Fourth Wing: A Spoiler-Filled Rant

Now if you totally loved this book this probably won’t be the opinion for you, but I feel as though this book was grossly over-hyped, and I don’t say that just to be contrary, I bought the book, I enjoyed it well enough, but everything about it felt familiar and therefore predictable.

As I read on I realized that it was because I HAD read this stuff before. This book takes scenes and character information from other popular novels and rams them together. Yes all stories are the same story and whatnot but this felt really blatant and that bothered me. So I thought I’d make a list here of the ones I’ve noticed. There WILL be a lot of spoilers.

• First up, the most obvious, we have a world in which dragons choose humans to be their bonded riders. This bond includes feeling each others feelings, hearing each other’s thoughts, and learning to fly together (via the use of a saddle no less). The dragon provides the rider with a certain amount of power. A female blue dragon whose name starts with an S is a major player (as it a giant black dragon and a golden one). This is Eragon.

• Next we have the setting, which is divided into factions. The main character does put some thought into joining the books and knowledge faction, but ultimately decides on the bravery faction, this will be where she comes into her own and becomes her true self. First though, she will have to go through a dangerous initiation, in which people die, and others are trying to kill her. She is even attacked in her sleep by a group which contains one surprising face. She might have died if not for her totally hot, rebelliously tattooed teacher who is only a few years older than her, initially dislikes her, but ends up with her. Her bestie in this place also has a sneaky little relationship that really isn’t all that sneaky. She trains in hand to hand combat and is required to wear black as part of her new factions dress code, but besides colour, they’re pretty lax in what you can wear, something the main character finds a bit refreshing, when looking back at what she’d have to wear in her other choice of faction, in which modesty is coveted. This is Divergent.

• The MMC is a dark-haired, with gold eyes (or gold flecked eyes), tall, muscular, he gives the fmc a nickname, constantly commenting on her violence and is clearly turned on by it, also, yanno, smut. This is From Blood and Ash.

• He is charming and a warrior, and his power of darkness, which blinds his opponents and makes him one of the most, if not the most, powerful of his kind, although she may be even more powerful than he is. She has a bond with him over which they can communicate, and they utilize this to say saucy things to each other. This is A Court of Thorns and Roses.

• The fmc is short (~5″2) and has brown hair which fades to grey. She learns she can control lightening, a “shockingly” powerful gift (haha). She is betrayed by her love interest, and both of them end up working with the rebellion, a position she probably wouldn’t have taken if not for a love interest. She finds out in a big cliffhanger reveal at the end of book one that her powerful brother, whom she had thought dead in the war for years, is actually alive and working with the rebellion. This is Red Queen.

• The disabled main character with seemingly every disadvantage repeatedly falling off their black dragon as they try to figure out flying together, which doesn’t work until special handmade gear is used is pretty reminiscent of How to Train Your Dragon as well.

I am also positive that I have seen the obstacle course scene somewhere before. Where the main character gets stuck on one obstacle every time she goes through the course, can’t for the life of her tackle it, until of course, she has to.

Like every story is not unique, Eragon is Star Wars in a Tolkien setting, Red Queen is pretty reminiscent of X-Men, etc, but I felt as though Fourth Wing was just more obvious about it, and because I had read all of these books before it was incredibly predictable. I liked all of those books the first time I read them, so I understand why people enjoyed Fourth Wing, don’t get me wrong, I also had a good time reading it, how could I not? It is a mashup of lots of stories I loved. I just think that the hype makes this book out to be some kind of unique, one-of-a-kind story and it simply isn’t.

Just wanted to get that off my chest a bit. If you have other stories you recognize in this book, or other pieces I’ve missed that fit into one of mine, let me know. I also encourage friendly debate, though I will not interact with anyone who is not being friendly about it.

by ThisFallenPrey