"The Primarchs" (novella collection)

I kind of bought this like "sigh... all right... I suppose I had better complete my collection." I mean tales of the Primarchs were kind of the reason I began looking through these Black Library scrolls... but I've often found myself disappointed by the portrayal of these legendary figures. (This has led me to one of the weirder bits of fanfiction I've read.) When Sanguinius eating an apple and smirking at Horus is the only memorable moment the guy has in the series until you've had over 20 books... then you got problems. And to be honest, I still feel like I have almost NO real sense of the character of Mortarion... Even Corax and Magnus are a bit of a fucking enigma to me and they've pretty much had entire books devoted to them... Am I just not reading it right?? Oddly though, I do feel like I know Angron, Horus, Russ and Lorgar pretty well now.

Great cover.

After a few books I was less than thrilled by, I figured 'The Primarchs' would be a giant disappointment. But instead, I have found it to be surprisingly awesome. It's split into four novellas, dealing with a Primarch each: Fulgrim, Ferrus Manus, Lion El'Johnson and Alpharius/BrOmegon.

To go over them briefly:

-After being a little annoyed by what I saw as wasted potential in 'Fulgrim', McNeill brings everything good about that novel into a much tighter, fast-paced novella about the collapse of the Emperor's Children with none of the shit stuff (ie no Remembrancers, no angsty hand-wringing from Saul Tarvitz about how his legion are getting way too interested in musical theatre, no conversations between Fulgrim and his sword...)

-Despite having to deal with one of the most boring Primarchs, 'Feat Of Iron' is a nice Ferrus Manus story that gives us a little more background on his chapter. It also links in nicely with 'Promethean Sun', if you read that one.

-'The Lion' gives us a much more concise and perceptive description of Johnson's worsening mental state and (often justified) paranoia than those two inteminable 1st Legion novels: through characterisation and his actions, it's all but explicitly stated that Johnson trusts himself, and the Emperor, and that's it: all other Primarchs, and all other Astartes (even his own) could be trickin' on him.

-'The Serpent Beneath' shows an Alpha Legion covert op against a xenos/psyker/Dark Mechanicum facility (??) which they believe to be a threat to their ongoing mission to confuse/arouse everyone in the Horus Heresy timeline. So that facility's gotta go. !Problem!: It's an Alpha Legion facility!!! OH SHIZNIT! Will there be some twists? Is a bear a Catholic?

The cover is great, but the full artwork might be one of my favourite Horus Heresy pictures so far.

Lemme go on a bit of a tangent (for the rest of the review). There are some very nice/upsetting parallel moments in two stories here: an Astartes previously thought to be fairly integral to the ongoing storyline is suddenly, unexpectedly executed by their own Primarch seemingly on a whim. Oh, God, I can't stop myself. Look away if you don't want spoilers. First, in 'The Reflection Crack'd', Fulgrim uses his wu-tang style to remove Eidolon's head from its mu'fuckin shoulders, after Eidolon makes one thoughtless ass-kissing remark too many. Then, in 'The Lion', well, Lion El'Johnson gets all up in Nemiel's grill when Nemmy's like "the Edicts of Nikea mean we can't use no Librarians, even if the Night Lords are deploying daemons against us" and Johnson's all like "whut, u shook or somethin? I done told you an ORDER, my word is law in this bitch" then BLAOW he blazes his headpiece. Yo, all types of blood comin' out of that Astartes, he's layin' there like a... like a fuckin' newborn baby, yo.

Lionel Johnson: blazing headpieces since the 1800s

These were shocking for a few reasons. Eidolon was always a gigantic asshole, so it was nice to see him get his comeuppance (and for his ass-kissing, as well! TARVITZ WAS RIGHT!) but I always figured he would get his at the Siege of Terra, hopefully at Loken's hand. His death does nicely illustrate, though (as if it needed further illustration; McNeill lays it on with a fucking trowel all through this story, and it's disgustingly brilliant) how far the Emperor's Children have fallen; a death of a key member of their officer cadre just sends them into paroxysms of delight over this exotic new sensation called "fear our Primarch might bust our heads right off for no apparent reason".

