How strong do you think Darrow would be with the Mind’s Eye and the Parasite in him?
By the end of LightBringer he’s arguably the greatest Razormaster to ever live so what do we think?
Is there anything else that could make him stronger than he already is?

Brown creates a world in the first book that is inhumanly evil, and now as I finish the 3rd he seems to be ever more interested in making me empathize and see the giga-hitlerist villains as humans, we’re supposed to see their virtues as they sit on top of the most inhuman system that could exist. Darrow constantly feels conflicted whenever the chance to kill an elite presents itself, we have to see these characters come to his side and then betray him and then come to his side again over and over. I feel like at least so far in my reading the author has a tendency to nuance monger to a frustrating degree. Does anyone else think the same?

My wife is reading RR (is like 12 chapters in) and has pointed out a few times that she thinks his descriptions of women are “creepy” or “infantilizing”. Referencing his descriptions of characters like Eo and some Pinks as small, gentle, fragile, etc.

I personally never got a negative impression from how he wrote those scenes, and read into them more of illustrating how they weren’t meant to see war or suffering. I’m curious to see what others think, because my wife is opposed to reading more based on how she’s interpreting things.

Tagged no spoilers because there’s no “Discussion” flair, but for reference I am halfway through Iron Gold

Edit: Thank you all for the input and perspectives (except for the incels commenting on my marriage). The affirmation is great, thanks especially to those pointing out that the POV of the first 2 books is a teenage boy, especially the first half of RR where he’s thrust into this world that he’s just expected to take in stride to an extent.

I’ve seen someone mention Joseph Zada from the upcoming Sunrise on the reaping film as Cassius and i thought that was a great fit, i thought it was funny because i’ve always thought of McKenna grace as an almost perfect fit for mustang in my head. What do yall think?

Coming from this couple of hours ago post, that OP's wife complained about possible sexist depiction of women and pinks.

https://www.reddit.com/r/redrising/s/yaioHyLFb6

Made me think about male pinks. I understand male pinks would fit quite exactly what we consider a twink, to a gold even more so (not to reds haha). Traditional gender attraction setups stereotypically (not always, things are changing) are made of a strong masculine physically bigger man and a (delicate?) feminine woman. I'm talking stereotypes. We live in a sexist world with gender roles and assumed traits, don't blame me, I'm just describing roughly what's mostly there.

Do adult women prefer twink type males? I believe not as a majority.

So, are "most" gold women scammed by this twink predominant design of pinks? I mean, they will have a good time for sure, they're trained to be excellent in bed, but maybe they're not so attractive, as per stereotypes?

I feel like gold women would have to reach out to another gold for a proper f*ck where as gold men would be happy with both. Both males and females would be satisfied with female pinks if they tend that way. Twinks are successful with many of today's gays, seems so too to gold men.

I know in RR things are more "modern", but still we are told that a lot of women tend to be attracted to Darrow and Cassius types of men.

I don't know how to explain this very well, apologies, I don't want to come as sexist. It's complicated to talk about this stuff.

Anyway it's not a big deal, just some superficial thoughts. If I get a ton of downvotes I'll accept them lmao

Obvious choices are:

Hans Zimmer

John Williams

Howard Shore

BUT

Less obvious, and more fitting may be;

John Murphy

Steve Jablonsky

Danny Elfman

Brad Fiede

Thomas Bergensen

Ludwig Gorransan

Absolutely left field:

Pendulum

Orbital

Kelbin

Any others?

I asked a similar question a few months ago, which was: What kind of music do the characters like? There were also very interesting answers, for example, that Cassius is a Swifty. Now I ask you guys: What perfume do the characters wear?

Tad annoying

anyone else watch this movie and just think of red rising. watching the lead tom blythe just reminded me of lysander and the capitol students as golds. The movie itself wasn’t very good but it just gave me hope for the new red rising movie which could at the very least bring the red rising world to life with visuals and cinematography even if the story isn’t done well.

I’m about 2/3 the way through Lightbringer and there’s 2 things that have been gnawing at me that haven’t been brought up… and I’m not sure if I’ve missed it or not…

1. Darrow seeing Mustang on the horse before going to the institute. I recall this happening, though I don’t remember Darrow ever telling Virginia about this. Was it not Virginia?

2. Darrow and the pitviper venom in his heart. I think it was at the end of Morningstar when Octavia/Aja were talking about studying Darrow and how he was able to survive so many carvings and get past quality control board. I don’t think it was ever explicitly said it was the pit viper venom from when he was a kid, but given how Octavia/Aja were interested in it, it’s weird that it hasn’t been brought up since.

Ajax is definitely still alive right?

The manner in which he dies basically off screen is fishy enough. Lynsander only sees his death from body cam footage.

By the time the head gets to Mustang it is described as very decayed

The head is just a skull when it reaches Lysander.

Later on we see how much Atlas relies on carving other's body parts onto other people in order to fuel his subterfuge. Even part of his plan was to completely recreate Lysander if necessary.

I don't think its a strech, especially with the way it is written, for Ajax to still be alive. It all seems to good to be true that he would finally spurn Atalantia and then die for Lysander.

