Paul's Thursday Reviews CCXXXIX · 4:37pm Feb 18th, 2021
Before anything else: yes, I live in Texas. Yes, things are kinda icky over here. To summarize:
But don’t worry, folks. I’m okay. I’m going to be okay. Compared to a lot of people, this hasn’t been a big deal for me. I’ve had a few hours of power loss and oh no, the office is closed so I haven’t been able to work all week. So sad. But seriously, I’m doing fine.
Let’s have a shout-out to JawJoe, who has a semi-regular blog going right now about writing tips. This past weekend he released The Obligatory Post About Strong Female Characters (yes, that’s actually the title). What I like about it is that it approaches the topic from a perspective I’ve not seen before, but which is both recognizable and personable; it’s like it’s something I’ve always known but never known how to put into words.
I question this “treat women like people” thing JawJoe references and dismisses in the blog. I admit I don’t go around reading writer advice columns, so I’m not in the know, but is that really the common advice people give on this subject? How is anyone supposed to take anything from that? It’s got to be one of the most useless bits of advice I’ve ever heard, and I’m glad JJ calls it out.
I know this is a common topic, but I love strong female characters (which may have something to do with why I love MLP so much). What bothers me is when people completely fail to understand what that phrase means. 1998’s Mulan wasn’t instantly popular because she could kick ass, she achieved that through determination, hard work, and triumphing over seemingly insurmountable odds both physical and cultural (haven’t seen the reboot, so no opinion there). Compare that to Captain Marvel, who was threatened by absolutely nothing and at times was kind of a jerk. What happened to you, Disney? People didn’t like Natasha Romanoff for the skin-tight suit (well, not only the suit).
So, yeah. Go read JJ’s blog. It’s a different take on a common subject. You’ve got to respect the idea of a strong female character (to say nothing of women in the first place) before you can actually write one.
Let’s get to the reviews, shall we?
Stories for This Week:
Breaking Babs by D G D Davidson
Princess Cadance Goes on a Shipping Spree by Dandereshy
The Fruits of Their Labors by Ponydora Prancypants
Grooming A Student by avidreader07
Blueblood: Hero of Equestria by Raleigh
The Masquerade by Monochromatic
Colors by Slateblu1
How Time Flies by Seer
The Mares' Vengeance Pact by Lise
Sunset's Isekai by Wanderer D
Total Word Count: 539,420
Rating System
Why Haven't You Read These Yet?: 1
Pretty Good: 5
Worth It: 3
Needs Work: 0
None: 0
Breaking Babs
4,727 Words
By D G D Davidson
In this re-imagining of the Season 3 episode One Bad Apple, Scootaloo decides that the best way to deal with Babs Seed being a bully is to fight. Literally. She asks Rainbow to teach her how to fight, who agrees without knowing Scoot’s real goals.
The story takes on the “Scootaloo is an orphan” gimmick, but does it in a way that doesn’t feel like it’s forced or melodramatic. Instead, the concept partially guides Scootaloo’s actions and desires, only taking center stage in a couple brief but important instances. It was tactful, and that’s something I greatly appreciate when being around this overdone trope.
There’s also this curious idea of the “knocker”. The story runs on the idea that while Scootaloo is an orphan, she never went into any orphanages because Ponyville has none. Instead, all of Ponyville knows about and supports her; she can knock on any door in town and expect a warm meal and a bed for at least one night. D G D Davidson doesn’t go into the details about this, which is certainly better for the story, but it does raise a ton of questions. It’s a concept that warrants exploring. By itself, it’s not all that believable – why couldn’t Scoots have been sent to an out-of-town orphanage? – but the idea is enough to have me looking for potential justifications, to say nothing for the implications for Scootaloo and Equestria in general. As such, I thoroughly approved.
That being said, I’m sure there will be some readers who will see the idea and give it a big, fat “Nope!”. And I can’t blame them. It can be hard to swallow on the surface.
But this is all ancillary to the point, which is Scootaloo making a serious mistake that costs her in big ways. The story is, on the surface, a lesson about bullying and when fighting is or isn’t appropriate. The lesson is a bit obtuse, but I approve of the author’s method of showing us the repercussions.
A solid read for any Scootaloo fan, especially considering it avoids Scootabuse and instead utilizes the Scootaorphan concept intelligently. I’m starting to get the feeling that D G D Davidson is an underappreciated author.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good!
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Love on the Reef — Pretty Good
To My Princess, on the Day of My Departure — Pretty Good
Catching the Wind — Needs Work
Princess Cadance Goes on a Shipping Spree
5,092 Words
By Dandereshy
Ponies these days just don’t appreciate Princess Cadance like they used to. But she’s going to change that. She’s going to give them all exactly what they want. Whether they like it or not.
This is an odd one. The story starts off with the revelation that many ponies come to Cadance demanding she force the pony of their dreams to love them, which she adamantly refuses to do because it’s (obviously) immoral. But then, for no apparent reason, she goes nuts and starts to do exactly that.
Then Shining tells her to stop, so she does. It’s a very anticlimactic ending.
This story makes no sense, and I say that without consideration to its base premise. This was a problem for me, as I spent too much time trying to understand why the heck Cadance had even decided to start doing this to get into the humor of it. Most of that humor involved “Cadance ships pony with X”, where X may be any random other character or object, animate or not.
That may be enough for a lot of people. The upvote ratio certainly supports that theory. I imagine if you’re the kind of person who can be told, directly, that something happened and start laughing then you’ll find this hilarious. But for me, the depiction of these scenes just wasn’t there. You can’t just say “X started making out with Y” and expect me to start laughing. This concept needed a lot of narrative support (and by “support” I mean “wit”), but that support never really came. Tack on an ending where Shining essentially says “Stop it” and Cadance says “Okay,” and I’m left more confused than amused.
