Ah, yes, those Redwall books. Let's start at the top:
Redwall:
I haven't read this book since... oh, I don't know... sixth grade, maybe? Meaning it's been AT LEAST SIX YEARS PEOPLE! HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO REMEMBER THIS BOOK! But out of all of the Redwall books, I do know that this is the most un-Redwallish of the lot. Cluny is a "Portugese Rat." Matthias falls into the mouth of a cat. Does it sound like the Redwall of today? NO! Does that make it a little difficult to read after you've just read The Legend of Luke? YES! Sure, so this was the one that started it all, but it's not that great, people, and it's kind of a weird read when you have grown accustomed to the more recent books! Pikestaff's rating: *1/2. I gave it another half of a star just because it was the first book so it gets nostalgia points. Next!
Mossflower:
Uh-huh, and when the last time I read this book... I tried to start it again not too long ago, but about 8 chapters into the thing I completely lost all interest. Do you know what that means? That it must be boring! Queen Tsarmina isn't a very engaging character. Gingevere is as close as you can get to a computer geek trapped in a medieval book. And Rose is not the greatest character in the world, folks. Shoot me. Go ahead, I don't care, but really, she's not that great! Wait a minute... is Rose even in Mossflower? Or was that Martin the Warrior... daw, whatever. They're all the same, you know? Ack, I can't even rate this book because I don't remember it. Tell ya' what: I'll go read it again and then come back and finish the analysis for this one. Okay, next!
Mattimeo:
Ah, yes, Mattimeo, and I remember from about 5th grade to 7th grade this was my favorite of the Redwall Books. Then I got a life. And then... I don't remember what my favorite was after that. Outcast of Redwall was my favorite for like 3 months before I woke up and smelled the Pine-Sol... anyway, I'm off track. Mattimeo, is, um, a sequel, and, um... it's got its good points. Slagar is cool for a little bit and then he gets old. Not the best of the baddies, by no means! Matthais is cooler in this book than in Redwall... Mattimeo himself is okay, but he's not great. It's an interesting book, I guess. Sure, I'll be nice. Pikestaff's rating: **. Next!
Mariel of Redwall:
I always thought that this book was kind of strange. Gabool, especially, has got some problems to work out. Villains are supposed to be scary, right? So Gabool is scary for maybe the first 10% of the book and suddenly he loses his mind. Insane villains can be scary if they are handled right, but Gabool was not. I mean, come on, he's afraid of a bell! Let's get some Prozac!! The hare characters in this book are interesting... Hon Rosie had a slightly more unique personality than most Redwall hares... but overall, this book is downright odd. Pikestaff's Rating: **. Next!
Salamandastron:
I just finished reading this book again, so of all the Redwall books it's currently the freshest in my mind... first of all, I'd like to say that I really didn't like any of the characters to a huge extent. If I did like them, they died. Mara has a 2-D personality. Tubgutt is really annoying. Samkin's personality is even more 2-D than Mara's. Arula is okay, but I was never big on moles in the first place. Urthwyte is downright stupid. Thrugg... okay, so he was cool. So was the falcon Rocangus. I thought he was the most interesting of the protagonists. Now the villains-- Ferahgo and Klitch are both fairly capable villains and their constant rivalry makes it even more fun to read... I like Ferahgo better because Klitch is kind of a brat. The Cool Character Award in this book goes to: Farran the Poisoner. Everyone was scared of him, even Ferahgo. So why did he have to go die! He was so cool! Still, primarily because of the villains, this book is okay. Pikestaff's Rating: ***. Next!
Martin the Warrior:
This is my brother's favorite Redwall book. But hey, what does that have to do with anything? This is the one with Rose in it, isn't it? Well, okay, folks... here comes my speech. Rose is wimpy, insecure, and the only cool thing about her is that she can make eagle calls. Which, by the way, is something she only did at the very beginning of the book. So why does everyone like her? It remains a mystery to me... Martin is same old, same old... the main villian whats-is-name is pathetic... I seem to remember I liked this book when I first read it because it was funny, but because I haven't read it in a little while I don't remember all the comic details. That guy who thought he was the law was pretty funny, though. Pikestaff's Rating: **. On with it, come on, what's next? This is too fun!
The Bellmaker:
This is another book that falls under the category of "Comedy," in my opinion. Where Mossflower and Mattimeo were both fairly dark, Brian Jacques decides here to throw in some funny stuff. But he also decides to throw in a lot of psycho stuff. Stuff like that otter and that badger who completely lose it and tend to kill anybody within a mile-radius. That was pretty psycho. Finnbarr Galedeep was kind of psychotic as well. Urgan Nagru was a good villian... probably not the best, but he was a lot better than Gabool, Cluny, and ol' Whats-his-name from Martin the Warrior. Plus, the Foxwolf idea was cool, but you know... it could have been cooler. You know who I really liked? That mole guy who decided to talk normal for once. Egbert, or whatever he was called... heh heh, an intellectual mole, fun fun fun! That combined with the psychoness makes this a fun read. Pikestaff's Rating: ***. Okay, next!!
