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Honor Harrington/YMMV: Difference between revisions
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* [[Alas, Poor Villain]]: {{spoiler|Steadholder Mueller}} at the end of ''Ashes of Victory.'' He also counts as an [[Unwitting Pawn]] in the way his downfall came about.
** Admiral Rayna Sherman in ''Honor Among Enemies''. She deeply regrets signing up with Andrew Warnecke and spends much of the single chapter she appears in plagued by her conscience before dying in the service of a madman.
*** Worse, her ship was blown to bits while she was trying to surrender, seconds before she was able to strike the wedge. (Even if she had succeeded, she herself likely would've been executed for being one of Warnecke's highest-ranking people anyway.)
* [[Anvilicious]]: The destruction of the starships ''Sovereignty of the People'' and ''Equality'' by {{spoiler|[[State Sec]]}} during the coup that put {{spoiler|Saint-Just}} in power.
** Also, just about anything to do with politics. The good guys' political opponents tend to be horribly stupid and foolish, except for those who are actively evil. Socialism and the decay of the educational system are things that make a Republic into a [[
*** The [[Anvilicious]] Revolutionary France parallels go beyond just Rob S. Pierre: His co-conspirator and successor is [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Antoine_de_Saint-Just Oscar Saint-Just,] his government is called the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Committee_of_Public_Safety Committee of Public Safety,] characters repeatedly refer to his governance as a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reign_of_Terror Reign of Terror,] and his capital is [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paris Nouveau Paris,] where the revolutionaries end up having an important meeting [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_Court_Oath in a tennis court.]
* [[
* [[Broken Base]]: A number of readers have complained it [[Jumping the Shark|jumped the shark]] after about the fourth book—perhaps because they wanted it to continue being a light space opera rather than [[Cerebus Syndrome|morph into a political conspiracy epic]].
* [[Canon Sue]]: A frequent accusation leveled at Honor, occasionally even in the books themselves, depending on how you interpret the lines in question. [[Aristocrats Are Evil|Pavel Young and William Fitzclarence]] ruminated about it at length, but Oscar St.-Just sums it up best near the beginning of ''Ashes of Victory'':
{{quote| She's just happened to be in the right places--or the wrong ones, I suppose, from our perspective--for the last, oh, ten years or so. That's the official consensus from my analysts, at least. The other theory, which seems to have been gaining a broader following of late, is that she's in league with the Devil.}}
** Hilariously, Weber has - in all seriousness - made the claim that she's ''totally'' a realistically flawed character - her flaws are that she's ''too good'' and ''too honorable''.
*** Someone with her capabilities and ethics has to be burdened beyond belief by the [[Comes Great Responsibility|responsibilities inherent to them.]] If she were "perfect", she'd understand that [[The Chains of Commanding|they're part and parcel of the job]] - she'd kick a rock and get started on the next job. Instead, she spends ''all'' her spare time insisting [[
*** Indeed, a possible [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]] in ''A Rising Thunder'' is when {{spoiler|Thomas Theisman}} tells her to [[Quit Your Whining]] when she starts backsliding into this emotional guilt-trap after a major battle.
*** For all her [[Tranquil Fury]], Honor makes some terrible mistakes when she lets her emotions guide her. Twice {{spoiler|The Honor of the Queen and In Enemy Hands}} she has run away from awkward social situations with the result that people get killed. Twice {{spoiler|The Honor of the Queen and Field of Dishonor}} she has been so impatient for revenge she's let it blight her career even though a little patience could have achieved the same thing with no personal consequences. Other times her armsmen have needed to physically restrain her to prevent her doing something suicidally dumb in the heat of the moment.
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** These are dialed way down in books written or co-written by other authors.
** [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=635193 David Weber orders a pizza].
* [[Rooting for The Empire]]: Late Haven under Pritchart vs Manticore under High Ridge government. [[
** Haven, even before that.
*** On one side, you have a small but prosperous [[The Kingdom|Kingdom]], with a powerful and well-trained military. They are engaged in a war for survival against [[The Empire]]. While they are smaller, they have allies, better technologies and are mostly winning.
*** On the other side, you have the remnants of a great [[The Republic|Republic]], turned into a decadent [[The Empire|Empire]] caught in a spiral of self-destruction. They are conquering systems after system in a hopeless headlong rush to delay the final collapse. Its only hope for survival is a [[Well
*** Both sides have their heroes and bad guys. But who has the most compelling story? The ones with some internal political troubles, and an exterior threat they have chances to defeat? Or the ones who have to defend a monstrous regime against nice guys in a Hopeless War because it's the last thing still preventing mass-riots and billions of deaths?
* [[Squick]]: One frequently overlooked effect of prolong therapy is that it extends ''all'' stages of human development. Which, basically, means that legally fully-grown-up 20 y.o. people still look like a bunch of <s> grade</s> middle school kids. [[Lampshade Hanging|Furiously lampshaded]] in ''The Shadow of Saganami'', where the people from backwater planets (where prolong hasn't been available yet) were acutely disturbed by this.
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** Mesa, who, as Weber [[Word of God|went on record to point out]], is actually ''right'' about the right and useful nature of transhumanism ideas (not genetic slavery, though). They're just being dicks about it -- and that's where slavery comes in.
* [[Tear Jerker]]: At some point, something in one of these novels is going to make you blubber like a child. That is all.
* [[What an Idiot!]]: {{spoiler|Mesan Alignment}}'s Long-Range Planning Board. Not only have those guys deviated significantly from their founder's original vision (their current ''modus operandi'' surprisingly resembles the one of {{spoiler|one [[Gundam Seed Destiny|Gilbert Durandal]]}}), but the whole snafu in ''Torch of Freedom'' was created exclusively by their actions. If they hadn't insisted on {{spoiler|culling Herlander Simões' autistic daughter as a failed experiment}}, the guy in question wouldn't have had the nervous breakdown that brought {{spoiler|1=Jack McBryde}} into the picture and made him his friend. And it all went downhill from there.
** ''[[Even Evil Has Standards|Isabel Bardasano]]'', of all people, described their actions in almost the same language, when she discussed that problem with Jack.
** In the end, their insistence on "proper procedure" has led to the complete unraveling of the {{spoiler|Alignment's "onion"}} and gave the Manties and Havenites the smoking gun they've needed. Together with several ''more'' critical secrets, like the {{spoiler|streak drive and the man who friggin' ''made it''}}. The outcome is debatable, and may even be a case of [[Doomed By Canon]], as those critical secrets are being revealed too late to do anyone any good due to a [[Phlebotinum Breakdown]] keeping {{spoiler|Herlander Simões from getting anywhere useful to prevent Oyster Bay, aka Pearl Harbor [[In Space]]}}.
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