My Deadly Shot: Wave Blaster vs the review (readers, you decide) · 11:34pm Mar 21st, 2015
Oh God, this happened again. Once again, I took an idea and rolled with it without really thinking it thought, which ended in another fine example of "Wave Blaster screwed it up". But I'm rambling, let's get to the review. This is Harmonists Contest Reviews #4 by HapHazred.
Faithful recreation on how Wave reacted after seeing the review.
First strike: Just as with The Doom Patrol, I went too far from canon, literally ignoring the MLP side and focusing too much on the Deadshot idea. The worst offender here is Trixie's character, which way closer to Floyd Lawton than to TGaP Trixie. Or, in a meta sense, this could pass as a John Ostrader's work, but it could never be any close to Lauren Faust's style.
Second strike: The "show, don't tell" rule was kindly told to f*ck off. There was way more exposition than action in the prologue, and it only got really better by the second chapter where I dished the exposition at all.
Third strike: There's little to no transition between canon!Trixie and Deadshot!Trixie.
Of course, as any proper writer, I have a defense. So, here are my responses to those screw ups and let the readers decide.
This is more DC Comics than MLP:FiM.
Well, basically, that was the point. If I wanted to make a pure MLP fic, I would never make it a crossover. Also, other non-corssover fics goe very, very far from canon and are absurdly good, like JB von Her's Mare-Do-Well: Regeneration or Jordan179's An Extended Performance.
Think about it as an Elseworld or a What iff...?; I took canon characters and put them in a situation that canon would never put them. Which is, in some ways, part of the point of fanfiction, to boldly drive stories where they have never went before.
Does this means that my fic is as good? No, but it doesn't mean that using a different makes it a flaw either.
Show, don't tell.
Oaky, this is an old and consistent problem of mine. I really like to use and explore complex ideas, so I usually tend to expend way more time and space than necessary to drive home the background, explanations and details in my stories.
However, since this was a first person narrative, that was kinda inevitable. This is not an omniscient narration showing the reader a wordl, it was Trixie thinking about it on the fly, reflecting on what is around her rather than telling a story. Hence the present tense.
Now, the Secret Origins chapter IS in past tense and IS Trixie actually telling us the story. But that's the point too, Trixie is telling the story. The level of detail is limited by what Trixie knows and cares.
Again, this doesn't make the fic better, but it gives a reason for the lack of balance between show and tell.
That's not Trixie, that's Deadshot with boobs.
Let me tell you something; a big complain I've ever had about superheroes (and villains) films is that they're always friggin' "origins stories". I'm so tired of it that I decided to revert the situation and demote the origins to a small prologue and focus entirely on what was happening now (another reason for the present tense).
Admittedly, it backfired. This was a too radical change for a well known character like Trixie and I should have put more thought on the Secret Origins chapter.
But, on the other side, I made this version of Trixie with the idea that "The Great and Powerful" is just a stage act. Going back to the episodes, there are two lines of dialogue that are what constructs Trixie in my headcanon:
Oh, I can't, I never have. No one can vanquish an ursa major. I just made the whole story up to make me look better.
It's the least I could do. I treated you and your friends so horribly when I was wearing that Alicorn Amulet. I just couldn't control myself. You can forgive me, can't you?
See? There's no scenery chewing, no third pony talking and no over the top bragging. In other words, this is the real Trixie talking instead of keeping an act. This two lines of dialogue says that there's more than "anything you can do, I can do it better" inside that pony's personality and that's what I aimed for.
Again, this is an explanation. not an excuse. The transition WAS too sudden and without enough explanations Trixie comes very OOC.
So, readers and fans of My Deadly Shot, what is YOUR opinion? The comments section is there for a reason, you know.
What was that bit about showing and telling? I think the only bit it really grated was some of Trixie's backstory which was told using exposition. As far as I recall, the rest wasn't particularly jarring.
And I didn't think it was screwed up. I went out of my way to explain that, as an action fic, it was thoroughly entertaining. Heck, that's why it came third, and in terms of sequence of events, minus the exposition, it worked pretty well. Sure, it missteps, but... doesn't everyone?
