Present Perfect vs. Nyx's Family · 10:53pm Aug 6th, 2014
(NOTE: I realize the author of this story is extremely controversial right now. I detest my timing. But I would appreciate it if we did not discuss him personally in the comments. I will delete comments that I feel veer to far into personal attacks. Of course, you being my followers, I know you are all too classy and intelligent to stoop to such lows. :)
Okay. I've been teasing and teasing and teasing it, and finally, after a good three months, I'm finished! RealityCheck's Nyx's Family is not an official sequel to Past Sins, but it is a sequel nevertheless, following Nyx as she goes to the Crystal Empire and meets Shining Armor and Cadence for the first time after the whole Nightmare Moon thing. It was suggested to me for review by rem-dog, who won an Epic Unicorn History-related contest no one knew I was running. :3 Note that I will be discussing the end of the story, so spoiler warnings. But first, let me start you off with a quote directly out of my Past Sins review:
Nyx is not really a great character. But sad to say, by the end of the story, I actually wanted to see more about her. I keep seeing that "Nyx's Family" story on the front page, and it's like... Given the reaction Shining Armor was supposed to have had to her at the end (and a lot of his other bits in the story, most of which I found thoroughly confusing), how's that meeting going to go?
Suffice to say, for once in my life, I went into a story desiring nothing more than a slice-of-life comedy, and came out disappointed that there was action and adventure. (There's your tl;dr, spoiler-avoiders.) Separating "how much I liked it" from "how well it works" is thus a tall challenge, so if this review comes off biased, well, there you go.
Oddly, the full-blown comedy was really jarring after the super-serious Past Sins, but given time, it grew on me. Sure, not everything worked well. The footnotes were a huge headache, though I did at least find out that I could keep the find window open in Chrome and still scroll the page, making getting to the new ones easier. Still, I don't know why the author didn't resort to parentheticals, as A) they are perfectly allowable for comedy stories, and B) he uses two 4+ line parentheticals in the middle of chapter 12, so hardly has a reason to avoid them. Worse were the references. This is yet another story where I had to think, "the author just doesn't know how to control themselves". There are references to everything from Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. (And the internet browser ponies, the Mythbusters, etc. etc.) They were horrifically distracting and never funny, as they always are.
This story was at its best when relying on the characters to provide comedy. Four chapters in, I noted it was "legitimately funny". (Oh yeah, I took like, six pages' worth of notes while reading this. One of them is "that's not what fiber does". Truth.) Twilight and Shining's parents are major standouts, despite Night Light being the walking Fear and Loathing reference, leaping out of the page immediately upon their introduction, and always livening up their scenes. Nyx is precious and adorable as all fuck, and gets to supply a lot of humor on her own, despite growing increasingly snarky and self-aware toward the end. (Someone once suggested to me that RealityCheck writes Nyx better than Pen Stroke. I am inclined to agree.) That said, when she's not getting into trouble and being cuter than sin, the story takes a bit of a dive.
Honestly, though, I want to drive home how funny this piece is, or at least how well the humor works. When not being inserted into dramatic action scenes, anyway. At one point, Nyx, Twilight and the others are gathered for a fancy royal banquet, the sort served in courses. The soup is bouillabaisse, which Nyx finds less than appealing, quipping that it "needs more booya". If you don't think that's the funniest shit, you may as well quit reading now, you're not going to enjoy this story. But if you laughed, let me tell you, that joke continues and it only gets better. I will leave it to you to read and find out how.
The other big, big thing that works in this story is Shining Armor and Nyx's relationship. For those not in the know, in PS, Nyx as Nightmare Moon hypnotized Shining Armor and made him do a bunch of stuff that both regretted and hated being made to do, none of which I actually remember. (I wasn't paying much attention.) Suffice to say, he starts off this story less than happy to see her, and generally pissed off at her existence. I did sort of feel that he was maybe a touch out of character, but the fact is the rest of the story makes up for that. They slowly get into trouble together and bond over feelings of helplessness (a major sideplot involves Shining's political position as Prince Consort, spending a lot of time setting up the new Crystal Empire military, which he'll have no part in), and it just really, really works excellently. Unfortunately, it only takes up the first third or so of the story, after which it's done and we can move on to the story that I guess the author really wanted to write.
Nyx's Family is, in essence, three different stories, maybe two and a half, and they don't weave together particularly well. The first is about Nyx meeting her family; y'know, what the title says? The second involves Twilight helping the Crystal Empire's library update to the modern system and discovering an ancient text on earth pony magic that completely revolutionizes the Hearth's Warming story. The third, which is at least tangentially related to the second, involves a dragon attack on the Empire.
