're kind of in charge okay so this is mostly going to be me rambling but to start off for entertainment value Eric who has not read the book you've only read the information that everybody has yeah what do you think happened in this book give me a detailed summary of everything that happened total spoilers everything uh the Lion's back and he like was a badass how'd he come back Eric uh uh Magic pixie dust okay what do you do once he got back well he obviously linked up with all of his friends and went on a crusade this is fantastic completely accurate very much lines up with the point you know happens at the end of arc's moment um yeah I mean the whole thing was around Vash door having some huge Giga plan to do something that was bad that maybe they explained it but it sounded like it was like here's a MacGuffin that the Imperium needs to deal with before it finishes being a MacGuffin then who's the guy that leads the Dark Angels Dante no Ezreal is it Ezreal Israel leads the Dark Angels Dante leads the blood angels okay same thing close enough good enough and they figure out where Vash door is somehow I'm sure it was super awesome detective work that sounds like what Space Marines do and it was like obviously a trap because you know insert Meme and then it was like I don't know something about a [ __ ] up planet that was theirs before that disappeared and is now back but in like Vash door Madness method whatever Vash door does to planets I don't know man and so they decided to say [ __ ] it to strategy and just charged in even though it was clearly a trap and then got their asses kicked and then the lion shows up and it's like hey I brought some friends you're like lamely trying to re-talk about the arcs of omen finale I wanted to know what happens in Lion's son of the forest is there other things that happened in the lion lion son of the forest has nothing to do with that really it happens before it happens before it so this is like the lead up to how lion shows up yes oh what happens in this book Eric I don't know dude I haven't read it I know that's the joke the patrons wanted this to be the episode they wanted an episode of you having not read it telling me the story of the book ah okay little did they know that Eric has a mental illness where he is incapable of making a fantasy it's true I can't write stories man it's horrible okay so the Lion Son of the forest is about how the lion was lost in chaos and had to go on a Grand Adventure an epic perhaps you would call it to learn about himself the past so that he can become a better person for the future at which point once he figured out who he actually is he was able to escape the chaos and return back to 40K just in time to save his friends laughs this is the Deepwater 40K with Eric [ __ ] nailed it all right so uh Eric's retelling out of the way let's actually talk about this now so arcs of omen takes place after Lion's son of the forest lion some of the forest tells us the story of lion entering the 41st Millennia from wherever he's been for the last 10 000 years okay so far I'm on track the end point being in arcs of omen Dante shows up to save asriel from vastures Trap where he like brings caliban back or whatever yeah and he's like also I've got your Primark with me and angron's there because they just made his model and he had to be there for the story so that they could have all the new models there yeah that didn't really make any sense nothing makes sense with the end of arcs of almond it's horrendously bad there's Vash door and then there's anger on and there's also Abaddon and it's like let's just throw names out the [ __ ] cheat see what happens so I gave you the out of just reading the little article thing that's only like 10 paragraphs long that they gave out to everybody yeah yeah yeah the full story doesn't make it any better I don't imagine it would the plot points on that are very it reminds me a lot of 80s Comics trying to sell a toy yes like here's GI Joe the Transformers are GI Joe cartoon yeah that is arcs of all men finale and I mean perhaps that actual writing is better like I read The Cliff Notes version and obviously those are going to be less exciting but I did not and the cliff notes aren't that much worse fair enough not the best writing I've ever read in my life and it's just so stupid yeah parts of it make me angry it's written like chaos wins but when you write down the facts it's like angron gets his head exploded yeah but he'll be back Vash or [ __ ] off after having done nothing I mean he completed his master plan of get the McGuffin that's a big deal it's apparently going to destroy the uh Imperium Abaddon [ __ ] off after having done literally nothing why was he there because they wanted to be like okay it's because they wanted Abbott on there yeah they wanted to be able to say like oh the Primark fought three great demons and came out alive technically abidance on a demon but yeah close enough so uh chaos gets their asses handed to them but because vashtor shits on the front porch of the Dark Angels is treated like a major loss to the Imperium yeah except like the thing was already lost he just like brought it back and showed that it was [ __ ] up he turned their dead cat into a marionette right like it's already you've already had the loss yeah it's it sucks it's definitely not a cool thing to do I've asked or quit being a dick it's [ __ ] up but like it's [ __ ] up and I guess you could call that a major chaos win because he did that showed them and ran away yeah and like I get the greater use of the McGuffin he stole but it will never come into play because nothing does but anyway Ark survolvement is written horrendously bad and it's unfortunate that the lion leads up to this because the lion throughout the book is very well written Mike Brooks wrote it I've been told he's a fantastic author this is the first of four books I own of his that I have been meaning to read that I finally sat down and read it was very good wow yeah and then it leads to arcs of omen's finale uh I think that's got to be even more disappointing than just being like a bad book yeah if it was a bad book you can throw it away but this is a good book that is that I know where this goes yeah okay here's the plus side arcs of Allman was a campaign book and as I've stated before campaign books aren't real they can't hurt you they disappear the second they're done being sold there's no real important story in any of them I guess technically someone did correctly point out the fall of Acadia takes place in the background of several books there's not an