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 Vaktathi wrote:
I actually haven't read the Dies the Fire series, but as its supposed to take place locally, I probably should get in on some of it

The first 3 were especially neat back when they came out especially because it was one of the first "everything stops working, go" that didn't involve a slow slide or zombies. I was so excited for the show "Revolution" when it was going to come out because it seemed like they were going to go off the same idea but that show was terrible and didn't even try to be a coherent universe.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Can't believe the HH cow hasn't died from dehydration yet, keeping up with that 15 year series is just insanity at this point. More insane is that it actually still makes enough money to keep going.

I'm still going through it off and on, and really like 75% of them do not need to exist and don't push the story forward at all. The later books in particular are particularly glaring in how obvious the 'we're milking this cow far all we can" they are. Then I saw Siege of Terra is going to be 10 books. Just how? How can you possible take ten books to tell that story without most of it being wasted time? And some of the books are actually not even all that bad, it's just that they're in a massive series and they don't do anything to progress it.

I think part of it is you have 18 legions, with their characters themselves.
Hell, 18characters is pushing it sometimes.
And because everyone has their favorite and want their favorites to be shown. and because they all want their favorites to be "Good Guys" they all have to be sympathetic, misunderstood or under control.
HH has no real villain,

Sure it does: Ben Counter.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Sure it does: Ben Counter.

I was going to say a lack of integrity and focus XD "Make as much money as possible" is a business strategy, not a creative vision and creative vision is what the HH series needed and seemed to lose all sense of somewhere around Fear to Tread IMO.

EDIT: As an aside, Fear to thread was really painful. It's a long book that moves the plot forward about 5 seconds every few thousand words, and honestly could have been half as long as it was. I have no idea why some writers (especially fantasy writers) have an obsession with making things as long as possible. The quality of a story is not in its word count and just making it longer doesn't automatically make it better. It's amazing to me that everything in Stormlight Archives and Malazan are such huge books that actually manage to be mostly worth their size while other people will just pad out a story like it's a damn race to see who can make the thickest tome.

Fear to Tread is also the last HH book I attempted to read. Killed my interest for a year, and by then the rest of the series had become insurmountable.

 LordofHats wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Sure it does: Ben Counter.

I was going to say a lack of integrity and focus XD "Make as much money as possible" is a business strategy, not a creative vision and creative vision is what the HH series needed and seemed to lose all sense of somewhere around Fear to Tread IMO.
.

There was either an Eisner Quote or Iger quote regarding disney and making money vs art it it pretty much said this
"We are in the business of making money not art, but good rememberable art makes money, so we are in the business of making art"
And it makes sense. Disney could just factory out movies, and they kinda do. But they make good movies, that are remembered and still make money today.
You can make Art and Money.
Ill see if I can find the quote

I am late to the thread another read the whole thing and I cannot be the first to write this but Star Wars after movie 7.

Also The Walking Dead after Neegan.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Can't believe the HH cow hasn't died from dehydration yet, keeping up with that 15 year series is just insanity at this point. More insane is that it actually still makes enough money to keep going.

I'm still going through it off and on, and really like 75% of them do not need to exist and don't push the story forward at all. The later books in particular are particularly glaring in how obvious the 'we're milking this cow far all we can" they are. Then I saw Siege of Terra is going to be 10 books. Just how? How can you possible take ten books to tell that story without most of it being wasted time? And some of the books are actually not even all that bad, it's just that they're in a massive series and they don't do anything to progress it.

The 75% filler bit is why its so insane, writing, printing and shipping all cost money. Still there seem to be enough people buying the filler to make it profitable? How? Who manages to keep slogging through all these terribly slow books? Some are even entirely unrelated to the actual HH.

Siege of Terra being 10 books at this point is unsurprising, given the track record they might milk the scouring into the HH series to keep it rolling.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Fear to Tread is also the last HH book I attempted to read. Killed my interest for a year, and by then the rest of the series had become insurmountable.

At some point the investment in the series was going to become more expensive than the hobby itself. It costs 1000-1500 bucks or something if you buy all the books on release (20-25 per book). That's at least 10 imperial knights here.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Still there seem to be enough people buying the filler to make it profitable? How? Who manages to keep slogging through all these terribly slow books?

