mgbfan

Ugg ... glorified fanfic.

mytzplyx

The Wheel of Time turned into a bad joke starting from book 8 or so. Books 1 - 7 may have justified "best fantasy series" status, but afterwards, it has...absolutely sucked. Many diehard fans even admit to still reading it just HOPING that Robert Jordan turns it around in the last couple of books.

leeta

I agree totally with this statement. In the last book (Book 10) NOTHING happened... in 700 pages!

I'm one of the former fans that are still getting the books and reading and hoping that Rand finally meets the Dark One in the Last Battle... .

I don't know if Robert Jordan is just milking it or has writer's block, but suspect the latter...

mgbfan

He said "not LOTR," so I presume shameless LOTR rip-offs are also out.

shimmoril

No, no, no he said Dragonlance, not 'any book ever written by Dennis McKiernan'. Gawd, I feel dirty just mentioning his name in a thread about the best fantasy/scifi ever. That man has never had an original/interesting thought in his life!

Michael Corvin

Nope. Glorified fanfic would be Truce at Bakura or some of the lame ones that followed once Del-Rey noticed they could milk SW for all it was worth. No other SW novels have captured the magic and characters we love like Zahn.

As for New Jedi Order. I have 4 books left. Decent. It just seems so rushed all of a sudden since they slashed it from a 30 book series to a 19 book series.

mgbfan

Okay, we really do need to stop and look at the title of this thread. Best ever ... how on God's good Earth are the freakin Dragonlance novels even getting a passing mention? I liked them as a teen, just like everybody else, but people ... these books do not hold up.

In five years, are we going to have to hear that Harry Potter is one of the best ever because the kids that read them and loved them never realized that they're nothing but slickly packaged cliche? The Dragonlance novels fill a role, a niche in the market, but they are entirely derivitave, overwrought, unoriginal, and do not hold up for the adult reader.

mgbfan

If that's the stance you're going to take, that there's nothing but subjectivity and everything is equal, then a thread like this is pointless. If that's the stance you take, then any piece of fanfic trash is equal in value to The Left Hand of Darkness, Dune, Hyperion, The Fellowship of the Ring, Ender's Game, A Stranger in a Strange Land, etc.

The original poster was asking about the best ever, and we've got to be honest ... Drangonlance belongs no where near that list. That's not to say they don't have value. But everything isn't as baseline subjective as you're implying. It's just not. You cannot put William Hung on a list of the best singers ever, and you cannot put Dragonlance on a list of the best SF/Fantasy ever. They simply don't fit.

Defining the standards becomes slippery, but that doesn't mean that they don't exist.

outer-edge

This whole thread is of opinions of what people think is the best, or is their favorite, or what they enjoyed the most. Typically, that is what a "best" thread is -- opinions on what people think is the "best", usually based on different criteria they use to judge the medium.

If you want to see answers that are not subjective, then you need a thread that specifically states its purpose as a literary debate about the best sci-fi/fantasy series, based on a defined set of criteria.

Until then, people will give their personal choices for whatever reasons they judge by, and some people will disagree. But, that is no reason to continually try and degrade other people's choices.

mgbfan

I didn't deny the role of subjectivity entirely. I merely pointed out the folly of taking the "it's all subjective" tact too far. That line of reason becomes utterly absurd at some level, and all I was doing was pointing out that we were approaching that level.

If you believe it's all subjective and all answers are created equal, then you have to accept my answer that William Hung belongs on the list of the greatest singers in history. And if you accept my answer that William Hung belongs on that list, you've just invalidated the list.

That's what's happening here.

GreenMonkey

Because, despite the trappings of typical D&D, the story is a good one, of redemption, and of a character's fall into darkness. To me, nothing is more heart wrenching than the betrayal of a friend/loved one. The Shakespearean style Tragedy can be a great kind of story.

I'm just talking the Weis & Hickman novels. No comment on the other gazillion novels. Don't let some bad bring down the good. I recomend a revisit of the books - you would be surprised how well they hold up (unlike some of the other crap I read in Elementary school/jr high - ex: Piers Anthony's Xanth)


For those of you that love the Raistlin/Caramon Dragonlance story for exactly those reasons, I highly recommend watching a couple of programs with similiar themes:

Babylon 5
The anime series Berserk

Fladnag

mgbfan,
Get over it. It's ALL subjective. You classify the Harry Potter books as "slickly packaged cliche," but they will probably inspire more kids to read write than Tolkien ever hoped to reach. In fact, when the Lord of the Rings trilogy was release there were probably numerous critiques of the books as silly, childish stories NOT literature. We're talking about fiction stories that entertain. If someone thinks Dragonlance is the best thing since sliced bread ... Fine. By the way, you kind of lose credibility when you spell Dragonlance---Drangonlance.

mgbfan

No. It's not "ALL subjective." If it's "ALL subjective," then William Hung belongs on the list of the greatest singers ever.

