REVIEW: Guards! Guards!
Terry Pratchett once said of the City Watch books that he wanted to give them a moment in the sun with
Guards! Guards!, but it turned into a full-time vacation. However, it's fairly easy to see why with
Guards! Guards! (which has easily got to be one of the best Pratchettian titles ever), for this is a turning point, not just for the City Night Watch, but also for the Discworld series proper...
The Night Watch of Ankh-Morpork is a joke. It is down to three members: the alcoholic and bitterly cynical Captain Vimes, the 'natural Sergeant' Colon, and the barely-human Corporal Nobbs. They are not effective law-enforcement in a city with a legalised Thieves' Guild. But a couple of things are soon about to change all that. The first is the arrival of Lance-Constable Carrot, a human adopted by dwarves with a very strong sense of law and order. And the second is that someone is conspiring to depose the Patrician, in a plot that involves a magically summoned dragon...
I feel that, reading the Discworld stories in sequence, that
Guards! Guards! is the point where Discworld ceases to be a fantasy comedy series lampooning fantasy conventions, and now becomes a world of some real depth. Lord Vetinari finally shows himself to be the Machiavellian mastermind who, even if he is deposed, always has a plan. Ankh-Morpork now feels like a real city rather than just a setting. And most of the characters are starting to feel real.
The City Watch are the stars of the novel, of course, and with the exception of Carrot, they spring more or less fully-formed off the page, with Vimes, Colon, and Nobby all impressing. So does Lady Sybil Ramkin, and to a lesser degree, Lupine Wonse and CMOT Dibbler, the latter of whom makes his debut appearance here. Carrot is a little more disappointing, but that is because I know of his later character development. Here, he comes across as, if not dumb, then singular and quixotic. Only his letters home offer much in the way of depth.
The plot is interesting and engaging, and while it is, to a degree, singular (focusing on the plot of the dragon being used to overthrow Vetinari), it is rich and entertaining. Not the usual murder-mystery/conspiracy of the later Watch books, but really, why is the dragon appearing, and who is behind it? If
Guards! Guards! has any other theme, it is of the revitalisation of the Watch, both explicitly in-story, and symbolically through their awkward swamp-dragon mascot Errol, whose fight with the dragon is one of the most awe-inspiring in the series, and should be set to music by either Nobuo Uematsu, or else Harry Gregson-Williams. However, the twist of who the real villain is a little disappointing, as in retrospect, there aren't many plausible alternatives as to who the Supreme Grand Master is, and there isn't quite enough foreshadowing except for one potentially easily missed phrase.
Still,
Guards! Guards! is one of the first real classics of the Discworld series. It shows that, despite the fantasy, Discworld has 'real' people and a 'real' setting to it. And it goes to show that the series can go from disappointment* to a zenith of enjoyment.
Special New Utterance Rating Trial: Yay!
First words: This is where the dragons went.
Last words: But then, what does?
*Subjectively speaking