actual book about that event other than the really poorly written Gathering storm campaign books which I also suffered through I totally found legal copies of that four-year-old book by the way I'm sure I'm sure I like how you're like I'm sure I did that I don't know why I would do anything else they released it in really poorly scanned PDFs right guys so anyway their sales pitch stories they're there to sell new models yeah but it is something that constantly marred the lion for me because I was reading a good book and I was getting towards the end I was like damn I love where this is going I can't wait to read more Adventures I got to the end and I was like oh I know where this goes and it's unfortunate because I I would read a sequel to this book that takes place between this and the arcs of omen oh so this doesn't actually like it doesn't end with like him meeting up and like it does not end at the start of the arcs of omen thing I had you read it ends at a plot point that is very clearly the like oh I see how he gets from point A to point B okay but it is a solidly written story it has amazingly well written characters within it that I liked a lot really it made me like Lionel Johnson which is shocking because while I've not suffered through much of 30k setting well when I say I haven't suffered through much of 30k setting you've only went through like 50 of it I've probably spent 20 to 30 hours reading stuff about it I've not sat down and read the 58 books in the Horus heresy series I'm aware of the contents of the general plot beats but I've not suffered through reading all that it makes sense because you don't really like the Imperium correct but I need to understand it because I enjoy the game and half of all things in this game rely on men and tin cans I mean a lot of lore that's not Space Marines is told with a Space Marine tint correct so yeah it makes sense but I am surprised that you say that you enjoyed the characters in this because you generally hate these types of characters that are Imperium Space Marine so let's start talking about the book itself now that we got the arcs of Home rant out of the way and we now have our bearings for what I will and will not talk about this book starts with a dream sequency thing that you figure out by the end of it that you figure out within like the first 30 seconds sort of and then within a minute and a half you're like got it stop I get it is it like a one of those like ethereal type dream things it's a warpy thing it's warp magic is it like oh this is all allegories to this other stuff they assume you are a 12 year old boy we really need to hit you over the head with a hammer to make sure you understand he gets to a clearing and he finds a lake and in the lake there is a boat with an old King in it the Old King is bleeding in the water and is surrounded by Dark Shadows that are swimming in circles around him not attacking him but at any moment could kill him this frail old King who is wounded and sitting in the boat on the water in this mysterious it's like okay we get it it's the emperor is he in a chair on the boat the infuriating part is like dude lion how do you not get this it kills me when it's that like your main character is an idiot yeah it's like one of those you get experience about the current events and like what's happening because somebody's assuming that your main character is just a complete idiot and needs to give you exposition to be fair in the first Dream sequence of this Lionel Johnson has Amnesia all right so he doesn't know who he is he doesn't know who the man in the boat is or anything like that I could see that being a valid reason so it starts like that the dream sequency warp thing ends and we get into the story proper and that is how we are introduced to the lion entering 40K now he is in the 41st Millennium with amnesia on a random Planet oh okay there's a massive Gap that's just like yeah yeah Amnesia he woke up here he wakes up in his warp dream thing from a nap nice hell of a nap so as a external thing to this book it's like one of the main things that I've always been told and have never researched the origin of is the lion is asleep within the Rock and like even the Dark Angels don't know he's sleeping in the Rock which is their home base asteroid ship thing [ __ ] I mean yeah even I've seen that yeah it's a basic like 40K fact that you learn early on and you go got it whatever and it's like yeah okay that's so dumb it makes sense [Laughter] so to get this out of the way in 30k lying is insufferable prick causes a bunch of problems that could be solved by literally having five words of conversation I don't know man that could result in like emotions at some point can't have those when a moment could be solved by a little bit of tact or any sort of like politicking or you know empathy between two people the Lion's Not Your Man laughs he is barely capable of speaking a sentence and he's fueled mostly by pride and rage this is Lion in 30k from everything I've gathered this is accurate to the lion in the alfarious book this is accurate too everything I've ever been told about him and including in this book it sounds a lot like everything you hate about Space Marines sort of it's what I hate about 30k which is one of my notes Here on my secret notepad you can't see I have 30k versus 40K lion and my problem with 30k and the real reason he hasn't shown me is because all the misspellings no uh I have no misspellings in this because I can spell [ __ ] no one can prove otherwise yes because of the notepad and it doesn't tell you it's underlined in red as it's a misspelled so back to this the lion enters the 41st Millennium with amnesia okay he saved some people from some monsters goes back with them to their Town their Under Siege by evil people he goes to their town to meet their protector their protector is a dark angel who is obviously one of the Fallen they're the non-chaos but also traitored something like that or is it the other way half of the Dark Angels betray the Imperium the fallen and the half that betray them so he's one of the Fallen he sees the lion the lion sees him and his Amnesia disappears and he goes oh [ __ ] I'm Lionel Johnson this is one of my sons he's pulling out his guns wow uh [ __ ] needs to go out and pick up milk again dude so they tussle yell at each other you betrayed me you betrayed me no you know you oops it was all a big misunderstanding you were a terrible father yeah he gets called that a lot spoilers basically every Primark it's called that one other than maybe Gilman I can't imagine why with their