Drake's Thursday Reviews #2 · 2:07pm Jan 17th, 2019
After a multi-chapter fic last week, let's knock out some oneshots.
And The Serpent Said Unto The Princess by Undome Tinwe
I always love me a good creation myth story. This one takes a pseudo-Biblical tone with Discord as a Serpent that invades Canterlot and tempts and woos Celestia in order to steal a piece of the Sun and use it to grant the power of alicorns to ponies, and in doing so begins to corrupt their minds and drive a wedge between the ponies and the princess, giving Equestria freedom from her, which in its own ways is just another kind of imprisonment.
This is a very interesting story, particularly for its characterization of Discord. He is neither malevolent nor generous, but both and neither at once, as Chaos truly is. A critique would be that the story can't seem to decide if it wants to use the names of the characters or the mythologized terms for them, switching back and forth between The Princess and The Serpent, and Celestia and Discord. I'd prefer the former myself to mythologize the story more and maybe leave it up that the Princess and the Serpent are other characters than Celestia and Discord. I'm not fully certain I agree with the decision to bring Tirek into the creation myth, but he works well in it for what role he serves. And the framing device of this being told by an obviously biased narrator allows some creative liberties to be presumed.
Recommendation: A short but very interesting take on the formation of Equestria.
Pinkie Figures It Out! by Twinkletail
This story makes a connection between the Kirin/Nirik and a certain other character that probably has been made elsewhere, but it's the first time I've seen it so I liked it, especially since I explicably figured out where it was going before the character was even mentioned - I don't know how I thought of it. While this story is quite amusing in concept, the execution is a bit "eh".
The narration is a bit scatterbrained but that's intentional because it's Pinkie Pie, but it stays that way when we're not following ponk. We're basically watching Pinkie try to piss off Twilight to get her to go flaming mad like back in Feeling Pinkie Keen, except she only tries to do it once, and then we're with Starlight and Twilight as they talk about it, Pinkie apologizes, and we get an amusing ending.
Overall it's not awful, but it needed more fleshing out, as-is it's the bones of a three-act fic that could be very funny but is just kind of amusing in its current state.
Recommendation: If you like Kirin and Pinkie I suppose you'll be interested in this.
One Last Ride by Hasty Revision
A very short fic that delivers just what it needs - Spike's last time riding on Twilight's back, framed through the obvious lens of his wings equaling maturity, so he's too big both in age and in size. It's just over a thousand words but it lasts long enough to hit the "Aws" it wants. Could have hit them a bit more effectively with some more words behind it, but it's fine.
Recommendation: A quick two-minute jab to the Spike and Twilight feels.
A quick little Sunset x Fluttershy oneshot with a lime wedge of Flutterbat. It's a sequel to a much longer fic which I had not marked to read later, not sure why, but it stands on its own well enough, we get references to some events happening in enough context to follow the story. Only critique would be that, while the story stands on its own, it doesn't have much to it: Fluttershy can control her transformations with an engagement pendant from Sunset, Twilight wants to turn her back, Fluttershy says no, Twilight leaves.
While this concept is very interesting, the story needs to flesh it out more - Fluttershy can control herself in her transformed state, but like, what enhanced abilities does she have, does she need to eat apples still? Is there some sort of "she's a monster" mentality Twilight is dealing with in trying to cure her after a full year of her living with it? I'm not sure. Perhaps other fics in this universe bring up these problems, but if so this should be a chapter in those stories instead of a standalone.
Recommendation: Needs some more meat on its bones to be appetizing.
Looking at the RIL list after, I see a recurring trend in the list, so it looks like next week, and probably the week after, will be Everfree Northwest fics!
I must say, I didn't expect anyone to do a review of one of my stories. Thank you for taking the time to give it a read and for your critique. Truth be told, I did worry it was a little short but found that adding more felt like I was stretching for the sake of it. Perhaps, in the end, I stopped a little too short.