#great analysis
y’all asked for my Izzy Hands thoughts here you fuckin go >:) it got a wee bit long sorry
here’s some ‘meta’ that was living in my head rent free about Izzy’s role as Blackbeard’s designated killer and other stuff. some of it is probably bullshit <3
HELLO not to be overly dramatic about Izzy Hands on this good day but. I think a lot about how Ed tells Stede that he’s never actually killed people directly. And like, we can debate how true that is - particularly because honestly, Ed doesn’t seem to have any hesitation when it comes to killing people except for the case of Stede - but taking that as legitimate, he also mentions that he always ‘outsources the big job’. Now, I’ve already seen it pointed out by other people that the person who usually takes this job instead of Ed is Izzy - but, god, the implications of that are making me insane, I need to think about that more…
i mean. the whole point of those books is that Peter is dragging the Folly into a modern policing era and that he wants to do things the right way. that is a KEY part of his character, that he’s a mixed-race police officer that’s an idealist who believes in a better way. how is this a surprise to anyone?!that’s LITERALLY THEIR POINT OF DIFFERENCE from urban fantasy generally, that a key plot thread is how you integrate policing by consent with goddesses and magic, rather than just an escalating series of boss challenges for the hero.
and maybe that’s not for you, and that’s fine, but…it’s like picking up an Agatha Christie and going “I really like the depiction of interwar British life, but why are there so many dead people?”.
Ack, I can’t stop thinking about this.
Because the thing is… this person told Peter to “shut up” about his policing essays; they called it “filler”, the “same thing over and over.” That’s… that’s not just failing to recognize the importance of what Peter does, believes in, and works towards. That’s actively dismissing his work, that’s blatantly calling it unimportant.
@themadia perfectly summarized here exactly why the essays on policing are so important. And taking that understanding of why this is so important…. Like, how privileged do you have to be to call Peter’s efforts to change things for the better filler?It feels like part of the wider phenomenon where people occasionally seem to read these books despite Peter, and it’s like…I love everybody else in the series, but if you’re not here for Peter and his digressions then why are you here, really?
To add onto this, if you think Peter’s digressions on policing are just “filler”, you’re not only missing the point of Peter as a character, you’re missing the very pointed politics that Ben Aaronovitch is putting in the story. American issues with police brutality are very well publicized (and so they should be) but the Met’s long standing issues of institutionalized racism and how that impacts the communities it’s meant to serve are a very real and fraught thing, especially today. (See this article in the Guardian about how black and mixed-race people in London are far more likely to be tazered by Met Police than literally any other group, and then compare that to Peter’s aversion at using a tazer in Broken Homes.) And all that supposed filler, that also serves as not just foundation for Peter as a character, but as setup for the eventual break between him and Lesley, whose attitudes on policing and consent and law and order seem like a difference of opinion between them that’s mostly irrelevant–until it really fucking isn’t. Those essays aren’t just filler or characterization–they’re foreshadowing.
Personally, I like Peter’s digressions on policing far more than his architectural geekery (no knock against it, I just don’t find the subject of architecture interesting on its own) but it’s all worth it for the big finale in Broken Homes, where Peter manages to thwart the Faceless Man almost entirely because he knows more about architecture and has noticed what literally everyone else hasn’t about Skygarden, making that big dramatic moment feel earned, because it’s so grounded in what’s come before. Like @sixth-light said, you CAN read these books and not care for Peter as the protagonist, but…why?
These are very political books, in many ways (come for the personified rivers, stay for the consequences of British colonialism) and to be perfectly honest the fantasy worldbuilding is mostly interesting because it’s woven into and hung on real-world politics and history, rather than the other way around. The only radical departures average urban fantasy worldbuilding are a) magic as a skill learnable by anybody and b) the lack of strict power structures in the demi-monde (vs. your average world of werewolf packs and vampire monarchs and whatever) and neither of those are unique. But the commitment to weaving the fantasy elements into the world as we know it, including all the ugly bits: that’s what stands out. You can’t have one without the other.
It’s funny; I never seem to stumble on the critical posts which ROL fandom reacts to, but I love the meta which results!
On a tangential note, here’s a quote from a Ben Aaronovitch interview from a couple years ago, on Peter vs Nightingale:
“In a way, they’re two sides of the same coin. I didn’t want two contrasting… they’re both examples of British stoicism. And Peter is the working class version and Nightingale is the upper class version.”
None of this relates to fan reactions, but I thought it was neat. I like that the author thought of them as kindred spirits from the start.
He also described Nightingale as “the guy who thought he was done.” He said that Nightingale had given up and was just going through the motions. I think that’s a big part of how Nightingale drifted into being a sketchy one-man department with no oversight. He just didn’t think it mattered, since magic was goign out of the world anyway. His role was kinda like “Last guy out of the building turns out the lights.” He griped a bit, but on the whole came around pretty easily to changing that approach to fit the times.
It has belatedly occurred to me that one way to look at ROL is as a non-dystopian alternative to stuff like the X-Men.
Ooooh, do you have a link to the interview those quotes are from? I’ve never seen them but they match my character interpretations so exactly I feel like I need a citation just to be sure.
I’m also curious what you mean by comparing RoL to the X-Men - I’ve always thought of the series as a direct contrast to that sort of narrative, in that it forefronts real-world issues like racism rather than discussing them via a comfortable (for white people, mostly) but flawed fantasy analogue, while also rejecting the notion of inborn “specialness”. Sure, people like the Rivers and the fae exist, but ultimately anyone can get caught up in magic if they choose to learn. (Or, rather, if they have the opportunity to…which is mediated by privilege.)
As for the various posts - usually they’ve come up in the #rivers of london tag, but because we’re a polite bunch we bitch about it on our own posts instead of dragging in whoever had the Wrong Opinion. If you don’t check the tag you’re not going to see them. Which is probably a happier way to live your life, I’m just obsessive. :P
