The Chronicles of Narnia Kept Getting Weirder 

SNAKEBOOBS!!!

did you consider buying one of those kitty-sized lion manes for Sir Terry?

11:11 You really just re-enacted a scene from the Good Place LOL

@@mhfromnh1421 such a great idea!

Hey Dom! Any chance you can flip the order of the Narnia playlist? If it's not too much trouble, of course. Love your work!

Lewis had a reason to hate school. He was abused in school, and one of his sadistic teachers was committed to an asylum for flogging kids so wildly.

@@sammyvictors2603 dang

@@sammyvictors2603 wow! I didn’t know that! That’s so horrible!!

wow, yikes, did not know that.

@@sammyvictors2603 holy cow

Look up any given Piers Anthony title some time; prepare to be amused before being viscerally appalled.

The gay part aside (it did mean happy after all) the "make love" and "giantesses kissing and petting" part sounded extremely suspicious.

@@gokbay3057 They were disarming the giants by flirting with them, but in a childish way so it wasn't TOO sexual. Jill was said to be better at it than the boys though

I remember seeing that one when I was a kid! I think we rented it from the library on VHS

@@ClearAsCrystal823 I grew up watching the BBC adaptation; it was my favourite, especially when my family's "The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe" VHS broke. :)

@@ClearAsCrystal823 Funny, we did the same.

IT'S REAL?! I DIDN'T IMAGINE IT?! THANK YOU!

@@sarahwestliddle567 if you did, then I imagined it too!

That book for me is Fat Men from Space.

I think Lewis knew he could count on a large fraction of his readership not liking school.

+

I have a cd copy my late husband downloaded and burned.

... well darn, that's a memory awoke in me. All I remember is the giant animatronic Aslan getting stabbed in the paw with the thorn and bleeding into the river on top of Old Man Caspian to bring him back to unlife and turn him young again, but I can see it so vividly.

Tom Baker (the 4th Doctor) playing Puddleglum is what sticks out to me from that adaptation.

@@Lawnie Oh yeah! The gigantic thorn...[shivers]

Its on youtube, search for it. :)

Tolkien: 'I don't much care for your jesus lion.'

I think you might be confusing Horse and His Boy with Last Battle. In the Last Battle, a Narnian Ape tries to convince everyone that Tash (the head god of the Calormene pantheon) and Aslan were actually the same, and also the Ape just so happens to be the mouthpiece of “Tashlan.” This lie was perpetuated by Narnians and Calormene who did not believe either existed as a means of control, and the lie was very distressing and disrespectful to the Narnians and Calormene who honestly believed in their respective deities

If I'm remembering The Last Battle right, there's a Calormene who walks through the door, sees Aslan, and comes over and bows to him as his god while all the humans are very confused. I think Aslan says something like, everyone who leads a life like I want my followers to lead, even if they've never heard of me, even if they have and are following some other god, is still following me and they're welcome in my land

@@jaysea5939 Yup, that definitely was there. I'm pretty sure the nice Calomene actually didn't recognise Aslan as his god and was a bit confused, and it's mostly to him that Aslan explains his shtick, and then the Calormene bows to him. That was really un-Biblically nice for a monotheistic god.

@@AntediluvianRomance ah, thanks!

I had no idea I would have ever heard a phrase like that.

When will we be able to buy "Jesus fursona party bus" t-shirts?

Thanks, that's my new band name

@@yudithcaron8053 I'll definitely buy it

Same lmfao

That was his reaction to That Hideous Strength.

@@earlenehamner3433 Heeey! rarely get to see that book mentioned. The Ransom trilogy is an... interesting one.

Tolkien would never have called him Clive, since he knew Lewis hated that name. He and the other Inklings called him Jack.

@@2wingo I think it’s a more funny image if Tolkien does call C S Louis Clive. Like, all pretense is dropped. You are correct of course, no I think the silver chair is unambiguously the weakest entry in the Narnia series, and his writing overall. Of his works that I have read, I would have to see the Screwtape letters is my personal favorite

That Hideous Strength wasn't the best book of the trilogy. However, the themes of how out of control a purely materialist outlook could go was prophetic. People mocked him badly for that at the time. Good insights with the Abolition of Man too. Again, they thought he was exaggerating at the time. They both remind me of Fahrenheit 451, again badly criticized at the time as hyperbole, but no one dares mock its themes now.

