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Alex ([personal profile] chatvert) wrote2018-11-28 05:52 pm
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Alex Eviscerates The Bourne Legacy: Chapter Six

[Minnesota accent] Ah, jeez.

I've been putting this off, but here we fuckin' go again. A year later, since I've been [yells at door] ABANDONED BY MY SHIPMATES!

[no response]

...huh, I really thought that shame might work. Well, on Mo at least. Shame stopped working on Alex around the time he hit his 20s.

At this rate, this goddamn thing's gonna take me forever.

[shakes self out] Okay, okay, okay. Here we go. Here we fuckin' go. [pops open a cider with Michael Jones Rage Quit bottle opener]

...we're gonna need a bigger drink.


Oh, goddamnit, I forgot about the lead-in to the mediocre action scene from last chapter. [rubs at temples] All right, let's get this over with.

Bourne-Sue ducks the first two shots from his pursuers - really - and then kicks a garbage bag at them, which explodes. Insert joke here. Anyway, it's basically a flash-bang to them, because they reel backwards, coughing and putting their arms over their faces. [Ren voice] Eeeediots.

Anyway, Brave Sir Robin punches...the lightbulb....you know what, I'm not going to address that, I think we can all see how stupid that is...and instead of getting glass in his hands and electrocuting himself, the light just goes out and he bravely runs away, away.

'80s Ninja Choreography: 3

He uses his flashlight immediately after that, finds a trap door, and disappears into the cellar, which is filled with the bodies of dead roaches. Insert joke here.

God, sorry, guys, I'm just...extremely tired of this. And I'm about, ehn... [checks scrollbar on pdf] ...a fifth of the way through the book. Destroy me.

Anyway, dumbass is trapped now, and with any luck the agents will shoot his stupid face to death. Unfortunately, since I just checked the scrollbar, we all know that's not going to happen.

Long and extremely boring story short, Bourne-Sue slams one guy's head against the wall and throws a fucking can at another before judo-chopping the other guy into unconsciousness.

'80s Ninja Choreography: 5

Then he leaves the basement and walks to the street, which is [checks map] mother h. fucker, a mile away from where I live. I am going to throw up everywhere.

Ohhh, Christ, here we go. Here we fuckin' go. It's about to get worse. Ohhhh my God, I almost punched myself in the head during part of this next bit. It is Not Good, friends and neighbors. Not Good At All.

He goes to a restaurant half a mile away from where he is, which sounds like ANOTHER DIGGITY DAMN DINER from the way he's describing it, which had better not be the fucking diner close to my house, and orders a coffee and a BLT. Strap in, motherfuckers. We are going to get a lot of BLTs in this book.

So dumbass goes to the bathroom with the Mysterious Envelope (oh yeah, didn't we all forget he had that? Nice fistfight, idiot) and opens it. We're all dying to know what's in there, aren't we?

Inside, he found a first-class airline ticket in Conklin's name to Budapest, Hungary, and a room key for the Danubius Grand Hotel. He sat looking at the items for a moment, wondering why Conklin had been on his way to Budapest and whether the trip had anything to do with his murder.



Hoo mama.

I could begin to explain what's wrong with this, but we all know.



1. Why in the name of Satan's taint would a retired spy who's on a secret mission for some reason have a plane ticket IN HIS FUCKMOTHERING NAME
2. okay if that's a government-funded ticket no damn way is he flying first-class I call bullshit the fly america act exists and he shouldn't be flying first-class anyway because that makes him more conspicuous is this your first day as a spy
3. why does he have a room key already
4. of course the trip had something to do with his [hairball noises] m ur de r [chokes] (phew, sorry about that, folks) and you're a fucking idiot godjesus I hate you so much you are the absolute worst

Bro, Do You Even Lift?: 18

God. Jesus. Six words and two Bro, Do You Even Lift? counts between them. Kill me.

Oh God. Super kill me now. I'm so angry. We're going to get to some bad shit soon and I'm Not Happy. This book is giving me flashbacks to the last time I read it. I've been subsisting almost solely on coffee for three days and I might rage-vomit my own blood like a Red Lantern.



Nope. Nope. Oh, God, I can't do it, I can't, I can't. I cannot. This bothers me worse than Martin Lindros, it really does. And Lindros pisses me off.