uh Stellar just the best track records across the board you've got a couple good ones you've got like Vulcan Khan the two missing ones gilliman sanguineous but he's dead on-screen dead so anyway this is where we get into the whole like 30k versus 40K lion the majority of this book is split between the viewpoints of The Lion and the first Fallen that you meet who he has this tussle with on this planet who I really like as a character by the way and it's basically split 50 50 between them other than like one or two chapters where you get someone else's point of view so is this planet complete Backwater whatever this is a Backwater in Imperium nihilus so it's on the wrong side of the rift it's with Dante getting [ __ ] up where no one can help Okay but it's also like just the middle of nowhere which is why yes and it's split between the two of them and you get a lot of first person of the lion which helps tremendously with fixing his character and one of my problems with 30k in general which is 440k to happen every character in 30k has to be a dumbass because smart people can't allow 30k to end where it does so that 40K happens fair enough yeah so if you want to return a Primark to 40K and you want them to not be like and ground where him being an idiot is the thing not all of them can be that you can't you have to have like actual interesting characters hey man angering's awesome uh I actually 30k and ground is interesting but this book is basically a lot of the lion going man I was a [ __ ] [ __ ] man what a dumbass I was it only took me a millennia to grow up and essentially every character you meet who remembers the lion in 30k is like this new guy can't be the lion it has to be an imposter because this guy isn't a complete prick and he's actually thinking which my dad never did the perfect disguise [Laughter] so uh yeah I very much enjoy that this book spends the majority of its run time fixing the character so that future stories with him in this setting can make him a likable protagonist question on that is he normal size for a Space Marine no primarks are essentially the Space Marines the Space Marines are to humans right so like that seems like it would be pretty glaringly obvious to everyone people don't go oh he's just a space stream they go oh he's probably some dark warp magic pretending to be my dead hero ah okay yeah no that's fair you can trust nothing in this setting and everything you've ever known is garbage why would you believe something good is happening to you well I mean I wouldn't assume that that was a good thing anyways but true because again that's another great point is no one actually assumes that even if it is him that they would be happy to see him why why would that be a good thing but yeah so I really do like that fact and it's one of my major like positive of this book is you get a lot of the Lions first person thoughts which is something I've appreciated with reading the dark Imperium Trilogy with Gilman I would say I've almost had about like half as much of the line at this point because Gilman while he's a main character of the dark Imperium trilogy there are more characters in total so you get less of him right okay question is the vast majority of interactions the lion speaking in his own head or is he actually like projected outwards as well oh man this gets into a good thing so here's one of my only faults in this book I get the reasoning of it but it's very awkward to my brain and I don't know if this is a me thing or if a lot of people will have this if the chapter is from the Lion's perspective it's in present tense if it's from anyone else's it's past tense that's horrendously awful to read Because you get the same scene continuations from chapter to chapter you switch whose perspective you're in okay so you're in like an actual person's perspective if it's a the lion chapter it is he moves he says and then it switches to anyone else and it's at the time I was feeling this and this is the same scene as a continuation of the scene ah okay okay this [ __ ] with my brain but I get that it had to be the present tense to make the dreamlike qualities of his Forest walk work right because when he's amnesiac in the beginning every and then it would be weird if only that part is present tense to make that feel dreamy and then you switch to past tense for the rest of the book it would be awkward so instead they went with a different awkward I there wasn't a winning situation I see what you're saying I think that's the kind of thing that has it happens like that that's not an unheard of I can't think of a book that does it that I've read they all tend to stay to one of the two yeah it's just a weird thing to constantly go back and forth in my brain with But to answer your actual question yes there is a lot of the lion talking to other people it's not all internalized okay back to the actual things I want to mention for this first First Act and everything yeah the lion essentially in three seconds decides hey the last thing I was doing in 30k that I remember was raiding my Homeworld of caliban to kill all those traitors Fallen who were under Luther and end the bad part of my Gene line and then I was here and it turns out after beating one of my sons nearly to death and having him tell me what a piece of [ __ ] traitor I am that he thought I was betraying the Imperium and he was loyal maybe maybe that was all a big misunderstanding wow character growth and in three seconds he goes well uh I forgive you oops my bad let's be friends and the Fallen are forgiven for any Dark Angel player out there just like blanket everybody's forgiven on that one and that's kind of his thing through the book obviously there is exception to his rule but he basically makes the blanket rule of I need all of my sons I need any one of them who can help me what if they're actually like a piece of [ __ ] though I don't care what you did up till this point I don't care if you were a Trader up until this point if you come to me and swear loyalty to my cause and swear to lay down your life for the people that I am trying to defend then you may work for me again and you are forgiven but if you continue to be a piece of [ __ ] I'll kill your ass there's no uh cross fingers behind the back no and while the decision feels unnaturally instantaneous I'm okay with it because it undoes the thing I complained about I think in two episodes now when I explain the Dark Angels yeah they're a one-trick pony it's the Fallen the Fallen we must stop the Fallen they betrayed us ten thousand years ago they must be captured and killed