He could have easily switched armor with someone in the tunnels and made his way back to Atalantia's side.

I don't know what the benefit of the hidden betrayal would be, but that's why I'm not an author.

While I wait for red god...?

I feel he’s around the right age, has the acting chops and on the plus side he’s already played an Irish person in at least one thing

If you had creative control over the opening for the film (let’s so no more than the first 5 min max) how would you open it? This is how I would want it done, but I know it’s not the best:
- Open on Carved Darrow standing in the crowd of initiates as Nero gives is speech in the precursor page. I want the speech to be heard for a moment before it dies into a background noise as we here a jig and click of heels
- Cut to Darrows dad dancing as Darrow monologues: I would have lived in peace.
- Cut back to the crowd as Nero exclaims: We Are Gold. All the while, the jig intensifies
- Cut to Uncle Narow pulling Darrow’s dad’s feet to hang him as Darrow monologues: But my enemies brought me war.
- TITLE CARD
- Darrow doing the Helldiver stuff and the rest of the movie

So we are all in agreement that this shit didn’t exist in the original trilogy right? There’s no way Octavia had this and was still fooled by everyone around her.

In Dark Age Lysander is interrogated by their Robot which tests a bunch of things his pulse, his pupil dilation, etc. and he says that lying isn’t a science but an art and gets away with lying to the machine. Despite this Octavia who also possesses the Mind’s Eye gets caught lying by the Oracle? How? If the Oracle is a better lie detector then why did QuickSilver spend so much money on that Robot? Surely with Mickey at their disposal carving an Oracle must be cheaper right?

Anyways there’s a bunch of things like how Fitchner fooled Octavia for so long that makes me doubt she had the Mind’s Eye. Likely it just didn’t exist yet as Pierce Brown just hadn’t thought of it.

Hello Howlers

I have been rereading lightbringer before I have to take it back to the library and I noticed something that bugged me a lot. In order to use the control for the dustmaker Atlas has his hands/forearms replaced with Helios'. He then gets them swapped back for his old arms pretty soon after (with the mechanical hands briefly in between). The rest of Lightbringer happens pretty quickly after this so I was wondering how the hell he was able to recover enough to fight Cassius and actually take off one of Cassius' hands and severely injure him while wearing little armor. I know Cassius was wearing a stolen set of armor and not the Godkiller set but still. When Darrow loses just his hand it apparently takes him months to work back to writing, let alone using a razor against someone like Cassius. If its a matter of Carver's skill then I can't think that Atlas' random carver who, while obviously talented, is better than whoever attached Darrow's hand. I can't remember if it is Mickey but it would obviously have been the best person for the job so probably mickey or Zanzibar. If someone says "The Mind's Eye" I will punch you through your computer screen because I hate that stupid plot device.

EDIT: Because so many people have mentioned it. I am aware that this series is ruled by "rule of cool" and I am here for it. I love the stupid power fantasies this series has. I just also love having answers for things that have been shown to behave one way yet suddenly differ.

Lysander vs Scarred. I gagged, shut the book, and called it a day.

any new information?

The duel at the end of Rob Roy should be the template for every duel in the RR cinematic universe. Also, which RR characters do those two most embody? I think Tim Roth is Lysander/Aja and Liam Nieson is Ragnar.

Any chance somebody has a spare ticket available for Conway Hall tomorrow?

Happy to pay obviously

Hey guys! I’m new to this fandom and currently halfway through Morning Star, but couldn’t be more excited for the movie! I’m a lover of movie soundtracks and sometimes I like to play music while I read. I’m curious, what do you guys think the upcoming movie soundtrack should sound like?

My personally opinion, I think it should be something along the lines of A Better Beginning by Joe Paesano (Mass Effect Andromeda soundtrack). It captures the sadness of the story, but also the hopefulness.

Oh and The Golden Age by Woodkid would probably be great for trailer music, though it could be too on the nose lol…

had better actually reunite in Red God, or I will crash the fuck out.

Darrow the girl that kinda helped kidnap our som and niece might be alive, but we love her now. Also please stop your murderous best friend from pounding her into sand

Just finished Iron Gold. What a ride, sheesh - knowing Dark Age is the title of the next book, I'm a little nervous about what's to come...
Apollonius has been my favorite new character by far. Am I tripping or did he have a brief intro moment at the end of Morning Star? Or was that Tharsus? Anyway, talk about aura farming. Holy shit Apollonius is exactly how I'd expect most Golds to act. Not merely narcissistic, but incredibly smart, witty and spunky. I love his obsession and appreciation for music as well. Hopefully in later books we get a glimpse of him playing his violin.

Watching how the final battle played out as well, I can't help but feel that Apollonius eventually got swept up in the myth of Darrow too. The exuberant hug after saving Darrow on the landing pad. The thrill of the hunt kinda thing. He was alone for so long as a prisoner and Darrow gave him a chance to prove his worth. It seemed like Darrow had a legitimate chance to gain a pivotal ally on Venus, if only he had left the old family slaves behind. But then again - I havent read the last two books yet...and its known those Rath boys are psychos. Im sure Apple wants his revenge now though. But I cant help but think about what could have been, had Darrow honored his word...we shall see.