Also that kids would age out of their roles

Some RPGs do that too. "This is a sequel that takes place hundreds of years after the previous installment. Everyone from the last game is dead."

Smart.

It's a book series by a devoutly Christian author where pagan gods exist and are friends with Jesus. That's pretty remarkable when you compare it to something like Paradise Lost. I'm glad these books helped you manage to escape, and I hope you're doing well.

Narnia actually helped a lot growing up despite being Arabic and with a mostly Muslim family. I was a child but I understood that if something could come off as racist was just because the book was a product of its time. I personally found it hilarious.

Most excellent 💚

The fact that "I grew up in a cult" is still something people can accurately say in the 21st century is insane.

Oddly enough Lewis got some flak from his contemporaries for including references to pagan gods in Narnia. There’s a scene in Prince Caspian where Bacchus (aka Dionysus) shows up with his Maenads when Aslan destroys the bridge of Beruna.

Not to mention Agatha Christie, who set an entire murder mystery at an exclusive girls school, that came off as a place for rich, neglectful parents to dump their spoiled daughters. The fact that all four murder victims are staff members is also unpleasant, to say the least.

I mean, isn't Hogwarts shown in a relative positive light?

Considering how much I hated school, Hogwarts read (and in films and games despite the stress of the sneaking levels, looked and sounded) like heaven. But it's in Scotland so I dunno if that counts XP Also The Worst Witch had a pretty good school, I guess, even if they didn't really delve into the class mechanics there. I.... Actually don't know where Miss Cackle's Academy for Witches specifically IS, but considering there's been two TV shows about the book series and it's all British...! I guess if it's a School With Magic I'm all over it.

Apparently C. S Lewis said that compared to his time at school, he almost preferred being in World War 1; because you didn't have to say you liked it in the end.

@@SWProductions100 I would recommend, The Ever - Interesting Topic (terrible title) by William Cowper, for anyone who wants a light - hearted look at life in a posh school in post - war England. First published 1953 so roughly contemporary with the Narnia Chronicles.

Even with a surprise round and winning initiative and having a haste spell it still sounds like they sat there and let her do it lol

I mean I thought it sounded like they were all heavily drugged so how could they fight her if sedated?

@@avosmash2121 they were drugged AFTER the powder was thrown in the fire. Depending on where said fire was in correlation to the party and the sorceress, they might’ve easily been able to prevent her from doing so.

@@jordinagel1184 They might have been interested in trying out the drug. It wasn't very safe though.

@@Salsmachev Throwing the powder on the fire was the somatic component of the charm spell. Most of the time needed to perform that action would have been retrieving it from where she was storing it. Also, haste spells usually only give you an extra attack in a full-attack action. They don't give you an extra standard action, and you certainly can't cast an extra spell. (Although Pathfinder Mythic powers could allow that...)

Hahaha I didn't when I read it because I was used to reading old literature, but I definitely died laughing when Dom put it all together like that and started shipping Eustace and Caspian 😂😂

@@dragongirl7978 of course :3

@@dragongirl7978 I was used to the context of it but the way they just kept repeating it felt like they were about to infiltrate a pride march not a giant's castle

@@hermi117 well, I was also a little kid when I first read it and very sheltered so that probably had something to do with it lol

I have read this book and completely forgotten about it till this review.

Was wondering why he didn't use any footage from the BBC miniseries

@@ethanride3203 I didn't even know there was one. And it's probably because this isn't the Lost in Adaptation one. He only really uses the films in that one.

There were a lot of great performances in that series, particularly Caspian imo.

Danny De Vito would be perfect Puddleglum

A true Respectabiggle.

He was far and away my favorite character in the series. I was later diagnosed with clinical depression. I'm not saying the two things are necessarily related, but...

puddleglum is superior, that’s why the silver chair is one of my favorites in the series. definitely a king.

Definitely a spirit animal

@@leeshajoi he’s also a true autistic icon honestly he’s kind of living the dream

Exactly! I just read that chapter the other day that's almost verbatim, I always thought it was such an interesting choice that they ate meat at all considering most Narnian animals were as sentient as humans.

It makes you wonder how hunting works in Narnia, like all the talking Stags, Boars or Rabbits must have some sort of "tell" if they don't want to be killed by accident. I think he said the size is a bit different, but I wonder if that would be enough - and horses can pass for dumb horses. It would have to be something they do all the time in the wild to not be killed, since the whole thing of hunting is surprise attacks from a distance.