Now, I want to say that finding the lost tomb of Chancellor Level Head ("Puddinghead" is revealed to be a derogatory nickname inserted into history by his detractors) is in itself a very compelling story. It just wasn't the story I wanted to read coming into this. Furthermore, it's not a story that requires Past Sins to be written. Nyx quite honestly did not need to be in this piece. Once she's done bonding with her aunt and uncle, the focus shifts to Twilight, Spike, Shining Armor and the crystal pony colt that Nyx rescues from bullies. So while I might have enjoyed that adventure story on its own -- again, it's a really fascinating piece of world-building featuring the best use of historical revisionism I've ever seen -- it doesn't work here.
Of course, it still has its own issues, mostly in the form of what I suspect to be authorial tract. The author does a good job portraying the Crystal Empire as a land with its own culture, sadly out of time with the rest of the world and trying to find its place. But mixed up in this is a lot of political and economic diatribe that sometimes informs the story but often detracts from it. Case in point, a footnote somewhere that mocks Keynesian economics. It really had nothing to do with anything, wasn't particularly funny, and only served to send me to the bottom of the chapter (and then to Wikipedia to find out what all the names were), breaking the story flow. The historical revisionism I mentioned went a little too far. I'm a big proponent of pony racism, but I felt like it was overused in this piece, portraying earth ponies as beleaguered "we are the good guys no matter what" salt-of-the-earth types oppressed by the vile unicorn overlords, drawing uncomfortable parallels in my mind to "America fuck yeah!" style super-patriotic action movies.
Let's just say I compared this story to Michael Bay in my notes on three four separate occasions.
And while the politics were probably the most interesting of all those parts (granted, it ends with the Crystal Empire turning into the USA, albeit with a cooler voting system, but I still had to shake my head at that in wonder), it still had the end result of killing the comedy by shifting the story into super-serious mode. The parts never meshed tonally, and this only got worse as the story progressed. I found myself gradually building appreciation for it again and again only to have that appreciation crushed by a poor choice on the author's part.
There was also a tendency to stop the action and explain things at length: economics, politics, magic, some of the technology introduced like the walkie-talkie. Chapter 11 does nothing but this. Side character back stories have a tendency to be thrown at the reader all at once, and not one time did I find myself interested by them.
Before I get into the side characters, I wanted to point out one very odd thing I noticed. There's are three scenes that stand out because they have a strong male character putting other characters in their place via clever dialogue and witty banter. Shining Armor does it the first time, setting a potential military recruit's parents straight that the military is not a place to make men out of boys, and then telling the kid that he needs to shape up, too. Night Light, Twilight's dad, tells off a flock of paparazzi in a monologue that is funny but goes on for far too long. And then there's the ridiculously-named Professor I. M. Dubious who spends an entire chapter waxing melancholy about the time he learned that Santa wasn't real. (And what is Santa doing in this story anyway? He's never given an Equestrian spin.) It gives the sense that the author has a lot of strong opinions about certain things and doesn't know when to leave those opinions out of the story: author tract, and another comparison to Bay.
Okay, now that I've mentioned him by name, I want to talk about Dubious, because he was a major thorn in this story's side. He's introduced during the scene where Twilight is making plans to find the Lost Tomb of the Founders, bringing up all kinds of objections because he's a lifelong diehard skeptic. It's his thing. He ends up being laughed out of the room after Twilight brings up his denials of both the Sonic Rainboom and the existence of Nightmare Moon, and I was fine with that. He was a funny one-time antagonist who helped expand the world a little bit, right?
Wrong! The Santa scene a few chapters later was put in, in the author's words, to give the character another say. We get his backstory dumped on us, and not once does he come off as truly sympathetic (it's more "you should feel sorry for him, he was lied to his whole life"). He then joins Twilight's team and continues to be a gadfly and an ass for the entire story. Every time he showed up, I groaned, because I knew he was just going to be needlessly complicating everything and slowing down the narrative with his long-winded diatribes. His character arc is one of the least-interesting parts in this story. (He just sort of decides to stop being skeptical when it's convenient.) Granted, the final scene in which he appears is funny, and the lesson of "skepticism must be divorced from cynicism" is nice, but it doesn't prove his worth as a character.
With that said, not all the side characters were bad. Roller Reel, the teenager whose parents tried to shove him into the army, was far better. He hangs out in the background, slowly growing as a character and growing on me as a reader. Bright Eyes, the colt Nyx saves, is another story. He's kind of cute on his own as well, but... I'll get into him more when I talk to Nyx. Rock Steady, another recruit, didn't have as compelling a character arc, but I also didn't mind seeing him around. The librarian, Precious Lore, was likewise. Still, we get a lot of dumped backstories.
