Literature Hysterically awesome, at first
I read this entire story, and was cracking up before I'd finished the first few paragraphs. As I went on, though, I simply got used to the consistent badness and then could only judge The Eye Of Argon on its merits as an actual story.
This happens to me a lot when reading/watching/playing something So Bad Its Good. If there's a new surprise of sheer badness around every corner, I consistently have something new to laugh at. This is the case with the films Troll 2 and The Room, where some new bizarre element of awesome brokenness is guaranteed to keep me watching. But if the humor comes from, say, only one thing, such as in this case overwrought and poorly-done Purple Prose and horrible spelling and grammar, then once I've stopped laughing at it there's not much left.
That was kind of the case here. Other than some bizarre usage of the word "slut" as an insult for men, a woman talking "bustily", "half chapters", and some other surprises, I pretty much had encountered all I needed to see within the first chapter or so. What was left was a story that is, I have to say, not at all the genre I'm into.
Which means that I was bored. Genuinely enjoyable stories that are poorly made can keep my interest as I both try to get absorbed into the story, while simultaneously laughing at the horrible quality of its telling. But I'm just not into Heroic Fantasy, and especially not Conan The Barbarian-esque fantasy, so not only did I not enjoy the story itself, but my lack of knowledge of the genre meant I couldn't laugh at misapplication of its conventions.
But I do recommend checking this out. It's not that long of a story, and if you're anything like me, you're gonna have tears of laughter pouring out your eyes before you've finished even the first chapter. Unless you're very well-versed in Heroic Fantasy, the first chapter or two is all you really need to get the gist of the awesome awfulness of The Eye Of Argon.
Literature Not much to say really.
The Eye of Argon is a violent sexual crime against all taste, decency, dramaturgy, narrative, grammatical correctness and characterization that you could possibly desire from any story, no matter in how modest of a dose. It's pretty much as close to a real-life, unironic version of Peter Chimaera and his works, that one can come.
The only part of The Eye of Argon that at least isn't outright suicide-inducingly incompetent, is its structure. That is to say, the structure is terrible, but at least Jim Theis realized that he needed to pay lip service to it, and not just blow his load on scenes of Grignr "smacking his valor of foolishness" or whatever.
Ultimately, The Eye of Argon finds its worth, more as an interesting time capsule of gaudy 70's Fantasy trends, than anything else. Barbarians were all the rage, from Marvel Comics wildly popular adaptation of Conan the Barbarian, to their and DCs own property like "Starr the Slayer", "Claw the Unconquered", "Arak Son of Thunder" and a plethora of other ripped, angry, (but strangely poetic) shirtless dudes. All of which begs the question: when will modern day "daaark and eeevil" fantasy like Game of Thrones recieve its own 'Eye of Argon''?
But yeah seriously, avoid this one unless you want to commit brain seppuku.