Basically: Here comes Deron. Deron is our new forger, our replacement for Cactus from the original books. While Cactus was clearly African-American, with Southern slang and an accent (it was the 70s, Ludlum wasn't exactly woke but he was a lot more liberal than most other thriller writers even now, especially during Ultimatum, which was published in 1990), we have...Deron, who just...bothers me. He's described as a brilliant forger who "[makes] his living painting copies of Old Master oils that [hang] on mansion walls", which he mostly does for fun. Also sometimes they end up in museums. Oh, and he does passports on the side! He's great at everything!

Fine, whatever. What bugs me, though, is another example of the (subconscious?) racism in this book: Deron is a light-skinned black man, and he speaks with a "slight British accent" and sounds "cultured". As opposed to in the previous chapters, where...well. I don't want to go through that again. Note From The Future: Tyrone in the next book has another Funetik Aksent, and is dark-skinned. It's...it's a bad book, Brent.

How Are You This Racist?!: 41

Okay, back to the recap.

Je-sus. I have, no joke, suppressed the urge to punch myself in the face twice while reading just this section. Bourne-Sue requests his fake ID so he can get into a bar without tripping the CNN alarm, and something something tomato on the BLT reminds him of the blood he saw at the mu-[hacking sound]-rder scene. This is the worst and I hate it.
What if he could somehow roll back time, make Alex and Mo reappear? That would be quite a trick. But the past stayed the past, receding further from memory with every day.

[michael jones voice] ~IF I COULD TURN BACK TIIIME, I WOULDN'T READ THIS BOOOOK~~~



I hate this, and I hate you.

A Composition in Heliotrope: 14

I'm going to go straight-up Sith by the end of this, huh? I'm going to become a Sith Lord. I'm already a saltlord. Can't be too much of a leap.

This is just turning into rage-vomit. I have four more pages and I'm going to die. This section alone has taken me four months. IT'S A BAD BOOK, BRENT.

I just read a few paragraphs ahead and whispered "I'm going to kill myself." I'm in the office. I kind of want to finish this chapter by repeating "this book is bad" over and over.

This book is bad. This book is bad. This book is bad. This book is bad. This book is bad. This book is bad. This book is bad. This b--

--what do you mean I signed a contract?!

UGH.

This book is bad.

[rubs at temples] Okay, where was I...four pages left? Four pages left. Christ. At this rate I'll finish in 2019.

I'm going to let Reggie Watts take over how I feel about the rest of this chapter:



WHERE MY GERUNDS AT. FICKITY-FUCK-FUCK-FUCK-FUCK-FUCK-FUCK.

It's a fuck shit stack, basically. This entire book is a fuck shit stack.

Bourne-Sue leaves the diner, and does the I'm-a-spy-so-I-have-to-be-sure-everyone-isn't-out-to-get-me crowd monitoring thing. SOMEHOW THIS IS MADE BORING.

Oh, Lord.
When he'd satisfied himself that the field contained no Agency suits, he crossed the street, went into a liquor store. He asked for a bottle of the Speyside sherry-cask single-malt that had been Conklin's drink.

1. Hey, do you think the author has a favorite drink?
2. Fuck you, Alex was sober for 7 years.

Gratuitous Violations of Canon: 78

Seven points, one for each year. You absolute ninnymuggins.
According to Mo Panov's methodology, he needed to inhale the Scotch again in order to pull out more of the memory.

[There is a tortured scream from outside and rapid footsteps. Someone's running towards the door at full tilt.]
[Muffled:] CONKLIN: Mo! STOP IT!
[Muffled:] PANOV: I AM ABOUT TO COMMIT VIOLENCE
[Muffled:] CONKLIN: DON'T MAKE ME SUBDUE YOU
[Muffled:] PANOV: JUST YOU FUCKING TRY I AM FULL OF RIGHTEOUS RAGE
[Muffled:] CONKLIN: MO, I SWEAR TO GOD I WILL DO THE REAL-WORLD VERSION OF A VULCAN NERVE PINCH ON YOU
[Muffled:] PANOV: [angry screaming]

...this is what happens when my shipmates abandon me. ANYWAY:

Gratuitous Violations of Canon: 79

[sigh] So he gets the alcohol and sits on a park bench and violates Virginia's open-container laws by popping open the Scotch and I am full of a deep and abiding hatred.
Bourne opened the bottle of single-malt, sniffed its elegant and complex aroma. Immediately, Alex's face flashed before him, and the slow creep of blood over the floor. Gently, almost reverently, he set this image aside. He took a small sip of the Scotch, holding it on his palate, allowing the fumes to rise up into his nose, to bring him back to the shard of memory he was finding so elusive. In his mind's eye, he saw again the view out onto the Champs-Elysées. He was holding the cut-crystal glass in his hand, and as he took another sip of the Scotch, he willed himself to bring the glass to his lips. He heard the strong, operatic voice, willed himself to turn back into the Paris office where he had been standing an unknown time ago.