As for Nemiel (RIP), I've spoken before about how little I have nice to say about the Dark Angels stuff so far in the Heresy. And Nemiel and Zahariel's tiresome rivalry/brotherhood was one of my least favourite aspects of my least favourite story arc. Nemiel was dogged but ran with some suspect dudes, Zahariel was brilliant in every way but also a psyker, he fell from favour, Nemiel got taken in by the cool crowd, Zahariel fell in with the Dark Angels who rebelled against the Imperium. It seemed to all be moving (so... fucking... slowly) towards a homecoming battle between Nemiel and Zahariel with Nemiel dying, then Zahariel being killed by Lion El'Johnson who turns towards the audience and winks, saying "This reminds me of the thing with Sanguinius, the Emperor and Horus, yeah? Cosmic!" But now my snarky predictions are RUNED (it's like ruined, but more arcane) and I actually love that.

Also, the 'brief moment of satisfaction' we see in Johnson immediately after he kills Nemiel makes my mind go into overdrive. Did he know about Nemiel's involvement in the plot to kill the Emperor all along, and his vengeance just took a few centuries to unfold? Or does he just really, really want to fucking kill EVERYTHING that disagrees with him, even if it's wearing Astartes plate? (His orders do get questioned quite a bit here; one senses it's taking a toll). Or did he just not really think about it and JUST DO IT? Or does he resent the idea that Nemiel's loyalty is to the the Emperor rather than to Johnson? Or that Nemiel is a better son of the Emperor than Johnson is? FUCK!!! Anyway, with this unexpected lurch in the Nemiel/Zahariel /Johnson love triangle, I expect the (eventual) Dark Angels conclusion to be a little more interesting. If Gav writes it.

Now fans of those 2 dead bastards, you know how BL plays with the chronology, so we may still see several books released with those guys as major characters. But I hope to Christ not, though, because as I said, they were, in my opinion, cunts. (Note: I wrote this sentence a long while ago - over a year, probably - but sure enough, Eidolon hasn't breathed his last... check out 'Angel Exterminatus'.)

Anyway, I done gone on too long about spoilerific stuff and I haven't even spoken about 'Feat Of Iron' yet (lesson: Ferrus Manus is a close-minded, intractable asshole, and his legion has way more Terminator suits than is fair) or how 'Reflection' has a gloriously over-the-top, homoerotic torture scene (3 dudes excruciating a naked Fulgrim while Fabius looks on, a creepy glint in his eye, quite possibly filming on his iPhone) or the Tinker Tailor Soldier Astartes of 'The Serpent Beneath', or how the Death Guard in 'The Lion' seem to be trying very hard in a very crowded field to establish themselves as The Asshole Legion (also, I hear all their dialogue in the voice of Ray Winstone for some reason). But the stories all have dope moments; I would say two stories are excellent ('Reflection' and 'Lion'), one is very good ('Serpent') and one is just verging on average but still pretty cool ('Feat Of Iron').

Overall, I give 'The Primarchs' 7/10, and strongly urge you to get it if you're a staunch fan of any one Legion featured, but mainly if you're keen on the Heresy series in general and like to find more out about the characters involved, rather than just the events/action.

*GASP* These tattoos say I'm Alpharius!!

(And BTW, what's the odds that the 'Serpent Beneath' Alpha Legion infiltration squad are gonna show up again? I feel like the secret Black Library motto of the Horus Heresy series is "If you didn't ACTUALLY SEE 'EM DIE... they're not dead." What, you think just because the last time you see 'em they're saying "shit bro, we'll NEVER GET BACK TO THE SHIP ON TIME" they're all just vacuumbait? Yeah, I remember another dude who was almost certainly about to die at the end of his book... his name was Garvi Loken...)

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