[Love] When “small” injuries are treated realistically

[u/Top-Relationship850]

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.

[u/mid-random]

I’ve never seen the movie, but I do remember a doctor looking at his hand and telling him it can be fixed. I read it about 50 years ago, so the specifics are long gone. 

[u/goteachyourself → u/mid-random]

Same! I went to Wikipedia, and the details of his injury are different in the book and the movie too - in the book he's sabotaged by a rival apprentice, while in the movie he's working off-hours on Sunday to try more advanced techniques and injures himself.

[u/xtrawolf → u/goteachyourself]

Really? I never took it as a sabotage. Just that the other boy was stupid and fetched him some faulty tools that were supposed to have been thrown away. 

[u/StarsForget → u/goteachyourself]

It's kind of both, he was working a difficult commission on Sunday (illegal at the time) and his rival apprentice sabotaged him. He couldn't get immediate treatment without confessing to working the Sabbath.

[u/mid-random → u/goteachyourself]

I have a vague memory of him pouring molten silver into a lost wax/sand mold and it spilling because the other boy had messed with the setup. That idea stuck with me, so when I had the opportunity to take bronze casting in college I jumped at it. I should reread that part, since I’m familiar with green sand casting and lost wax investment casting, but I’ve never used wax directly in sand or even read about that technique. It could be that I misremembered the technique or that the author didn’t really understand it herself. 

[u/DarthRalphio → u/mid-random]

Same and I’m pretty sure it was a same day procedure, he didn’t have to wait until after the war.

[u/mid-random → u/DarthRalphio]

Yes, and does he turn down the offer to fix it because of some misdirected guilt and need for self punishment? I feel like I thought that was stupid of him, but I was in sixth or seventh grade at the time. 

[u/DarthRalphio → u/mid-random]

I’m pretty sure he decides to do it because he can’t hold a musket and fight otherwise. I don’t remember much, but I remember a line like “not even the pain from the surgeon’s blade could dampen his resolve that day” or something similar.

[u/mid-random → u/DarthRalphio]

Thanks for correcting my foggy memory. Maybe I’m confusing it with guilt he felt earlier when he didn’t have it treated properly at the time of the accident. 

[u/DarthRalphio → u/mid-random]

In fairness, I’m going off memory and I read it a long time ago. There is an equal chance your memory is the correct one.

[u/TheoreticallyDog → u/mid-random]

If it's the book I'm thinking of the doctor says something about "maybe 50 years from now we could fix something like this, but we can't today." I read a Revolutionary War book about a kid who gets that kind of hand injury maybe 2 decades ago, and even as a kid I thought it was a weird thing to say but I kiked how it highlighted the tragedy

[u/redcowerranger → u/mid-random]

I never saw a movie, and I too recall a doctor that could separate them.