Paul's Thursday Reviews CCXLIV · 8:18pm Mar 25th, 2021
No reviews next week, folks. I’m on break.
This was a frustrating week. I caught something, no idea what. Not the Coronavirus, so no worries there; pretty sure I’d be feeling a lot worse if that were the case. It took me a few days to even realize that something was wrong. The biggest problem was a seemingly endless lethargy that left me feeling like I needed to sleep all day… which, oddly enough, always went away for a couple hours in the late evening. A few other things occurred, but most of them weren’t recurring so I don’t know if they were symptoms of whatever I had. The only thing that did recur was this very sudden breathlessness that would strike without warning and make my pulse shoot through the roof. Those moments were… a little worrying.
I spent most of the week trying to relax and sleeping it off. Work did not help at all on those grounds, as I got called into the office on four separate occasions. The combination was enough that I wasn’t able to get much writing done. That’s the frustrating bit; it felt like I was finally getting some momentum until then. Every time I loaded up a doc to write, I’d find myself staring at the screen blankly for ten minutes while wishing I was in bed. I did finish one side project that we should hopefully see released in a few weeks, but other than that? Total crash.
The symptoms are largely gone at this point. Haven’t had that rush of breathlessness in three days and I actually managed to go the last two without collapsing in my bed at some point or another, though I was certainly tempted at times. I have no idea what I had, but it feels like I’m on the tail end of it, and good riddance. Now if the rest of the world would just leave me alone, I would like to sit down and write about Rarity having Applejack issues for a few days. Is that too much to ask?
On to the reviews. As mentioned last week, I’m using the “one big story +70k words or less” rules for these blogs now, so we won’t be seeing consistent review counts anymore.
EDIT: It dawns upon me right before posting this that the lethargy hit after I swore off drinking juice mixes and limited my soda intake to one glass a day. Perhaps I’m facing some kind of caffeine/sugar combo withdrawal? Doesn't explain the breathless episodes though.
Stories for This Week:
Tales of Apple Scratch: The Lieutenant Cloud Kicker by Mariacheat-Brony
The Flicker of a Film by The Princess Rarity
History Repeats by SaddlesoapOpera
Sunset: To Equine or Not Too Equine by Sunset_Shimmer83
Accepting Help by Tinybit92
Total Word Count: 147,379
Rating System
Why Haven't You Read These Yet?: 0
Pretty Good: 2
Worth It: 2
Needs Work: 0
None: 0
Cloud Kicker is many things. Most people would say first and foremost “irrepressible flirt and slut.” But she’s also a proud and capable member of the Royal Guard, arguably one of the best ever trained. This is the story of how she got there.
This was a curious one. It is set in a humanized Equestria where events are very different from what we know in the show. I was a little confused by this throughout, because sometimes it is hinted that events from the show have/will be happening, and in others it’s clear that they aren’t going to happen at all. For instance, I strongly suspect the whole “Nightmare Moon” thing never happened. I get the impression I’d have known better what the world’s “deal” is if I’d read the stories in a different order, as this was apparently not the first to be written.
The story is 90% slice-of-life, starting with a brief look at Cloud’s childhood and how she became best friends with Vinyl Scratch and Applejack. It then progresses to the meat of the story: her training to be a royal guard and her apprenticeship under Spitfire. There is no dominant villain, although villains do appear, and while there is some action it is secondary to the real point of the story, i.e. Cloud’s growth and struggles as a soldier-in-training. I see nothing wrong with this. Cloud’s misadventures and personal agonies were more than interesting enough.
One thing I’m on the fence about is how many background elements are planted around this story. There’s a lot more going on than Cloud’s life; hints towards what characters like Twilight and Applejack are doing, odd suggestions of differences between this world and the one from the show, people in new and unexpected roles, and so on. Part of me is thrilled to find out there’s so much more to this world, thereby hinting at so much more to come (and there are certainly plenty of sequels to support that idea). On the other hand, it almost feels like Mariacheat-Brony tried to do too much with this, placing a lot of loose threads around the map with little hope of dealing with them all.
