Daring Don’t disappoint me. Also Chapter 3 of The Shy Knight and the Rainbow Princess is finally out! · 2:56pm Dec 9th, 2013
You know what they say, I ship it! I totally ship Daring Do and Awi-whatever the heck his name is. An now I have already run out of things to say relating to this cover art… um, Cranky Kong is playable in Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze. It’s unrelated but such a fact is awesome and I figured I’d share it with you. Fanfiction Progress time!
Fanfiction Progress
Hellish screams are what best describe my experience with this chapter. Literally, this chapter was just so hard to put thought to paper… digital paper but paper none the less. I had all my notes of what happened where and my own thoughts on how things would go but none of it was transitioning well. I personally blame the style of writing, having to use Fluttershy as the narrator rather than the glorious disembodied voice you’ve come to love is really frustrating. I could never describe anything appropriately by limiting myself to Fluttershy’s voice.
Alas though the deed is done and I can focus on writing the next chapter. Well, after I reply to the comments on the 2nd chapter… and all my episode review blog comments… and review this fanfic because it looks fun and the author requested it. But then I shall work on chapter 4… while trying to not play the Bravely Default game I just received from the post… darn it!
Now then, I guess we best discuss the recently uploaded chapter. With this chapter I present to you the backstory of Fluttershy within my ‘Truth’ series of fanfiction. Those of you who have read Magnetism and paid close attention to chapter 6 will notice that quite a few things tie together. Chapter 6 of Magnetism even starts off with a flashback from Angel’s perspective, right after the events you see within the 3rd chapter’s flashback. With my upload of chapter 3 you’ve probably also noticed why I split Campfire Chat into two chapters, I suspected it was going end up ruddy long and I was right.
Now this story, one of the first MLP fanfic ideas I ever had, has always run off the basis that Rainbow Dash is foalnapped by Fluttershy’s arch-nemesis to whom she had. Originally I had no plans as to what this villain would be like. When I saw the synopsis for Putting your hoof down I began to consider using the as yet to be revealed Iron Will in the villain spot but with how he turned out I decided I was left with no choice but to make my own. I went with an ogre because of how I wanted to depict an ogre and this depiction of ogres contrasted greatly with ponies and Fluttershy in particular. Big is not too bright and incredibly strong, but I wanted to make a connection between him and Fluttershy so I made him weak for an ogre, as Fluttershy is considered a poor flier for a pegasus. Anymore than that I can’t reveal for the moment except for two things. The first of which is that something I hope to be a big part of the fanfic and to whom I’ve already enjoyed within Campfire Chat Continued is the interactions between Rainbow Dash and Big Boss. Another thing I can say is that design wise, particularly in how Big’s face looks, I was inspired by the following Pokémon;
Other Episode Reviews for Castle Mane-ia
I found far less reviews this week. Well I'm aware Ugugg only tends to share his thoughts on season openers and enders and that NintendoGal's review of Castle Mane-ia has been delayed until after her review of Daring Don't... strange, I know. Enjoy these three reviews though of an episode that I absolutely loved (helps that it is now my 9th favourite episode of My Little Pony);
James Corck
Thejboy88
Zyr1987
Episode Review of Daring Don’t
Season 4 has been on a role so far. Its opener is not only the best opener of the series in my opinion but also the best two part episode we’ve had. Its 3rd episode was absolutely hilarious, had great character interactions, a gorgeous setting and has already settled itself in as one of my top ten favourite episodes. Given my love so far of season 4 you should know then that I tried really, really hard to like this episode. I really wanted to like it but I just couldn’t.
Starting things off with the positives there is the Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash interactions. I’m a FlutterDash shipper; of course I’m going to see them interacting nicely as a big positive. The opening had some great interactions between them, absolutely adorable with a significant lack of personal space. It’s also funny that once again Rainbow Dash decides to try and involve Fluttershy in something to whom she should know already Fluttershy has no investment in. Be honest Dash, we know you want her to be a part of everything in your life; you are not complete without her.
There were some good things other than the FlutterDash moments that took place within the opening primarily. Pinkie Pie has a brilliant moment in which the show takes advantage of the ‘presenting a long journey via map’ cliché, reminding me of the recent Muppets movie’s own map joke. Rainbow Dash is adorable when excited, especially during the first half where it doesn’t prove inconvenient or annoying and can be enjoyed fully in how cute and funny it is. Along with fan-girl Rainbow Dash being funny there is also fan-girl Twilight. Their interactions are brilliant as they banter about the books and exchange their various knowledge and theories. One final positive thing is the morals within the episode. They are great morals, but like Castle Mane-ia, they suffer in execution.