Now, for the first time, he could see the plush appointments of the room, the painting by Raoul Dufy of an elegant horse and rider in the Bois de Boulogne, the dark green walls with their deep luster, the high cream ceiling etched in the clear, piercing light of Paris. Go on, he urged himself. Go on-----A patterned carpet, two high-backed upholstered chairs, a heavy polished walnut desk in the Regency style of Louis XIV, behind which stood, smiling, a tall, handsome man with worldly eyes, a long Gallic nose and prematurely white hair. Jacques Robbinet, French Minister of Culture.

That was it! How Bourne knew him, why they had become friends and, in a sense, compatriots, was still a mystery, but at least now he knew that he had an ally he could contact and count on. Elated, Bourne put the Scotch bottle underneath the bench, a gift for the first vagrant who noticed it.

Oh, Jesus Hussein Christ. I'm sorry, everyone. I'm so sorry. But that all had to be seen to be believed.

Okaaayy...what do we got here.

1. This is absolute rubbish.
2. TOSH AND RUBBISH.
3. It is, in point of fact, a fuck shit stack.
4. Oh, wait, I have to give actual reasons? Fine.
5. WHY WOULD THIS EVEN BE A THING. WHY WOULD HE HAVE BEEN IN THE OFFICE OF THE FRENCH MINISTER OF CULTURE. OR THE HOUSE. IT'S REALLY NOT CLEAR.
6. leaving the bottle is a dick move my son addiction is a real problem and what if a kid finds it you ass. you dumb motherfucker
7. "vagrant" you cockwaffle at least treat the homeless like actual people

Uhhh what do we got here.

Gratuitous Violations of Canon: 80
A Composition in Heliotrope: 17

Is that all? Huh. It seemed to hurt more than that.

Y'know what, I'll give it another. Because this is ridiculously stupid, the whole how-he-remembers-it scenario.

I hate all of this.

Gratuitous Violations of Canon: 81

Here's something else that must be seen to be believed:
A young couple were kissing on a nearby bench; three kids with a boombox passed through, made lewd noises at the snuggled couple.

...a fucking boombox???? WHAT YEAR IS IT

I'm serious this was published in 2005 have you ever left the house sir

A boombox.

I'm tempted to add a point for that, but God only knows where I'd put it.

Anyway. Bourne-Sue manages to identify someone by the shape of their ear and SURPRISE IT'S KHAN.

And any and all pretense of a BIG SHOCKING TWIST REVEAL is thrown out the window:

Knowing this, he rose and slowly and deliberately crossed the park and sat down beside the man, whose face he now saw had a distinctly Asian cast to it. To his credit, the man did not start or give any overt indication of surprise. He continued to watch the little boy. As the ice cream started to melt, his father showed him how to turn the cone to lick up the drippings.

"Who are you?" Bourne said. "Why do you want to kill me?"




Okay well right now Bourne-Sue is just being completely stupid. YEAH I'M GONNA GO SIT NEXT TO THE GUY WHO WANTS TO KILL ME THIS IS FINE.

Bro, Do You Even Lift?: 19
The man beside him looked straight ahead, gave no sign at all that he had heard what Bourne had said. "Such a beatific scene of domestic bliss." There was an acid edge to his voice. "I wonder if the child knows that at a moment's notice his father could abandon him."

A Composition in Heliotrope: 18
Subtle Foreshadowing™: 7

God damn I hate this entire interaction.
Bourne had an odd reaction to hearing the other's voice in this setting. It was as if he had moved out of the shadows to fully inhabit the world of those around them.

"No matter how much you want to kill me," Bourne said, "you can't touch me here in this public place."

You fucking idiot. IT'S SO EASY. HAVE YOU NOT SEEN A JAMES BOND MOVIE IN YOUR LIFE THIS HAPPENS ALL THE TIME ALL THE TIME PARK BENCH MURDERS ARE LIKE SO EASY JESUS HUSSEIN MCGILLICUDDY CHRIST ON A RITZ CRACKER

Bro, Do You Even Lift?: 20
A Composition in Heliotrope: 19
"The boy is, what, six, I would say. Far too young to understand the nature of life, far too young to fathom why his father would leave."

