Fanfiction Review II – Human After All, by Nicknack · 5:19am Jun 28th, 2014
Nicknack – Human After All – Human in Equestria
Lyra meets a human, an immortal researcher that is the last of his race.
Looking back, this fic had about all the red flags you could expect from a pony fic. We have Lyra, an archeologist obsessed with mythical humans, that finds the ruins of a lost human civilization, where she finds a human researcher that is immortal, very intelligent, has powerful magic, and is the last of his race. Of course, humanity was destroyed by human hubris and so forth, and, spoiler alert! he grows mad with power, and tries to take over the world in order to resurrect his race. It does manage to dodge many of the shortfalls of stories that share such characteristics, but fails in many other aspects. This is one of those stories that tries to tackle multiple big themes, and proceeds to fail spectacularly at each one. However, it is certainly ambitious, and even when falling flat at its face, manages a fresh spin on multiple fandom cliches.
Worst part is, I like the first chapters quite a bit. In fact, most of the time when it is just Lyra interacting with this human, the fic is interesting, poignant, and very enjoyable. The interactions between the human and Lyra start off great, with nice hints of mystery and depth to both characters, but they grow progressively more tired as the plot gets in the way of characterization.
The conflict itself is the main issue here, being poorly thought out and full of plotholes, most of them related to consistency issues with Lyra's characterization. Most of the problems would be resolved by a ten second conversation, and when you have the thousands year old immortal as the impatient one, in contrast to the young, eager researcher, that is hard to swallow. There is no mention of diplomacy, in a situation that clearly screams for it, and it has one of the worst instances of Tyrantlestia in the history of ever. According to the story, ponies are actually magically transformed humans, and that in doing so they lose their drive to innovation. This leads to the awkward situation where the Murderous lunatic has to confront an oppressing god, and you can't help but wish that both would just die in a fire. There is a lack of self-awareness involving these issues, and considering how the characters change as they get more human, there is a fair bit of "Humans are Evil", one of those tropes that make my blood boil.
In the end, this is one of those fics that aims high, and fails spectacularly. There is the seed of a great story here, one of redemption, the meaning of life, and the legacy of a species, but it is buried deep beneath a sea of baffling choices. However, that is one things thatwas absent on those great first chapters, before the whole thing just falls through the cracks.
Why it should be read: The first third is pretty good, and has a nice plausible human in Equestria.
Stand-out Moment: In the later chapters, there is a scene where Lyra watches a human movie for the first time, and how she reacts to it, despite not understanding the culture or the language. It was powerful, poignant, and unique.
Also, How the Human loses the memory of anything older than x years is a lovely concept for ironic immortality, and I wish it was better explored.
2/10