Canon characters fared a little better. Cadence is about as bland and pleasant as she is in the show, so that was good. Shining of course was a major player, and Twilight came off well. The rest of the mane six show up eventually, and I noted at one point that Rainbow Dash and Applejack were "written horrendously", but I didn't note why, so we'll let that slide. (I will say that Rainbow tussling with Dubious was a horribly unnecessary scene, once again dragging things out. It also led to a needlessly casual Sonic Rainboom.) Spike comes out mostly on top, portrayed as Nyx's mischievous older brother who is still young enough to get in trouble with her. Their dynamic was great. Though I wondered about his "I'll tear you apart" line at the end. Out of context, it's of course out of character, but I'm not entirely certain it works in context.
I guess I should talk about that third plot line. Garble and company, introduced in a "whoa, wait, what, seriously?" moment, show up after reading about the Crystal Empire in a newspaper and eating a bunch of magical gems that make them grow to what I assume was Dragonshy size. They storm into the city, bust through Cadence's Crystal Heart barrier and start wrecking shit as the military, under Shining Armor's lead, tries to drive them back. (An overlong "preparing for war" scene drew another comparison to Bay's military-worship.) The main battle doesn't take place, however, until Spike turns his greed to his advantage and beefs up into a Spikezilla. I could not decide if this was the greatest thing ever or the worst; that feeling continued throughout the final conflict, and Spike growing up was definitely not the worst thing that happened.
This is where Bright Eyes comes in. He's just sort of your average bullied kid, because he happens to be a unicorn in a city not only comprised mostly of earth ponies, but of earth ponies who distrust unicorns because, y'know, they were sort of enslaved by one. (Stereotyping, I should point out.) Nyx saves him from bullies and they become fast friends, and I have to hand it to the author that he didn't do any shipping with them, not even "Nyx has a coltfriend" playground taunting. It's a pit into which I myself have fallen, so kudos to RealityCheck.
Anyway, as the battle continues, Nyx becomes less and less important, while Bright Eyes becomes more and more so. He fends off some diamond dogs with a sword, which I thought was incredibly stupid. He also happens to be wearing the walkie-talkie magical crystal thing when the dragons attack, with Spike on the other end. Cleverly, this becomes important after Spike is blinded by dragon bile, and Bright Eyes starts directing him; it's probably my favorite part of the battle, because it was pulled off so darn well. Of course, things get ridiculous quickly after some crazy long-distance spellcasting by Twilight and uniting of the crystal ponies produces some crystal armor for both of them, turning Spike from kaiju into giant mecha. Oh yeah, and Garble eats a shitton more of those gems for the final battle and literally turns into King Ghidorah. Unfortunately, the story called Nyx's Family ends up being about Spike and Bright Eyes. The Mythbuster ponies do more in the fight than she does.
The worst part of this is that Nyx lampshades this in the final chapter. She all but breaks the fourth wall to say "I wasn't the main character in my own story" and I think that's got to be the most infuriating thing I have ever seen in a story. If the author was aware of what they were doing to their main character, why didn't they stop it? Why not make this Nyx's Family and leave The Search for Puddinghead's Tomb as the sequel? Then the super-special action hero OC can swordfight diamond dogs to his heart's content and pilot his Spike-bot in a kaiju battle, and the reader isn't deprived of the story they were promised.
One last thing about the plot: the ending of Spike's part focuses on "power of love" as the ultimate truth or whatnot. Garble even makes fun of him because his armor has a giant heart on it. Unfortunately, this means there's a considerable amount of Sparity at the end, and honest to god, I wanted to downvote the story after finishing the penultimate chapter. I don't care if Spike is "a teenager", he's still in his baby dragon body, and Rarity is still leading him on when she damn well should know better. (This gets some lampshading in the final chapter as well; it did nothing to quell my irritation.) I was quite honestly disgusted by it, and it ruined the ending of the story for me.
The last thing to talk about is the writing, which, in short, needs some work. Descriptions were decent, and RealityCheck has a good handle on action scenes, but the main issue aside from the footnotes were POV shifts. POV continually changed throughout the story, even toward the end when there was a scene break every other paragraph. I learned to just deal with it, but it didn't stop it from being annoying, and got bad enough that, at one point, the reader was being given information that the characters couldn't possibly know. Along with that were typos, Youtube links, use of triple hyphens for em-dashes (I'm not even that bad), Luna saying "strewth" (it's short for "God's truth", there's no reason to use that word in pony), a fatalistic lack of quote marks during monologues, confusion about the dragons (not all of them were described, so I had some difficulty following the battle), capitalization breaking down toward the end, Rainbow Dash saying "kewl", lots of "suddenly" and just generally adverbs, tons of bold-italicized caps lock, and a picture in the middle of chapter 26 for no good reason. I have distinctly read better-written stories.
