EThe Bubble

• MLP: FiM
• Comedy
• Sci-Fi

Silverstream buys a Bubble, a crystal orb that allows anycreature to connect with each other socially.

• Ocellus
• Silverstream

Muggonny · 8.3k words  ·  91  6 · 2.2k views

Introduction: Hello, everypony. Hope you are all doing well in these tough times. But I’m doing good all things considered. Anyways, enough about me, I mean you're here for the review right? 

Summary: Silverstream buys a Bubble, a crystal orb that allows any creature to connect with each other socially.

Initial thoughts: This is a story about Ocellus being given a bubble that leads her to another world where she can be anything and everything she’s ever wanted, even have a vast number of followers that will like anything she says or does, always watching. It feels like a very meta-way of showing the effect social media can have, and using Ocellus as a main character was definitely a unique choice and I enjoyed the amount of details given to the bubble and the interactions within, but let’s discuss more, because there’s much I have to say.

Score: 9/10

Heart of the story: The heart here is Ocellus, her journey from start to end. At first like all changelings, she’s curious how the Bubble works, and what science is held within. She sees more and more through her time within that no matter how nice it is, it’s not real, and once that reality hits, Ocellus knows she has to get Silverstream and return back to whence they came. It’s a gripping tale, that held my interest, and there were some moments where I felt the writing wanted me to laugh, but it just didn’t do it for me. The comedy felt a bit weak compared to everything else.

Score: 8/10

Characterization:
Silverstream: Silverstream is hyperactive, easy-excitable, and often is the group “cheerleader” of the young six. So how does Muggony handle her? Well, we have a lot of good things, but also a few not so good things. I’ll start with the nitpicks and end with the positive’s.

Silverstream hovered down toward the changeling, blowing more of her homework out of reach. “Ooh, are we deep in thought? I love being deep in thought! Do you think our existence in this universe matters if we live within a vast quantity of universes, or do you think that once we reach the end of space all we will perceive is a black abyss of nonexistence?”

This feels like a very deep stream of consciousness to come out of Silverstream’s mouth, and I never really expect her to be this intelligent. She is energetic, very enthusiastic about anything and everything, But this begs the question, is Silverstream intelligent enough to even joke about something like this? It comes off as a double edged sword at least to me.

Am I supposed to laugh here? Well, I didn’t.

It got me thinking about Silverstream and how she’s silly, hyperactive, and just easy to get along with, in a lot of ways, she feels most familiar to Pinkie Pie, but due to how sheltered she was, it’s easy to understand why she acts in such a way, without really considering what her words or actions might imply beyond the bare simplicity of the phrasing and how she takes it all in stride.

Now, for the positives. Muggony for the most part writes Silverstream, exactly as I imagined she’d be. She’s full of quirks, but at the end of the day her excitable nature and eagerness can often lead her to make “quicksnap” decisions, where she really should stop to consider the consequences of her actions, and how they might affect not only her, but her friends.She’s good a good heart, and in a lot of ways she feels very familiar to me with Pinkie Pie out of the main six. So i feel like Muggony really handled that aspect of her character well.

Ocellus: The quiet/shy one. Ocellus never really got to shine in the actual canon of the show, but she reminds me a lot of Fluttershy. She doesn’t want to be a problem, she’s eager to learn all she can about other creature’s cultures, she’s resourceful, and can sometimes be the “meditior” between the Student Six, which is a role that she and Yona sometimes split, as they are the two most level headed ones. So how does muggony handle her?

With absolute dignity, respect, and care. There wasn’t a moment where Ocellus didn’t feel like Ocellus. She is curious about the bubble, but she also realizes the dangers of it, reaches out to find silverstream, despite knowing it could lead to dangerous things, she is supportive to her friends, and wants to help in any way she can.

Bubble:
The bubble is a very interesting concept. At it’s very base, it sorta reminds me of VR and how you put on the helmet and are put into another world, but in the case here, the bubble pulls you into this other dimension if you will. A place where you can do anything you want, be anything you want, and even have the bubble feel your emotions to help you in other ways. Perhaps you’re struggling with depression and want to use the bubble to escape from reality to live in this alternate reality where you don’t have to deal with all the real life or real world affairs, and as a concept I find the bubble to be fascinating. Even though the bubble is written very robotic like in nature, I felt like it was practically another character in this piece, and I admire that.

Score: 9/10

Writing/Grammar: I didn’t really notice any errors in the way this was written. However, if I could make one little note, it’s that you should watch how often you use “She” in a paragraph. See here:

Lifting it up, she touched it to the area just below her horn. A cold chill ran down her spine for a moment and dissipated. She felt none the better after she pulled the orb away from her head, and somehow that made her feel terrible. She was really hoping beyond that strange reflection that she’d feel something interesting. Yet there was nothing.

It’s really, really a nitpick. But if you put Ocellus’s name instead of one of these “She’s” it would overall read better and not feel slightly repetitive. There’s maybe like two, maybe three of these in the entire piece, where I just felt like a chance of a word would’ve been better.

-Not the loudest tangent of a bird and his yak friend could —
Is this a typo? Ocellus is female, and it states this in the introduction. So why is there a “his” here?