I for one would absolutely love to see this concept done justice. I hate to say it because I genuinely like Dandereshy’s work, but I just don’t think this pulled that off. Even so, I’m still going to rate it on the middle ground because, clearly, there is a large audience of appreciative readers for this.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
366 Hours — Incomplete
The Fruits of Their Labors
29,005 Words
By Ponydora Prancypants
Sequel to The Fires of Friendship
Ah, Ponydora Prancypants. They were developing into one of the best authors on the site until they tragically disappeared without explanation in… 2015? I think. Seriously, check out The Flight of the Alicorn when you get the opportunity. It’s one of my all-time favorite Rarity-centric adventures.
The Fruits of Their Labors, written way back in 2013, is set in a world where Applejack and Rarity were the closest of friends as foals, but grew apart and even became enemies until Twilight showed up and unintentionally forced them to tolerate one another. In the prior story, AJ and Rares finally mended their friendship. Recently Rarity finds herself being invited to Manehattan Fashion Week by Hoity Toity, and the whole idea has her terrified. So she asks the pony he trusts more than any other to accompany her for moral support. Applejack is… hesitant. That hesitation isn’t because she doesn’t care for the big city, but instead because she has family there, and she isn’t thrilled about the idea of bumping into them.
Or, to be succinct: Rarity does Fashion Horse things while Applejack struggles to reconcile with her mother’s side of the family. We have to bear in mind that at the time of writing there was no canon regarding AJ’s parents, because in this version Applejack’s mother was an Orange, not a Pear. This made plenty of sense at the time, as the show does specifically reference them as “Aunt and Uncle Orange”, and many people made similar conclusions in their stories before Hasbro decided to correct the record.
Ponydora Prancypants’ methods were a bit questionable this time. The story starts off being about Applejack, but before long AJ essentially takes a back seat so that Rarity can be the star. This is fine overall, but it does leave a glaring hole in the whole “Applejack reconnects with her family” part. Oh, eventually we do get to the big family reunion, but there was very clearly a potentially dramatic and unpleasant moment before that, a scene that only Applejack witnessed. As a result, we don’t. It was a prime opportunity to really showcase Applejack’s situation and the author skipped it in favor of a faster and less effective conclusion with Rarity as the only real player. I am disappointed.
Also, there’s the fact that Applejack disappears for a whole day, and when she’s found she’s doing something that could land her in jail had anypony present desired to charge her, and there’s no explanation for why she was doing it. It’s just “hey, AJ’s doing this, now we’ll move on.”
So the directing could have been a little better. This sort of problem was prevalent in Ponydora’s earlier works.
But the story is still a strong one. It’s got a budding OTP romance (which gets a little steamy, though nothing to warrant an M rating), Rarity rediscovering her identity as a Ponyville mare, and Applejack coming to terms with her Orange family heritage. The ending features several cameos of popular ponies for the time in a way that didn’t feel distasteful or forced, there are some surprisingly good ponified lyrics of a couple songs, and our two protagonists work as well together as can be hoped.
Things may have gone a little too smoothly for all involved, but if you’re seeking a stress-free romance that does a little more than just romance, this should fit the bill. Another nice story by Ponydora. A shame they disappeared before finishing the sequel.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good!
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
The Flight of the Alicorn — WHYRTY?
The Fires of Friendship — Pretty Good
Giant Enemy Carb — Worth It
Que Sera Sera — Needs Work
The Ties That Bind — Needs Work
Grooming A Student
3,738 Words
By avidreader07
Requested by avidreader07
Princess Celestia’s new student is starting to feel a little homesick. She decides to try an outdated practice to help her feel better: grooming.
The cover art is a little deceptive, what withTwilight looking annoyed, but I imagine the author’s options were limited on this subject. At any rate, the story is set in two parts: first, setting the scene, and then the actual act of grooming. The former is a worldbuilding piece in which Celestia describes, in very vague terms, how she became an alicorn. The latter part is exactly what it sounds like.
The grooming is… curious, and not in a bad way. Of course, grooming is something animals – horses included – do for one another, so it’s reasonable to imagine that it might have once been part of Equestrian culture. At the same time, seeing one of our beloved ponis doing it for another is strange, simply because it isn’t normal for our culture. It’s an entertaining piece, if only for the sheer cuteness of filly Twilight going through with it and Momlestia being the groomer.
I can think of nothing particularly negative to say, except that perhaps it took a little long to get to the point. I would recommend it to anyone looking for a slightly different brand of Celestia/Twilight bonding.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Getting Back In The Swing Of Things — Pretty Good
Blueblood: Hero of Equestria
419,164 Words
By Raleigh
Prince Blueblood. Once, he was a namby-pamby pony prince. Now he is known as a national hero and icon. The first member of Princess Luna’s Commissariat, he played a critical role in the war against the changelings that followed the invasion of Canterlot. His memoirs are immensely popular and considered essential by the Equestrian government in maintaining the population’s positive image of the military structure.
These are not the memoirs published for the public. No, what we have here are Blueblood’s personal memoirs, written privately with a far better grasp on the reality and horrors of war. They are presently classified, restricted only to the princesses themselves and a select few trusted ponies.
This was highly entertaining. Written as if put down by the prince himself, it comes off as pessimistic, self-critical, and to some degree even self-shaming. On top of him being a pompous, self-centered ass, of course. This is a Blueblood who believes his entire reputation and public perception to be a lie and criticizes even his most noble and brave feats – of which there are surprisingly many – as selfish cowardice.