and tortured Etc right and anyone who finds out that they did it needs to die so that we can keep the secret of their betrayal yeah the the whole keep the secret thing is always like this story beat had to die because there could be only one story for all of dark angel history if this book did not change that okay so I get it I'm very happy with the outcome feels slightly unnatural but it kind of had to you have to rip that Band-Aid off yeah that's fair I feel like there could have been more time that could have been like oh he was gone for a while let's see where he was to be fair this is an interesting thing of like what he learns early on basically by talking to his first Sunny meets is during the breaking of caliban or whatever the [ __ ] happened where caliban shot at his forces his forces decided to exterminatus caliban and at the same time for some reason he Looney Tunes down to the planet with some of his forces to hand slay everyone on a planet that was being astermonautist just for good measure I guess so he could have a dramatic death in 30k sounds right so anyway that's what occurred and then poof caliban I guess gets pulled into the warp by some ritual or something that was going on on the planet Everyone Gets Lost in Time and Space Doctor Who music plays and everyone starts popping back into reality at some point between 30k and 40K really this was all just a huge plan of uh Vash door all right from start to finish the Hawaiian ending up on the planet it's all Vash store yeah so uh do you wanna know of Astro's main role in this plot oh was he actually like a thing no he was not a thing in caliban in 30k he was made up 10 minutes ago by GW but do you want to know his point in this book sure he's not there he has nothing to do with it sounds right yeah they get shoehorned together because their models came out at the same time yeah very much sounds right this book is about the lion so from his perspective caliban was minutes ago right yeah and he's like oh I guess the thing that just occurred was kind of a misunderstanding and only the people in charge are to blame for it I would like to talk to them about if they think I was the traitor if they knew they were the traitor other than Luther who I definitely believe was a traitor okay so you know the point of view then of his son who is a renegade Marine which is different than a chaos Marine for those who don't know they're the ones I actually really really like there's a renegade Marine in aramon and he's a really interesting character oh yeah they're just like not helping the Imperium it's Marine who is hated by the Imperium for whatever reason yeah insert betrayal or whatever but is not aligned with chaos they're just hated by the Imperium yeah it's just like normal bloke almost they tend to end up either as like Pirates or quiet cloaked figures who are giant who try to blend in on one of the infinite worlds full of [ __ ] weirdos yeah definitely they all super blend in just like a normal person that gets talked about in this book and in alfarius's book too of like because olgrens and stuff exist and are like a part of Imperial Society a space rain who doesn't wear their armor can blend in if they like hide their jacked nature and just like stumble around like a drunk simpleton uh and just pretend to be an ogre right okay fair enough fair enough so you get a bunch of renegade Marine stuff and I really like that Viewpoint and it's honestly like my favorite angle for a Space Marine because you get to actually experience a Space Marine with intelligence and like for a space frame to be a space brain you always get told they are so intelligent they are so smart while castling being shown that they're like a high school jock with like no [ __ ] brain power or they'd be like what the hell am I working in yeah I mean it's very clearly they bought into the propaganda machine of either the Imperium or chaos Gods yeah either way yeah yes which is why I really like the Renegade Viewpoint and you get a lot of exposure to Renegades and Chaos in this there is some really cool scenes with chaos focused stuff some neat chaos relics get shown off lots of fun stuff on the chaos side of things too but the Renegade perspective is more rare and in my opinion is really underutilized in most 40K stuff yeah and it makes sense because it does give you a unique perspective that's outside of the the two-party system of Space Marine chaos Space Marine where it's like just trying to survive in this [ __ ] up Universe like they're still super soldiers but they don't have the backing of a military force you've got 10 Rounds left to work with exactly it's kind of an interesting take on what's going on and there's definitely a lot more freedom in what you can do and that's why I end up liking the character so much in this while we're on the subject of characters and Chaos this book does the thing that I've wished 40K would do Eric do you know what zangor are shitty the giveaway for free true they don't give them away for free they put them in sets to make the sets less valuable same thing but beastmen have always made great sense in Old World in AOS I understand them in fantasy in 40K they always kind of get just [Music] yeah they exist because we had to sell zangor yeah and like there's a few models here and there of those types of other races and beastmen and that kind of stuff but it's not really a thing and you had to like really look in to figure out what basement were supposed to be in 40K and the references to them are like super rare and most of them are so [ __ ] old you assume they're not even lower accurate anymore yeah this has beastman chaos beastman and they get explained properly as to what they are how they come to be for the most part and as a faction how beastmen are treated by both the Imperium and chaos and I was like thank you this book did the thing beastmen make more sense in 40K I am happier I understand my zongor now look at them all I get them is it a good reference is it portrayed in a way that's interesting Beyond Just Your Problem of you wanted anything it's basically what you'd assume this is later in the book where you get the explanation but this is like a baseline thing that has nothing to do with the book but it's essentially explain like basement are altered humans mutated humans whatever right like an ogre and or like a squat whatever other types of mutants sure and basically in the Imperium they're usually used as like slaves if they're not entirely killed off when found which I never really got because like the Imperium already treats normal people