Ahum.

Uh...



40K players?

Firefly. . . I made it all of 3 or 4 episodes before I turned to the wife and said, "Really?!? this is this BS you been hyping for so damn long? Why the hell do you like it?"

The writing was trash, the acting wasn't great, the budget was worse (and ultimately didn't help the series). Overall, and I know its unpopular opinion these days, I am glad that gak was cancelled.


There's a small chance that, if I hadn't had my wife talking it up like it was the greatest show ever for a couple years, and hadn't had friends say it was a great show, and generally had so many people talking up this show as something absolutely amazing, there's a small chance I may have enjoyed it. . . but ultimately I found it to be a horrible waste of my time that I'll never get back.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
The writing was trash, the acting wasn't great, the budget was worse (and ultimately didn't help the series). Overall, and I know its unpopular opinion these days, I am glad that gak was cancelled.

For what it's worth, I think the series is getting less and less slack as time goes on. I think it was a profoundly mediocre show and the only thing good to come out of it was a quite entertaining movie that hits no good notes if you didn't watch the show.

 Vermis wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Still there seem to be enough people buying the filler to make it profitable? How? Who manages to keep slogging through all these terribly slow books?

Ahum.

Uh...



40K players?

From the 10 or so 40K players I know, several have never read a HH book, several a few and one about a dozen. Not one has read dozens and according to Wikipedia they are up to 56(!) books. It would be interesting to see the numbers of 40K players versus average number of HH books read.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
Firefly. . . I made it all of 3 or 4 episodes before I turned to the wife and said, "Really?!? this is this BS you been hyping for so damn long? Why the hell do you like it?"

The writing was trash, the acting wasn't great, the budget was worse (and ultimately didn't help the series). Overall, and I know its unpopular opinion these days, I am glad that gak was cancelled.


There's a small chance that, if I hadn't had my wife talking it up like it was the greatest show ever for a couple years, and hadn't had friends say it was a great show, and generally had so many people talking up this show as something absolutely amazing, there's a small chance I may have enjoyed it. . . but ultimately I found it to be a horrible waste of my time that I'll never get back.

Firefly was a product of its time and place, it was the era of shows like Stargate and Farscape, they're trope-filled, low budget, small cast space adventures. Next to stuff like that, Firefly holds its own. And, just like those other shows, if you try and get into many years or a couple decades after their initial run, they don't hold up as well. Same way trying to watch 60's Star Trek or Doctor Who now would be awful without nostalgia glasses.

 Vermis wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Still there seem to be enough people buying the filler to make it profitable? How? Who manages to keep slogging through all these terribly slow books?

Ahum.

Uh...



40K players?

Much as I would normally want to agree, I don't actually know anyone who has kept up with the series or even tried to

That said I don't think GW is expecting people to, they're writing books for every conceivable subfaction, getting a bunch of people to buy maybe the first few for the meat and potatoes of the origins of the HH, and maybe a couple others after that related to their specific faction of interest as the years go on, instead of expecting anyone to actually read and own 35 HH books.

But I do wonder how long it's able to keep going, I haven't read any of them in years. I really just don't need every minor faction and character's viewpoint of the Siege of Terra spread over 10 books. More to the point, I think I preferred when the Horus Heresy was an era of barely understood shrouded myth, far too much of the substance of the HH basically relies on everyone involved having the emotional intelligence of a toddler and a stunning lack of ability to self reflect or think through simple consequences that simply does not fit the positions of power these people hold or their climbs to get tehere, and it's all presented largely unironically, coming off as hamfisted and stupid instead of dystopian grimdark. Having the Horus Heresy so illuminated and defined, and seeing the wizards behind the curtains so to speak as the manchildren they mostly are, makes it far less interesting and compelling (particularly as it relates to the primary 40k story) than it was just as a mythical origin era.

I feel like Star Gate SG-1 has aged very well, but SG-1 was a great show. Farscape definitely hasn't aged well. Nor have the early seasons of TNG.