The Blueblood who comes out of this story is a fairly complex individual. He’s snobbish, arrogant, elitist, and cowardly. Yet he’s also at times kind, friendly, self-aware, and never defeatist under any circumstances. Blueblood, for all his faults, is one who never stops thinking about the best solution to a problem. In a way, he is ideally suited to his task of Commissar; his special talent for navigation clearly extends beyond mere cartography, including every aspect of his life and his place in the war effort. Whether he is aware of that or not is unclear.
Accompanying this fascinating protagonist is an ever-witty narrative, an ongoing war that is as brutal as any you’ve likely read, and an Equestrian government that is rife with corruption and failure. The government in particular appears to be at least inspired by the modern American Congress, the members of which care only about ensuring they win the next election and who are perfectly willing to stall the war or pointlessly sacrifice soldiers’ lives in that endeavor, to say nothing of placing the blame of failure on anyone and anything that happens to not be them. Watching Luna walk into the Equestrian Parliament and tell the collective nobleponies there that they’re bloody idiots (to use kinder vocabulary) was pretty awesome, even if it amounted to precious little.
Speaking of Luna, another major element of the story is Blueblood’s relationship with his ‘aunty’. Luna is the sole reason he’s on the front lines at all, having mistaken him as sharing her sense of military honor and duty. Luna is, in many ways, the impetus of the entire story, and so what she does and how Blueblood perceives her plays a critical – if not always foremost – role in ongoing events. Putting Blueblood’s fear, respect, and perhaps resentment for her next to his total and undying loyalty and love for Celestia creates just one more interesting dynamic in the exploration of his character.
Of course, there’s also the war itself. It may surprise you to hear that in ~420,000 words, only three battles actually occur. That’s right, three. The vast majority of the story is setting the scene, preparing for combat, dallying around waiting for the timing to be right, or even outright procrastinating. This isn’t a story where some great military mind leads troops to victory after victory, but a gradual slog that spends most of its time with no fighting going on at all. This forces us to devote our attention to other matters, such as Blueblood’s personal struggle with his reputation and duties, his relationship with the soldiers under his command and his fellow officers, and the fits of drama that tend to arise around him. It’s also a pointed and remarkable demonstration of the complete ineptitude of the Equestrian Army, which is incapable of so much as a parade march without first having a dozen forms signed in triplicate. Once more, we are shown the bitter truth of how bureaucracy exists purely to make things worse.
But when the fighting does happen, Raleigh delivers. The battles are always desperate, the situations tend to be dire, and there’s no hiding the bloody nature of things. Despite all his best efforts, Blueblood regularly finds himself in the thick of the fighting and, more often than not, at a critical point where his actions alone can sway events. Be it two armies converging in a crush of bodies in a desert valley or correcting the profoundly bad decisions of doe-eyed officers who thought the enemy would just casually die for them, Blueblood regularly demonstrates his capacity as an officer and soldier. That he paints all his actions through a lens of cowardice and selfishness only makes the events that much more interesting.
Complementing this even further is a relentless stream of interesting characters of varying types. We’ve got career officers who see the war effort and the lives of soldiers as nothing more than stepping stones to promotion. We’ve got politicians masquerading as officers. We’ve got former criminals trying to turn a new leaf. We’ve got (admittedly awesome) drill sergeants that can cow even Equestrian heroes. We’ve got eager, naive young commissars hoping to learn from the legend that is Blueblood, who in turn longs to help them escape the terrible programming put into her by Luna’s overbearing new organization. Let’s not forget his ever-loyal, ever-present aid who happens to possess what may be the worst hygiene on Equus. And those are just the OCs. Luna, Celestia, Shining Armor, Twilight, and Rainbow Dash all make significant contributions while Rarity and Cadance make some cameos early on.
I could keep going, but I’ve got to end this at some point. What’s truly important here is that Raleigh gives us a story with a fascinating protagonist, a witty narrative, and tons of different but interesting plot threads to keep things going in long stretches between battles. I was entertained from beginning to end.
If I had to put down a particular flaw, it would in fact be the slow nature of the story. If you came here looking for an onslaught of epic battles against changelings, you will be sorely disappointed. The writing style reminds me of a less extreme variant of Scyphi’s Grief is the Price We Pay, which had a tendency to extrapolate at length for entire chapters on subjects of minimal importance. Blueblood: Hero of Equestria is nowhere near that bad about it, but it may still annoy the more impatient readers among us who just want to get to the next important scene rather than listen to Blueblood whine about his stinky aid, his ongoing migraine, and his unsatisfied libido (three of his favorite subjects to whine about).
Still, if you can get past that issue then you’ll find a story ripe with wit, adventure, drama, and the best and worst ponies Equestrian society has to offer in the midst of a real and deadly war against a determined and tricky foe. I look forward to the day Raleigh finishes the sequel so I can continue the war in earnest, even as I cry at knowing it will be a very long time before I can get to it.
Bookshelf: Why Haven’t You Read These Yet?
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
The Masquerade
6,119 Words
By Monochromatic
Sequel to The Princess's Gift
Twilight Sparkle is Princess Rarity’s permanent bodyguard, her “shadow”, as the nobles have taken to calling her, and she is obsessed with her job. It’s easy to be obsessed with the protection of a pony when you’re also obsessed with the pony. But tonight is to be a nightmare: the annual masquerade ball. Dozens, maybe even hundreds of ponies gallivanting about in elaborate dresses and masks, and Twilight wasn’t allowed to escort her princess to the event. Now she has to find Rarity and pray to whomever will listen that she doesn’t get flirty with somepony who isn’t her. After all, the masquerade ball is also known as an event for romance…
Everybody’s favorite Mono keeps the RariTwi groove going, and for that we all love and adore her. Unlike the previous story, in which Twilight trains a crushing Rarity in fencing but maintains a certain distance, here we see her constantly thinking about things relating to Rarity. What dress is she wearing, where is she going, what is she planning, how is she going to do it, what are the risks involved, and – most importantly – how do I keep the suitors away from her long enough to become one myself? It’s made all the sweeter when Rarity does show up and unrepentantly teases Twilight throughout the majority of it. And of course there’s the conclusion, which will make every hopeless romantic grin like a cheshire cat.
