TLove Me Like You Love Her

• MLP: FiM
• Romance
• Comedy
• Drama

Sweetie Belle has a problem, and her name is Rarity.

• Sex
• Rarity
• Sweetie Belle
• Spike
• CMCs

JackRipper · 2.8k words  ·  330  25 · 7.3k views

I read: Completed at 1 chapter, 2.7k words.
I rate: 8/10
I recommend: Read it

So this is one of those stories with a love triangle. Depending on who you ask, so far so good. Specifically said love triangle is the relation between everyone’s favourite dogsbody; Spike, best pony; Rarity, and best pony’s frumpier sister; Sweetie Belle. Spike likes Rarity, Sweetie likes Spike, Rarity has better stuff to do. That’s the story - the other CMC are there too, but merely for comic relief and damn is it some good comic relief actually.

Anyway, is it good? Yes. Romance, as well as most comedy, lives and dies on its characterisation. And here JackRipper writes Sweetie very well - she comes off as a fairly nervous and self-conscious teenager, albeit one who is not prone to anything like whining or self-pitying. In essence, she’s a perfectly likeable protagonist and her slightly underconfident attitude plays off spectacularly well against Rarity’s well-meaning nosiness and Spike’s inability to admit he likes her. Furthermore, Scootaloo and Apple Bloom are also written admirably and they make an excellent straight man and wise guy comedic duo that gives some much needed lightheartedness to what might otherwise become a somewhat angsty story. 

JackRipper’s writing itself here is good. It isn’t amazing by any means, save for some of the dialogue. Scootaloo specifically shines here with a lot excellent one-liners that hit spot on in terms of comedic timing - for that matter, his use of narration to show emotion and reaction to dialogue is also well done.

In terms of plot itself, the story is a love triangle with Sweetie trying to seduce Spike. That’s it basically, and its told cut into small episodes of either them interacting or Sweetie getting somewhat dubious advice from her sister and the Laurel-and-Hardy-channelling CMC. There is nothing wrong with this, but I cannot really give it points for originality or innovation; the writer does nothing new, he merely does old stuff well. And that’s okay honestly, I’d rather have old and good than new and crap. (I’d prefer new and good but then again I’d prefer my own experience with love triangles ended with the girl of my dreams not moving to another country, so yeah.)

Moving on.

To conclude, I’m actually finding this a difficult review to write because, frankly, it is a heck of a lot easier to you - yes, you, dear reader - why some is bad than why it is good. I can’t really pick apart stuff if there’s nothing to pick apart.

Plot: 3/5. Romantic comedy and love triangles are by no means new by JackRipper’s take on them here is competently heartwarming.
Characters: 5/5. All the characters are particularly well-done here with appropriate dialogue and a lot of plausibility.
Style: 4/5. Comedy and dialogue are excellent, romance and narration are above average.
Execution: 4/5. Excellent work here on a simple oneshot that works of a fairly popular ship.
Overall Rating: 16/20 = 8/10

To JackRipper: As usual, good work here. You wrote an entertaining fanfic that captures young love in a charming manner. Keep it up; if possible, do use the same style of humour in future because it really does carry the story out of being generic and into something that’s genuinely good.

For something like this: i like you: a cliche' story. (but a cute one) Yes, that’s the title I don’t know why. Anyway, it is another SpikeBelle story discussing this exact difficulty of teenagers confessing their love for each-other. Read it too.

As always, if you enjoyed this review, why not check out one of my stories? While totally unrelated to anything mentioned above, Biography of a Hikikomori is, in my overinflated opinion, not criminally underrated but there’s definitely a misdemeanour involved if you haven’t read it yet.