Random Ramblings CCXIII · 7:15am Dec 9th, 2017
IN WHICH I SPOIL PLOT POINTS KINDA
Today was a day. I got some adulting done (yay me). Still have more to do. I regret that my mental health – what's left of it – must come before my writing. But that's the way it works sometimes. Anyway, I'd like to take this opportunity not to pity-party again, but to give a General Author's Note to the whole Recovery Arc. Follow me!
Okay, so yesterday I suddenly got some comments on some of the early SRA entries from a new reader. Despite the reader favouriting the stories, he left some criticisms that I felt were, to put it bluntly, really stupid. Or maybe I'm too stupid to understand them.
Now I know I'm not the best at handling criticism – it took me several days of fuming to realize Moth was right about keeping characters grounded (that he scorched me on Christmas Day was a factor) and some months to agree Posh had a point about Sasha's overly quick plot progression. I probably SHOULD fix that one, but what would it accomplish now? The story's been out for awhile and has close to a hundred upvotes. It's not like when I went back and added the flashback to Exes Meet – another time I eventually agreed with a criticism, by the way. That flashback really ought to have been there from the start, and the reason I didn't put it in at first was because I'd envisioned it in the middle of the story and it fucked up the pacing. It was only later I realized it belonged at the beginning, so I wrote it and shoved it in there, and the story is ten times better for it, especially because it sets up a future meeting between Sunny and Flash.
Anyway, here is one of the posts, from NoFS:
I don’t like the idea of making Sunset living a poor life so that we can pity her. That’s not Hasbro have planned, and in actual lives, people with mental illnesses are often being bullied but not bully other people.
You. Don't. Fucking. Get it. Does this person honestly believe I made Sunset poor just so she can be pitied? Please. I have more respect for myself and my readers than that – also, I'm FAR from the only writer on this site to do this. I've made several in-story justifications for her living situation. First and most important, she's technically an illegal immigrant. That means all her documentation is fake. She's used multiple identities over the ten years she's lived in humanoid world. Second, because of this, she works low-paying under-the-table jobs. Third, she's spent the past three-plus years pretending to be a high school student again in order to maintain access to the portal, taking away from her work-time. Fourth, I was not so subtly channelling my own feelings of the time (or an earlier time) – that's why a couple of readers got onto me for being "self-inserty", which at least is a critique with merit.
And trust me, I know fucking first-hand what it's like to be bullied for having a mental illness. However, I've also been on both sides. I said things to other people as a kid that I'm not proud of, just as people said things to me, because it felt nice to be on the other side of the situation. It's not unreasonable for Sunny to have been in a similar situation, lashing out as a coping mechanism for an underlying problem. So on that point, the reader is completely fucking wrong. PS - My mental illnesses are NOT self-diagnosed; they're legit, signed off on by a therapist and a shrink, and I take medication every day. What's your excuse?
I don't give a damn what Hasbro has planned for her or not. This is MY universe. I've spent nearly three years living with Sunset in my fevered brain, and I'm gonna write her how I wanna write her. I have EXPLICITLY decreed everything after Rainbow Rocks to not be within continuity for any EQG stories I write. I do like the EQG movies and specials that came after RR, but they simply do not and CANNOT matter to the stories I write. I'll tell you why:
For over two years, I've had a story – a massive one – outlined that will see Sunset return to Equestria under tough circumstances. I haven't started it yet because it is VERY important I write the Anon-A-Miss story first, as it precedes my monster – it'll have multiple moving parts, intentionally shifting POV, a logical explanation for The Dazzlings, and a very different take on Sci-Twi that mostly ignores canon. Oh, and it also explains why there's only one Sunset.
Also, as I'll explain in the post-Anon-A-Miss story, Sunset isn't exactly "poor". She just has to keep herself on a very very tight financial leash because of reasons. It's going to take me some work to iron out the explanation so there are as few holes as possible, but trust that I know what I'm doing. All of this has been planned for a long time.
OH! By the way! Fuck the Sunset Group blog entry from last month where OP shat all over Anon-A-Miss and anyone who writes stories about it. I spent over a month rewriting that story from scratch to fix its plot holes and make it better, so don't you dare fucking tell me I'm a bad, inexperienced, lazy, hack writer for deigning to not dismiss that comic outright. (I'm a bad lazy hack writer for totally different reasons!). I do accept my redo of it and it is important to one of my continuities. I REFUSE TO LET THAT STORY DIE.
Here's another comment:
It makes me think of those people in the forum keep saying ‘sorry’, being pitied, being forgiven, and backstab others again and again.
If someone has ever made me want to suicide, I will certainly not forgive him. Especially when I saw so many people being forgiven by new members of this fandom and they started to manipulate these newcomers.
I just can’t accept it.
I literally have no idea what this person is talking about here. If someone could please explain it to me?
In my stories, no single person pushed Sunset to self-harm. It was her way of trying to cope with her inner demons, as it is for many people. The whole purpose of Sunset's Recovery Arc is for her to realize that it's not enough for others to forgive her for her sins; she must also forgive herself, which to me is far harder. She also has to deal with some folks she'd rather not. It's hard. Sure, I was bullied as a kid (and boy did I gloat like a mofo when one of my childhood bullies ended up in prison) and teen, but I grew up in an age before social media, so I could go home to get away from it and recharge.
Maybe if I drink some coffee tomorrow, I'll be able to work on my final one-shot Sunset-only story. Oh don't worry; I'm not done torturing Sunnybuns just yet, but everything after this is multi-chapter or, in the case of the final Burrito story, will co-star Sonata. So, yeah. Look forward to more stuff from me eventually™.
Peace out!
Spot on Soufriere. Don't let the bastards wear you down.
I've really enjoyed your writing, and the Anon-A-Miss stories in general (when they are well done). Sure I hated the comic, but the stories add more to the story and give it reasons beyond mere sentimentality, as you point out above.
Keep on rockin!