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A review by hidekisohma
The Black Cauldron by Lloyd Alexander
3.0
So after reading "The book of Three" a few weeks ago, i decided to jump right into the 2nd book "The black cauldron". Seeing as this is the titular title the disney movie was based off of. and...it was...fine?
Funnily enough, i have to say that i really liked the first book more. There were a bunch of extraneous characters in this one that weren't really necessary and i didn't really care about.
The story to the film in terms of the group has to get the black cauldron before someone evil can use it and have to get it from some witches. that stays the same, but pretty much everything else is different. The reason they're getting it, their journey to GET the cauldron, who wants to use it, etc. Since there's no horned king in this one, they have to go for the big baddie (who we don't see in this book).
Pretty much everyone from the first book returns and we see Taran starting to develop as a character as he's getting a bit older. We see he has to really overcome his pride and sense in this one, and you can tell the author was going for a "growing up with every book" thing.
There really wasn't a "we need to fight a big baddy" at the end of this one as there was in the previous one as it really is all about getting that titular black cauldron. Without too many spoilers i'll say, there is SOME action, but the action definitely is NOT the focal point of the story.
the bard, princess, gurgi, and taran are all back to form and they're all recognizable from the previous book and their banter made the book interesting enough. as i have the remaining three books in the series, i'll definitely be reading them.
all in all, not bad. not great, but not bad.
3 out of 5.
Funnily enough, i have to say that i really liked the first book more. There were a bunch of extraneous characters in this one that weren't really necessary and i didn't really care about.
The story to the film in terms of the group has to get the black cauldron before someone evil can use it and have to get it from some witches. that stays the same, but pretty much everything else is different. The reason they're getting it, their journey to GET the cauldron, who wants to use it, etc. Since there's no horned king in this one, they have to go for the big baddie (who we don't see in this book).
Pretty much everyone from the first book returns and we see Taran starting to develop as a character as he's getting a bit older. We see he has to really overcome his pride and sense in this one, and you can tell the author was going for a "growing up with every book" thing.
There really wasn't a "we need to fight a big baddy" at the end of this one as there was in the previous one as it really is all about getting that titular black cauldron. Without too many spoilers i'll say, there is SOME action, but the action definitely is NOT the focal point of the story.
the bard, princess, gurgi, and taran are all back to form and they're all recognizable from the previous book and their banter made the book interesting enough. as i have the remaining three books in the series, i'll definitely be reading them.
all in all, not bad. not great, but not bad.
3 out of 5.