In summation, this story is, in many ways, superior to its predecessor, particularly in characterization of the main OC and also in deft use of humor. But thanks to copious writing errors, author tract, Bay-esque over-the-top action, and a confusing mixture of tones, styles and plots, this falls apart as a story and fails to deliver on its premise. Or rather, it delivers and doesn't know when to quit.
2.5/5
Just as much to like as dislike.
Not sure what my next vs. post will be. I'm thinking maaaaaybe Antipodes, but I've got a bunch of catching up to do, and I know there are one or two vs.-worthy stories in my audiobooks, not to mention stuff coming from the "Old Favorites" folder in my group. Well, okay, I guess my next vs. will be Order from Chaos, Justice and Hope, but I'm reading that for different reasons. :B Expect it soon!
Y'know, I really like this story.
I really do.
But I agree with every word you said about it. The tone is way broken, he spends too much time soapboxing, and the whole damn thing is busy busy busy... Which is honestly an issue in all of his stories.
Edit: Ooooh, you're reading Snarkle's Sonic crossover? I really love those actually. I was terrified going in that they'd be the usual schlock. I was so happy they weren't.
That author tract habit is actually the entire reason I eventually quit following RealityCheck and his stories. He gets worse about it in later stories in this 'verse.
Again, later stories in this series start picking up a definite shipping tone with those two.
Those three get kind of weird in places, especially if you only know Sonic from the games and aren't familiar with the Saturday Morning cartoon or comic series. Still some of my favorite crossover fics, though.
And for the record, I thought Pen Stroke's "Winter Bells" was the better "Nyx and Shining make amends" story, but that might be because RC's Nyx eventually gets to be a bit too precocious for my tastes.
On the other hand, seeing Night Light's speech to the paparazzi on TVTropes was the entire reason I read Past Sins to begin with, so there's that.
Haha, ouch. Same as 2349293, I like the story too but can't really see anything in this review I can disagree with.
Anyway, Antipodes... A vs. post for it would be fun, especially if I fail to contain my opinion about the ending in the comments.
Snarkle's Sonic crossover, on the other hand, I'd look forward to for entirely happy reasons.
Nightmare Night and Nyx was MUCH better. And are you surprised that RC failed to keep his political opinions out of his story?
Well, that's a few thousand words off the list.
Antipodes would be pretty interesting, since I'd actually read it. I had mixed impressions, but it was pretty good
concept-wise. I've left a fairly wordy review in the comments, but whatever.
Guess I need to go read the Sonic trilogy then.
2349236
Biggest mistake you can make with RC.
Do any research about him, even surface level poking around on his blogs, and you'll come to understand why.
Yeah, I stopped following RC once I realized he's a huge ass (only later [and by later I mean last month] did I learn he's a homophobic one too.).
2349293
I've already read them, I just need to refresh myself so I can read his PR Battle entry, and also to get them out of the Old Favorites folder.
2349322
I'm not surprised, nor am I against it. Putting it in the first story would have been a bad idea.
I will make sure I read this.
2349348
I'm afraid that everything that can be said about Antipodes has been said and I'm just gonna end up shitting all over PK some more. :C
2349398
This is the first story I've read by him. And I'd like to lay off the personal attacks. Better note that above.
2349621
Fair enough, Apologies.
2349348
I hear Under A Luminous Sky by that... uh, navy dude, or whatever, is pretty good...
I've known RealityCheck for a decade, back when I read his webcomics, and I hung out on the IRC for said comics where he frequented. He pretty much kicked off my conservative phase, but I'm trying not to hold that against him. The best way I can think of to describe him is if Glen Beck had a lot of nerdy interests.
I think I'll pass on this story for now. Not only am I already reading another RC story (The Great Alicorn Hunt), but I still have those half-finished FoE stories to get through.
2349696
Colons are important. Its the difference between "Fallout: Equestria" and "Fall of Equestria."
The second one proooobably isn't worth your time.
2349804
God fuck no. I hate, hate, hate that they have the same acronym. I've gotten in the habit of using FoE, as have a lot of others in that sub-fandom, and now I'll have to train myself out of it.
I want Fall of Equestria to fail like Ishtar.
2349621 Poor PK, I really feel bad about the reactions he got to the ending.
2349831 Uhh, knowing what I know about Fall of Equestria, do I want to know what Ishtar is?
Regarding the acronym, FoE never really made much sense for Fallout: Equestria, in my opinion at least. It's just as well if we cannot use it anymore.
My one question is this: would you recommend this fic for reading?
2349886
Oh, Ishtar is this comedy that was infamous for being a huge box-office bomb. From what I hear, it wasn't actually that bad, and it definitely wasn't offensive like Fall of Equestria is.
2350114 Ahh, gotcha.
Thanks for writing this. I had read the firs chapter and put it on the Read Later list hoping for some slice of life, but now it looks like a chore. The great alicorn hunt is all the RC I can handle.
