EThe Greatest Trick

• MLP: FiM
• Comedy
• Random
• Slice of Life

Trixie finally bests Twilight.

• Twilight
• Luna
• Trixie
• Main 6
• Starlight Glimmer

Ninjadeadbeard · 3.7k words  ·  205  7 · 3.1k views

!ereh ythgiM
,erehT olleH

Hehehe
Don't mind the joke, I just thought I would be appropriate because this is the first comedy fic I will ever review!
So congratulations Ninjadeadbeard you will forever hold that title.
Double congratulations, for making such a funny fic!

Now without further ado, let's begin!

The Review

Very few stories can tell a good joke that everyone will find funny...
This is not one of those stories...
But frankly I don't care about what you think…
This story set out to tell a good joke, and tell a good joke it did.

"The Greatest Trick" is a one shot Slice of Life Comedy fic, so it’s not trying to tell the most complex or compelling story. Instead I believe it set out to do 3 things:

1. Entertain the reader.
2. Surprise the reader.
3. And have the characters be in character.

I believe this story succeeded in all three regards, but before I talk about how, lets address the stories flaws.

First of all it's a comedy, being a comedy in of itself is both a positive and negative thing, due to the nature of comedy relying on who, what, when, where, and how its delivered (*told). For me it's not a negative as I found this story funny, but comedy is subjective so reader discretion is advised (note: this warning will go on all my comedy reviews so this is not a special case), while I will be praising the jokes and the writing a lot in this review know that there is no universal joke. and even if there was this story is not telling it.

What honestly supposed me when I was writing this review, was just how little there is to say about this story's flaws, there are some yes but their only really minor grammar errors. Yet as stated before this is a comedy fic, so it relies heavily on the jokes and less on the story. If you don't find the joke funny, you aren't going to find the fic enjoyable.

Now however is to move on to the main show!
THE POSITIVES!!!!!!

(Was that grrrreat and powerful enough for you?)

There are 5 major positives that really make this fic shine:

1. The Characterisation!
2. Appropriate actions from the cast!
3. Appropriate reactions to actions from the cast!
4. All characters actually felt in character!
5. Unconventional usage of the 5 rules of writing comedy!
6. Not caring about the readers feelings whatsoever!

Now, these five (Yes this is on purpose, it's just to annoy people with OCD (people like me!)) positives can be split into two main points. The characters and the 5 rules. Let's break them down.

The characters in this fic really do feel like the mane six, Twilight felt like Twilight.
Luna felt like Luna
Starlight felt like Starlight.
And the great and powerful Trixie (was still a cunt as she should be) felt like (Surprise, Surprise) great and powerful Trixie.
The way they move, how they react, and the events of the fic just all fit so nicely into the context of the show.
These are the Mane 6... oh and Spike, Spoiler alert he plays such an important role in the story! And I just want to take a quick moment to just gush over how in character Spike was, I mean seriously I have never seen a fic with Spike feeling so much like the show I could almost hear Cathy Weseluck speaking in my ear.

The interactions between the characters, heck the setting, the usage of the population of Ponyville, 👌 Epic.

Now for what I was saying about the rules of comedy (well you can look them up yourself but since 90% of you are lazy bones here they are):

1. You Don’t Have to Be a Comedian to Write Great Comedy

2. Silly Is Not Funny

3. Go to Your Personal Pain in Life to Find Comedy

4. Keep the Comedy Grounded and Natural

5. Don’t Start with Premise, Start with Character

The rules I will be focusing rules 2, 4 and 5 due to me having no understanding of the authors personal life and for the first rule being irrelevant for this review.

Let’s start with rule 5, because why not:
Before the joke/s really start to flood in it starts of by introducing us to our environment, our cast and our setting. This really helps prepare or ease in the reader into your world before the fireworks start.

Next up is rule 2:
This is the only rule that is in risk of being broken, but after reading though the story a few times I believe that the comedy walks on very thin ice, that sort of cracks with the final few sentences. However by that point the climax has already happened, the punchline's been dealt and the fic's coming to a close.

Finally is rule 4, nobody's favourite number:
Originally, I was debating whether or not this applied to the story, until it hit me. The reason the characterisation is so good is due to how grounded the comedy is in universe, (this applies until the very end but still, close enough). I can't go into detail how that is, due to it not only ruining the joke/s and spoiling the story, but to the explanation being completely unnecessary. The comedy was grounded, until the final few sentences. That's all you need to know.

Final ratings

Overall rating:
<For archive purposes: 7.3/10>

Conclusion

This fic set out to be a nice and short comedy fic with ponies, and it’s a goal it achieved. I certainly enjoyed it, obviously it’s not the best comedy fic out there, but then again it could be to someone. Comedy is subjective after all.
Simple improvements could be made to some areas involving the grammar, there's a tendency to start a sentence with 'And' when it's not appropriate.

I would recommend reading if you want just a quick pick me up of sorts.
Earned a like, and a spot in my library.

Final words:
This fic made me go out and learn a few things.

I learned what a buntings are!
And, learned what aplomb means!

Ah, thanks for the quick review! Happy that the jokes managed to land with you, considering how you opened with the "all comedy is subjective" stuff. And yeah, I've found that's very true.

But... you don't like Trixie? The Great and Powerful???

7508044
I honestly do love her.
I was just complimenting how... in character you got her.