Havelock Vetinari - Blog Posts

Pov: You're Otto Chriek and the Ankh-Morpork Times is writing a puff piece on the Patrician. You need a photo for the occasion, and you've just told Vetinari to pose in any way he feels like.

Okay, but what does Vetinari do during Hogwatch? Does he go on business as usual? Do the clerks?

Because I feel like some otherworldly entity with villinous things in mind for Ankh-Morpork try to do an evil version of A Christmas Carol on him. Like, every year they try and every year he scares them away by just not putting up with it at all.

And Drumknott is the complete opposite of Bob Cratchett in every way.

I'm sorry, but you cannot convince me that Vetinari and Death are scary people. In my book, scary people don't leave dog biscuits on their animals grave every week for over a year. They also don't try to pick up a book that's so big it crushes them and they have to call their roommate servant for help.

They're just little dorks that have to throw their weight around sometimes for the greater good.

(I woke up thinking this and had to share. What has my life become?)

I was in the mood for tomfoolery...

The Utena hair-pull... do punish me for my sins

Just so you know, Vimes addressing his letters to Vetinari with ‘My Lord Patrician’ does Things to me.

Ponytail Vetinari. Is that a thing?

Messy warm-up sketch of Vetinari

The Discworld Adventures for PC

I learned about the “Discworld” universe over a Videogame magazine called “Bravo Screenfun”. I read in one of the issues about the second Discworld Adventure with Rincewind the sorcerer, the worst wizard who ever lived. I later read the walkthrough of that game named “Discworld II: Missing Presumed...!?” in the another issue of “Bravo Screenfun”, reading about the weird adventures of Rincewind and how he was able to solve many riddles and overcame obstacles. I played the two Discworld games with Rincewind and played “Discworld Noir” too.

Those games made me interested in the books. It was surprising how different the books were. I figured out over time that the games took several of the Discworld Characters and plots and sprinkled them anywhere into the narrative and the gameplay. The first game was a adaption of “Guards! Guards!” and has elements from “Moving pictures” with Rincewind being the main protagonist and not the Vimes, Carrot and Co. Rincewind has to find a summoned dragon and stop that dragon from destroying Ankh-Morpork.

The second one is a adaption of “Reaper Man” AND “Moving Picutres” in which Death decides to stop working and going on vacation because his job is stressing him out and he doesn’t feel appreciated.

“Discworld Noir” on the other hand was about the private detective Lewton, ex-member of the watch. It was like a Noir-Movie, very atmospheric and grim, yet still a parody of the noir-genre at the same time. No pre-existent book-plot was used but many of the characters from the books were.

Because of those games I started to read the books. It was surprising how different the game interpretations of those characters were. Especially of Havelock Vetinari who ordered a hit on Death for becoming too popular. A rather absurd action of the Patrician when considering how he acts otherwise.

Those games I love so much guided me to the books I love so much.

Thank you Terry Pratchett, thank you for those games and your books. Nothing is like them; nothing I know is like them and will ever be.

R.I.P.

Do you guys ever think about how Vetinari believes that all people are inherently evil, but then he does things like:

Giving people others would deem irredeemable second chances (Lipwig, the other thief too, he even regretted the death of Lupine Wonse, the guy who summoned a dragon and tried to kill him); spends time with ppl who see only the good in everything (Carrot, Leonard); treats and values ppl like individuals and actually cares about them (that scene in Jingo where he tells Vimes that it’s good that people didn’t get killed in the war).

So I thought,

What if he doesn’t want to believe that everyone is evil. What if he had arrived to that conclusion just from his actual life experience with the assassins and guild leaders, because that’s all he had seen other people do. But he tries to spend time with good people and give criminals second chances because he wants to be proven wrong. To be proven that his philosophy is actually wrong and “there is some good in the world and it’s worth fighting for.”

Discworld Politics

I like how in Night Watch Vimes has to face his younger self and has the universal experience of cringing at his younger self but realizes you need to start somewhere. You start out naive and ignorant then life bites you in the ass and you learn, unless you're Vetinari then you've always been cool.

So plain and simple yet so recognisable and adorable

the night watch and friends