@@MagusMarquillin Well, maybe they differed in more ways than size, Lewis just didn't elaborate; and keep in mind humans are hunting for animals not that dumber than us, so maybe in Narnia that's also the point. A talking horse wouldn't normally eat a dumb horse soup, just as we wouldn't eat a soup made of monkeys, but there will be some sentient carnivores that would eat non-sentient animals.

The Magician's Nephew makes it really obvious, though it is mentioned in other books, that size is definitely one of the big differences between the talking animals and regular ones. Large animals tend to be significantly smaller when they can talk, while small animals are larger. Reepicheep as a talking mouse is supposed to be around two feet tall. This does kind of clash with the two talking horses in The Horse and His Boy being able to pass as regular horses.

@@dare7782 I believe the Talking Beasts were by far the minority in Narnia. The Magician’s Nephew mentions Aslan chose 2 of some animals to become talking, skipping over some species entirely. Also, certain talking beasts died out over the years, like flying horses and talking lions that weren’t Aslan. Between this and some of the talking beasts eating animals, I don’t think it’s surprising that the people would too. Also, I think the horses passing as regular horses were mostly the result of most Calormene not realizing that talking beasts were a thing. They had had basically no contact with Narnia for over a century, and they spoke of Narnia’s previous happenings like myths and legends rather than history.

Also I won't waste time having theological debates with the heroes, specially when I already have the upper hand and an army at my disposal.

It's weird that this happens enough that it needs to be on the list, but it really does!

I'd really like to do a rebuttal to this list at some point, even though most of it is sound advice. I mean, I can think of a few situations in which I'd want to be a snake, and I wouldn't want to arbitrarily handicap myself.

@@michaelmccarty1327 Thulsa Doom in the 80's Conan movie with Schwarzenegger did it right: when he sensed Conan was about to attack his den, he turned into a snake simply in order to slither away through a small hole.

What a great reference. I haven’t seen the Evil Overlords list for a decade

Wouldn’t Horse and His Boy technically be a mid-quel?

Horse and his Boy is good, but Shasta isn't even my second favourite character, despite his being the protagonist. Bree was my favourite and Aravis second.

@@JoeMama410 i'd argue it's more like a spin-off book

Imagine fighting with someone so much that you marry her to do it more conveniently... soooo romantic

@@austintrigloff9562 Clearly you have never been married

Read a Nancy Drew book from the 1930s. The term ‘queer’ is all over that book

@@KatieLHall-fy1hw or the original _Dracula_ novel, where "Van Helsing rushed into the room, ejaculating furiously".

I think you mean "dialogue." There were two people speaking.

@@iapetusmccool At Van Helsing's age, that's kind of impressive. 🤣

In "Bringing Up Baby" Cary Grant is in Katherine Hepburn's robe and answers the door. When asked why he is dressed, the stressed Grant says " I don't know. Maybe I just went >>GAY

Holy FUCK that would be *sick*

*Batman looking from a distance and taking notes*

Peter - Red Edmund - Blue Lucy - Yellow Susan - Pink Eustace - green Jill- Pink after Susan retires as the pink one Caspian and family - the silver ranger/ sixth ranger

What kind of Zords would they have?

Let me tell you about a show called The Mystic Knights Of Tir Na Nog...

When's the first one?

@@ambuknight Eragon

@@benjaminarnold51 oh yeah Furthers Du I had forgotten that was MASSIVE

@Scom Tott A five cent piece.

@Scom Tott Are you serious?? 🤣

Shibboleth

Yes, but the blind faith comes in by resolving to agree to untie the Prince even knowing he might kill them all.

​@@sloaneglover1026 Exactly.

I noticed that too. I guess he didn't say that because it contrasted with his earlier bit where he said he wouldn't bother to repeat the signs because they didn't do any of them right.

@@McFlingleson But they did that sign right!

Thank the gods...

Awesome bookseries

Disney + is doing a new Percy Jackson series WITH Riordan, so presumably it will be better.

It will be more faithful without a doubt. I just hope it’s genuinely good to boot.

Very British.

So do I. Thank you for that! 😋😁😘

That was a funny line from Dom, but if I recall in context they thought gnomes were coming in sd they were going to fight them, but the prince decided to just pretend he wasn't disenchanted to them but instead it was the witch, which probably threw them off. And they obviously didn't know she was going to enchant them, and i suppose as soon as she threw incense on the fire the enchantment would have started to take hold, however weakly. But they also said that they were glad she turned into a snake bc it would have been difficult to have to kill a woman, so they might have been reluctant to attack her anyway unless all other things failed

​@@friend_trilobot It's been so long since I read it, lol.