Short review is short, but there’s not much else to say. If you’re familiar with and enjoy Mono’s fics, then there’s every reason to pounce on this endearing bit of RariTwi fluff.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good!
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
The Enchanted Library — WHYRTY?
The Princess's Gift — Pretty Good
The Princess's Choice — Worth It
The Queen's Secret Crush — Worth It
Colors
1,749 Words
By Slateblu1
Sequel to The First Step
It hasn’t been long since Sunset was slammed by an orbital rainbow cannon. Vice-Principal Luna has been helping her, acting as a sort of therapist. It helps, especially now that Sunset faces a very real depression. Today, she’s taking a break from her friends. They have so much energy, and she has so little these days. But one of those friends decides to make an appearance anyway.
Despite the bittersweet subject matter, I found this to be a pleasant piece. It’s all about Sunset’s quiet struggle against depression and Rainbow coming by to let her know that she doesn’t have to face it alone. In an unusual move, this one doesn’t feature a boisterous, annoying Rainbow shoving her nose where it doesn’t belong, but a patient and contemplative Rainbow who just wants Sunset to know that she knows. I rather liked that – and the implications it may have for Rainbow, as well.
The only issue is some slip ups in the writing. For example, the pointless repetition in the first paragraph:
She needed some time alone. Her friends were full of so much energy. She couldn’t keep up sometimes. Today, she just needed some time alone.
Far more grievous to me is the use of phrases that don’t mean what the author apparently thinks they do:
“So, how are you?” Rainbow asked after a fashion.
After a fashion? So Rainbow didn’t say that, just something similar? Why aren’t we seeing what she actually said? Why write something completely different but similar in meaning when you could have just wrote her actual dialogue? Yeah, it’s pretty obvious Slateblu1 has no idea what “after a fashion” actually means.
But ignoring the weird slip-ups with the writing, this is a decent sequel to its predecessor. Nothing fantastic, but certainly worthwhile. It gets an added bonus for not being as heavy-handed with its messaging as The First Step.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
The First Step — Worth It
How Time Flies
6,486 Words
By Seer
Sequel to Time
The inevitable has come. Rarity is dead, and Celestia can only mourn her lost love.
Well, no. There’s still one option…
This is what I might refer to as a “beautiful tragedy”, even if it lacks the appropriate tag. It’s all about Celestia being too feeble-minded to move on after the death of the pony she loves more than life, and the extreme measures she’ll go to in order to fix that.
I find it hard to believe that Celestia would fall into this emotional trap, but I’m willing to suspend my sense of disbelief considering Seer handles the subject so well. It’s an emotional story thick with the pain of loss, with a twist ending that reveals just how deep the rabbit hole has gone so far. As a lover of sadfics, I thoroughly approve.
The only thing I would point out is that there are a number of mistakes within the writing, mostly in the form of odd or nonsensical “sentences” that suggest an editing snafu. For example:
"I... well, is this you want?"
It doesn’t happen that often, but often enough to suggest Seer made no attempts as proofing the story.
Other than that? This will be a surefire hit for sadficionados everywhere. If you like tragedies, romances, Rarity, or Celestia, then this should go on your radar. It feels vastly underviewed, and you don’t have to have read Time to get into it, so go give it a read.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good!
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Time — Pretty Good
The Mares' Vengeance Pact
5,238 Words
By Lise
Sequel to Discord's After-Mails
In a long series of chaotic mails, Discord has finally found that Octavia is the mare so infatuated with him, and now the two are set to live together. Forgotten in the nonsense is that he’s got a lot of mares interested in him, and not all are willing to let his, *ahem*, “poor” choice in mares slide. This is why Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie are meeting at the Carousel Boutique: to plot their revenge. If only they weren’t simultaneously preparing for a wedding...
Following in the footsteps of its predecessors, this is a silly story in which we listen to Pinkie, Rarity, and Twilight conjure up potential punishments for the draconequus who so foolishly ripped their hearts to pieces. At least, that’s how they see it. But Rainbow Dash is getting married to one of Discord’s daughters soon, and all three have responsibilities regarding the marriage that they’re trying to take care of while trying to figure out how to best destroy Discord.
Rarity was my favorite, constantly fanning the flames with her incessant marshmelodrama while also struggling to maintain a public facade of decency and finishing the wedding dresses. To be honest, she feels like the heart of the story, with Twilight being the audience’s eyes and Pinkie being a secondary character. They weren’t slouches though, with Pinkie’s struggling attention span and Twilight temporal-themed revenge schemes holding their own in wackiness. Rarity was simply the most… blatantly theatrical. As she is.
This was fun. Ultimately pointless, but still fun. It earns points for being a story in the series not told from Discord’s perspective. Those who enjoyed the previous entries in this series will almost certainly have fun with this one.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
I Drain Fillyfoolery?! — Pretty Good
Dear Discord, I hate you so much! — Worth It
Dear Someone, I Discord you so! — Worth It
Seven Scrolls For Discord — Pretty Good
Discord's After-Mails — Pretty Good!
