Mark Reads ‘The Last Hero’: Part 7

In the seventh part of The Last Hero, the Kite flyers take an unexpected detour. Intrigued? Then it’s time for Mark to read Discworld. 

Okay, can this entire review just be, “Ditto the last review,”  because I FEEL THE SAME WAY. The sense of wonder that Pratchett conveys through the side-trip to the moon is INCREDIBLE. Y’all, there are MOON DRAGONS that LIVE ON THE MOON and eat WEIRD MOON PLANTS and there’s literally nothing about this that I don’t love???

Look, through sheer luck (which is the wizardly way, of course), Ponder is able to figure out how to get the Kite to land on the moon, and at that point, I figured that they would be stranded for a lot longer than they were. I actually had to remind myself that this is a much shorter book than I’m used to. Regardless, Pratchett introduces a solution to the crash of the Kite while also getting to reveal a huge surprise in the Discworld universe. It’s clear and meaningful because MOON DRAGONS. Moon dragons, I can’t get over this. Sorry, not sorry, let me yell:

• They’ve got longer legs, but they look like they’re made of silver moonlight.
• “All nose,” that is literally how they are described.
• They fart fire. THEY FART IT.
• Can we just acknowledge this: “The strange thing was, as Leonard said, that once you stopped sniggering about the whole idea it made a lot of sense. It was so stupid for a flying creature to have a weapon which stopped it dead in midair, for example.” THIS IS AMAZING.
• The dragons on the moon behave like deer. DEER. Just on this point alone, they feel drastically different than swamp dragons.
• (I was curious why none of Kidby’s illustrations include all the lunar vegetation. I wanted to see what those looked like.)
• The lunar vegetation is like SUPER FOOD for swamp dragons. I don’t even have a theory what it might be made of it, but the more I think about this, the cooler it is. Did the dragons evolve this way because those who could fart-propel with gas (GET IT) could navigate the low gravity atmosphere better? LET’S SCIENCE THIS UP.

I just love it so much, y’all. I also love that Pratchett made a joke about that whole phenomenon that happens to people who see the Earth from space. Leonard suggesed growing forests to spell out the name of countries!!! I HATE THIS AND ALSO CAN’T STOP LAUGHING AT IT.

I am also gonna make a guess: the swamp dragons all ignited at once and pushed the moon further along its passage, so much so that you can now observe it from the Disc. That’s gotta be what the wizards see at the end of this section, right??? That’s my theory! And in the next section, the Horde’s gonna end up in palace of the gods. They’re so close, but… shit, I don’t have a theory as to what Evil Harry’s plan is. Well, two for three is pretty good, so onwards I go.

MOON DRAGONS.

https://youtu.be/VBccpiMpgCU

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