@@friend_trilobot The witch was a bit dumb. She could have pretended to cry and begged for mercy on her knees, then stabbed the kids and marshwiggle in the back and then proceeded with her plot.

It bends the universe, so to speak.

I'm the exception to the rule, apparently 😂 (and I'm a bi woman)

Except for asexuals. Who may still appreciate his beauty in a more aesthetic kind of way the way one can appreciate a beautiful sunset.

then i must be an undead abomination cause im not feeling it. more power to you i say tho lol

well, i'm not gay so... i feel nothing. except for perhaps contempt toward you.

This is very well put. And I think that's part of why The Silver Chair has always been my least favorite. I used to have the series on audio book, as well as the Focus on the Family audio dramas... But I don't remember giving this one more than one listen. (I definitely listened to The Horse and His Boy the most.) There's just a feeling of gloom over the whole thing. Even growing up in a doomsday cult, and being terrified of the whole Book of Revelations... I will take The Last Battle over this one any day.

@@songweretson yeah, I remember this one feeling odd as a kid. Even the last battle has that righteous feel when u meet all the characters thatve passed. I do love the gloom - as a reader of the chronological order, it makes the reader think critically of Narnia and what it’s magic stands for, as almost a prep to what Lewis probs knew would be the absolute wtf ending to the last battle. It’s like telling the reader “hey, you’re gonna have a bone to pick w me soon and I’m excited, make sure to really think out ur take on the world of Narnia so I read some good essays okay”. At least the last battle ends on a clear note; this one was just a horror movie soundtrack, ending on a drawn out sigh. Probably more nerve wracking than the finale now that I think about it. All of u, thank you, I adore this series and if u couldn’t tell I will take every opportunity to talk about it :)

SC just has so many dark and scary elements to it that go beyond what the previous books had, and it’s a lot for child readers being introduced to this style of storytelling for the first time. Being eaten. Having your mind stolen from you. A crisis of faith. Enslaved creatures. Child grooming. And that’s just a few of them. On top of all of this, instead of having a cheerful and exciting sounding setting for their adventure, the kids are described as going on the most cold, miserable backpacking trip ever and then end up in this underground environment that only feels more and more claustrophobic, gloomy, and suffocating the further they get into it. There is much more of a looming sense of powerlessness, frustration, and confusion than the previous adventures as well. I think the SC is a bit weaker in the storytelling department out of the series, but absolutely masterful in setting tone, mood, and hitting its readers with one borderline horror genre concept after another like a punching bag. It also has an iconic trio as it’s main characters. It definitely has my respect for its ability to induce atmospheric dread.

@@doll_dress_swap12 yes! Now that I think about it, the journey-ing in SC has a lot in common with HHB. They walk around the desert, fearing being found out; they accidentally infiltrate some pretty powerful people’s top-secret meeting; they go through what’s described as a slave city; a man lost his son via kidnapping; there’s a ton of death during an attempted invasion; if Lewis wanted to, it could’ve been as dark as SC. but it isn’t; the golden age is going on, there’s faith in Aslan, the also iconic characters have much more upbeat relationships, especially a bit after they’ve got to know each other. The Narnia timeline really effects how Lewis writes these. So many people say that after LWW the quality went down…idk if that’s true, but every story did bring some unique feel to it that I love.

That was dark. Before that the giants had come across as rather dull but basically ok grown - ups.

GET IN MAH BELLEH!!!

... because that's a thing we can all relate to.

well damn

Pity he didn't learn much from Prof. Kirkpatrick, because in his later writings Lewis showed no understanding of atheism.

well that's ironic

@@BrianS1981 Lewis was an atheist from his teen years through young adulthood (and didn't transition directly to being a Christian or even a theist from there, for a while). He voraciously read the material and heard the speakers and teachers of his day, one of his favorites being Bertrand Russell (among several others) whom he favorably quotes sometimes in his Christian work. Many of his friends, both old and new, remained atheistic. To sheerly claim he "showed no understanding of atheism" shows no understanding of Lewis. What could be argued, perhaps, is that the atheists of today are numerously and greatly different from Lewis' day (though not in my own experience, aside from being somewhat more liable to post-modernism, though that was already emerging in Lewis' day, both during and after his own atheism); and I think it might be fairly argued that there are several kinds of atheists (and even atheisms), not all of whom are well-represented (if at all) by Lewis as an atheist himself or afterward.