like that generally anyways so yeah you you get into that problem though yeah I agree with you of when the Imperium Associated to everybody it's hard to then say and they treat these people even more shitty yeah and you're you're like I've lost all feeling you have six-year-olds mining coal how do you make it worse but they get into that aspect and then that's why most of them end up as like worshiping the chaos Gods which is also hinted at probably being the thing that caused them to end up as beastmen anyway right where it kind of like feeds in on itself of like they were Outcast because of the slight changes and then they found a potential out if you're a human and you worship chaos Gods you end up mutated yeah that's fair that makes sense I can understand the process you get a couple views of beesman neat happy they were there I don't expect that to be a commonality in 40K going forward but no but they definitely seated it this is later in the book where this quote gets dropped with this quote like being my inner businessman puke a little bit at how blatant it was where they were like beastmen are even capable Warriors for any Imperial Guard officers who have The Bravery to use them in units in their army list that is 2 000 points and sellable in the near future unlike Jesus Christ we get it you want to add them to ig at some point right like here's the bullet point that was forced into the book check mark take let's go we gave him the chaos yes but can we also give them to the Imperium right whatever I mean sure I don't care either way I guess it would be neat to see some models like that but and while I'm talking about like little factoids that are later in the book here's a a not spoiler for the book and yet it will spoil the book If you are a thinking adult right like a leads to B leads to C obviously this book is incredibly predictable in the way all 40K books I've read are that's not really shocking that's an over generalization but essentially a 40K books for the most part are written like action movies yes by the end of the First Act I was like oh this is where the First Act ends I can now write the rest of this book and I know what the climax of the book will be based off the First Act yeah this is end of Act 2 is going to have this exact plot point that will then lead into this climax in act three nailed it right it's just 40K that's the writing quality of the stories it's not that they're bad it's that action Things are Written with certain arcs you know the story I feel like they could do better I think some do better to put it this way we're going to be reading the infinite and divine right I could not at the end of actual and accurately predict the end of infinite in the vine we'll get into it could you predict the later parts of that book based off the First Act of that book no but the epilogue or whatever sure for sure that's different that's not the story for the book right and that gets into the whole I feel like it could be done less tropey but it's on par with all the other decent 40K books for the most part right it's fine I don't hate that fact but it's something that don't go in expecting to be shocked and wowed by the amazing twist and turning story it's a 40K book honestly there's nothing particularly wrong with like the beginning middle end hit to climax falling action whatever it's called and then resolution like that thing that we learned in seventh grade or whatever it was the spiky line it works the dip at the end of the second act when the the lowest point for your hero before the third act climate yay so before we get into a couple of my more specific thoughts from the predictability issue I have one other major issue with this book that is systemic in 40K books chaos tax no this may be me to some extent but I'm just gonna throw this hot take out there books are an awful medium for action action scenes should not be written into books they're [ __ ] miserable at it it is the worst part of every book I disagree generally yes there are some books that do it correctly though because they focus not just on the action as it's happening of like a bullet point bullet point bullet point type thing and hit like the emotions that are happening as the action is going on I'm going through non-40k books that I've read yeah and basically every one of them I can think of the time when an action scene occurs being the point where I am the least interested in the book like it just becomes a like The Witcher with pirouette being every third word in an action scene yeah that is a large problem yes books are just not the medium for it you have books made for an action setting where they desperately wish they were action movies they have long drawn out scenes of men beating on each other and it's like no matter how well you illustrate the scene how correctly written it is at a certain point when I have to tax my mind to think about two slabs of meat going at each other for like 20 minutes three to four times a book or he shoots his guns so well the bullets fly so true they smack into the wall missing the main bad guy because we can't kill him at this part of the book I think that that is where I do agree with you those types of action scenes are generally the type of thing that you can just turn your brain off and read words and then get to where stuff picks back up I have my hot take for the dark Imperium Trilogy which I don't know if it's ever made it into one of our episodes but this is a rule I came up with when I was talking to my brother about the series and I think it is a funny rule that kind of works okay if you're reading dark Imperial oh I think I know what this is and the chapter begins with a Space Marine Gilman doesn't count as a Primark that is not Felix just hit skip you will lose no story yeah you'll just lose some like Boulder porn and it's part of I think that's because that's guy Haley I think guy Haley I don't know this fact but I get the feeling having read like six of his books now that he writes Bolter porn like Shakespeare right where there is none of it and then the tax so that he doesn't get tomatoes thrown at him by the Apes in the audience yes and then none of it and then the scenes so you don't get tomatoes thrown at you and then the none of it and then the scene so you don't get to me every so often throughout the book and I think that that is fair he shoots his gun so well it's like it could fire twice in a single shooting phase because he was so close no just because that's the rule in 8th Edition they took it away in ninth making this even funnier yeah I definitely