The Outcast of Redwall:
Highly anticipated, I remember when this book first came out and everybody was looking forward to it... it became my favorite, something which lasted, as I said before, only a couple of months before I read it again and realized its many flaws. Including: It's really really prejudiced against vermin-- I thought we knew by now that there was no such thing as bad genes! If a mouse had decided to poison somebody, would he have been made an outcast! NOOOO!!! They would have gone into a weepy forgive and forget thing! Swartt is not the best antagonist in the world. Veil was cooler than him. Sunflash was a carbon-copy of almost every other badger I've ever read about, and although you do feel for him when Skarlath dies, they carried it way overboard. Bryony is the ultimate Cheerleader of the Redwall World. She would be voiced by Drew Barrymore if they made this book into a movie. Okay, I'm done now. Pikestaff's Rating: *1/2. I'm not quite cruel enough to give it only one star. Next!
Pearls of Lutra:
Oh, yay! This is still my favorite of the Redwall books. The sad thing is I'm really not sure why. Some of the other books were better but this is my fave... okay, I'm going to name some reasons why this book was cool. 1.) Romsca. All Romsca has to do is show up in a chapter to make it better. She is the coolest character that Brian Jacques has invented thus far. I can't believe she had to die. I wanted her to survive and go on to be the protagonist in the next book-- seriously, I liked her that much! She was the "Good Baddie," and I've gotta admit I've always thought those types were the coolest. 2.)Ublaz Mad Eyes is a pretty original villain. As a bonus, he's a pine martin, and I can only think of one other pine martin in the whole Redwall series, which makes him refreshingly unique. Also, he really is the type of guy who would attain a "legendary" status. Most other bad guys-- they die and you forget 'em. Ublaz is too different for that. Okay-- the weak part of this book is the good guys, who mostly are pretty boring. Clecky is okay. The Abbot is funny when he starts hallucinating just because it's so pitifully comical. Maybe that sounds morbid, but maybe it's just me. Anyway, Pikestaff's Rating: ****. Next up!
The Long Patrol:
If I can say one thing about this book, at least it's a page-turner. Some Redwall books are a snooze, but it took me 3 days to read The Long Patrol-- compare that with my average of about 3 weeks to read several other books. So yeah, it was interesting. But if we dig in deeper, we just find more clichés. Everybody always does the same old thing, blah blah blah, the villain was another dumb rat hoarde leader-- the only cool thing about him was that half-wavy, half-straight sword that they had and would throw up in the air to find out where they were going. That was cool. There was some mildly funny cronies among the bad guys, though. Sneezewort or whatever his name was and his pal were both pretty humorous. All the hares are the same except for the guy who made drum sound effects and Ellbrig, a minor character whose role should have been expanded because he was cool. The drum guy was interesting, but not enough to be remarkably different. Cregga Rose Eyes was totally and completelly insane beyond help. In other words, this book was primarily a jolting mix of psycho-ness, old redone clichés, and only mildly above average characters. In short: Not Brian Jacques' masterpiece. Pikestaff's Rating: *1/2. Next!
Marlfox:
Cool idea. That's the underlying thing in this book... it's a cool idea. No more dumb hoarde leaders or insane searats. The whole Castle Marl-and-the-family-of-foxes-who-are-always-trying-to-kill-each-other idea was actually engaging. Especially when the Queen Fox ended up being outsmarted by her own daughter. That was cool. Now some of the foxes were stupid, it's true, but most were pretty intelligent... Mokkan, especially. He was smart enough to win, but no, the Good guys always win... it's that deux ex machina again that I was talking about in my story... (sigh.) Goodbeast characters-- for some weird reason I liked Rusvul Reguba. His son Dannflor was okay, but not great. Songbreeze, likewise, was only okay. The goodbeasts are clichés, once again. Oh well. This is a fun book to read anyhow. And I liked how it was told as though in a "play"-- you know, Act 1, Curtain, and such... refreshingly different. Pikestaff's Rating: ***. Next!!
The Legend of Luke:
Lord Brocktree:
This is my second favorite Redwall book. Pearls of Lutra is my favorite, and this one is second favorite. Why? Because it was so much more original than all the other Redwall books!! Dear Brian Jacques... Originality, please, I'm dying here, I love ORIGINALITY! Did you catch that? Translation: The more original, the better, and The Legend of Luke was original. The big red boat was actually scary. The way it got stuck in that cliff-- cool. Martin-- actually pretty likeable. His quest and the way he decided to embark on it-- realistic. The way the book had a "flashback" in the middle-- engaging, and again, ORIGINAL!! Praise the skies! The characters and their prediciment-- pretty good, considering. That black squirrel-- psycho! But some psychotic characters are fun, as long as they aren't played overboard, which, fortunately, the black squirrel isn't. Overall, I'm quite pleased the way this one came out. Pikestaff's Rating: ****.
ACK! BACK UP! I haven't read this book yet! What, you want me to analyze it anyway? You really like me that much? Oh, well, heh, I love you too... now click here and quit fooling around.
