I just posted this on the science fiction community lemmy.ml link to post, hadn’t found this community yet.
OK, so first off, as the title says, there will be spoilers in here. So if you’re planning on reading it and haven’t yet already, please stop.
I read the series as a teenager and absolutely love them. Recently, I have taken the time to reread all five of them, and have to say I was slightly disappointed. I still thought that the writing was very amusing, the social commentary was good and the lightly touched philosophical discussions were good as well. My main problem concerns character development, or better said, the complete lack thereof in my opinion. I found that most disturbing into different aspects:
The lack of real, meaningful friendship between characters As an example, Arthur and Ford are supposed to be friends, but from the interaction in the book it seems more like they tolerate each other and don’t really appreciate each other’s presence or influence on their adventures. Every time they get out of touch, they don’t appear to feel sorry about it, and when they see each other again, they are extremely British about it. This also applies to the other characters in my opinion.
** the complete abandonment of the relationship between Arthur and Fenchurch** So, in the first three books, Arthur is like this maladjusted guy, who really doesn’t know what his place in the universe is. This also applies to his personal relationships. Then, he meets a woman that is presented as his soulmate, someone that finally understands him and respects/likes him the way he is. All of a sudden, she disappears into thin air, and she’s only mentioned one more time in the book series. Arthur seems happy to just make sandwiches and doesn’t seem to mourn this loss too much after the initial search. To me, this makes the character rather shallow. I appreciate the author was not trying to write a novel about love in space, or whatever, but still, it feels a bit lacking to me.
I will end my rant here, I am very curious as to your opinions on this matter. Do you feel like I’m just expecting too much from these books or do you tend to agree with these criticisms?
I think you're missing a few key points:
It's a COMEDIC series, not a serious drama. It's Adams taking potshots at things that struck him as funny or upset him. Like the whole "shoe event horizon" thing was an eloquent rant about how he couldn't find shoes that fit one day. (No, really!) The fact that it blew up into this massive thing was an accident, not a design, and he didn't set out to write a Serious SF Series™.
The "Britishness" of the relationships is part of that comedy. He's making fun of Brits' "reserve".
The Fenchurch thing never really fit into the vibe, and given the series' entire schtick of random things occurring out of nowhere and then vanishing into nowhere (like the guy whose every incarnation was killed by Arthur Dent), it's on-point for her to just vanish into nothingness. (And as for his reaction, consult point 2.)
TL;DR Summary
This is a comedic series best viewed as a collection of incoherent, inconsistent vignettes with an underlying theme (kind of like the more serious The Martian Chronicles of Ray Bradbury), not as a serious space drama spread out over books.
I get what you’re saying. As to point one, I agree. On the other hand, a comedy series with social commentary and philosophical aspects can still contain a lot of character development. For instance, the series Scrubs comes to mind where they definitely pull that off. But I get it’s not the point.
I agree employee number two, mostly on the friendship part.
I have a different opinion on Fenchurch. To me, their whole falling in love process was extremely well written and beautiful. Somehow it shows that someone who can’t find a place to fit in the whole universe in can still find someone to call home, and I thought that was really cool, but I do realize that it’s only my opinion and not a fact.
On another thread, a lemming pointed out that the author was on record, saying, he regretted how he wrote Fenchurch in the fifth book. I couldn’t find the quote in a quick search, but I found something else:
But it's very funny in a very British way that all of this happens, and everything is great and beautiful, and he then loses it all.
British comedy relishes the opportunity to totally pull the rug out under a character whenever they get too happy.
If there isn't an air of light despair about a character, surely that means there is pain and misery coming their way to fix that soon enough.
With respect to Mostly Harmless being bleak, consider that the first book starts with the destruction of the earth, and the deaths of everyone on it. "Less bleak" than Mostly Harmless isn't a happy ending, but one that doesn't so conclusively stomp on every possibility for happiness. Characters should have hope.
It just needs to be lightly stomped on with regularity to remind them that happiness is always temporary, but despair is forever.
But then Eoin Colfer's "And Another Thing..." did a decent job of showing that in a universe as crazy as Hitchikers, there's always another path.