@@BrianS1981 He very much did understand it, considering he was one. The atheists of his time were simply different from the ones of today.

I mean, Freud's stuff is sort of nuts. And Freud himself didn't always have the best track record with patients.

@@friend_trilobot Freud did venture into such fields as speculative anthropology (Totem and Taboo) and the early history of religion (Moses and Monotheism) and came up with some delightfully bonkers ideas.

​@Tyeler Nowell If my time here has taught me anything, it's that most things worth diving into tend to be a bit bonkers. Religion, science, even something seemingly simple such as the more obscure facts of a franchise or series you really enjoy often ended getting a little nutty if you go deep enough into it. It's just how things are I guess.

@@rosesweetcharlotte all people back then were nuts. people today are still nuts. Freud just asked uncomfortable questions and sometimes, but not always (and not very often) recieved uncomfortable answers.

@@boarfaceswinejaw4516 Freud: today I'm going to ask my patient if he wants to sleep with his mother. I am the patient. Yes. PSYCHOLOGY

Me too.

Straight dude myself, but I feel your pain. High heels especially seem like some casual torture society has accepted for some reason

@@warlordofbritannia I don't even like heels higher then 3cm.

I think the comment is more that that's a bit of a heavy subject to depict in a kid's novel. But I feel it's done really well and I agree it should be applauded.

@asterismos5451 he did write it during WWI, which was one of the darkest points in human history.

She was stranger-danger before stranger-danger became a thing. "Don't talk to strangers, they could be an evil snake-witch who will kidnap you, murder your mother, take you underground, take over your mind and then make you marry them". Much more effective than "Don't take turkish delight from strangers".

Horse and His Boy is my favorite book of the series. It’s not insane, yet it’s still the one I reread the most!

@@LordSpongy Strangely enough its the one I remember most

The Magicians Nephew is my favourite book maybe because its the first not baby book my mom read to me but I loved most of the books until The Silver Chair thats where I couldnt anymore but it was because it gave me nightmares as a child getting trapped underground is a fear of mine so it triggared me a bit.

the magician's nephew was my favourite and actually got me into tolkien when i got too disenchanted by the narnia books. i still can vividly recall the descriptions of them going through the water into the dead world and into the void where narnia is created from nothing but the lion and the lamp and a bit of detritus

@@LordSpongy I love the part where Aslan brutally rips the flesh off the back of a girl and then justifies it because in making her escape the girl left a maid to be punished and each tear of his claws was a lashing that maid received.

"Ready yourselves good men, at the dawning of the sun we go forth to clap cheeks!"

I mean, I think that the old meaning still stands in certain circumstances at the cost of sounding a bit... Piratey. Like, I could read the example sentence as "treasure", but only in the most pirate voice possible.

That's a very good point on Puddleglum. I think he was written that way for the kids who grew up with TLW&TW and Prince Caspian. To give them a character that reflected the hardships of adult life.

In some ways Narnian mythology mirrors Lewis' own character where weird sexual fantasy was disciplined by Christian ethics.

true

I'm pretty sure 9/10 British Authors from lets say 1700-1980 will say the British School system was hell on earth with nothing but beatings, bullying, depression, and worse and it left a profound impact on their writing decades later.

I loved this book too! After The Lion, Witch, Wardrobe it is actually my favourite. As you say, the kids have personality, Eustace is still struggling to be a better person and Puddleglum is THE BEST! It is interesting to experiencing the realms beyond Narnia, the Green Witch was truly chilling and Rillian was a bit of a spoiled brat, which was fun.

One of his headmasters was so sadistic that he had to be committed to an asylum.

@@Tadicuslegion78 i could relate. My schooling in 90s America was cruel, bullying from kids and harassment from teachers, two of them were harsh and two-faced jerks. It was also a scary time for a kid diagnosed with autism, which made matters worse for me at school.

It was a really fun book. I like this one and A Horse and his Boy cause the characters have good personalities.

Same, and not being biased because of childhood nostalgia. Narnia's not a book series made for high action, and not a big fan of cgi..and eyy name twin

Not an unpopular opinion at all the BBC is almost word for word the same as the books.