If I may give a suggestion: there is one way to avoid making the whole thing either an origin story or ignore the origin altogether. Just make it so that there isn't any transition. Trixie remains a showpony, and does her merc job on the side. We didn't see much of that in the story, and if you had shown it, you wouldn't have had to deal with transitioning her from one state to the other: she'd be both, and hopefully (if you do it right) it'd be flawless.
be proud of your work dude, because it's a good one
you did what you wanted and stayed loyal to what you wanted to write, you already said it but....oh come i'll do it
YOU'RE A WRITER !
you based Trixie on how you see her and how you want he to evolve with this kind of event and it worked well
and as you said, it was written at the first person...so it's going to be about Trixie
still as always the best parts will always be the fightings parts.
I admit the swearing parts with Trixie can come as weird....we're not used to see her swear that much
or even hiding while Sonata is getting job for her.
A lot of us would expect her to put an entire show just to show how great she is at her job like "Trixie is the best in what she does".
but as you said, you used the real Trixie, not the one she created on the show.
So be proud of your work
You got into Phoenix Wright!?
I am so proud!
I enjoyed it quite a lot. Some of the points that said you went wrong were kind of true, but in some cases this benefited my enjoyment. Like Trixie being more like Floyd than Trixie, I don't like Trixie as much as some, I do however like Floyd. Really the only complaint I have is that it's to short
.
I look at it this way most, if not ALL superhero or supervillain origins? Are just meant to establish two things. Establish what they can do, if they have powers, or WHY they're doing it and most of them can be summed up in ONE sentence. The Hulk? Hit by gamma radiation. Superman? Alien from another planet who was raised in Kansas. Batman? Parents shot and devoted his life to crime fighting. Spider-Man? Bit by spider, Uncle died because of a decision he made, became superhero. The Flash? Police scientist struck by lightning.
A LOT of these kind of origins just need to TOUCHED on, but not exactly made the focus. SOME origin stories can carry an entire story or movie..... Others cannot!!!
2898095
Well, I'm trying to be more self aware. You already made the review, so the strikes are actually me acknowledging the fics flaws. It came a little bit over dramatic, but that's basically my signature by this point.
Of course it ended with missteps, but some are bigger than I expected and kinda should avoid them seeing how much time and work I put on this one. Also, with each re-read I give to the thing, it looks more and more like a Michael Bay film. I respect the guy, but I want to take things more serious than that.
I will take that suggestion for future projects, especially if I do another crossover (which is the most probable scenario). But I won't change My Deadly Shot, I may be emulating The Bay, but it'll be a nice day in hell before I use the tactics of The Lucas.
2898162
Oh, I AM proud of it. If I wasn't I wouldn't be defending it, wouldn't I? But still, if I want to improve, I need to be self aware and acknowledge my work's flaws.
Like you said, Deadshot!Trixie was too different from what we're used to see in a Trixie centered fic. Granted, most of Trixie!Fics are around the "Great and Powerful" which I usually avoid, but still it could have been less 'grim and gritty' anyways.
2898403
Meh, it was like one of those "Everything Wrong With..." videos. Not the kindest ones, but with a brutal honesty that can help a lot.
Well, the "show vs tell" has become more of a taste thing over the time (Hitchcock even used to jump the rope with the line between those two), but there was a lot of narration that went too deep into explanations instead of actions or dialogue, which kinda stops the story for explanations' sake.
Well, leaving how the fic was constructed apart, I think is a big flaw to miss a character's portrait. It kinda defeats the purpose of having a character if there's no use for said character's character (I dare you to say that multiple times faster).
2898633
And another meme-based fandom I fell into.
2899041
Yeah, maybe If I find a good story to tell it will have a continuation. But right now I feel I should find a way to reconcile Trixie with her actual characterization before doing so.
2900191
Okay the origins are important, but not the only story available to tell. For example, there is What's so funny bout truth, justice and the american way? which drives the point home without constantly retelling us that Supes comes from Krypton/Kansas. Hell, it doesn't even tell us the origins of the characters that debuted in the story. It just tell us the story.