don't go to Warhammer books for emotional fight scenes No and it's the weak point of this book is the fight scenes feel like I get it move on yeah which is unfortunate but it's something I've always felt with 40K books it's not a fault of this specific book and again you could be listening to this or watching this and saying I don't agree with you I'm only here for the actions scenes I skipped past all the dialogue character development and plot oh there's definitely a lot of people that think you're insane but that is not my jam man that's like my only real complaints with the book which I the predictability is not a complaint it's just a fact yeah and I think that both of those types of complaints kind of disappear a certain amount like if the book is reasonably well written as literature and you have the understanding and expectation that it's not going to do something wild and there are going to be fight scenes that aren't going to really hit you anywhere other than gunfire real fast big explosion and if you go into it with that that's not a bad thing yeah okay so enough of the general stuff let's talk about like some specifics of the book okay this is later in the book where this specific quote occurs but it doesn't matter because it was in the arcs of omen thing and I am sure it's going to show up in every Dark Angels codex from this year forward the Fallen is the name for the traders of caliban whatever right yeah and now the lion is re-pulling them in under his banner and forgiving them and you definitely can't keep the name falling and he even makes the joke of like the Fallen as a terrible stupid name like it sounds so pretentious and you get a chuckle out of that because it's self-aware but then Mike Brooks got the note from the office that said by the way you have to rename the Fallen too and he had to write the line I don't have the exact quote I'm not gonna pull it up but it was essentially you known them as the Fallen but I know them as the Risen I thought you were gonna say they're redeemed or something like that I think it's the Risen okay in this book but I remembered it being the redeemed when I read arcs of omen I don't know if they finalized which of the two is going to be the name they just knew it was an R and it was such a cliche awful gag worthy line when he says it right oh my God was was it in like a uh pre-battle chant like hyping up something I won't spoil the plotline portion but you can guess how that line will get used you've you've watched an action movie yeah oh so I know that our audience much like me is filled with soulless Pricks who have no fun in life yeah I think that's a fair assumption so when the lion got shown off you like me got a good chuckle out of his 35 foot long Power sword that's Primark size that he somehow has five minutes after waking up and the fact that he has the emperor's Shield which I'm very happy they blatantly said in the original interview where they were like showing him off they were like yeah we decided internally that we were going to give every returning loyalist Primark a piece of The Emperor's equipment but there wasn't one for the Primark so we made up a shield and I was like I appreciate how honest that was thank you you didn't try to pull the cloth over on that one just accept it you're just like we made up a [ __ ] Shield Man the emperor he's never had a shield in any artwork or mentioned it at all in the Horus heresy series he has a shield now it's a cool Shield though so you like me upon seeing this badass shield and this 45 foot long sword that he has yeah he went oh I can't wait to see how they shoehorn him and hitting these because that's what my thought was when I saw them because I was like how the [ __ ] does he end up with this [ __ ] the funniest thing is that when you were originally like he's had a dream by the water I was like he's gonna pull the sword out of the [ __ ] leg no Eric the sword doesn't come from a lake it comes from my favorite plot point that is in the first act so I'm allowed to talk about it okay okay I have called it Deus Ex closet it is the greatest moment in literature just opens up a random closet and it's just like oh look a badass sword that's 20 feet long you are so correct it hurts no way on this just like random Backwater Planet so I don't get accused of making fun of this more than it should be uh I loved this moment I actually loved it I had to rewind because I was cackling like a madman right because audio I could not hear the rest of the audiobook because I was laughing so hard it wouldn't just occurred as my brain broke okay so in the First Act obviously you have to solidify the relationship between lion and his new son okay yeah so they go on a quest to free the people from their oppressors and it turns out it's chaos guys surprise surprise yeah this sounds exactly like what I was saying originally he goes on the epic journey yeah yeah so they're on a random Backwater planet and freeing people from like random chaos dudes yeah so they've got a pair of obliterators which have you seen the model the big Hulk has a giant gun on its shoulder obliterators and he doesn't know it's an obliterator but he he like hand describes an obliterator to you you're like got it I can picture the model thank you okay just like randomly has that that's fair sure and so those who start fighting him and he's like damn I have no weapon I have to find a weapon but my son is pinned down I can't just run away and find a weapon I'll open this closet door he opens the closet door and is back in the forest the dream sequence thing yeah and he takes like five steps and there's a sword in a stone no and he pulls the sword from the stone and it has Dark Angels iconography on it it has his symbol he pulls it from the stone you know what I'm with you I don't hate it the only thing that could be better is if that wasn't a closet and it was a wardrobe just to hit that extra little point on there The Lion The Witch in the wardrobe just really hit those early and get it out of the way but out of a [ __ ] Stone the main bad guy gets set up is a psycher which are called witches yeah so this book has a lion a witch and a closet closet roll credits for some reason is Mike Brooks American and just didn't realize that closets are called wardrobes so anyway then the lion leaves the closet thank you I'll get the only life I'm getting out of that but I'll give it to you so that's how he gets fealty which is what he ends up calling the sword because all swords need a name and that's what he named it really it's an expression of his fealty and the