Stranger Than Fanfiction S6E13 Review · 9:34pm Jul 30th, 2016
We're back from the mid-season hiatus! This time I'm purposefully going into things blind, I saw one or two season teasers but no more. I've even spoiler hidden the rest of the episodes on Derpibooru. So, how was our first one back?
This episode was okay. It had a lot of meta commentary about the fandom and just fans in general, with Quibble loving the first Daring Do trilogy but thinking the later books got too unrealistic and focused more on action-adventure stuff than exploration and ancient puzzle traps. I liked the continued relationship with Rainbow and Daring, Rainbow is still a fangirl but handles it much more maturely than Daring Don't. Otherwise the Daring Do convention was like a real con (I presume, never been to one myself) and the adventure was cool with a new monster.
Why the episode was okay was Quibble. He started great and then slid downhill. For the first act he was fine, he was a perfectly nice and friendly guy who got along with Rainbow, but had strong opinions on the series that differed from hers. The second act went into cringe comedy as he and Rainbow get kidnapped and he thinks it's all made-up. Points to the writers for making the Daring Do adventure experience mentioned earlier so it can come back here, but it still makes me cringe when Quibble keeps insisting "this isn't really happening" and lampshading all the improbable things happening to them. Even when he falls off a bridge he just thinks the adventure runners are unsafe.
Then the third act made me throw up my hands. Okay, Quibble accepts it's real, he meets Daring Do... and he's still going! He directly insults Daring and keeps noting the cliches in her adventures when he is right next to Daring on one of her adventures. It got to the point I'm just "Dude, shut the hell up please." He ultimately reconciles with Rainbow while still disliking the later books, but the problem is that since he has the epiphany and explains it to her, it came off more as him trying to justify his opinions after being proven wrong about Daring Do so he wouldn't have to admit he was wrong.
That was Quibble in a nutshell in the third act - he was a smug jerk who acted like he was right, but he was. And being right does not absolve him of the fact he was a smug jerk about it. Even when he continues to mock Daring Do to her face, he's supposed to be in the right. This would be fine if Daring wasn't a real character. Except she is, Quibble has learned that everything he dislikes about the later books actually happened. And he's still acting like an entitled fan. I know if I was somehow teleported to Equestria and learned all the adventures the cast had been on were real, I wouldn't start telling them what to do because I've seen all the episodes and know how they tend to go. At least I wouldn't be smug about it like Quibble.
Overall the commentary on fandoms and differing opinions on them within the fandom was well done, and the adventure was fun with some humorous bits. I just got fed up with Quibble's schtick after sitting through it for more than half the episode.
Quibble's my bro. I know his shtick was getting a little heavy towards the end, but I still couldn't help but chuckle at his ongoing commentary. I suppose I just have a higher tolerance for that type of character trait.
Plus, that monologue over the ending credits was just golden!
Quibble was an annoying jerk, yes, and he'd be tough to put up with for more than half an episode or so, but I see this as an actual example of more realistic writing on the part of the episode writers. Some people are just like that. Even when they're proven wrong, or even when things like what happened to Quibble happened, it's not going to instantly change their personality or make them Instantly Better. Just because he found out Daring Do is real, that doesn't mean he's just going to automatically stop being a jerk. It's just who he is.
If anything, QP's lack of personality change makes far more sense than Starlight Glimmer's Abrupt 180 at the end of season five.
4122831 True, but realistic does not equal likeable.
4122841 I completely agree there. I'm just saying the writers did a good job with him. Not every character has to be likeable to be well-written.
I think what makes Quibble shine is how well Patton plays him, he just absolutely shines.