I actually have that on DVD

As Dom says he immediately takes a leadership position as the oldest character, but he tries to guide the children rather than commanding them. After they get trapped at the giants' castle he reproaches himself for not being forceful enough but I think his style of leadership was good.

My favorite character in the books.

Totally agree, he's like Eeyore in Winnie-the-Pooh. Especially since his pessimism isn't treated as a 'problem' and Jill and Eustace accept him just as he is - let people be themselves, kids!

Tom Baker was PERFECT as Puddleglum in the BBC Silver Chair adaptation.

@@unclestone8406 I still occasionally re-watch the BBC's Silver Chair, just for Tom Baker. "We could light the fire inside, but then we'd all get smoke in our eyes! We could light it outside, but then the rain would come down and put it out!" "We'll end up....knifing each other I shouldn't wonder." "There'll be something nasty at the bottom." "If they don't taste of anything they at least can't taste terrible. I think they're rather nice." I have many more paraphrased Puddleglum quotes in my head.

It really feels he went planning to be harsh on it

I also really liked Puddleglum. I wasn't sure about him at first, but the further I got into the story, the more of a hero he became to me.

@@llewelynshingler2173 I usually love Dom's videos, but this level of snark was unwarranted. Like we get it Dom, you loathe Christianity. No need to go so hard on a series loved by millions, Christians and non-Christians alike, because of that bias. And I'm saying this as someone who has several bones to pick with Christianity after being in a cult. Plus, it's a bit odd to point out that it's bad to have a child-groomer-who's-clearly-evil in a book meant for children, a snake-witch who puts modern stranger-danger warnings to shame, while simultaneously shipping child Eustace and adult Caspian across multiple videos. I know the shipping is a joke but c'mon.

Ben barns caspian x dom x aslan?

@@marocat4749 Ben Barnes, not gay for

That’s funny, because TSC is my favorite of the books, probably because of the Tam Lin parallels

It's my least favorite, but I love all of them. I am also a hardcore Christian, so the more I read the books the more parallels I understood. It's really only half a story without understanding the allegory.

Why would you assume it's accidental? The Narnia stories are allegories but they're not *only* allegories. They're all pretty definitely fairytales too.

Brief aside, ”tLtW&tW” might be the worst shortening of a name I’ve ever heard

For some reason, I always thought that the Green Lady was Jadis coming back in another form. I doubt that's accurate. But with the snake element, she definitely has Lilith parallels. (I've seen Jadis compared to Lilith as well, but Jadis is a straight up Satan parallel, so I don't see that as much.)

gay ude hre o I wonder wonder on his comment even more

"He's not a tame lion".

Unless it’s something about the inevitability of the end of the world? Like it being a definite event that God knows the time of? It gets a little foggy, cause biblically there is a parable about not being caught sleeping when the end of the world comes (be wakeful and ready, ie don’t wait to follow Christ’s teachings as the end of the world will come when all will be held accountable and you don’t know when it will be). So Father Time being asleep doesn’t really fit that metaphor exactly. Unless either: he is sleeping now but as he is the concept of time itself, he is separate from the requirement to be awake, instead people must be ready for him as he will herald the time of the end. Or, it’s an extension of the faith moral of the story, depicting someone following the instructions and will of God: to sleep until the end of time. It’s not that tidy an analogy however you look at it, but there are definitely biblical links between the concept of being asleep or awake and the end of the world.

@@richardbourton4523 I suspect that that reading is overcomplicating it. If there *is* any significance to this character, it's probably as simple as the concept of Time not actually *ending* at the end of all time, since that's actually when he wakes up. As they emphasize repeatedly in The Last Battle, everything in creation is merely a shadow of the "real" version in Aslan's Country.