Second episode: Ticket master. Santa Claus costume in window.
You missed one obvious meta-reference. The footnotes are a tip of the hat to Terry Pratchett.
Yes, I know, story went everywhere. It was supposed to be a one-chapter one-shot... and... it just GREW. (despair and awe.) Just a one-shot--- reluctant Shiny babysits a reluctant Nyx and bond. then I realized Shining Armor and Cadence were in the Crystal Empire and had to invent a reason for Nyx/Twilight to go all that distance. Then I started asking "why this" and "why that...." Next thing I know there's a giant kaiju battle in the middle of the city.
Let that be a lesson to you all. Don't feed your fanfic after midnight.
I'm terribly sorry you're picking up "'Murica, F*** yeah" vibes. No, actually, I'm not, because I inserted nothing of the sort. That you automatically associate someone expressing an appreciation for freedom and free will with "America" is your issue, not mine.
yes, yes, earth pony slavery. I always considered the hearthwarming tale to be bunk, as earth ponies are OBVIOUSLY operating at a serious power disadvantage. So I decided to go with it--- and use it as an explanation of how a lone unicorn overran an entire kingdom.
And yes, the earth ponies/crystal ponies were oppressed, but they were also capable of jerkdom in their own right (see Bright Eyes' treatment and Roller Reel's barely smothered bigotry.) So they're hardly unjustly ennobled.
The fact that Shining Armor was given his new military rank by magically-assessed popular opinion (which he darned well earned the hard way) hardly makes the Crystal Empire "'Murica Two." (You seem to have an allergy to anything that even vaguely hints at Americana. You aren't French are you? We have a topical cream that clears that right up.)
You presumably haven't read my other stories, but a recurring theme connects them, especially the Nyxverse stories: no people should be ruled by "divine right." As the stories are interconnected, that concept crops up in all of them. The unicorns want their thrones back, the other tribes aren't thrilled at the prospect, and Celestia and Luna just want to take a damn break from being responsible for everything... but don't dare because the unicorn nobles would make an end-run for the crown if they tried.
I'll grant the chapter with the economist talking with Celestia about the impact of earth pony magic suddenly getting parity with unicorn magic was a jarring departure, especially to those who don't like to think about economics--- but I put it in to illustrate that yes, there is an impact beyond the Empire's borders. Some of them surprisingly subtle. I was disappointed that few could appreciate the nuances.... you'd think I was trying to make a class of surly sixth-graders do their homework. Lord knows if I'd quoted "Spice and Wolf" they probably would have broken out in hives. But I don't and won't apologize for taking a shot at a teachable moment.
And Keynes was a crackpot.
Nyx's lampshading? Well, dear boy, first lesson of life: things don't turn out the way you expect. As this was a prequel to a sequel (you got that?), Nyx sort of HAD to fade into the background... otherwise the next story in the series ("Nightmare Night and Nyx") would not have made as much sense. She didn't have much room for growth in this story, because the NEXT story was where her bigger growth arc was supposed to take place. She had to leave the Crystal Empire pretty much the same state she arrived.... Someone else had to be the Big Darn Hero, so Spike was selected.
And after all, at the end of the day the story's title was "Nyx's FAMILY."
I'm terribly sorry you don't like Sparity. It is, after all, the only "canon" romance in the show as of yet... even if it is apparently one-way, for the most part (though Rarity obviously returns his affection, if not on the same romantic level.)
Why the dragons?
Well... I frankly needed something to bring everything to a head. Shining's troubles with his role as prince consort and military leader; Nyx's own troubles with her weak magic, the earth pony 'odd man out' problem; the crystal pony's insecurity in a modern world; Rock Steady and Roller Reel's trauma from Sombra's reign; Bright Eye's self-esteem issues--- I had hoped it more obvious, but the common theme I was shooting for was how all these different characters were struggling, in their own way, with feelings of helplessness. they needed something, something big that would unite them all to a common purpose and give them a chance to learn that yes, they could take care of themselves in this unstable new world. (and again, Nyx is sidelined here for the sake of her learning her own esteem-boosting lesson in the next story.)
I contemplated having an army of changelings attack, or Sombra returning, or maybe a revolution by paranoid delusional ponies (like the soap-foam "suicide bomber" pony) But after the breakfast scene, everyone and their uncle in the comments section was forecasting "dragon attack"... And I decided "yeah, Garble's probably still got a mad-on about Spike anyway.... so let's do this."
AS to all the Godzilla/Anime/Pacific Rim/Hobbit/etc. references--- HA!! YES, I ADMIT IT! I DID IT! AND I'D DO IT ALL AGAIN, AHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAH!!!
Ahem.