If you believe that's true, then nothing has any value over anything else. The art on a Wrigley's Doublemint gum wrapper is no better or worse than the Mona Lisa. After all, that's a pretty gum wrapper. And since everything's equal, they're equal in terms of art.

It always sounds nice and good to say it's all subjective, that all opinions are equal, blah, blah, blah. But the problem with that thinking is that nothing is ever really good, and nothing is ever really bad, or anything in between. That stance allows William Hung to be the best singer ever and a chalk hopscotch drawing on the sidewalk to be the greatest work of art ever.

Actually, you're very wrong. The LOTR books were lauded across the literary world. If there was a criticism about them, it was because they were adult, when many people were hoping for a young adult tale in the vein of The Hobbit, which was also critically acclaimed. Nobody said that LOTR was childish, though some said they wanted it to be MORE childish.

I welcome a debate, but you're probably better off if you don't use "this probably happened" as your argument, especially when it most certianly did not. If you want to engage in a debate of maybes and probablys, you'll get torn to shreds.

And you lose ALL credibility when you resort to pointing out typos as an attempt to score points in a debate. That's totally hack, man. Really weak.

Fladnag

mgbfan,
You're right, the art on a Wrigley's gum wrapper is not art, and neither is the "art" on a Campbell's soup can, unless it has Andy Warhol's name at the bottom of a canvas. Seems like one man's soup can is another man's art, but that's not subjective!
Subjectivity does not make Wiliam Hung a great singer, and all opinions are not equal, for example, yours.
As far as probablys, I guess I should state conjecture as fact. FACT: The books were not "lauded" across the literary world. The was criticism check E. Wilson, E. Muir, P. Toynbee.
FACT: "Despite the criticism and the publicity the book received after its publication, it wasn't until an illegal paperback copy (ie without paying royalties) was launched in the USA in 1965 that it became immensely popular."
If you're going to critique the use of conjecture, you probably don't want to start a sentence with, "If there was a criticism about them..."

Kal-El

mgbfan,

I respect your opinion, but NOTHING you say to me or to any of the posters who mentioned Dragonlance will change the fact that WE consider it worthy of being mentioned in the list. You don't like 'em, fine. But to continually beat to the ground that it doesn't belong in this thread begs the question, who died and made you God? I just don't see why it seems to bother you too much.

mgbfan

Why not? If you say the Dragonlance novels are among the best SF/Fantasy ever, I say William Hung is one of the greatest singers in history.

Why is my statement more absurd than yours? Remember, it's "ALL subjective," then answer the question.

Ahh, you're new to Internet message boards, aren't you? You've an awfully thin skin.

Yes, they were, as was The Hobbit. Universally? Of course not. Be serious.

Never denied it. You'd be hard-pressed to find any great work of art that somebody didn't criticize. Picasso received gobs of it, but that doesn't mean his work wasn't lauded across the art world. It was. I know you're very excited to have done a Web search and turned up criticism of LOTR, thinking you've scored some massive point. It's a little sad to burst your bubble, actually ... but to say something was lauded doesn't mean that every individual soul who reviewed it loved it. If that's the case, nothing in history has ever been lauded.

Now ...

William Hung is the greatest singer in history. The Dragonlance novels are among the best SF/Fantasy ever.

If it's "ALL subjective," as you say, these statements are identical in value. And the little line drawing I just did on the back of a receipt is better than anything Monet ever did. Because it's all subjective, right? All of it.

Or maybe it's just subjective until you don't like to to be subjective anymore. Maybe your feelings are hurt because I said that the Dragonlance novels are adolescent, lack depth, and spew out cliche with zeal. Maybe you're feeling just a little stung that you thought they were great, only to learn that they're for children, or teens, at best. And maybe, just MAYBE, that's why you're so terribly angry with me for calling your attention to that fact.

