Alastair Nelson, Staff Writer
Ernest Cline has done it again! Unfortunately, I mean that literally. Ready Player Two is virtually (pun totally intended) identical to its predecessor, plot-wise. Cline’s debut novel, 2011’s Ready Player One was a smash hit, and for good reason. It is, after all, the age of the nerd.
We all love a good easter egg these days. There’s nothing like watching one show you love and catching that, sometimes subtle, sometimes not so subtle, nod to that other show you love. Or that movie, game, book, etc.
RP1 was one giant easter egg about a guy looking for an easter egg in a stack of easter eggs. It was a cornucopia of 80’s pop-culture trivia, touching on everything from Joust to Jurassic Park.
However, it was definitely geared towards one type of geek more than others: Gamers. Ready. Player. One. Need I say more? RP2 takes the same formula, ramps up the science fiction aspect, and replaces video game related fun-facts with entire chapters (and planets) dedicated to John Hughes movies and Prince.
I now know more about Prince and Pretty in Pink than I care to, even if it was presented as part of an old school Dungeons and Dragons quest.
There is a large portion of the book dedicated to Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings that I could appreciate, but seriously, of all the geeky things Cline had to choose from, he picked the one thing we have already seen brought into the mainstream via five very long and detailed movies? Really? What made the first book great was the nerdy stuff that happened to stem from the 80’s. RP2 fails to deliver the nerdy stuff and what we’re left with is just, well, stuff from the 80’s.
By all means, read the book, it has its merits, but if you’re looking for another geeky goldmine, I might suggest a trip to the library instead of the bookstore.