I hardly expect it to change your opinion of the story. But you might look at it with a different perspective, who knows. I just figured I'd stick my two cents in.
2350443 On behalf of Present Perfect, thanks for the elucidation.
2350107
If you liked Past Sins or even if you just wanted to see more about Nyx, yes, I would. However, having been told that Pen Stroke wrote his own "Nyx meets Shining Armor" story, I may have to reevaluate my opinion on this story's merits in time.
2350443
Oh boy, time for a huge reply to a huge post. :D I love those.
Well played, sir.
To my detriment, I have never read Pratchett. :B If there's ever a movement to add robust footnotes to Fimfic, you have my assurance that I will lobby for it.
I distinctly got that impression. Does that make the dragons' use of fire opals at the end meta-commentary on the story growing out of your control? :3
A lot of the issues with the earth ponies and Hearth's Warming trod this weird line between "yeah, that makes sense and you're using it well" and "this is the same old shit I've already seen on the subject and I'm tired of it." I personally have issues with authors going the historical revisionism route because it suggests that what we've learned in the show isn't the truth, and that paints Celestia in a bad light. (Even though this story really didn't make that assertion outright, so there's that.) In doing that, everything the show stands for crumbles; I sort of need Celestia to be infallible, or at least 100% benevolent, which is a definite bias of mine.
It was more that you made a big deal of his being called "Commander in Chief", and then the popular vote outdoing Cadence just appointing him. (Actually, I was pleasantly surprised the one noble one-upped her on that. And, well, voting en masse via Crystal Heart is way cool, no joke. Who honestly ever turns politics into something magical and cool?)
I have not, no. That's an interesting track to take given how many in the fandom consider the two Sisters to be divine in the first place. Yet I sense that you're not monarchy-breaking though, which intrigues me.
I kind of figured that was the reason for why this went where it did. At best, I can berate you for choosing a misleading title.
Only if one ignores the Cakes, Cadence and Shining Armor, Twilight's parents, Rarity's parents, Pinkie's parents, Cranky Doodle and Matilda... :V
I wish their introduction hadn't been so abrupt, mostly. Good work on that theme of helplessness, though, that really comes through.
I also have a terrible jones against out-of-fic references, so much so that I'm writing a series that's nothing but references to other things to lampoon the practice. They distract from the narrative, pulling the reader out of a story, and... I just really hate them. :B But all the kaiju stuff at the end was very YMMV if you ask me. Some of it was "Oh my god I can't believe he" and some of it was "Are you kidding me, is he really". Thanks for the response! :)
2350937 You have not read Terry Pratchett!
SHUN THE INFIDEL! SHUN, I SAY!
SHUN SHUN SHUN.
Seriously though, read... well anything by him. Brilliant humorist and a very thought provoking writer as well, and he makes the english language sit up and bark.
As to the fire opals--- something of a plot device. I wanted a functional explanation why dragon whelps don't go ballistic with greed growth all the time, so I added an essential ingredient. The implication was to be that Spike, due to being hatched with powerful magic, was extraordinary in his own right....
It's not so much historical revisionism as sensibly filling in the gaps. The hearthwarming tale was just that-- a tale. And a lot of it didn't make real solid sense. It was pretty obviously a bowdlerized version of what happened and left a lot of room for interpretation.
And as to Celestia: she can be benevolent, without being infallible. And in this case she had nothing to do with the events of the Hearthwarming, it was ancient, half-forgotten history by the time she and her sister rolled around, so how does it reflect badly on her?
This WAS an issue in the story, remember. The crystal ponies getting kind of pissed at all these unicorns and alicorns, benevolent or not, coming in out of nowhere and bossing them around. Even in show canon, it's not exactly turned out great for them all the time. Shining Armor, after being initially rejected by them, wanted solid evidence that he had their support.
No, I'm not into monarchy-breaking. The gradual descent of power of the British monarchy has been something of an example I follow (Celestia's self- financing is actually based off the system that the British Queen uses IRL.) And, if you're looking for examples of Celestia's benevolence, it exists in the fact that she doesn't want her little ponies to depend on her forever. Like any worthwhile mother-figure she wants them to grow up and stand on their own... hooves. She's basically trying to work herself out of a job.
Yeah, giant monster battles. Sometimes you just gotta Bay-splode all over everything. Some people thought it was cool, anyway.
Personally, I got SO tired of everyone thinking it was a "Pacific Rim" reference. Fifty years of Godzilla stomping around and all anyone could think of was "Pacific Rim, Pacific Rim..." argh.
2351211
Ahh, that makes sense.
I was speaking to the broader body of fanfiction, sorry. Far too many authors want Celestia to be the cackling puppeteer who's twisted history to show her in a kind light, and it drives me up the wall.
