Hap Reviews: Contest Entries 6 · 1:04pm Nov 22nd, 2019
Hello again, folks. Today we have a couple of stories that looked promising; one that reminded me of a story I myself wrote back in 2016 (one of the most popular ones, too!), and a short story that I actually spent a good long time having to think about, as the things I ended up finding interesting about the story took a few rereads to sink in.
Let's see how they did!
Worshipping at the Altar of Knowledge, by TCC56
I like this premise. I liked it so much I even wrote about this premise in 2016 (Part-Time Goddess (and the Church of Post)). Pony gets worshipped as a god. Pony realises this is happening. Pony speaks to cult, finds they're all big old embarrassing numpties and decided to let them get on with it, with a few adjustments. The end.
This one is about Twilight, however! Specifically after she becomes the proper Princess of Equestria. This time it's framed more as a dark cult than a saturday church club. They both have salads, though. I opted to go for the potato salad option, whereas here it seems TCC56 has gone for fruit salad...
I was a bit floored by how similar they were, and a lot of the things I liked about this story feel redundant to go over since they're things I've gone and done myself. I feel the pacing here is more organised, less dialogue heavy, and I like the focus this story puts on Celestia and Luna in the earlier phases of the story. It's short, clocking in at just under 5K words, and still tries to divide itself into three separate parts, trying to give even focus on all of them: discovery, conflict, and resolution.
The story is funny, too, and made the corners of my lips raise three times, once per chapter. I counted. This is quite good for a story! I imagine quite a few people will find the humour very entertaining, given the differences between how well jokes land for me and how well they land for others...
I feel that the even focus on each phase of the story leaves it feeling a bit unbalanced. The final chapter feels disproportionately comedic compared to the other two. Twilight's character in the first chapter also feels somewhat off to me, perhaps a bit too sharp and mean, though I also feel this is swiftly corrected in the other two chapters. I would have liked to see more of the conflict between Twilight and the cult, perhaps before she went and spoke to Celestia? Who knows.
The cult's dialogue is excellent and my favourite bit of this story. It's good stuff and I especially liked how it was formatted to be more of a big clump of dialogue than equispaced like conventional dialogue would be. I normally frown at fancy formatting but I found this one landed quite well for me.
All in all it was a bit of a surreal experience going over this story, and I feel I'm disproportionately biased when talking about it.
Who would enjoy this? Does the prospect of Twilight getting a cult make you curious? Did you read Part-Time Goddess and enjoyed it? If either of those things fit you and you have something of a funny-bone, I think you'll enjoy this story quite a bit. It's quick, snappy, and even rather thoughtful at times. It's worth a read and short enough that on the off-chance the comedy doesn't land for you, you won't have committed a lot to it, so there's not much excuse for you to at least try it out.
To be Kind, by brokenimage321
I had to re-read this one once or twice since I initially didn't like it and was struggling with the concept of reviewing it, since I try to keep some positive stuff in these reviews and belabouring negative points isn't what I want these to be about. After going over it again I was able to find some more merit with the story.
Here, it appears that Fluttershy has become Princess. Not 100% sure how, given how it ends up. She's somehow managed to defeat every villain in Equestria except for two: tabloid press and Starlight Glimmer.
This, frankly, is weird to me, since Starlight is literally one of the more redeemable villains of the show. It's become highly frustrating to me to hear folks bang on and on about her reformation being garbage when it's given far more depth and time to develop than pretty much any other bad guy's reformation, barring perhaps Discord. Supposedly Fluttershy has dealt with the likes of Tirek, Chrysalis, and Cozy Glow which I find rather unbelievable, considering how much she's struggling with Glimmy-Glam (and Glimmy was basically just a control-freak who never got told off and then angry that Twilight took away her toys; pretty easy to handle once you slap them with consequences, as Twilight did). I can't tell if this is just oversight, or whether this is just another example of the usual 'Glimmy shouldn't have been reformed! Raagh!'.
