YMMV / The Iron Tower

• Complete Monster: Modru is Gyphon's right-hand man and, as Gyphon is mostly inactive, is Gyphon's most active agent in Mithgar, nearly bringing the world to ruin during the War of the Ban. Five thousand years later, Modru instigated the Winter War as part of a plot to free Gyphon, sending Vulgs to raid the Boskydells, and a horde of his Spaunen to raze Challerain Keep. Controlling his armies by projecting his will through brain-damaged mind slaves and executing any minions who defy him, Modru spread warfare to every corner of Mithgar, from the Boskydells—where his Ghuls torch dozens of towns and butcher numerous families, including those of protagonists Tuck and Merrilee—to the far south, and makes it clear to the captive Princess Laurelain that in the event of his victory, he will exterminate the Warrows, enslave the Elves and Dwarves, and burn her father and all his subjects in a single great funeral pyre. When Elven Lord Vanidor tries to rescue Laurelain, Modru has him racked to death, forcing Laurelain to watch. When Tuck attempts to free her, Modru beats him near to death with an iron bar. In the end, Modru attempts to sacrifice Laurelain to ensure Gyphon's return, gloating that while he could have used anyone's blood to feed his master, it amused him to use that of "a royal damosel".
• They Copied It, So It Sucks!: By far the biggest criticism of the trilogy is that it's clearly The Lord of the Rings with the Serial Numbers Filed Off, with some arguing it's even more blatant about this than the original Shannara books. It's hard not to notice the similarities (Warrows are basically Hobbits, the Evil Overlord's standard is a burning red ring on a black background, the protagonists' journey through Kraggen-Cor is very similar to the trek through the Mines of Moria, and the battle of Challerain Keep is almost beat-for-beat the same as the Siege of Minas Tirith, to name just a few). To be fair, it's been said that the author originally planned for the The Silver Call duology to be a sequel to The Lord of the Rings, only to realize how messy it would be to get the legal rights and so had to come up with a (mostly) new backstory for the duology that was different enough from The Lord of the Rings that he wouldn't get in trouble for plagiarism, which ended up being expanded into The Iron Tower trilogy. Some still enjoy the books in spite of the obvious influence of The Lord of the Rings, while others dismiss it as an inferior knock-off.

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