Oh my god, I am so glad you showed me that comic. :D Does fantastic justice to the ending of this story, and SmilingDOGZ is a great artist. Actually, I'm watching him and I think I skipped over most of that comic because I had no idea what was going on. Well now I do, thanks!
2351284 my portrayal is more "benevolent chessmaster/prankster."
Except when she completely loses her temper.... (see "Alicornundrum" for an example.)
2351597
Celestia losing her temper and kicking shit is one of my favorite things. And of course, the best reason for her to do so is someone threatening her little ponies. :)
2350937 Maybe I'm remembering it wrong, but wasn't a reference to Santa using that name? There is clearly an Equestrian version, but a word that amounts to saint being part of his name seems, wrong, at least cannon wise. An alteration of Kris Kringle or some horse pun with Nickolaus might be a better fit. Though admittedly despite starting a story about what that equivalent is like the best I could manage was King Kringle who is really Czar Nickolaus of Reinia, so I never came up with a good alternative, but you're a much better writer than me so it seems like you could figure out something that fit.
2355554
My real complaint about him was that a side character I didn't care about waxed long over his existence. As far as the name or identity of Santa in this story goes, everything could have been cleared up with a "Hooves" or whatever tacked onto the moniker, but it never is. It's just odd is all.
2355868 pbbblt. "Santa Hooves." Now that's a trope I can't stand--- "Flintstone Speak." Everything has to be a REFERENCE TO THE SETTING, to remind you that this is the stone age/ponyland/smurf village/Duckworld. In case you forgot in the past five minutes.
That, and how everything in Ponyville is made of HAY. Even RL horses don't subsist entirely on hay. Come on, throw in some Oatburgers or alfalfa chips or something. And maybe, just maybe, the fries could just be fries--- horses CAN eat potatoes, already.
Salt licks... no, horses do not get drunk on salt. STOP THAT. they had one tavern in Appleoosa called "the Salt Lick." They have bars called "billabongs" and "watering holes," I'm pretty sure they're not serving pond water.
But there I go again...
2349398 which is precisely why it was better. He told a story and told it well.
But by the time of Nyx's Family, he was getting featured chapter after chapter, and so RC, a person who was essentially bred to spout the very opinions he does, started deploying them.
I rather took it personally. Almost like the cute stories with well written cute characthers were a lure to draw attention and the political rants where the real reason the stories were written!
I mean look, I think RC has every right to espouse his political opinions in his comments, or blog posts, or even in "the audience" which is explicitly a self insert. You expect the author of a self insert to tell you his opinions in said self insert, since the point of such a thing is for him to playact his reactions to being put in Equestria. So, rant away.
But there is absolutely no narrative reason whatsoever for something like Chapter 11 of Nyx's Family( the one where the story comes to a screeching halt so that Celestia can let us know that the Austrian School of economics is the only school of economics worth paying attention to) to exist.
I mean seriously , it comes out of the blue , has no connection to anything in the story before it or immediately after, and is executed with all of the subtlety of a kick to the face. The cumulative effect is that it does to the reading experience what a brick wall erected overnight across an expressway does to the morning commute of said expressway's users.
The only reason that I can work out for the existence of that chapter is that RC realized he had a large audience and decided to lecture us on what really mattered, which was clearly not his story. felt like a bit of a "bait and switch" style swindle.
If you want to know what I think of RC's writing ability, note that Nightmare Night and Nyx remains listed on my user profile's top ten favorites list. There are political subtexts present in Nightmare Night and Nyx, but that is exactly what they were, subtext, there to uncovered by anyone who wished to dig, but also overlooked by he who wished to overlook them. but by Nyx's Family the subtext was now the point, smothering the reader, smothering the story.
2349322
winter bells is the better Nyx and Shining make amends story because it is actually about Nyx and Shining making amends. This isn't. Once RC found a soapbox, and most importantly male characters that could be the heroes, like God intended! Nyx got shunted rather violently to the side.
But....
this is actually one aspect in which I prefer RC's Nyx. For me Nyx is the ultimate Nerd, genius IQ, bottomless curiosity.
Some may call this mary- sue ish, but that is how I read her, and how I am currently writing her ( if this story that is handwritten in the notebook to my immeadiate right ever sees the light of day.)
Of course my reasoning for why Nyx is like this is that she is an amnesiac goddess with a lot of processing power so to say, and space to fill ( since she no longer has Luna's memories). RC on the other hand believes that writing the Alicorns as divinities is literally blasphemy, one of the 900 trillion things he and I disagree on.
2374387
I wasn't going to say more about it in the wake of his blog drama, but that "guys save the day" thing was the second reason I quit reading his stories. The third was his apparent need to pair every female member with a male partner. I don't object to him straight-shipping only, but I got tired of having every female character partnered up with a guy. Like their stories weren't complete without a male love interest. Final straw was Celestia giddy as a schoolgirl over seeing the seapony king again.