I love Stargate SG-1, but I just pulled up a random first season episode (ep8 Brief Candle), and if I had never seen Stargate before today, I'd be looking for something else to watch before the 90 second mark

We're just legitimately used to a higher bar these days, and thats a good thing. The closest I can think of to something of the same budget/acting quality/sets/etc as Firefly/Stargate/Farscape today is Vagrant Queen on Syfy, and that's sporting a mighty 4.1/10 on IMDB ratings right now (and I think that's generous honestly), but had that aired in say, 2000 we'd be talking about it like a beloved classic. Firefly was a great show if you caught in in 2002, but if one tried to get into it today, I can totally see where it would be a letdown.

Forgot one...


Rynn's World guarantees that I will never buy another GW novel ever again.

i love Sg1 and i binged it all a couple summers back, when getting through 10seasons in 2 months was feasible for me.......i miss those days, now its a month to get through a season)
IT definitly has some major problems(Lets not forget the 4th episode, what is essentially the first episode that is a regular is hot garbage.)
I feel it still holds up somewhat well, but you kinda have to think of it differently.
ITs kinda sad sometimes to think shows that where great of even pehnominal when they come out, will be left behind or looked back at with a quint "Awwww" because of just the changing times.

The first season of SG1 was pretty weak, but once it found its footing it really took off. Same thing for TNG and Babylon 5, really.

Joss Wheeon kind of does the opposite. The first three seasons of Buffy are clearly the best, while the last two are mostly pretty dire. Angel got a second wind with a lot of fresh blood in season 2/3, but it was getting tired just before the end. Firefly was never really my thing, but I thought the movie played well to Whedon’s strengths in a way many of the episodes didn’t.

Does anyone remember Special Unit 2? That was a show that was just finding its stride when it got cancelled. What a shame.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
The first season of SG1 was pretty weak, but once it found its footing it really took off. Same thing for TNG and Babylon 5, really.

.

TNG took like 5 seasons to get good honestly.
I honestly tried to watch TNG......i literally couldnt. I turned it off. Which is funny because i actually like the show and characters, i remember it when i was a kid watching episodes.
But i cant actually sit down and watch it as an adult.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Firefly was a great show if you caught in in 2002, but if one tried to get into it today, I can totally see where it would be a letdown.

Funny, I tried getting into it back then, but I had the same reaction as Ensis.

I watched the series in 2003 and I didn't think it was good. I even wrote a spiel once upon a time about how the first episode of the series was god awful and I was unsurprised the series never took off.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:
Firefly. . . I made it all of 3 or 4 episodes before I turned to the wife and said, "Really?!? this is this BS you been hyping for so damn long? Why the hell do you like it?"

The writing was trash, the acting wasn't great, the budget was worse (and ultimately didn't help the series). Overall, and I know its unpopular opinion these days, I am glad that gak was cancelled.

Don't sweat it. We may disagree, but the name of the thread is "The moment you gave up on a franchise", not "Convince me I was wrong to give up on a franchise".

Everyone likes different things. I've seen a lot of stuff from this thread show up in the threat of 'Franchise you followed all the way to the end with no regrets' thread, and vice versa.

 Vaktathi wrote:
I love Stargate SG-1, but I just pulled up a random first season episode (ep8 Brief Candle), and if I had never seen Stargate before today, I'd be looking for something else to watch before the 90 second mark

We're just legitimately used to a higher bar these days, and thats a good thing. The closest I can think of to something of the same budget/acting quality/sets/etc as Firefly/Stargate/Farscape today is Vagrant Queen on Syfy, and that's sporting a mighty 4.1/10 on IMDB ratings right now (and I think that's generous honestly), but had that aired in say, 2000 we'd be talking about it like a beloved classic. Firefly was a great show if you caught in in 2002, but if one tried to get into it today, I can totally see where it would be a letdown.

I'm trying to think of what you mean by a 'higher bar' for shows these days, and I'm drawing a complete blank. Do you mean effects? Because if you mean story and characters I'm just going to laugh.


Firefly got carried by the 'Whedon is a demigod' phenomenon off the back of Buffy, same as Angel. That it wasn't very good was because people deliberately weren't looking behind the illusion.
Fox knew. Its why they advertised the show as 'We gots space whores!' to draw interest.