I really do think it is a shame that was all I could think of for positives and that now we already move onto the negatives. My expectation process for this episode has been all over the place. At first I was worried I wouldn’t like it on the basis of not liking the previous Daring Do related episode, Read it and Weep being one of my few poor rated episodes. Then, after learning of how the comics hinted at Twilight’s mother being the author for Daring Do, I was excited for the episode. Then I realised the possibility of Daring Do’s author not being Twilight’s mother so I became worried that it wouldn’t live up to my hype. Finally I just settled my expectations as regardless of who the author is I knew season 4 had been doing a terrific job so far so I could expect this episode to be decent enough even without Daring Do’s author being the parent of a main character. I somehow still ended up being disappointed.
Now those of you who have even seen one image of Daring Do author, A.K. Yearling, won’t be surprised by the twist but it turns out she actually is Daring Do and her stories are actually an account of her real life adventures. This is disappointing if compared to the hoped for author reveal but I locked that expectation away for the episode. It is however with her introduction that I feel this episode begins to take a down turn.
For starters is how Daring Do is presented and perceived by the main characters. I’m okay with the fact that Daring Do is a badass, or at least that’s how they want to portray her. What I’m not okay is how they go about doing it through making Rainbow Dash useless and her constantly admiring her despite Daring being both a jerk and no better than she is. Now I understand that Rainbow Dash is a big Daring Do fan and that later on part of the moral is to not let your admirations of others impede your own abilities however I feel they do a poor job presenting it. Dash continues to go nuts over Daring Do despite consistently being the cold shoulder and never once seems to object to Daring’s attitude. Furthermore they don’t go about making Daring Do worth admiring by showing her as more capable than Dash but by undermining Dash’s own abilities. Rainbow Dash seems unable to do anything right within this episode, easily being captured by a villain whose name I’ve no idea how to spell and who seems less impressive than the manticore she confronted at the beginning of season 1. Here though, Dash is just tossed aside. Rainbow Dash only doubts her abilities after Daring Do gets captured, to which would be understandable if she had been portrayed as anywhere near as competent as she is throughout the rest of the series. I don’t even feel the point about Dash being too busy fangirling to be a worthwhile excuse. Rainbow Dash admires the Wonderbolts but when they come along Rainbow Dash goes and does her best. You could say this wasn’t the case for Sonic Rainboom but that episode was about her overcoming said doubts anyway. She shouldn’t have been presented so incapable even with her admiration of Daring Do.
That was my main problem with the episode, probably best summed up as how I found Daring Do presented and compared in regards to the others. I did find other problems with the episode, like how the mane 6 just watch as Daring Do gets beaten up and her artefact stolen. It’s used for a joke but it is entirely missing logic, particularly from the non-Daring Do obsessed characters, who shouldn’t have stood there gawking. The main villain is uninteresting both in personality and in abilities; he literally is just an evil, odd looking Aipom. Also, like with how I found problems with how the first moral was presented I also found problems with how the second one was presented. The whole ‘sometimes you need help’ thing doesn’t have much impact when it seems like all of the things that Daring and Dash did together, Daring Do probably would have been able to do on her own. She wasn’t shown having that hard of time doing things, struggling, but it never seemed she was incapable of the task without help. The things Dash helps her out with also look very minor. She manages to escape on her own but gets helped a bit by Dash and then Dash helps her remove some heavy rings. Sure doing so is important but in watching the scene it doesn’t feel that way, it doesn’t feel like an epic feat that could have only been accomplished through the power of teamwork.
I wanted to like this episode, I wanted season 4 to continue its roll of enjoyable episodes but I just can’t bring myself to like this one. It starts off well enough but after the Daring Do reveal, with exception to Twilight and Rainbow’s quick fan talk exchange, I found nothing funny or exciting about the episode. I hated seeing Rainbow Dash undermined just to show off Daring Do and I hated how Daring Do was being admired for feats the others have pretty much done. There is too much about this episode that I dislike and not enough that I liked. I was thinking of rating this as an Average episode but even episodes like Mysterious Mare Do-Well, my lowest rated Average episode, had more that I liked about than Daring Don’t. Daring Don’t to me is… a Poor ranked episode with a score of just 2.