The good news is that this story focuses on Cloud for the most part, as is appropriate, so the constant seeding of threads don’t distract from the purpose of the story. And I do enjoy it when an author shows ambition. So I guess I’m more positive about this aspect than negative. But it still leaves me uneasy for reasons I can’t put my finger on.
Of course, there’s the sexual humor. Anyone who has read these reviews for a while knows I love sexual teasing as part of the humor in stories. Cloud, being a constant flirt, tickles this part of me ceaselessly. A part of me thought it was being used too often at times, demonstrating a character with an unrealistic/unreasonable ability to bed whomever she wanted. But then, not being a playboy, I have no idea what qualifies as ‘realistic’ in this regard, so I’ll leave it be. Besides, with the very last character Cloud snogs in the story, I’m starting to think Mariacheat-Brony simply envisions this Equestria as a sexually wild place. I honestly can’t imagine that character of all people being that easy, which can only mean the author has made some fundamental changes to either the character or sexuality in general for this world.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect in all of this is how it’s not a “feel good” story. The characters don’t live happily ever after. Rather, the ending is shockingly cruel, leaving families torn apart, people missing, and relationships in tatters. It’s not at all the kind of conclusion I anticipated. I’m okay with this, though. It feels more realistic, and leaves the door open for more stories to come in and either heal wounds or, at the very least, let the characters move on to fresh starts. It’s still a kick in the feels, though.
All in all, I enjoyed this one. At times it seems to meander and there are certainly some confusing, unexplained changes to the world going on. Even so, it was a curious and fun read. I find myself looking forward to the sequels.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
The Flicker of a Film
1,825 Words
By The Princess Rarity
Fancy Pants and Fleur de Lis, Equestria’s premier power couple. But once, they were just up-and-comers…
This story, which The Princess Rarity describes as experimental, depicts Fancy and Fleur in their youth when they were rising movie stars. This threw me entirely off the rails; I’ve envisioned a lot of potential circumstances for these two, but never movie stars. My first reaction was to question when/if there’s ever been a suggestion that there are even movies in Equestria. But then I remembered One Bad Apple, so yes, absolutely, there is film in Equestria. Makes me wonder why we never see more about that kind of thing in-show.
But Photo Finish as a movie director? Shenanigans, I say!
Anyway, the story is short and straightforward. Fancy and Fleur are costars in a gangster romance, and after an interviewer hints there may be something between them, they start to see the appeal. While the whole thing is utterly predictable, I really like how The Princess Rarity doesn’t just Tell us this is what’s happening. Instead it’s all about Show, forcing us to watch their behavior and realize what’s going on for ourselves. Even better is how they keep shifting between their roles and their true selves, which can make it a little trickier to know when their long bouts of silent staring are intended for the scene or real. A nice touch there, author.
A little too brief for what I’d like to see, but not bad for what we get.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Misadventures in Manehattan — Pretty Good
The Last Curtain Call — Pretty Good
Daring Do & All of the Time in the World — Needs Work
History Repeats
58,574 Words
By SaddlesoapOpera
The ancient necromancer Grogar has returned to Equestria, and this time he’s bringing the Smooze with him. Princess Luna, forewarned by dreams of premonition, sends Rainbow Dash to the human world to bring back a hero and warrior from thousands of years past to help against this unprecedented threat: The Megan.
This was quite the rollercoaster ride. SaddlesoapOpera wastes no time with this story, starting us off running and refusing to slow down. Every chapter ups the threat level and keeps things tense, turning what could have been only a blast from the past into a fast-paced adventure. This has its benefits… but also its downsides.
The story flows through multiple different, simultaneous threads, never letting you focus on any one problem for long. Be it Rainbow trying to help Lightning Dust, Megan and Applejack going up against an army of changelings, Twilight fleeing a corrupted dragon, or Celestia and Luna coming to blows, there’s always something big happening. While this will work great for the thrill-seeking crowds, those of us who were hoping to really get into the minds and hearts of our heroes may find it lacking. We’re not given any time to think, much less to consider the consequences of what is happening. This runs the risk of making the events feel shallow, even when they aren’t.
