A once well respected resident of Ponyville, who had been sent to prison for a crime he did not commit, has been released. But being as almost all of the townsfolk still believe he did it, and have angered-driven hatred towards him, helping this poor stallion to get back into society may be more difficult than the Main 6 had thought, even with the help of the very detective from Fillydelphia who cleared his name. Now all hope relies on Sapphire Shores, The Pony of Pop who makes a stop to Ponyville to visit a certain sick filly, and Princess Luna, the princess of the night who has watched this stallion's suffering for sometime to help fix everything. Will the pop star and princess save this poor prisoner? Read to find out in this drama like story.

I may have made a mistake with this review. It has nothing to do with the story itself, but I started reading it the same day I finished a book where the protagonist cheers his warriors into battle by singing the praises of a Catholic bishop's wife as the best whore in Britain on their way to slaughter Vikings.

I might have overestimated my ability to switch gears back to ponyfic and its propensity to have scenes lead to nothing but snuggling. You are free to take my dissatisfaction with today's story with a grain of salt.

Now then. I have two issues to talk about here. First, six chapters and 30k words in, I was still reading exposition. Never mind the fact that only one of the three titular characters have appeared so far, that one has... done little but sit still and look sad. With good reason, to be fair. The long description mentions his suffering in prison, and the story details his experience as outright torture. Physical, mental, emotional and sexual torture. I just wish the story did more than just talk about it.

I'm not asking for a rape scene, I just don't need to know every detail of this character's backstory right now. Twilight hears the news of a convicted murderer being released, and ponies talk, then Applejack goes home, and they talk, then there's screaming, and talking, then the Detective shows up, and they talk, and they give the guy a bath, and they talk, then he screams in fear at Winona, and they talk, then she goes home with Twilight, and they talk over dinner.

Compare this to an episode like Bridle Gossip. It starts a similar way, Twilight coming to town and finding everyone in a panic, and there's exposition to find out why. But then things happen. Characters make decisions and take actions like Apple Bloom following Zecora into the forest. They don't detail everything Twilight knows about the zebra homeland right off the bat, nor rely on flashback of Zecora's other trips to town only to then discuss the flashbacks. They move the plot forward and the details follow rather than expounding on the exposition.

My second issue with the story is Abacus, the prisoner himself. He's hard to describe. He's not a Mary Sue by any means, but with everything that's happened to him, I wonder if he's gone too far the other way. The tragedy he witnessed, the torture he endured, the author saw fit to throw mild autism in there as well, he's a hodge-podge of so many factors I have no idea what to expect from him. It's not a case of being unpredictable, but rather... any prediction could be correct. I can't say any reaction he has in any situation would be in or out of character.

To clarify, let me use his reaction to Winona as an example. The scar on his face was from a guard dog mauling him, so he screams in terror when he sees dogs. Which makes sense. But there's so much going on with the guy it would also make sense for him to just go prone and submissive to stop the inevitable attack. Or smile because the dog might be less painful than the guards with their weapons, tools, and rape. Or bark like a dog himself as some desperate way to scare it off. Hell, the guards probably made burning jokes around him like Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon did. Instead of getting angry at them it wouldn't have surprised me if he laughed with them, because that response was conditioned into him. Anything to make the pain stop.

And none of that is taking autism into account, just survival instinct.

I understand the motivation behind writing a character like this. He needs obstacles to overcome, challenges in his way so there's something invested into reading about his struggles. You can't make a character too special, make things too easy because that isn't normal. Conversely, when you pile on a character like this, what does normal even mean? When I stepped back and thought about who he was, if everything could make sense, why does anything matter?

The author left me a comment saying this story is being polished right now, so to give I'd like to give my advice on how to fix these issues.

First, get rid of the autism. Just cut it. It may have only been brought up once or twice in what I read, but the mental gymnastics it brought up trying to figure it into Abacus' characterization just wasn't worth it. Even without autism this guy has all the obstacles he needs for readers to cheer him on.

Second, get him involved in the story somehow. I was getting sick of reading everyone talking about him, around him, and him never adding anything. If he's so damaged he can't/won't talk, fine, write a bit from his point of view. Write him sitting in silence, trying to make sense of the world again with all these ponies around him all trying to be friendly for a change. I was confused about what to expect from him, so give us a glimpse into his head to narrow things down a bit.

Third, fix the pacing. Get him into town faster, even if it is just the scene of going for milkshakes. Break the exposition with some action. Use those scenes to introduce details. Maybe one of Diamond Tiara's cracks triggers and episode for Abacus, which would be a good, logical way to necessitate more exposition. Sprinkle it like breadcrumbs throughout the story to keep the reader intrigued by it rather than dumping it all at once.

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Ah fuck, so this group is back on track? Guess I'm gonna have to get back into the zone here.

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Oh holy crap this thing is still around? I reviewed this for Blunt Reviews and Rage Reviews some time ago, and the subsequent exchange was... bizarre.

As for Abacus, at least at the time I reviewed it (the author may have changed things since then) he was clearly a variant of Mary Sue known as a "Sympathy Sue", a character that exists only for bad things to happen to them, and for the other characters to sympathize with. He had absolutely no personality of his own. And yeah, there is nothing about the character or story that has anything to do with autism.

There was also the rather disturbing passage later on where the author attempted to justify major child abuse, specifically, the princesses forcibly exposing children to scenes of brutal, violent prison rape from Abacus' memories. Don't know if that's still in there, but I nearly lost my shit when I read that. And subsequent comments by the author made it quite clear that he had no clue why doing that was a bad thing. Oh yeah, and then the princess go on to gaslight another abused child into believing that her father only abused her because he loved her so much, and that it was her fault she was abused. Seriously.

This was without a doubt the worst story I've ever reviewed, and quite possibly the worst I've read here.

Oh, and the author attempted to get his followers to attack me and the Rage Reviews group because he didn't like the review.