Now, is it ALL subjective, or isn't it? If it is, how can you say that William Hung shouldn't be listed as one of the greatest singers in history? By your own insistance, there's no criteria by which to omit him.

mgbfan

Ask yourself again, though ... do you really consider it worthy of being on a list of the best SF/Fantasy in history? I understand you like them, but take a step back and really ask yourself if you believe that.

If the answer to that question is "yes," really and truly, then tell me this: How much SF/Fantasy have you actually read?

I'm not talking about Star Wars novels and other fanfic trash - I'm talking about the genuine article: Dune. The Left Hand of Darkness. Ender's Game. A Stranger in a Strange Land. Earthsea. The Mote in God's Eye. Bear, Baxter, Asimov, Bradley, Simmons, Pratchett, Adams. How much have you really read?

I'll wager that if, after stepping back and reconsidering, you still believe they do belong on the best-ever list, you're not very well read in the field. Please tell me if I'm wrong.

Quite the contrary. I've said several times in this thread that I enjoyed them when I read them.

I also enjoy the occasional sloppy joe with greasy potato chips, but I don't mistake that meal for fine cuisine. There are days when I'd love nothing more than a good, messy sloppy joe. But if there's a thread of the greatest food in the world, I'm sure as hell not going to mention it. Doesn't mean I don't enjoy it.

GreenMonkey

I must say, I've read scifi/fantasy since 6th grade or so. I've absorbed Asimov's Foundation, Robot, and short stories multiple times. Ditto for OSC's Ender's Game. Not a big fan of Baxter (but I read his book about the machine that looks into the future, I forget the name). Absorbed Heinlen's books at least 3 times minimum (esp. The Door into Summer).


It seems that you are perhaps mostly a scifi guy. Perhaps that is where the schism here is coming from.


Obviously, your critique of the Weis & Hickman DL is dated. I've re-visited books from years ago and found they lost or gained a lot of respect with me. Vastly different opinions of some of them (Robin Hobb is my best example, as I mentioned earlier).



I see the point you are trying to get at (that some stuff can definitely not be proclaimed "best"). I've seen the trailer for the horror of a movie that is "I, Robot" and think Asimov would roll over in his grave (worst thing that I could think of ).


But your target here is apparently a little fuzzy in the distance of your memory. I didn't remember DL Weis & Hickman being so great, but when I re-read them last year, I realized that they were indeed quality. Esp. the Twins trilogy. A far, far cry from the "sloppy joe" of books.

Fladnag

mgbfan,
My feelings are not at all hurt by your criticism of Dragonlance. I've never read any of the books. What I object to is your pompous, derogatory attitude about other people's choices and the inane rant against art being subjective. You've also got to get over your William Hung fixation.

mgbfan

Why? He's the best singer in history.

mgbfan

I enjoy good fantasy; it's just much harder to come by. So much of today's fantasy is blatently derivative, the DL novels included. If there's something good and original out there, sign me up. The early Coldfire books were decent. I mentioned Earthsea and, of course, Tolkien. There's other notable fantasy out there as well. It's just scarcer than good & original SF.

Your post is welcome here, in that you're well-read and even while you defend the DL books, you're forced to admit that they probably don't belong on the list. I think most anyone who is well-read in the genre(s) will have to admit the same, even if they feel the need to demonize me for being the one to point out the obvious.

NEUMANN

Alphalpha from lil rascals is the best singer in history lol, while i see what you are getting at (dude wheres my car does not belong in a discussion on greatest movies ect...) i think dragonlance merits being on this thread,it is almost an industry unto itself with quite a large fanbase and even though i am not a fan of the dragonlance novels i do not find it to be preposterous for dragonlance novels to be discussed on a thread like this

mgbfan

And then? And then? AndThenAndThenAndThen ...

Man, I hate myself for knowing lines to that movie.

Maybe if we had a list of best young-adult SF/Fantasy series, I'd buy its inclusion. But the original poster didn't specify that he wanted to discuss teen fiction. It certianly doesn't belong on a list of best adult fiction.

MScottM

Can't we all just get along? LOL

Xander

Dude, why the hell do you care if people want to put Dragonlance on their "best fantasy books" list? THEY think it belongs there. You've said you don't have it on yours. Fine. Give it a rest. I consider myself "well read" in the sci-fi/fantasy genre, and I put the Chronicles and Legends DL books in my top ten list. If you disagree, fine, but stop trying to convice me that they don't belong there.

X