Still, whether the endless rush of danger is a bad thing will depend upon reader interpretation. If you’re willing to not think about it all and just let it happen, then you’ll probably have a ton of fun. I certainly enjoyed more than a few moments of the nonstop action, especially in regards to seeing Pinkie Pie be Best Pony for a while. Seriously, she was great in this.
Two things in particular bothered me. The first are the songs. There are two of them, and they struck me as woefully out of place and borderline inappropriate. If I were six again, then maybe I would have enjoyed them. Being an adult, I was more annoyed by having these dark, deadly, and inescapably serius moments ruined by a bunch of characters breaking out into, *ugh*, song. I think I get what SaddlesoapOpera was going for, but the juxtaposition of dread and doom against silly lyrics and stage direction was just too much.
The other thing that bothered me was Luna’s behavior throughout the story. She never does anything particularly bad or wrong, and yet her inability to actually help in the ongoing situation… turns her back into a bad guy? What? How? Why? There was an insurmountable rift between cause and effect here. It felt like the author was creating shenanigans in a bid to make the ongoing events more epic and dreadful. I’d feel different if Luna had actually done something bad, but she never does. So what, her plans failing on two separate occasions somehow translates to “clearly I was always meant to be evil?” It didn’t make Luna tragic, it made her look like an idiot. I am mildly offended by that.
If you can ignore these two issues, what you’ll find is a nonstop adventure that works a ton of Olden Pone Charm into a Modern Pone World. Megan, Grogar, the Smooze, the Flutterponies, the original Rainbow Power, there’s a lot for fans of older MLP generations to grin about, and SaddlesoapOpera does a solid job blending those elements into FiM, even if the explanations are somewhat shallow.
If you want an adventure and are interested in some old-school pone nostalgia, there’s no reason not to dive in.
Bookshelf: Pretty Good
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
The Sun Also Sets — Worth It
Sunset: To Equine or Not Too Equine
5,036 Words (Incomplete)
Sunset_Shimmer83 failed to provide cover art.
Requested bySunset_Shimmer83
No, that extra “o” in the title isn’t a typo. I don’t know why it’s there, either.
At some point in the past, an ever-curious SciTwi took blood samples from Princess Twilight and Sunset Shimmer to get DNA results run. They finally come back, and Sunset’s suggests that she might not be a pony after all.
Or, if you go by the first two chapters, which are at this time the only ones: lots of sexual hijinks and supposedly comedic events happen, and something something blood tests.
Shimmer83, your story is everywhere except where it needs to be. This is supposed to be a story about Sunset Shimmer possibly not being a pony in the first place. That’s a big deal to most people. You’re literally telling someone their entire life as they’ve always known it is a lie. But you sum up the entire revelation with:
“You’re right Twilight, this has to be a mistake? This test says that Princess Twilight's test came back as unknown which makes sense as she’s an alicorn, but I have human DNA? How is this possible? I remember being born a unicorn in Equestria!”
Sunset and Twilight just stared at one another in shock. Sunset stood up suddenly startling Twilight.“This doesn’t make any sense Twilight, how the hell can I have human DNA? I'm supposed to be a pony...aren’t i?
Twilight stood up and took Sunsets hands in her own.
“I’m not sure, but i’m here for you. We can figure this out together.”
“Thanks Twilight, I really do appreciate it,” Sunset said letting out a sigh.
Aaand we move on.
That’s it, Shimmer83? This giant, life-changing revelation and mystery suddenly comes up, the entire reason this story exists, and this is the entire reaction we get about it? And then you immediately jump to dick jokes and a cat fight. It’s almost as if nobody in the story, including you, actually cares about the supposed primary premise. Did you just want to have a wild party scene where random characters from CHS and Crystal Prep get frisky with one another? Because that seems to be the only thing this story wants to focus on.