I actually really like this episode, a lot more than CastleMania.
I just loved seeing RD being that much of a fan to Daring Do, I loved the Indiana Jones references (the map, the pony who looks like Belloq...), and now I can finally ship Daring Dash whithout any problems.
Sure it has some defaults, especially when Dash is all depressed because she felt guilty, that was too much out of character, and the pacing was a little bit off.
But like Mr Enter said in his review, there is so much more to love about this episode. This one goes easily in my top 20
Sounds like what's going to happen to me with my strange new Photo Finish x Fluttershy story once I'm past the point where I can rely on scenes from Green Isn't Your Color. On the bright side, writing the story should get easier from here, right? Right? Please say yes
Edit: BTW, I can't help but think of the ogres from Baldur's Gate in regards to the ogre in story. In case you don't know, they look like this (the big green thing).
1589258 I can't even phanthom how people could like this episode more than Castle Mane-ia. While Castle Mane-ia wasn't the deepest of storylines it was at least absurdly hilarious, something I felt Daring Don't to lack for the most part. Ah well, seems like this is just going to be one of the episodes where my opinion is in the minority, I think I've seen only one other person dislike it and another who thought it to be just okay.
I enjoyed her being a Daring Do fan when it came to interacting with her friends and Twilight in particular but I felt it went poorly when her fan love was directed to Daring Do.
I don't think I've watched an Indiana Jones movie all the way through. I've seen bits of all of them-wait, I have watched one fully, that Crystal Skull one. Apparently a lot of people disliked it because of aliens which is strange. The aliens came and blew someone up. What's not to like about that?
1589487 There was character development in Daring Do but it didn't make much sense, or rather, felt important enough. She didn't need the help to get out of the trap and the whole lifting of rings feels rather unimportant on it's own. I know it was important but in establishing why you need to trust in others and accept help, doing so to lift heavy rings doesn't sound that impressive of a reason.
Castle Mane-ia I felt to be the better episode because it was funny and presented great character interactions. It was set in a known location but explored more in-depth and felt more interesting than the bland jungle and ruins seen within Daring Don't. I do feel your problem with Castle Mane-ia is how you perceive it to be a scary episode when I don't think it was trying to do so at any point. It's scares were more surprising and built entirely for the purpose of comedy. Glad to hear your opinion on the episodes though and I thank you for commenting IonXtreme.
1592578
Dear gosh, what is it with you and shipping Fluttershy?
I always find it odd to imagine shipping someone involved in an OTP with others. Less beloved ships sure but the OTP is sacred.
Regardless though, good luck with your writing. I did once think of a FlutterDash story involving Fluttershy's modelling career. One in which Dash had an obsession with buying all of the magazines with Fluttershy in them and another where Rainbow Dash ended up volunteering to model alongside Fluttershy as she feared Photo Finish was taking advantage of Fluttershy (not true but Photo Finish plays on this to keep Dash doing the modelling, natural rainbow maned ponies are hard to come by). Ideas I'll probably never right, never had an end point to them and I have other ideas that take priority. Well then, thanks for commenting as always Zyr.
1605322
. Some parts were funny, but for me, there's nothing memorable in this episode.
First of, I didn't really liked Castle Mania, because it was just ponies scaring each other in a castle without knowing it... For the entire episode
I liked when RD's admiration was directed to Daring Do, because it was creepy/cute/funny at the same time, and we don't see RD being like this very often.
I like shipping RD with other ponies, but I will never ship Fluttershy with anypony expect Dashie
And if I can give you a good advice, you should watch Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, this is like my 4th favorite movie ever
(Plus I didn't thought that the Crystal Skull movie was that bad too)
And yeah, I'm a traitor
1605322 C'mon, Fluttershy's too adorable not to spread the love around with. Also, so far as I'm concerned, nothing is sacred, save Fluttershy's adorableness and my Beast Wars Megatron/Rubber Ducky OTP.
The only ponies I can't see myself ever shipping her with are the ones who purposefully made her miserable (aside from Photo Finish, who I admit I loathe, but I can see a creepy crush-like vibe from, which is where the idea spawned from) and children. I also admit I want to ship her with Celestia, Luna, and maybe Octavia eventually.