Reviews Literature / Inheritance Cycle

I have to disagree with you on most of your points. Like you, I've only read the first two (when I was 13, then again as an adult, halfway through 2 now).

The worldbuilding IS uninventive, yes, but I've read tons of good fantasy series that fall on the old "Empire/Elves/Dwarves" archetype. I wouldn't call Eragon a Marty Stu - at least, not by Book 2. He's been lucking his way through the plot so far, and constantly being propped up by secondary characters such as Arya, Saphira, Brom and Angela. He hits his stride by the end of Book 2, but name any trilogy (and at the point book 2 was written, this WAS a trilogy) where that doesn't happen.

Eragon being in the closet would be an interesting plot twist. How do you figure?

@darrenw1: Ironically, the first example that springs to mind is Star Wars. Luke is already a leader in the rebellion at the beginning of the second movie, and is making his own decisions and surviving by virtue of his own skills. He trains under Yoda, yes, but his training is a much smaller part of the movie than Eragon's in Eldest, and Luke is much more active in his training than Eragon. Luke challenges his teacher, and even flat out defies him sometimes, while Eragon mostly just lets himself be molded like wet clay without any resistance. Th only questions Eragon poses are there for the sake of setting up infodumps, and he only abandons his training early because the same thing happened in Star Wars. Perhaps more importantly, though, Luke had to seek out his training under Yoda through adversity, and then convince Yoda to train him against Yoda's judgement, whereas Eragon just goes to his Yoda and gets trained without any conflict whatsoever.

Luke is an active participant in shaping his destiny throughout the entirety of Star Wars. Eragon is maddeningly passive about his through much of Inheritance, simply doing things because he's told to or reacting to events rather than actively pursuing goals he's chosen for himself.