Sunset's Isekai
58,102 Words (Continuation: Chapters 16-29)
By Wanderer D
Sunset’s Isekai is a bar that exists outside of time and space, run by everyone’s favorite Bacon Human. It receives a great many visitors, but sometimes she gets a ‘different’ kind. She calls those “Personal” guests, and she finds that she usually has something more to offer them than drinks.
The story continues apace, but with gradual changes. There comes a point when finding people to collaborate with you gets hard. Wanderer D answered this problem by simply joining Sunset’s Isekai with non-MLP material, which includes the likes of Babylon 5, the rebooted Duck Tales, the rebooted She-Ra, and so on.
But that doesn’t mean the collaborations are over. Within these chapters alone, WD manages to work with the likes of Winter Quill, Fan of Most Everything, ChibiRenamon, and Pascoite. I have to acknowledge that the Ambergris collab was my favorite chapter. It also tickles me that every few chapters, someone has to point out that Bulletproof Heart Rarity is a total bombshell.
It also interests me that Sunset seems to be only growing in power. Apparently owning an interdimensional bar is enough to gradually give you incredible powers that render most creatures you encounter on your multiversal adventures in awe, although said powers are nebulous at best. Of course WD could just be using the ol’ “any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic” angle (which is kind of awkward when we’re talking about actual magic-magic, but you know, same general idea). I like this element, but I feel it could use a bit more clarity.
Overall, I enjoyed my second romp through the Isekai, and I’m looking forward to more. As is usual of incompleted stories, I won’t be ranking this. Even so, it is safe to say that this would still land safely in my “Pretty Good” bookshelf.
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Gunsmoke — WHYRTY?
Sunset's Isekai – Review I — Incomplete
Stories for Next Week:
Twilight's Dollhouse by Kaidan
Time of Death by Starscribe
Rarity Bakes Snickerdoodles by LimeAttack
Unsung by Fabby
Anonception by Thought Prism
Drip by ambion
This Is Gonna Be A Blast! by Eddy13
Mother of Nations by Benman
Thirsty by Samey90
Let the Silence Sing 2 by Aegis Shield
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Here is the problem with Texas, they don't have stuff winterized. They can't import energy from other states because their grid is independent from the others so they can avoid federal regulations. They also don't have nearly enough in the way of snow plows, even up in the northern part where they do get snow sometimes, much less in the southern part where snow is extremely rare.
It is good to see you have power though given that many parts of the state don't have it.
Then there is snow in the UK where everything just shuts down.
Hey, a fellow Texan! Like you, I am in Texas. Unlike you, we have been without power since our power company warned us of a “45 minute shutdown” on Monday. Luckily, our family is from much colder climates, so we are handling the cold fine and helping our neighbors where we can. The lack of power is getting old though. Still, glad you and yours are alright.
Sunset's awesomesauce.
5456331 My sister lives in San Antonio. I sent an email to all my siblings saying roughly "Sick of the cold. We're all coming to stay with you until it warms up." She sent back a picture of her back yard and a set of onions who just barely stuck their green tips out of the snowbank. We decided to stay in Kansas for now. (although it's supposed to be in the 70s by the end of next week)
I'd disagree with Jawjoe's post (and I'd put this there, but at least on mobile, there's no place for comments). It feels about 20-30 years out of date. Specifically because he makes the inaccurate claim at the end that if you write them as a character, they just end up a man.
This isn't true at all. One of the reasons the common advice, which was reiterated multiple times by women authors at LTUE just this last week, is to write them as a character first is because writing "strong female character" or "strong male character" ends up being a dive right down the hole into stereotypes. If you write a "strong character" gender will come into it, but after you've worked out a lot of what else makes this character strong, be that their firm kindness (one of the panels at LTUE talked about MLP:FiM), their love of music, or other attributes.
Jawjoe's advice is more to dive headfirst into the strongest identifiers of sex you can find and build everything around those. That's going to produce a character that's been pigeonholed. You can create a character that is a gender yet still displays their own sense of self and identify that isn't solely defined by their gender.
Or as one woman at LTUE put it: I can like fluffy dresses and hiking, darn it!
Jawjoe's advice will push you toward writing specific tropes of characters. Not that we can't write those, but there's a lot of range outside of that.
I will say, we do have it good up here in the north where our infrastructure was designed to handle cold weather. And we're taught how to drive in snow cause we actually get it regularly. Otherwise, on the topic of the Mulan remake, it absolutely sucked and I hate it. Every pitfall of Captain Marvel is there too, and they removed every single bit of humor present in the original movie. So glad I didn't pay for the early access to that thing.
Oh hey, thank you for the signal boost. That helps a lot. I hope you're doing okay in the cold over there. Winter seems pretty much over here, and we barely even had a winter.
5456516
Do I make that claim? It wasn't my intention, but looking back, I think I can see why it may seem like that.
It's funny because I think my first book's protagonist, who's this Strong Woman(tm) who doesn't seem like a girly girl at a glance, actually has a line that goes "I'll have you know I actually look great in a dress!" -- so I think we're pretty much in agreement here. Actually, this distinction could make for a good blog post on its own, so let me just make a note of that...
EDIT: Huh, there is definitely a comment section, but apparently it wasn't showing up on mobile. It should be fixed now. Good catch.
5456533
I still say they should've kept Eddie Murphy as the dragon. Not a CG dragon, just Eddie Murphy, and everyone pretends he is a dragon.
