User blog:Argulor/Martin II---the most boring, predictable character of the entire Redwall Series

I'm here to talk about Martin II. When, in Mattimeo, we first here about him being the newborn son of Tess Churchmouse and Mattimeo, it is a great setup for the story of a new hero. Martin II sounds like a very promising warrior-to-be.

But when we got to know him years later in Pearls of Lutra, he was a huge disapointment! No, it wasn't because he was a bad warrior---he was as courageous and strong as his namesake, Matthias, Mattimeo, and every other hero in the series. No, it was because he was so flat out BORING AND UNORIGINAL.

First off, there is his name to consider. Upon reading about "Martin", it is just weird reading about a mouse who feels like he should be Martin the Warrior, but isn't. Second, he had no distinctive personality. He was brave, kind and good...just like every other hero in the series. There was NOTHING that stood out about him from any other hero in the series, let alone his namesake. Third, he had no character developement. EVERY young hero, including Martin the Warrior himself, had some kind of character development. But then again, those heroes were young, whereas this Martin appears to be a full grown adult. It was fine having a hero like that with Urthstripe the Strong---he was a badger, and large creatures like that make a good impression as full grown adults, even if they don't have a lot of character development. But Urthstripe probably had more than this Martin!

Lastly, Martin II goes on his quest, comes back, and...that's it. Nothing happens to him. He's not even mentioned in the epilogue, which tries to talk about the fates of every character in the book...and he was one of the main characters!

He was the bare essentials of a hero, and I was really disappointed with him. He didn't end up being so much as mentioned in the future books, and with good reason---he's a hero worth forgetting about.

Any thoughts on this are welcome.