Bourne shook his head. The conversation was not proceeding as he had intended. "What makes you think that? Why would the father abandon his son?"

nothing about this is subtle and bourne-sue has firmly grasped the idiot ball



oh also khan talks like someone trying to up their nanowrimo word count

Subtle Foreshadowing™: 9
A Composition in Heliotrope: 20
"An interesting question from a man with two children. Jamie and Alison, isn't it?"

Bourne started as if the other had plunged a knife into his side. Fear and anger swirled inside him but it was the anger that he allowed to rise to the surface. "I won't even ask how you know so much about me, but I will tell you this, in threatening my family you've made a fatal mistake."

"Oh, there's no need to think that. I have no designs on your children," Khan said evenly. "I was merely wondering how Jamie will feel when you never come back."

"I'll never abandon my son. I'll do whatever it takes to come safely back to him."

"It seems odd to me that you're so passionate about your current family when you failed Dao, Joshua and Alyssa."

Now the fear was gaining ground inside Bourne. His heart was pounding painfully, and there was a sharp pain in his chest.

if he has a heart attack and dies because khan injected him with digitalis i'll be ok with this

oh yeah and

Subtle Foreshadowing™: 11
A Composition in Heliotrope: 24

because "I won't even ask how you know so much about me, but I will tell you this, in threatening my family you've made a fatal mistake." is such stilted, shitty dialogue

anyway back to hell
"What are you talking about? Where did you get the idea that I failed them?"

"You abandoned them to their fate, didn't you?"

Bourne felt as if he was losing his grip on reality. "How dare you! They died! They were pulled away from me, and I've never forgotten them!"

YEP THEY ARE ALL DEFINITELY DEAD ESPECIALLY JOSHUA

Subtle Foreshadowing™: 14
Gratuitous Violations of Canon: 82

because joshua is fucking dead, as evidenced by david hugging his bullet-riddled body to him in the middle of his nervous breakdown over seeing his family murdered, which you would know if you rEAD THE FUCKING BOOKS

honestly this was done far better in Iron Man: Armored Adventures with a far superior Khan
"THAT'S A LIE! MY FATHER'S GONE!!!"


The hint of a smile curled the edges of the other's lips, as if he had scored a victory in dragging Bourne across the invisible barrier. "Not even when you married Marie? Not even when Jamie and Alison were born?" His tone was tightly wound now, as if he was struggling to keep something deep inside him held in check. "You tried to replicate Joshua and Alyssa. You even used the same first letters in their names."

Bourne felt as if he'd been beaten senseless. There was an inchoate roaring in his ears.
"Who are you?" he repeated in a strangled voice.




D E F I N I T E L Y N O T A B I T T E R S O N W H O W A S P R E S U M E D D E A D , N O P E

Subtle Foreshadowing™: 17
I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means: 7
A Composition in Heliotrope: 20

three points because this is so egregious
also i don't think "inchoate" is what you wanted there ol buddy ol pal because it means "incipient" so like. tinnitus?


The smile had vanished as quickly as a cloud changes its shape, and there was a small tremor in the smooth bronze column of his neck, as if some fury, long held in check, had briefly escaped to the surface.

OH MY GOD HE'S WRITING IN WOLFSPEAK

A Composition in Heliotrope: 21

Aaaaanyway there's an abrupt third-person-omniscient POV switch (which is just terrible writing) as Khan tries to walk off with Bourne-Sue like he's a fucking football and somehow manages to lose him. YOU'RE AN AMAZING ASSASSIN, KHAN. THE BEST. OF ALL TIME.

Thank Jesus the chapter is over and I can go drink myself into oblivion. NOT WITH THAT SCOTCH GET THAT SHIT AWAY FROM ME I DRINK RED WINE MIXED WITH FANTA LIKE A CIVILIZED HUMAN BEING

OUT OF A SIPPY CUP

BECAUSE I'M AN ADULT

EVL = Jerry Jenkins: 5
I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means: 6
A Composition in Heliotrope: 21
Physics? What Physics?: 2
Gratuitous Violations of Canon: 82
Because The Plot Says So: 8
How Are You This Racist?!: 41
'80s Ninja Choreography: 5
Subtle Foreshadowing™: 17
Bro, Do You Even Lift?: 19