I didn’t come here to see Sour Sweet cussing like a sailor in an all-caps rant about dicks being drawn on her family photos – which is somehow supposed to be funny rather than insulting and disrespectful. I came here because Sunset’s entire life is about to be turned upside down. As it is, you are not writing a mystery or a slice of life, you’re writing a comedy for the lowest common denominator. How long before it descends into fart jokes?
I get it. It’s a bunch of horny teenagers at a wild party. Fair enough. But you’ve focused so much on the setting and getting a laugh (or perhaps a rise of sorts) out of readers that the entire point of the story is drowned in it. As a result, I don’t expect anything better for the rest of the story. If Sunset doesn’t care about this enough to spend real time on it, regardless of setting, then there’s no reason for the audience to care either.
So that’s the very first thing I would recommend, Shimmer83: focus on what’s important. It’s okay to throw in a joke every now and then or set the scene, but not at the expense of keeping the story going. Aside from the Sci-Twi/Sunset shipping, I can’t think of much at all in the entirety of the first two chapters that was important in any way to the advertised primary plot.
The second thing I’m going to recommend is fix your formatting. You’ve got double-spacing and single-spacing mixed chaotically and it doesn’t work. Use double spacing. Always. I don’t care if the next paragraph’s topic is directly linked to the topic of the prior one, do not mix these formats up. It's not creative, it’s not meaningful or impactful, it’s just annoying. Also, do more proofing or get a proofreader, and stop using all caps.
On the topic of tangents, you really need to avoid stuff like this:
Sunset glanced around to see if she could spot any of her closest friends, who she now considered family. She had ever since just before the whole Anon a miss drama had taken place, thankfully they had all made amends, and Sunset held no grudge towards the ones responsible for it.
What is this, author? Why does it exist? It has nothing to do with anything around it, and I’m pretty sure the Anon-a-Miss incident isn’t related to what this story is about. You can’t just drop past events into the story if they serve no purpose.
Oh, and do your research. Use the MLP:FiM wiki. In this day and age, there is no excuse for misspelling Anon-a-Miss so grievously (and don’t think I’m not eyeing that Shakespear-inspired title).
I think I’ll stop there. There are other things, but there’s no point in trying to tackle everything all at once, and some of the unspoken things may get fixed anyway as the other issues are addressed. I’d like to comment on the actual plot of this story, but I can’t because it’s largely nonexistent. Focus your story at the start and give us a better hook, author. Once that’s done then maybe we can start talking about the big scale plot stuff. Good luck!
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
New Author!
Accepting Help
2,885 Words
By Tinybit92
Sequel to Being Honest With Yourself
Sunset had to stay at school late for her long-running detention after the Fall Formal. Which, unfortunately, means by the time she got to the homeless shelter, they were overfilled and couldn’t take her. Her backup plan is to sleep at the school, but when even that is foiled, it’s starting to look like she’ll be on the street for this late fall night.
And then a Wild Fluttershy appears.
I never bought into the “homeless Sunset” trope. I get where the idea comes from, but I can't help but think that if Sunset was homeless, it would have been noticeable in her appearance. I tend to think that she resolved the issue long before the Fall Formal, possibly even before the first Fall Formal she won. So this whole “Sunset is still homeless by the time of Equestria Girls” thing just doesn’t jive for me.
Buuut that’s just my (humbly correct) opinion, and I can’t deny that the concept has appeal from a storytelling standpoint, so I won’t judge this based on that alone.
Anyway, the story is exactly what you’re probably thinking: Fluttershy discovers Sunset is homeless and out of luck for the night and insists she spend a night at her place. Perfectly predictable. The good part isn’t Fluttershy doing Fluttershy things but the conversation she has with Sunset regarding why she does Fluttershy things. Which, again, is perfectly in character and expected, but no less endearing despite that.
Rarity is still Best Human in this series and I still liked Applejack’s story more. Still, this story is only the weakest compared to the others because it does exactly what is expected rather than taking a more creative route to explore Fluttershy’s nature while helping Sunset. It’s decent on its own. My only real regret is that we never got the promised Rainbow Dash or Pinkie Pie sequels.