@@natsmith303 you’re probably right though something I forgot to mention but remembered when I was reading the rest of the comments is that the Last Battle is potentially specifically the Saturn Story of the chronicles. So having Father Time/Cronos/Saturn here and denoting randomly that he will wake at the end of time is potentially set up for the last book in a sort of in-joke for Lewis. Please don’t think I’m trying to weirdly flex Lewis knowledge here, but there’s a pretty convincing theory about how the narnia books were created: CS Lewis famously wrote a ‘hidden story’ into Narnia (to quote someone from my class at school ‘it’s Jesus, init’) but he apparently based the tone of the books themselves on a poem about the planets/celestial bodies he read. As these move through the sky we see them at different times, so the verses describe each celestial body in a sort of mythic way based on when we see them. (The citations for this are at the end of the comment but I first saw this on a documentary). Each book is then based on a different celestial body’s stanza in the poem. This is not confirmed as true; but is certainly convincing: Jupiter was described as something like ‘winter’s past and guilts are forgiven’, and this became the basis of the plot of the lion the witch and the wardrobe. So that’s the Jupiter story. The Dawn treader is the Sun story (hence the name of the ship) as they sail to the horizon. The Silver Chair was the Moon story: which makes sense given the nighttime imagery and silver grey pallet and tone. Confusingly, it could have been Saturn (Father Time would then make sense as Saturn is Cronos, Father Time) but Saturn’s verse is very dreary and about the end times (when he wakes up I suppose) so The Last Battle is the Saturn story. Interestingly the poem ends with ‘We leave all things To reach the rim of the round welkin, Heaven’s heritage, high and lonely.’ Which sounds a lot like the Green Hill of Aslan’s country which to me makes the theory seem pretty convincing! A breakdown of the poem verse correspondence with the books can be found here: apilgriminnarnia.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/a-planet-narnia-chart-by-brenton-dickieson.pdf. This article is pretty sceptical that Lewis intentionally shaped the books this way, but includes the full poem for you to read at the end: apilgriminnarnia.com/2019/12/05/the-planets/.

@@richardbourton4523 Ohhh yeah, I've heard at least the broad outline of this theory before. I still don't buy it, if only because the Chronicles don't feel like they were planned out like this theory would require.

That line stuck with me purely due to Tom Bakers delivery of it in the old series

Don't forget his crab walk around the room while saying it.

Tom Baker’s Puddleglum is the single biggest reason TSC was my favorite of that series. My sister and I insisted (as adults, mind you) on giving the family cat Marshwiggle as a middle name.

Best line

@@michaelbootes4822 A part Mr Baker was born to play.

I don't think I knew about that last part! Do you remember what book he mentions it in, by chance? I'd be interested to look up what exactly he says about them.

I mean homosexuality was literally illegal in England through his life I believe, but if I recall, a childhood friend of his came out as gay in a letter and he didn't really judge him for it much. I think in a different private letter to someone else (I got it from an anthology of quotes so i don't recall) I read him say, seemingly the view that homosexuality is a sin condemned by the bible (which isn't as clear cut as you might think) that how a Christian should treat someone who is gay depends on whether they have a choice in their attraction - here said if they don't have a choice, they should be pitied more than anyone, not harassed and hated

Yes, the system was called 'fagging.' I think the older boys had their own specific younger boy to boss around, though likely any older kid could demand a younger kid do stuff for him at least on occasion. This was an official policy at schools?! Apparently it has only very recently (90s) been gotten rid of. I have no idea if there's a relationship between the slur and this term.

This was common practice in boarding schools. The 1969 movie If... starring Malcolm McDowell depicts it.

@@silverhawking It's in his memoir Surprised by Joy where he talks about his school experiences

Yeah. There's a reason why Morrowind is the most beloved of all the Elder Scrolls games. Weirdness is something that's highly underrated in fantasy. It makes the world feel so much bigger and more mysterious and more real.

This is something I've thought of too. There's such a major focus on having logical worldbuilding (no doub thanks to the immense thought put in by Tolkien), yet when you look at stories from Ancient Greese, they're worldbuilding was essentially just "wouldn't it be cool if...?" How does Poseidon have children that are Pegasi? Who the fuck cares! It's cool though. Or how when a modern writer wants to make a new creature, there's an expectation to make it in a way that could potentially exist (a difficult task as generally, if it can exist, it probably already existed), but ancient greese was just like "let's throw a goat head onto the back of a tiger and give it a snake tail. Yeah, that's badass"

"Nonsense" books can be good for getting out of the trap of losing childhood creativity and keeping strict lines and definitions in our adult brains. I class hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and mermaid in the bathtub as books in this category

@@PriyaPans You're just making me want to read *George's Marvelous Medicine* again. Raoul Dahl has a peculiar way of speaking to children about even the most bizarre and even wicked things without so much preachiness and "must have right consequences" that so many other children's authors stick by. "My grandmother's such a horrid woman I'm gonna replace her medicine with a concoction of every random thing I find in the house boiled down into sludge just to see if it'll make her nicer" is the kind of concept only Dahl could pull off.