5456567
Yes. Right here:
You take the current advice of "write a strong character" and stick (male) into it. This following the claim of—
So yes, this is exactly what you've claimed. You even make the incorrect claim early on in the post that the character of Ripley from Alien was written as a male. It wasn't. It was written genderless (all the crew were) so that the casting crew could pick the best actors for the job, regardless of gender. For example, when speaking about the script, one potential (Helen Mirren) for Ripley said:
Yet you claim the opposite in your post, and use it to make your point. This lack of research and following of assumption based on that lack upends everything you've assumed and claimed afterward, as all of it is incorrect and fashioned wholesale out of cloth. Because this core point of your thesis is simply wrong.
What you've done is reminiscent of a lot of stuff from the early 90s, which resulted largely in fantastic gender stereotyping and painfully cliche character design, and the modern pushback against such pigeonholed female protagonist and a push for more characters that pushed past gender assignments.
In all fairness to the south, the north would be in a similarly tight spot if it was lava we were talking about, and in that case it’d be the Hawaiians laughing.
Grooming a Student looks cute, but the title has a caustic, Timber Spruce-level bad connotation that makes it seem decades out of touch.
I haven’t read JJ’s blog, but I’ll strongly second what
5456516 said. I would take the generic “treat women like people” advice as this: write a character who’s a person befitting the narrative first, then add the relevant pronouns. Gender does inform some aspects of a character, but far fewer than one might expect.
Thanks for the link to JJ's blog, it was an interesting read.
My approach to Strong Female Characters™ was to marry one. That way, anytime I'm writing a SFC and I'm not sure as to how she would react or think in a given situation, I can just ask, "Hey, sweetie! Suppose you were..."
Works like a charm.
5456582
Huh. I distinctly remember reading interviews years ago that Ripley was written specifically as a bog-standard male action hero, originally. I can't seem to find very good sources for it now, but even a cursory search turns up both Ridley Scott and Sigourney Weaver saying that Ripley was conceived as man.
Regarding the rest, I see where you're coming from, but I think it's a misconstruction of the point I was trying to make. I will admit it may be a bit of a foot-in-mouth situation where I put it badly and thus easy to misconstrue, but I don't want to turn this page into a slapfight over every line in my blog and their intended meaning. I would definitely agree that it's wrong that if a character isn't explicitly or stereotypically "feminine" they just end up being men – this is nonsense. My point had more to do with not ignoring a character's gender/sex, as that leaves an important avenue of their personality totally unexplored, which is doubly important when you're writing a woman in a patriarchal society.
Again, I think this topic alone is deserving a blog on its own. This particular one was meant for people who really, really want to write a Strong Female Character(tm), insist on it being feeeeeemale, but just have no clue how to even approach the topic. As Paul points out, that's how you get completely generic, boring characters like Captain Marvel in the recent movie(s). Ironically, while marketed as a "girl power!!" movie, the titular Captain herself could be a man, woman, or Lovecraftian alien, and still be equally bland and uninteresting. I was hoping the blog would help a new writer avoid that.
5456596
This is pretty much it, I'd say. I argue, though, not to treat the character's sex as unimportant, not to make it a superfluous detail, but actually use it to flesh them out – which is part of "write a strong character". So if you go the other way around, write the character first, add sex second, then you've missed out on using the sex to flesh out the character in the first place.
5456617
I think that the question arises with the term "conceived." We know from the actual script that each character was written genderless, and there's a lot of evidence of that out there, such as the Helen Mirren quote. Conceived could (and is very likely to) mean that when the original back-of-a-napkin idea was dreamed up and pitched, it was a standard action-male-protagonist, but then between that point and the script they realized it was stronger by stepping away from that, and went neutral with everyone (as the original script used in casting was completely neutral, the only requirement of gender that the couple that was married be a man and a woman, which has been noted by the movie staff that even today wouldn't be a requirement anymore).
The conception of the idea may have been male. But by the time the script was written, that had been tossed out. Once the casting had been figured out, the script was tailored accordingly.
.
This is why so much of what's said (for example, at this last weekend's LTUE) is "Strong character, gender." Not "Strong gender, character." But "Strong character, gender" doesn't eschew gender. It's clearly there. But it doesn't pigeonhole a character based on their gender either. But a lot of your post shares lines/approach with the kind of "pro-women" dialogue of the 90s that created the "strong gender, character" issue later.
Characters can be strong or weak regardless of their gender. I don't think anyone here would say that Twilight Sparkle or Applejack would be weaker characters if they'd been written male. The strong character is true regardless. MLP lets that strong character meld not only with their gender (female) but also lets what could be gender stereotyping "meld," so to speak, with their strong character.
I get what you were aiming for now, but I think your post misfires on it a bit, because it seems to point more toward the "Strong gender, character" issue that's become a problem.
5456626
I would agree with this. Buuut...
In the particular example of FiM, I would actually add this: I'm under the impression that fundamentally, Lauren Faust deliberately wanted to create a positive, feminist show. The fact that the main characters are all so diverse and different and, indeed, strong in more than one way, not just physically, while still being girls, was the point. "There is more than one way to be a girl" and all that.
I think the show would've lost a lot if it had been, say, an equal number of male and female protagonists; it could have been done, because of course a strong character doesn't rely on their gender, and so individually, the characters of FiM would have been just as good and strong as well – and yet, the show would have been lesser for it.
5456627
I disagree (and this may have to be a point where we agree to disagree). MLP was created specifically with an all-female main cast, yes. We know this because Lauren Faust specifically stated that as her objective. But if it hadn't been her objective? If her objective had been to have male and female protagonists to show something like "Hey, both genders can be friends and enjoy one another's company in a wide range of activities?" It wouldn't have been any weaker. The characters still would have been strong, regardless of their gender.