Score: 9/10

Originality/Execution: I must admit, i’ve never read anything quite like this. The central idea of another world outside our own, feels very “anime” like. Sword art online and their VR helmets that download your brain into another world. However, I don’t know if Muggony knows about anime, or just thought of this all by his lonesome. However the case may be, it’s creative, thought provoking and leaves me with a lot to think about. The execution while I feel may have been rushed a bit, due to how fast it moves through the piece in a brief 8k words, I can understand why Muggony chose to end it how he did, and I respect knowing when to end a story. Sometimes, it doesn’t have to be long to be good.

8/10

Overall thoughts and feedback: The Bubble is a very ambitious story that shows us the risks and reward of living in such a place. The relation to social media and followers is very in your face, but it makes it very blunt what it is, and I can respect that. However, I also would agree with Ocellus and smash that stupid bubble as it isnt’ the reality she wants, nor needs.

Final score: 9+8+9+9+8=43/50
8.6/10

Headpat worthy: Yes.

Boop worthy:

Needs work:

To the author: keep up the good work, i really enjoyed the alternate chapter, but i also thought the original ending felt like a good conclusion, so good job.

To the reader: Highly recommended for any fans of Scifi, great characterization on two of student six, and just an overall enjoyable bin. it has a few issues here and there, but really it's worth at least a glance.

Notes

Ocellus shook her head in surprise and blinked. “W-what are you?” If the Armataur wasn’t weird enough, this creature was much bigger, like a tree on herbal viagra. She was round and plump like a hippo, but wore a thick coat of gray fur; adding the warthog-like tusk, she looked monstrous. Held aloft in her paws was a pot, which she stirred continuously .

I’m with Ocellus here. What are you? This creature if it can be called that is a very strange occurrence, and most of what’s in this bubble feels awfully cringe worthy at times, I had to point this out, as much as it makes me blink my eyes and debate life choices, it’s also hilarious.

7437422
Thanks for the review!

I actually do have plans to turn The Bubble into an anthology, but that has been in hiatus for until I can decide what I want to do with it next. There was a full sequel written, but I hated it. That will forever stay in the annals of Gdocs until the end of time... or until I decide to rewrite it.

7437422
Hi, me again! I let this review sit on my mind for a day so that my view would be fresh. I really enjoyed it and liked some of the points you made, although I think you missed the point of the humor based on the examples shown.

This feels like a very deep stream of consciousness to come out of Silverstream’s mouth, and I never really expect her to be this intelligent. She is energetic, very enthusiastic about anything and everything, But this begs the question, is Silverstream intelligent enough to even joke about something like this? It comes off as a double edged sword at least to me.

In this exert here, you undermine the fact that this is my version of Silverstream's character and that I'm going to write how I perceive her. How is it that I see her? Well, she's overexuberant at times yet always eager to learn new things. I imagine that beyond her airheadedness, she's actually a very intelligent creature, as I reveal to the reader in this scene:

“Yeah. Besides, you know I already have a thing for Gallus silly!”

Ocellus tilted her head. “You never told me. How would I know?”

Silverstream playfully slapped — more so tapped — her on the head. “You’re a changeling, dummy! I might be birdbrained, but I also know you feed off love.”

You are so caught up in deciding if this is something Silverstream would say that you miss the actual punchline:

Silverstream hovered down toward the changeling, blowing more of her homework out of reach. “Ooh, are we deep in thought? I love being deep in thought! Do you think our existence in this universe matters if we live within a vast quantity of universes, or do you think that once we reach the end of space all we will perceive is a black abyss of nonexistence?”

“Silver, eat this cookie.” Gallus took a cookie out of a crinkled up aluminum wrapper from his saddlebag and handed it to her.

The punchline itself is the transition. It goes from Silverstream spouting out big ideas that would make the average person question their own existence to something so belittling as her getting even more excited over a cookie. If you want to go deeper, this adds to both Silverstream's and Gallus's character. Silverstream, the overexuberant curious one goes right into questioning the universe, and Gallus, the no-BS cool cat, shoots down her theory by offering a cookie.

The only reason I'm going into this much detail on the humor is that although you gave the story a high rating, you said that some of the comedy is cringeworthy. But you don't go into detail about why it's cringeworthy. You went into a little bit of detail about why Silverstream's bit at the beginning didn't work, but I didn't learn anything from it. Even if the reason is, "I'm not into this sort of humor," I want to hear your reason.

Following up on the Silverstream bit, you also misinterpret the point of the following:

I’m with Ocellus here. What are you? This creature if it can be called that is a very strange occurrence, and most of what’s in this bubble feels awfully cringe worthy at times, I had to point this out, as much as it makes me blink my eyes and debate life choices, it’s also hilarious.

The description of LIl' Miss Fabulous wasn't the joke itself, but the various weird characters you can meet over the internet. I'm glad it landed with you even if it didn't land the way as intended. Taking both of these examples into consideration, I would feel better if you understood what the jokes were going for and still not laugh instead of not understanding them at all. I ran many of the jokes by several people to make sure they worked.

This is the only real problem I had with the review. You did a great job otherwise, and I look forward to seeing you review more things I might submit in the future!