Bookshelf: Worth It
Previous stories reviewed for this author:
Oh no, he's cute — Pretty Good
Being Honest With Yourself — Pretty Good
Asking a Favor — Worth It
Lunar Musings — Needs Work
Stories for Next Week:
A Weekend Farmhand for Applejack by FlimFlamBros.
Stars in His Eyes by The Princess Rarity
The Word is Fear by BronyWriter
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My brain read this first as "no reviews this week" and was like "Well now I want to see what the rest of this post is."
Whatever you caught sounds yikes (especially the breathless part, that'd definitely be alarming). Glad you're feeling better, and hope you make a full recovery! Get some rest time!
I am reading a rather interesting story right now called "My Life as a Bipedal Quadruped" in the off chance you haven't already reviewed it.
Thanks for the feedback - detailed analysis is always welcome!
As to your primary concerns, though, I can at least offer where I was coming from.
The songs, like Grogar's somewhat melodramatic, ham-ish villainy, are all about trying to be a faithful fanfiction, not simply a good story in a vacuum. This is Equestria/Ponlyland, and Grogar is a canon character from G1 who is precisely that hammy in the old toons. And likewise, modern Equestria runs on music, and even in the gravest of crises music finds its way in. You say it's weird for them to sing during a disaster, but I'd suggest that it's weird for Ponies NOT to sing when danger looms and emotions run high. Megan herself comments in-universe that it was bizarre to burst into song at her darkest hour, but among these rainbow horsies, It's just how things work. Why do they sing? Well, why do they use teacups with finger-handles? It's just The Way.
As for Luna, bear in mind this was much, MUCH earlier in the storyline, when Luna was still somewhat freshly redeemed and carrying lingering bitterness, uncertainty, self-doubt, and anachronistic culture-shock. Season 3's Luna spent decades in her sister's literal shadow, then turned evil and threatened the world, then went to space jail for a millennium ... and then has been purged and free for -- what -- about six months? Less? Celestia and Discord are literally the only familiar faces on the planet for Luna, and she's got baggage with both of them. It may seem jarring for Luna to slip so easily back into her old ways, but she carried that darkness for a lot longer than she's been trying to be good. It's basically a backslide -- like a recovering alcoholic with only a week sober stumbling back into the bottle. It's not great ... but it absolutely happens. Especially to a character who is so accustomed to being feared, being vilified, being lonely, and looking inferior to her amazing perfect sister (as well as the new addition of her sister's night-themed
replacement sisterprotege).Lastly, she also doesn't slip all by herself, either. Discord is there at his manipulative best, needling and poking tender places, reminding her that Grogar, the same dark sorcerer who (in this fanon) taught both her AND Sombra dark magic centuries ago before Sombra double-crossed and murdered him, is now back and using those same skills to wreak global havoc. Luna is desperate to find a quick, clean solution to the crisis before that link to her own old shame comes to light and ruins her shaky good reputation, and then little miss Wonder-Twilight shows up to prove herself the better heroine in front of a massive crowd. Luna throws herself back into the role of a destroyer because her emotional state is the same as it was when she FIRST succumbed to that sinister temptation: she feels inferior, outshone, disgraced, and unappreciated. She is less feeling EAGER to go back to being bad than she is feeling FORCED to. It's only when she has a chance to better confront her lingering tension with Celestia and accept her own guilt/responsibility that her redemption is better able to "stick".
That was my way of thinking on those topics, anyway. Whether that all landed, worked, or makes sense is another matter...
5483912
I still don't like the inclusions of the songs – the formatting of the overarching story doesn't support them at all – but I can accept you had a reasonable excuse for putting them in. And to be fair, I never saw the one involving Grogar; for all I know it was just as dark and ominous as your story.
Time is a relative thing as far as fanfiction goes. An author may interpret these events as being six months after Luna's return, but the reader may interpret it as having been three years (and I do). I'm perfectly willing to accept your timescale based on the fact it's your story, but at the same time, I don't think that time scale was ever clarified in-story, which leaves room for the reader to keep their headcanons. Unless you did and I missed it?