What you've said here is that the show would be lesser if it hadn't embraced author intent, but then tied this to the gender, which is entirely inconsequential outside of in the case of MLP:FiM being the author intent. Would the show be lesser if the author intent was an all-female cast but was forced into something else? Yes. But would it be if the intent had been, for example, "guys and girls can have fun together" and the characters were a range of genders?
No. Because the intent would be honored.
MLP:FiM's characters would have been solidly designed however Faust approached it, because she approaches characters with strong, self-realized identities in mind. Had her intent been to not have an all-female cast, I have no doubt that the characters would still be just as strong.
These two things do often coincide.
I don't think they always do, but for many of us this is the case.
And I do agree that the idea is misunderstood very often as well.
Now on to the weather.
I am not aware of any part of Texas that gets even a little snow regularly, so it is honestly no surprise that you guys got absolutely mauled by the weather over there.
Meanwhile, over here in North-East Nevada we've had hardly any winter weather.
I am glad that things haven't gotten too bad for you like so many others have it right now.
Hopefully this unexpected mess can be dealt with soon, and some semblance of stability can return.
Haven't read any of these in their entirety though I have read probably 15 or 20 chapters of Isekai, and I've enjoyed those. I tend to skip to ones that cross with shows or stories I'm familiar with.
5456596
California has brown outs and controlled shutdowns every year for some that happens ever year, namely summer. Texas had controlled and a few uncontrolled shutdowns because one of the warmest states in the US was hit with a once-in-a-century winter storm. No one in Texas is taking the north’s criticism seriously.
5456617
Agreed, it's important, and I think you hit the nail on the head with "use it to flesh them out." It's an important part of a character, but rarely the defining characteristic from which the majority of their other narrative-relevant traits spring, which I think is where the stereotyping and pigeonholing tend to come from.
5456740
What I said about the weather I said in jest, which is I believe how Paul meant the meme pic to be taken (and he's free to correct me on that). Note that I said the picture and not the entirety of the situation.
In all seriousness, the situation is a disaster, and of course it isn't being handled perfectly because these things can't be. There's always plenty of blame (justified and otherwise) and criticism (expert and armchair) to go around.
5456599 You too? I'm surrounded by them. My mother drove herself to our local hospital when she thought she was having a heart attack. Twice. We lived across the street at that time. My wife and I discussed it and came to the conclusion we needed to be much more insistent on driving when she had issues like that. Then a few months ago, my wife drove herself to the local hospital when she was having rapid heartbeat issues. My girls inherited all of that. God save their future spouses.
5456887 In around 78 or so, Kansas had a humdinger of an ice storm. We had chunks of our home county with no intact power lines over spans of ten to twenty miles, and by that I mean *every* wire was down over that distance, about ten percent of the poles snapped, and we didn't get power back at home for over a month. There was a lot of farmer generator swapping going on in the county after the first week that roughly went "Bob has power back, but Fred won't get the power company out there for two more weeks. Can he borrow yours?" Texas at least sounds like the vast majority of power lines are still up, so everything may be powered up in a week.
5456903
Yeah, what is it with some women and pain tolerance?
My wife broke her right arm at a war (SCA armored combat), and she came back from the doctor, borrowed a lefty's shield, strapped her cast behind it, and finished off the weekend fighting off-handed!
Hey, glad you're still liking it! Sunset is implied to have lived in many places across the universe in between bar sessions, so the assumption is that she's learned and grown in power thanks to that. She's the bartender, but she's not just a bartender. Ya feel me?
5456382
From colder climes? Are you really a Texan?
But seriously, sorry to hear things have been so crummy for you. Let's hope this all gets resolved soon-ish. In my area things are largely back to normal, food shortages notwithstanding.
5456471
I was born in Orange, TX, just west of the Sabine River, but raised in Vinton, LA, just east of the river. The two are only 10-15 minutes away from one another by interstate. As such, I like to think of myself as a product of both states.
I moved to the suburbs north of Houston for work about 8 years ago.
5456627
5456647
Good points in general, but I feel the need to note that I never took JJ's blog as saying "make all characters men, then add boobs." I didn't get anything even remotely like that out of it.
No one own tire chains down here, that's the problem.
5456903
When I was real little – early 90's, maybe late 80's, not sure – an ice storm blew through Southwestern Louisiana. I distinctly recall my family of five and my cousin's family of four converging on my grandparents' place, where they had a non-electric space heater (can't recall what it ran on) and a house with far superior insulation. Power was out for about two weeks, but my parents and grandparents had been prepared for it. It was a miserable two weeks, but at least the scenery was different and quiet beautiful. And destructive. Very destructive.
Sadly, I can find no record of this storm anywhere I look. Apparently Southwest Louisiana/Southeast Texas doesn't warrant any mention in the history books.
5457006
Still vastly too nebulous for me. Buuut I understand it's beyond the scope of the story, so I'll just have to live with "Sunset's a God now, deal with it."
5457027
And even if we did, we wouldn't know what to do with them.
5457032 lol, yeah I do have the metastory running in the background, but I figured showcasing how she got super saiyan would be a real big departure from the intention of the fic.
5457020
, but someday my kids will be! 
Maybe not
Luckily power came back on last night, so the worst is behind us.
5457026
media1.giphy.com/media/5xtDarmwsuR9sDRObyU/giphy.gif
5457026
That ... wasn't what I said he was saying.
Then I pointed out where he said this directly in two different places.
He didn't say so someone had to make them men. He claimed that if someone attempted to create a character without establishing gender first, then they would just create a male character.
The (male) bit is entirely his own insertion on the advice of "create a strong character." As I then pointed out, his own evidence of it (Ripley from Alien) was not actually true, and faulty.
Creating a strong character without assignment of gender first does not automatically make them masculine.
