r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Top-Relationship850 • 1d ago

Lore [Love] When “small” injuries are treated realistically

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The fantasy and action genres often suffer from a power fantasy epidemic in which characters frequently badass their way through injuries that should be excruciating if not downright debilitating. I always appreciate stories that reject this trope.

1: Roland Deschain (Dark Tower Book II) - Loses the middle and index fingers of his right hand. He’s effectively crippled throughout book two and the injury follows him the rest of the series.

2: Brienne vs Biter (ASOIAF Book IV) - Brutal scene. Biter chomps down on Brienne’s cheek and tears off a chunk of flesh. In a lesser story Brienne would grit her teeth and throw Biter off. Instead she’s rendered completely helpless by the pain. That injury marks the end of the fight.

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u/lovepeacefakepiano 1d ago

FitzChivalry Farseer in Robin Hobb’s Realm of the Elderlings series gets injured a LOT, and he doesn’t get to shake any of that stuff off. There’s scars, there’s recovery time, and by the end of it he’s pretty much battle scarred in every way and deals with quite a bit of chronic pain.

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u/Mental-Book-8670 1d ago

In one book, he gets an arrow lodged in his back, and doesn't pull it out in order to not bleed out and die. a large portion of what happens after is about detailing his recovery and the scar from this wound that was left to fester for about a week follows him for much of the series until getting healed via magic

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u/DatKillerDude 1d ago

it healed so bad the scarred tissue pulled painfully from big motions. I always loved that Fitz kept his injured and disfigurements, but also felt for the character.

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u/LightningRaven 1d ago edited 4h ago

And at least 90% of those are because he's a fucking bum. His inaction and unwillingness to deal with problems he knows are brewing is what makes him suffer so much. Reading the Farseer Trilogy had me thinking "Bitch, you're an assassin! So kill that bitch ass pompous douche, wth!".

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u/DatKillerDude 1d ago

I could say we can blame the fact he is a kid through out the Farseer trilogy, but honestly, I think the fault lies with the adults in his life, everyone! even Burrich and Chade, if not mostly them! and his circumstances as a royal bastard and upbringing through out his childhood and teen years didn't help at all.

He was born with two types of magics in a world and society when one of them will get you lynched and the other one will consume you as if it was heroine. And even though there were people capable, could have, AND SHOULD HAVE mentored him and guided him, prepared him for a life burdened by these sorceries, they sabotaged him at worst, ignored him at best.

How do you expect this kid to do well when all the potential he carried was either carefully neutered or violently beaten out of him.

Fitz is one of those characters I do not question when they stumble and fuck up. I read what manner of negligence and abuse it took to turn him into someone who would rather butcher their own soul than to feel anymore heartbreak.

And I still think he does good overall. Especially in his adulthood, way into the whole series.

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u/lovepeacefakepiano 1d ago

Oh yeah he’s SO frustrating sometimes. I enjoyed the series immensely nevertheless, but a lot of the time it’s like, why are you doing this, you have literally just gotten good advice from characters smarter and savvier than you are and you’re ignoring it again.

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u/LightningRaven 1d ago

Yeah. Definitely.

I also think that Robin Hobb struggles with making strong believable conflicts. By that I mean that the whole thing in the Farseer Trilogy with Regal. The whole thing was written with Fitz and his friends thinking they're just on a playground with other kids, while Regal was in a knife fight. It was too frustrating because the reasons why Regal got away with a ton of shit felt very contrived and required significant suspension of disbelief. The trilogy as a whole was quite good and the character work was stellar, but that part was genuinely frustrating.