The story presents that Fluttershy has become so batty trying to reform this one pony that she has resorted to wiping her memory each day for a few years now. You might be wondering, Hap, isn't that stupid, and surely anyone with a sensible head on their shoulders would realise that? I would reply, um, yes. Fluttershy is unable to be hard on Glimmy and deal with her the way she needed to be dealt with (in this case, shouted at, loudly, and be shown consequences for her actions, which if we recall is what Twilight did, initiating the slow process of causing Glimmy Glammy to give up control). The story tries to disassociate itself with the Breezie episode by referencing it. I would argue that it fails. It is the same conflict and Fluttershy has just forgotten that particular lesson, or never learned it the same way in this universe.
These, as you can see, are my problems with the story. It prioritises drama and presenting the scenario over making sense, and whilst I'm down for a little bit of that, it's hard for me to get too invested in Fluttershy's emotional turmoil (the meat of the story) when I feel she's been pretty heavily dumbed down. Being mean for good reasons has been a conflict she has had ample introduction to, even before season 3's finale (when she would have become an alicorn, I imagine..,?). It may not be easy for her and it may never become easy, but this feels like an exaggeration to me.
There are merits to this story, however, and these are things that took me a second reading to sink in, since initially I was having a big old struggle suspending my disbelief for the reasons above. The story is a strong deconstruction on why Fluttershy would be highly unsuitable for rulership, and this is intentional as far as I can tell. It's very compelling to see how poor a ruler she would make when we see her insecure at every turn, unable to even answer questions to a reporter without breaking down into tears, and of course, as we can see above, go absolutely batshit insane (though I'd argue, and still do, that this is by far the weakest part of the story).
The story is competently put together too, outside of the gaps in logic I mentioned. I like the way it flicks between an interview with Fluttershy, between worldbuilding, and between Fluttershy dealing with Glimmy and the emotional struggle that results. Were I to have no problems with the premise and logic I would be wholeheartedly recommending the story. For 4.5K words it is easy to digest, very well paced, and gives a reader ample time to absorb information given and appreciate multiple facets of Fluttershy's rule.
Regardless, I feel it did not work well for me. Maybe I'm just grumpy. Maybe I misunderstood some of what the author was going for. Who knows, but here we are.
Who would like this? The story is fine. It's okay. I don't like it but plenty of others evidently do by the rating. If you're happy to suspend some disbelief and have more of a seasons 1-2 vision of Fluttershy in your mind, then for 4.5K words this'll be fine. If you like deconstructing Fluttershy, then even if like me you disagree with some stuff presented, it'll at least be a fun academic read to consider, as it does bring some interesting thoughts to the table, and the concept is very strong. I'd have liked to see maybe a longer version that fleshes out the leaps in logic and progression of Fluttershy's character from sensible-if-soft shygal to the worst ruler I've seen in a while.
I'm afraid I'm seriously running low on the energy required to read through more of these, since reading tires me out. I still think 11 reviewed is a pretty good run, though. If there are any particularly interesting stories you folks have found on your own adventures through this contest, feel free to recommend them to me and I'll do my best to take a look!
Regardless of how I feel about some of the entries, I feel that all of them have been at the very least interesting and thought provoking, and it was interesting to go through them and try to formulate my thoughts on them. Hopefully if anyone else takes a look at them you find it as engaging as I did.
Cheerio,
Hap
Thanks for the review! For what it's worth, I apologize that "To Be Kind" didn't quite do it for you.
If you don't mind, I wanted to add a couple clarifications. I will admit that I use a lot of hints and implications in my writing, so I apologize if these details weren't clear...
...or that's my two cents on it, anyways. Author is dead, etc. Not trying to sound whiny, etc., but I thought I'd clarify what I was going for.
Thanks again for the review!
5159106
No need to apologise. The only thing worth apologising for is not trying, and I think the polish that went into the story, regardless of my personal problems with it, is ample demonstration that effort went into the story.
I went over the story a few times and did consider the interpretations you offered, but I would have liked to see them given more development and focus. It's entirely possible that your method of trying to translate these ideas simply doesn't fit me very well, in a manner similar to what you're describing between Fluttershy and Starlight.
I should hope you don't take me too seriously though! I am quite aware that the story seems to have done very well for itself (far better than mine) and at the end of the day my interpretation is just one of many.
…"as well as XXX"?
5160769 Whoops, looks like I hadn't finished that section.
Something, something, introduce the second story I talked about was what was supposed to go there. Evidently my large, capital letters reminder was a failure.
I do so love it when a plan fails to come together.