Although I don't think the time frame matters in this context. I have a hard time believing that evil can be put on the same pedestal as alcohol or drugs. It would be different if Luna demonstrated a penchant for evil behavior in this story, a "I'm a bad girl trying to be better" character type. But she's not. Her every action is aimed towards being a good pony. Aside from Discord's needlessly cruel poking, I didn't see anything in this story pushing Luna to be a villain again.
It would be different if Twilight had gone up to Luna and outright accused her of helping Grogar in front of the entire castle, or if Celestia had told Luna in her face that she was a hopeless troublemaker. But that's not what happened. There was no cause to the effect. There was certainly cause for guilt, maybe depression and a feeling of helplessness, but to go from failing to help to being part of the problem? That's a leap of continental proportions.
5483948
Well, with regard to Luna, then, I suppose I'd have to ask:
What reason did she have for becoming so violently evil the first time?
There was no sadism there, either. She felt alone, outshone, unappreciated, envious ... and so she decided that if the world loved Celestia's light so damn much, she'd just break their precious toy in a fit of pointless, childish and counter-productive spite. And again, in the fic, if her efforts with the Megan AND with Discord all blew up in her face ... if Celestia was disappointed and Twilight made a fool of her and the heroine she'd sought out in the world of dreams turned out to be a useless wreck, then screw it. All she has left, all she knows, is being the ruiner-of-stuff everypony seems so eager to prove that she is.
If Luna's behaviour 'worked' 1000 years ago, then History Repeated present-day (heh). And if it didn't make sense back then either, well, then I was still being "faithfully wrong", just like the aforementioned inexplicable teacups...
5483954
Do we know why she became so violently evil the first time? I would argue that's up to interpretation. Sure, we've seen Luna and Celestia fight in Season 4, but what do we really know about the background events? Not much canonically. It could have been something immature as you say. It could have been something taking decades with far more mature back-and-forth between the sisters. For all we know "jealousy" is merely a simplification for something far deeper and more complex with a variety of intricacies and details we just aren't privy to.
Buuut again, this is your story, and as such it depends on your headcanon. So I suppose I should just handwave everything I've just said as not so important to the discussion. Getting ahead of myself again.
But then there's this "All she has left, all she knows, is being the ruiner-of-stuff everypony seems so eager to prove that she is." What? Where does this come from? With (again) the exception of Discord being a jerk, not a single pony so much as hinted that they blame Luna for anything, to say nothing of trying to prove she's ruining things. How the heck is anyone supposed to make that kind of connection? Celestia didn't accuse Luna of anything. Twilight didn't do anything except point out the flaw in Luna's plan. Neither of these things translate to "you're a fuck up and a villain, Luna, and you always will be." And she openly demonstrates her distrust of anything Discord says, so there's no reason for her to take his cruelty as anything more than Discord being Discord (at least as she knows him). It's a crazy leap of logic.
...
I suppose I'd be willing to buy the idea that Luna was not in a logical/sane state of mind. The fact that she thought being Nightmare Moon was something anyone at all wants or expects of her is enough to indicate a warped mind with no common sense. And if Luna's mind is broken into not thinking anything out intelligently, then I suppose it (ironically) stands to reason that she could interpret perfectly innocent, non-accusatory reactions to her choices as "wanting her to be the villain". Which means that all we have to do as the reader is assume Luna is insane from the very start, although that's hard to do when there hasn't been a lot to indicate such throughout the story up until she suddenly decides to go Nightmare Moon on everyone.
5483397
Been trying, and mostly succeeding. Using this time to read Axtara.
5483407
I just got finished explaining to someone how adding stories much longer than 100k to my RiL is very hard to do right now, darn it! I'll admit that the story looks very interesting. I just don't know if I have the space anywhere in my schedule over the next two years to actually get to something that big. Still, I'll keep it in mind. Maybe something will happen to give me an excuse to squeeze it in.
5484131
.
Hey, absolutely NO hurry or pressure, I didn't at all realize how busy you were, and as far as I am concerned, if you have time, great, if not no worries, by this time next week I will probably have forgotten I even made the suggestion in the first place