Pretty much my thing with it. She doesn't really sound like a child half the time, and it starts to give the impression that she's almost infallible. So much attention is given to "she's always right but nobody listens to her because she's a child" that it starts to feel like more soapboxing. I first really picked up on it in "Nightmare Night and Nyx" when she was basically lecturing Celestia on why it's wrong to tell children fantasies, and it got annoying when she was correcting Twilight on applications of magic in "Alicornundrum."
2374702
I didn't draw attention to it in the review, but I did notice this.
For every potentially strong female character in this story, there's a male character who overshadows her. Twilight is generally in-character all during the story, but she needs Dubious's help to save the ponies trapped in the tomb. Nyx does jack-all during the fight, leaving saving the day to Bright Eyes and Spike and essentially turning her own story over to them. Twilight's mom is a strong character from the get-go, but it's Night Light who gets all the major scenes. Cadence does her Crystal Heart mega-shield thing, gets overwhelmed, and the day has to be saved by Shining Armor and his troops. (Admittedly, his was the most compelling of the character arcs, but still.)
Oh yes, and let's not forget the "horses aren't matriarchal, deal with it" author's note.
The Michael Bay comparison wasn't meant to end at "explosions and military worship".
2374702 2374702
I suppose a giggly Celestia could be cute if well done. (see " On a Cross and Arrow") I did not read Alicornundrum beyond the first few chapters so I cant comment on that.
One of the two rage inducing moments in the last chapter of " Nyx's Family" involves this kind of issue.
So after swooning over Spikezilla's manly defense of the Crystal empire Rarity and Cadence has a conversation where Cadence encourages Sparity. at one point Cadence says " they have ways" to overcome differences in "Age, Size and Species".
This is infuriating in three different ways.
First there is the subtext, found throughout the battle description, that women find violence by men on other men attractive ( isn't it astounding how the understanding of female sexuality held by religious fundamentalists is nearly identical to that of Pick-up artists, despite their completely opposite goals? It is very similar to how Austrian School fanboys and Marxists have the exact same unquestioning religious faith in the perfection of their economic systems despite the fact said systems are exactly the opposite.Opposite systems, Identical behavior.)
The second infuriating factor is the really obvious one given recent dramas on this site.
what does anyone here think is RC's view on say, transexuals who undergo operations to ' bridge the gap" between the genders?
I think we can all agree that he is, to put it lightly, opposed.
But apparently it is A OK for a mammal and a reptile/dinosaur to get it on... in the context of a loving monogamous marriage of course, and provided that they are different genders.
The third infuriating factor here is that it reveals just how childish RC's view of romance is. According to his own comments in this very thread, he supports Sparity because it is the Only canonical romantic relationship in this show
The fact that RC doesn't register
.'s parents, or 
's parents or especially the Cakes! as examples of a romantic relationship is kind of depressing. In RC's world, romance is a world of calling each other cute names and giving each other gifts, the real romance represented by the Cakes, the give and take and camaredery and partnership that builds families... true love in essence .... doesn't even register as romance in RC's mind. And that is just depressing.
You Identify something here that is common problem when one writes: differentiating what the author knows from what the characthers know, to misquote Orwell, it is a constant struggle not to have your charachters know things that they cannot possibly logically know.
For example, when i say Nyx has a genius IQ, all that means is that she is really fast on the uptake when provided information. She can interpret and understand it quickly.
But Nyx cannot be wise because wisdom because wisdom comes from experience and Nyx has no experience, the oldest thing she remembers post return to fillyhood is the events of the shows pilot. This means that by the time "Aliconundrum", Nyx has at most 4-5 years of actual lived experience.
The idea that Nyx can correct Twillight on applications of magic is a complete breakdown of charachter. Twilight has a greater innate talent for magic itself than any pony in history and has spent decades studying subject. This would be analogous to a conversation between Einstein at the height of his intellectual powers and the worlds smartest 8 year old ( IQ wise) at the time.
Certainly the 8 year old does a better job of understanding Einstein when compared to other 8 year olds, but there is no way he/she can correct Einstein on physics!!!!!
It is when things like this happen that you cant help but see Nyx as RC's author avatar, because clearly the barrier between author and charachter have been broken. I gather that in other stories ( I have only read his Nyx ones, and only a few of those) he Uses Twilight in the same way , lecturing the other ponies on how things should be, which is always the way, of course that , RC thinks things should be. In this case he Uses Nyx because not only does she have the advantage of being smart, but If you are reading a story with Nyx in it you probably have some sort of emotional attachment to her. To have her turn into a sockpuppet for an authorial rant , again, feels a little like a betrayal.