fealty of his sons being redeemed re-offering themselves to the emperor it's not a bad sword name there's worse well okay in 40K where things are called like Dark Angels Angels Absolution whatever whatever yeah fine it's fair so that's how he gets his sword in the First Act and I can't talk about the shield I wonder if Excalibur is not trademarked or anything is it I don't think it can be that's why you can use it in like [ __ ] random animes and [ __ ] which is why they couldn't use it because they couldn't trademark it they need to be able to have that as part of yeah I just love that in 30k he had like a famous important sword but Cipher has it so they couldn't give it to him in 40K because a famous Fallen has it so they're like well so we had to give him a new sword so we gave him this one Cipher obviously yeah not Cipher pole that's the different thing entirely don't [ __ ] it up Luffy man that's a that's a weird cross that happened chaos got real crazy but I see it there's also a fun moment talking about the Power sword there's a fun moment in this book that had never clicked for me until this moment in this book I'm aware I Googled it afterwards and this has been brought up in other books so I don't feel bad talking about it but there is a fantastic like Space Marine officer type showing off slicing through enemies with his power sword showing off how good he is at swordsmanship okay and one of the like stock Space Marines makes the Starkey comment of typical [ __ ] officer if any of us had that sword we could do that you jackass you're just the only one equipped with it and I was like that's a great point and then they like make an offhand mention of like yeah only officers get power swords because they're Ultra hard to make that's why the rest of us get chain swords because you just need to be able to hit the xenos and they die meanwhile I'm just like you know what what's really dumb bringing a sword to a gunfight that's 40K incarnate you can't have that logic how the officers always carried a Rapier with them in [ __ ] World War One you can't talk about logic with 40K and yeah not realizing they all have guns yeah you know I'm fine with it the swords are cool they are so I don't care but and while I can't say anything about the ending I will say I [ __ ] loved it and it was one of my favorite things in the book and you know he ends up with Dante like that's the public information arcs of omen that's where he ends up as someone who read Dante Devastation a ball and all that stuff God damn the End of This Book is good I really [ __ ] love Dante man yeah and like we actually there is like not just five minutes of end credits hey Dante's here it's a nine credit sequence okay but you just love Dante so Notch that it's like it's good enough for you it's such a correct reaction it's accompanied by more emotion and other things being said okay it just pulled on all the right heart strings and I was like [ __ ] I actually care about these characters holy [ __ ] these are Space Marines and I like them and I guess since I've talked about it a couple times now I should point out like a chunk of this is devoted to the lion coming to terms with the fact that he is suddenly a psycher to some extent oh yeah because like he now has his Forest walkability which is like his ability in 40K now if you like play his new model where he has like his ability to just planeswalk essentially it sounds a lot like planeswalking yeah essentially he walks through like the warp Forest path that reminds him of caliban and he walks through it and goes to different places I wonder what it's gonna look like next time that will be interesting because in RX development it's revealed that caliban has become wormwood yeah and it's like an all-mech world but that should already be the case when this book takes place it's not that earlier so I don't know if what he's walking through is like the real caliban that is in the warp or if because he is a Primark level psycher he has created this on accident over 10 000 years I don't know what the forest is I would be surprised if anybody knows until it's done and it's just being left open kind of thing they may never fully explain it and just leave it as like go figure it out close enough I like how things are more open-ended like that but I also like on the opposite end of things I love that they don't mince words and because you have lion who's from 30k and a bunch of Renegades who don't agree with the 40K Imperium you get a lot of the Imperium is a [ __ ] it sucks it is the worst it has ever been it had problems in 30k it's an awful [ __ ] in 40K they somehow made things worse yes and I appreciate that standpoint of like the matter of fact external view like gilliman has it which I've always appreciated but from Gilman's perspective he's essentially alone on that because everyone else he talks to is from the Imperium like even other Space Marines are current day Space Marines these are space rains from 30k who don't have any loyalty to 40K Imperium right that is a more unique perspective I appreciate the like on a bashed look at how shitty the Imperium is where it's not filtered through characters who who are like oh I love you know working 45 hours a day and dying by the age of 20. yeah it's great you end up with a lot of those in Imperium Focus books and I prefer this perspective so much more of just not [ __ ] doing that right I mean part of why it's cool is because it's different and from lines like interesting perspective of being a 30k person you get a bunch of like fish out of water moments that are cute where he's like trying to make a joke about one of the other primarks and no one gets it except for like the space Rings who will never chuckle at anything it's an end joke you had to be there I appreciate that and like his General feelings on all his brothers you get a pretty good feeling of how he feels about every one of his brothers throughout this book at some point the ones he respects the ones he doesn't respect but still wishes was alive stuff like that like yeah he randomly bad mouths Gilman five times because it's funny right that's the kind of thing that like it does help solidify Humanity in characters where it's like they're more than just the facade of bullet points this is what happened it's like they have feelings and backstories and there's reasons and I like that he reflects on like their relationships in 30k and is intelligent enough to like he's like I [ __ ] hated Gilman also I really wish Gilman was here like gilliman was an insufferable prick who was way too good at