Drake's Thursday Reviews #8

Here we go!

Princess Flurry Heart's New Babysitter by Hood

A premise like this promises hilarity for sure... I would have assumed. Unfortunately this story is very difficult to get into, because it's technical elements are rather bare-boned. A lot of the story is talking heads and the dialogue is quite awkward, there's no real sense of character voicing and a lot of it is exposition or dialogue in the sense of "this is what we need to say to move the plot along." But even trying to get into the story, it isn't very good - the circumstances of how Trixie becomes Flurry Heart's babysitter are remarkably contrived, and then it takes us to the final chapter to actually get to Trixie interacting with Flurry Heart.

But then enters this story's greatest crime - it just isn't interesting. I dunno how you make the idea of "Trixie babysits Flurry Heart" boring, but this author found a way. The sequence is almost entirely narration and most of Trixie's dialogue is just so bland and dull. Trixie has none of her charm or charisma here, she just says words. There's also some subplot involving an orphaned Trixie volunteered at, but it doesn't go anywhere - presuming the fic's Complete tag is an error, this is just a dead fic, and either way the orphanaged plot seems forced.

I don't want to be mean in this review, but I can't help it - how do you make the premise of "Trixie babysits Flurry Heart" boring?

Recommendation: This should be comedy gold, but instead it's iron - dull, clunky, heavy, and unordinary. Fantastic premise, awful execution.

Who's Your Daddy? by Sporktacles

Yeah... this fic goes there. From the summary and title, you can take a guess as to what it is, and yup. It's surreal and silly and dumb. This fic isn't as funny as it could have been, but it got its mileage out of its concept, so I can't say I disliked it. It wasn't as funny as it might have been, but it was very funny as-is.

What is odd about this fic, though, is the one throw-away line from the first part that sticks with me.

The statement worried Sunset. The last time she had heard those exact words in that exact tone was years ago, not long after her beloved pet gerbil had been eaten by a passing hawk.

This makes me irrationally amused for the mental imagery. Because you know it was something like Sunset took her gerbil down to the gardens and let it out to be on the grass, then out of nowhere a hawk dives down and grabs it. Or she has it out on her desk and opens the window and HAWK and Sunset just stares and whispers "Nibbles?" "Scree!" I'm sorry but there is no circumstance where "my pet gerbil was eaten by a hawk" cannot happen in a comical fashion. That is just one of those events where no matter how it happened, it was funny.

Recommendation: It made me laugh several times and loudly, so mission accomplished.

"Thanks, Mom." by naturalbornderpy

This fic took a little bit to get going, but once it dead, it went at a good pace. Again, much laughs, surreal humor, the silliness it promises from its concept. Luna steals the show entirely during her scene, and the second chapter is great. Not much more to it than that, it delivers what you came for.

Recommendation: All the zaniness you'd expect from its premise.

Comments

[PresentPerfect]

That last one sounds great, and Who's Your Daddy was also great. :D