Voss wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
I love Stargate SG-1, but I just pulled up a random first season episode (ep8 Brief Candle), and if I had never seen Stargate before today, I'd be looking for something else to watch before the 90 second mark

We're just legitimately used to a higher bar these days, and thats a good thing. The closest I can think of to something of the same budget/acting quality/sets/etc as Firefly/Stargate/Farscape today is Vagrant Queen on Syfy, and that's sporting a mighty 4.1/10 on IMDB ratings right now (and I think that's generous honestly), but had that aired in say, 2000 we'd be talking about it like a beloved classic. Firefly was a great show if you caught in in 2002, but if one tried to get into it today, I can totally see where it would be a letdown.

I'm trying to think of what you mean by a 'higher bar' for shows these days, and I'm drawing a complete blank. Do you mean effects? Because if you mean story and characters I'm just going to laugh.

Mostly I'm referring to production value in general, approaches to realism, and less reliance on camp humor and gimmicks, better scene framing and timing, better budgets or and a more advanced set design science, etc. There's absolutely still awful stories and characters and atrocious acting (hello anything Star Trek these days), but to go along with that we've also had examples of outstanding storywriting, characters, and acting that was simply nonexistent in almost the entire television medium and especially scifi/fantasy in the late 90's and very early 00's even in shows that had their own problems in those areas (e.g. Battlestar Galactica, Game of Thrones).

I mean you also have the shift from episodic to serial recently where you can tell better stories.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Vermis wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
Still there seem to be enough people buying the filler to make it profitable? How? Who manages to keep slogging through all these terribly slow books?

Ahum.

Uh...



40K players?

From the 10 or so 40K players I know, several have never read a HH book, several a few and one about a dozen. Not one has read dozens and according to Wikipedia they are up to 56(!) books. It would be interesting to see the numbers of 40K players versus average number of HH books read.

I know more people who read the HH books then actively play 40k.

a book every 2-3 months is pretty cheap compared to a 40k army.


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 Just Tony wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:The Spellpurge and forgotten realms. I was a big fan of forgotten realms, read as many of the books as I could, bought the sourcebooks etc. (I did play games in FR but I also bought em because I wanted to know about the setting)
the Spellpurge just killed my intreast. it turned the setting into something I could no longer reckongize

As a WFB fan and player, I can feel your pain...

WFB to AOS actually suprised me because at the time AOS had happened both 4yh edition D&D and MWDA had been out for awhile and basicly failed. both MWDA and 4E Forgotten realms where "hey let's blow up the setting, do a big time jump and restart with a new game to make the game more appealing to new fans who won't feel intimidated by all this back story" and they failed because the eistablished fan base rejected it. AOS has done alright now (apparently it's selling quite well) but considering what had happened in the market during the planning phases it was a pretty ballsy move.

I know quite a few who do Audio Books during commutes/painting.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

BrianDavion wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Just Tony wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:The Spellpurge and forgotten realms. I was a big fan of forgotten realms, read as many of the books as I could, bought the sourcebooks etc. (I did play games in FR but I also bought em because I wanted to know about the setting)
the Spellpurge just killed my intreast. it turned the setting into something I could no longer reckongize

As a WFB fan and player, I can feel your pain...

WFB to AOS actually suprised me because at the time AOS had happened both 4yh edition D&D and MWDA had been out for awhile and basicly failed. both MWDA and 4E Forgotten realms where "hey let's blow up the setting, do a big time jump and restart with a new game to make the game more appealing to new fans who won't feel intimidated by all this back story" and they failed because the eistablished fan base rejected it. AOS has done alright now (apparently it's selling quite well) but considering what had happened in the market during the planning phases it was a pretty ballsy move.

Its kinda what just happens sometimes. There gets to a point where things are so fething big that they intimidate people wanting to get in. So they have to get new people in because older fans inherantly dont buy much. and the simple answer is.....reboot it.

When I wanted to get into WHFB's setting, there was a book available at regular bookstores called something like "The World of Warhammer." It was pure background (and art) and fairly slim, but packed the right amount of information to leave me with enough of a foundation in the setting not to feel overwhelmed. I don't think I've ever seen anything like that for D&D, Mechwarrior or Warmachine.

Warmachines lore was in it's expansion books, the problem was it was stories with no background.
Now those don't exist and the only way to get lore is their books.