@@Arkylie have you ever read... I believe it's called "the boy" by Roald Dahl. It's the first part of his autobiography series of books and the people he met were real characters. I'm not one for reading autobiographies but I make a special exception for that book. Strong reccomend. His brain just worked in another level. Would've been fascinating to have conversations with him and to know how he thinks.

LMAO

OOOooooh Eustace and Caspian; even the actors are shipping this!

It was my favorite of the Chronicles for a long time. Not sure if i have a fave now

It was the first Chronicles of Narnia book I read as a child, so I was a little confused.

@@johnsmith8906 I'm not surprised. It's probably the trippiest of them all. And that's a high bar.

Same

It was good book about tyranny but of course as every book it was not Perfect, but ending was great in my opinion.

Yes!

I love "The Magicians Nephew" too, but because of the world building, and the quote "Narnia, Narnia, Narnia, awake. Love. Think. Speak. Be walking trees. Be talking beasts. Be divine waters."

It's my favourite too. For the longest time it was "Voyage of the Dawn Treater" but that was when I didn't knew all of the books yet.

Very Tpain. I didn't know I needed that laugh.

Ancient comment but AGREED. still feel the same tbh. But as a kid I gravitated to a lot of chaotic, trippy, melancholic media.

@@Emma-se5wm Did you ever read the Earthsea books? They're the kind of books I wish I had discovered earlier because their vibe is very similar.

@@c.c.lilford2916 You know, I never did, even though I was intrigued by the covers! I've always been more hesitant to read series over standalone novels (in case something wasn't finished) but I should visit those next time I'm stuck inside for a while and need something new but not super cerebral!

@@Emma-se5wm They're VERY good, don't think of them as a series, just focus on The Wizard of Earthsea and the Tombs of Atuan and if you like them read the rest.

@@c.c.lilford2916 Thanks for the tip!

I might suggest making your super powerful character someone like Lu Bu. If they rely on him/her too much, he betrays them. If someone is able to bribe the character, he betrays the players. He may help greatly at times, and other times is a thorn in their sides. But he is too strong to oppose early-mid game, so the players will have to use him sparingly and in their most dire needs or he may take then down.

The original illustrations of Puddleglum look like a lanky scarecrow with frog feet so you probably saw those when you first read it. I agree that TSC has a meandering feel to it. I disliked it as a child because it didn't feel like part of Narnia. I really need to reread the whole series as an adult to see how I feel about it now.

@@RaggedToothRat That's very valid. I think I was young enough that I didn't care if it felt different, because it still felt good. If you're reading it for that classic Narnia feel though, you'd be very disappointed. And y'know what? I had this big Narnia Chronology book with a bunch of the original illustrations. That's for sure where that mental image came from.

@@RaggedToothRat It's really only the first two and the last that spend most of the book in Narnia, with #3 not even technically going there at all.

As a child I confused Puddleglum with Worzel Gummidge, who actually was a scarecrow.

@@bmlgordon There's also a family resemblance to The Scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz.

Same, Aravis and the horses are legendary.

My family used to the complete series volume too

Lasaraleen is a major stand out in that book, love her😂

Agreed! To date it also remains my favorite entry

I had a big singular book that had all the volumes in it too! I liked the Magician’s Nephew and The Horse and His Boy too, more than any of the other books. The art in my book was wonderful too.

Agreed, anyone who actually thinks that Lewis “peaked” with his first book is clearly not operating in good faith. Growing up, The Horse And His Boy was always my absolute favorite in the series because it’s the quintessential “road trip” novel of the Narnia books. I really like what you brought up about Jill and Eustace and the character development they go through.

Honestly though, felt like Edmund was the only character with an actual arc in the first two

​@@limelightraver5690The Horse and His Boy suffers from modern readers who are made to believe everything is based on race (though telling people of different skin colour they aren't human by saying discrimination against them is racist therefore classifying them as non-human is racist itself). Modern education system would make C.S. Lewis gag.

I'm trying to figure out an alternate to 'made love'. Is that just blowing kisses or something as innocent?

@@Roadent1241 I mean i don't remember the context, it is fantasy, could be very literal

@@Roadent1241 lol yes it just meant like flirting/being ingratiating.

@@tayh.6235 Thanks. Now I have ingratiating to add to my dictionary.

I agree throne has more dignity

Lol, in my language it's a "silver stool" . Even worse 😂😂

In my language it's basically "armchair".

Probably too old now.

@@alanpennie8013 Sadly yeah, quite a shame.