5457209
And that's still not what I got out of it.
I have to say I was rather anxious when I found out you'd be reviewing 'Blueblood: Hero of Equestria'. You are, of course, absolutely right about the main flaw being my tendency to waffle and repeat. Nevertheless, thanks for the review, and I hope I can carry on maintaining those high standards.
5457026
5457200
I thought that was just exactly the opposite of JJ's point.
I think some people might benefit from applying the Principle of Charity here. That is, making a good-faith effort to understand what the other person is trying to convey rather than pouncing on poor phrasing and such in order to "score points."
5457209
I agree. In fact, nobody reasonable disagrees. You are arguing against a strawman.
My point was merely that if you focus on writing a "strong character" first, before assigning gender, you'll miss out on using gender to flesh out the character, which, I argue, is actually very important, especially if you're writing a woman in a patriarchal setting. Consequently, the character will be weaker for it. Case in point, whether Ripley was written originally as a man or genderless, I argue, the definitely feminine Ripley of Aliens, who fills a surrogate mother role and has a thematic opposition with the alien queen, is a far more memorable character than the Ripley of Alien. I added "(male)" in parenthesis because a common piece of advice to a rookie writers struggling with writing women is that they should just write a man, then switch the pronouns, which is plain silly.
If your argument is that I built my argument poorly, you might have a point, and I've taken it to heart. Case in point, I didn't make myself clear, so I'm forced to explain after the fact.
If your argument is something else, you do not have a point.
5457345
Exactly, thank you.
5457518
That's going to have to be where we conclude, because what you're saying right here and what your post directed toward seemed quite far apart to me.
Honestly, I’m a little surprised Grooming got that high a rating. I didn’t think there was enough substance to it to do better than Worth It. Maybe because I can’t quite get past thinking of it as pure fluff, since the worldbuilding wasn’t part of the original concept. Then I wrote that one line--I don’t think I need to specify which one
--and I couldn’t not elaborate. It wouldn’t have flowed nearly as smoothly as it ended up doing.
Also, while I’ve accepted that I’ll never flesh out the pre-bath scene the way I’d hoped to originally, I’ll probably never be happy about that. Then again, if it’s already maybe taking too long to reach the point as is, showing the lesson scene would’ve definitely dragged it out too much.
And yes, I could count on one hand the number of pics I found that had anything to do with grooming.
BTW, speaking of me not seeing my stories the way my readers apparently do, I’d like to hear your opinion of my latest story, Dream Lover, which did a whole heck of a lot better than I feel like it deserved.
5458424
Consider it on the list! It'll be a while because of how long I book my review blogs in advance, but the story will certainly be read.
Personally I try to write interesting female characters. Whether they're strong or not doesn't really matter to me. (But I'm not really sure what people mean by "strong" to begin with. Physically strong? Mentally strong? Strong social and negotiating skills? If they simply mean female characters that aren't damsels in distress then that's really not hard to pull off.)
5460371
To greatly generalize the concept, I believe a strong character is any character that has to and is willing to work hard to achieve their goals, regardless of what that work involves. They face serious challenges and overcome them.
A strong female character is the same thing, they just happen to be female.
I know, it sounds obvious and simple.
5460422
I guess that's a good way to put it, but I don't understand why anyone puts so much effort into discussing the whole Strong Female Character thing, to the point where they'd write whole inconclusive essays about it. Like, how would you describe Twilight? You could say lots of things: she's smart, nerdy, sometimes abrasive, sometimes rude, hard-working, generally friendly, neurotic, pedantic, talented, and so on. To take all that complexity and relegate it to "she's a strong female character" is weird to me. No one does that with male characters. But anyway, like I said, I just try to write interesting characters. If they happen to lose their conviction/drive to achieve their goals halfway through the story, or are unable to overcome their challenges due to their flaws, and if that makes them weak, I don't necessarily see that as a bad thing.
5460503
The subject is more complex than that, I think. More complex than I could possibly debate over, because the answer isn't clear cut and may be slightly different from person to person. But I will say Twilight having all those traits doesn't make her a strong character. Nor do I believe that being "strong" and failing are mutually exclusive. A character being strong doesn't mean they'll win – that would suggest only protagonists in non-tragedies can be strong in the context we're talking about here. A villain can be strong. A side character can be strong. A protagonist who is defeated and ultimately loses everything can be strong.
Yeah, it's complicated. I hate to try and define it in words, because there will always be some counterpoint that I didn't think of, or an example that warrants an extra look, or whatever. I think it's something we all have to decide upon for ourselves.
And then debate it relentlessly, I suppose.
5460510
i.pinimg.com/originals/56/1d/2d/561d2dc3ebdae43c1bd05cdda678d006.jpg
I dunno man, I was just going by your definition.
5460607
Are you saying a character can't face and overcome serious challenges and not also lose in the end?
5460610
But I’m not talking about the end. If they fail to reach their goals or overcome some challenges during the story, does that make them weak? If so, then that doesn’t necessarily make them a bad character. Here’s what I said:
5460615
See,this is what I mean by it being a problematic topic (and me not being good at debating). If they ultimately fail – at the end, in the middle, whatever – that doesn't make them "weak" in the context of how we're discussing "strong". "Strong" in this context isn't decided by whether you win or lose. Winning or losing isn't the point, and I regret giving off that impression.
It sounds like you're conflating "strong character" with "strong person". It has nothing to do with being smart or complex or physically strong or magically powerful. A strong character can be these things, but just being these things doesn't make them a strong character. Again, it's a complex topic. Any one definition can't really be the end-all-be-all definition.
5460626
In that case, why is writing strong female characters a good thing? What’s wrong with writing weak female characters?