Logistics Jesus Christ has placed needs Logistics right he would have actually been pretty useful right now still hate him I hate him but damn I wish he wasn't dead yeah [Laughter] okay that's that's kind of neat okay I think this is my final Point we've rambled for a while now I've kind of just said my thoughts as I finished this book hours ago it's getting to be hours ago now two hours and five minutes ago I was like it was 20 minutes ago when we started but uh looking over at that recording time yeah hours ago sounds right back to my inability to pronounce words yeah which one is it this time this is not my fault this is the fault of the British Isles okay so this is something that I have quietly known as like a Trope in 40K books just in the back of my head and it didn't solidify until this book so 40K books all have a bad habit of a word they over repeat in the infant and the vine when we get there is Death Masks have fun with that you replace all face with death mask nailed it yeah I've read most of my Space Marine books I like through guy Haley and there's one word that I've always felt he overused in those books to describe Space Marines which is pretty natural which the English want to pronounce as pre too natural instead of preter-natural which is the actual pronunciation I double checked that I did not fail English and that is how it is pronounced on the internet when I use the pronunciation guide but for some reason the English pronounce it pretty to Natural which just means superhuman or Beyond natural I know what the word is but I feel like neither of those pronounce pronunciations or what I think it is so yeah Predator natural is the pronunciation fair enough learn something every day pre to natural abilities it's mentioned a lot in 40K books for Space Marines this book made it 90 of the way through the book without using it and then it used it and I had to pause as I came to terms with the fact I just told you of not only do I know this word gets overused with Space Marines and it just happened in this book and it all clicked together for me but also that's not how you pronounce this word right I'm not insane and I am not insane the British are idiots I'm just imagining that the narrator has like a lot of pauses and doesn't keep things smooth going to give emotion or whatever and it sounded to you like actually like pretty too natural they all do it multiple narrators they make it sound like they're saying three words yeah his pre to natural abilities things like that actually can be a downside to having books read to you I don't want to make it sound like I dislike the narrator the narrator for this was Timothy Watson and he did a fantastic job there was a lot of different voices to do voices I was able to keep track of multiple characters in scenes none of them sound like aramon and the aramon books which is just the [ __ ] worst so I'm happy about that too it is one of those that like when things are generally good on audiobooks and then you get that like one instance of like pre-to natural type thing yeah it can like pull you out it just like breaks everything and at least for me like when that happens I have to like pause my brain thought and go hold on that's not three separate words put it together what do we have oh I understand now and now I've missed five seconds of story similar one off topic but on topic twice dead King it's read by Richard Reed who to me is the voice of necrons absolutely fantastic he is for the infinite Divine he is for twice dead King yep he's his neck rounds to me fantastic voices the beginning of twice dead King I don't know if the script slash book itself had typos when he was reading it yeah or if he misread then stopped then reread the line he did that multiple times and in the Final Cut of the audiobook on Audible that I listened to yeah it's in there where he'll read a line and it doesn't make English sense and then he'll reread the line correctly really and it's in the book and it happened like there was like two grammatical errors in the first 35-40 minutes and I was like oh no this is gonna be a [ __ ] catastrophe then it never happened again huh it's like there was like two grammar issues early on in the script or like day one while they're recording he's like bro get me a [ __ ] rev two of this yeah or they just when they were editing it and doing all of the cuts they just were asleep for that first 30 minutes it was like six a.m you just get to the office you haven't had your coffee you get past that part and then you start sailing yeah it likely is just because because of like the editing just yeah it happens think of how many times we've redone a line in this episode apparently a 10 000 year nap is all it takes for him to realize he was acting like a hormonal like a [ __ ] like a [ __ ] [ __ ] hormonal or morning how do you say that ruined the word no laughs [Laughter] sometimes we don't retake the line and we just make a new one because we don't know English sometimes we say pre to Natural [Laughter] and a team [Laughter] it's not even from this podcast that's our other one um [Laughter] ruined a [ __ ] animal forms forever oh all right on that note we have discussed this enough we have rambled enough it has been like almost two hours for us who knows how much of it made the Final Cut I look forward to listening back to this after it's been edited I do too because I feel bad for our editor please give them all due respect in the comments section we gave them a wild ride to work with and turn this into a coherent thought this was an experimental episode of just me rambling after reading a book and wanting to talk about a character in my love hate relationship with the things going on in 40K lore if you liked it tell us if you hated it tell us it's fine I'm fairly confident that when we do the actual book club review of infinite Divine it's going to be a bit better way different because I get to actually talk about the whole book without worrying about spoilers I can have notes where I'm not just going off the cuff 25 minutes after I read the book at least both of us will have actually read the book for me three times now overachiever I liked the book and you were reading it so I reread it all right we're getting a little loopy let's get out of here for the week sounds good [Music] thank you

Channel: Poorhammer

Views: 62,496

Keywords: 40k, Dark Angels, The Lion, Lion El'Johnson, Lore, Book Review, Arks of Omen, Vashtorr, Son of the Forest, Warhammer, Warhammer 40k, Horus Heresy

Id: KNM7sAIFZrw

Length: 62min 8sec (3728 seconds)

Published: Thu May 11 2023