Read it Later story count: 98 (-1)
Now thrice Pfizered, I sally forth once more on another nail-biting adventure. Well, no: actually I just write some waffly stuff about a few ponyfics. But hay, you should be used to that by now. I am planning on doing a slightly larger edition again before the year is out, by the way – perhaps another RCL edition in search of a story to which I can award that elusive five-star rating! Not this week, though. Today's three stories are as follows:
Ponyville Chess Club and Mail Swap by Singularity Dream
Longevity by RainbowBob
Nightmare Moon is a...Salespony?! by iAmSiNnEr
★: 0 | ★★: 3 | ★★★: 0 | ★★★★: 0 | ★★★★★: 0
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I find average scores two stars.
OCs
Comedy/Slice of Life; 6k words; Apr 2016–Jun 2017; Everyone
Discord never fixed their mailboxes, so the six ponies of the Ponyville Chess Club have to meet every day to exchange mail with each other.
Singularity Dream is best known to me as the person behind the Big Ultra Master Review List. Sadly it's no longer updated, but it's been an incredibly useful resource over the years. However, they've also written a few fics themselves. The setup here really appealed to me, and there are certainly some nice touches with the OCs and their sometimes less than reverent attitude towards Princess Twilight's obsessions in particular. Luna being unfamiliar with modern things may not be to everyone's taste these days (or even when this was written) but I can roll with it. Less so "We shall remain a friend to thou", admittedly. There's also a great explanation for why Vinyl and Octavia's house from "Slice of Life" is the way it is. What rather lets the story down is its roughness. The pacing is uneven, there are a lot of minor technical errors, that kind of thing. There's even a section in chapter two which is missing entirely, replaced by the author's apology for not being able to write it well. As Shrink Laureate said, that kind of Adams/Pratchett stuff is hard to pull off, and Singularity Dream doesn't manage it here. I think there is at least a comfortable three-star story in this premise – but this is not it. ★★
Longevity by RainbowBob
Tank and Rainbow Dash
Sad; 1k words; Aug 2013; Everyone
The life of a pet can always vary. For Tank, he was fated to outlive his master. Now with master gone, he tries to make sense of it, the way only a tortoise can.
This one I found really frustrating, and the short description above hints at why. It's a Tank-POV piece, seeing him contemplating life after the death and burial of his beloved Rainbow Dash. I liked the way that we see things from Tank's perspective, including his intellectual perspective: while by no means stupid, he simply doesn't comprehend pony stuff like burial. What really brought the fic down for me was the total absence of pronouns for Rainbow: Tank refers to her as "master" throughout, even when that means using the word multiple times in the same sentence. I found that incredibly irritating long before the end. A shame. The obvious parallel is with Skywriter's Winona-centric Sun Princess (PR 6) and if you only want to read one fic of this kind, I'd recommend that one over this. ★★
Nightmare Moon is a...Salespony?! by iAmSiNnEr
Nightmare Moon, Celestia, Twilight, Mayor Mare and Mane Six
Comedy/Slice of Life/Alternate Universe; 1k words; Nov 2021; Everyone
Nightmare Moon has returned from her thousand years of banishment. Though, she wants to introduce Eternal Night another way...
Another story that had a great concept but couldn't quite pull off the execution. I love the idea that, in this AU, Nightmare Moon comes across more like she's trying to make a fast buck out of eternal night than just being evil for the sake of it. Terry Pratchett's Eric does something kind of like this with demons. Although that's an enormously high bar, I was greatly amused by the concept here and was still hoping for some chuckleworthy fun. Unfortunately, the first third of the fic is literally a word-for-word recreation of Nightmare Moon's appearance in FiM S1E01. Things then pick up considerably as she explains all the stuff she's been doing on the Moon, how she'll turn eternal night into a tourist attraction, etc. This is the best part of the story. The ending is disappointing, though, with the use of several real-world brands not working at all. As with Ponyville Chess Club and Mail Swap, this fic has potential but doesn't make the most of it. ★★
Next time, stories featured should include Rated Ponystar's AppleDash romance, Treating Her Right.
This might be the lowest scoring Roundup slate I've seen! Though I know your rating system means these are all just kind of average.
ReplyDeleteSome interesting ideas this week, even if none of them stuck the landing. And well done on the triple-Pfizer (which in itself sounds like a gymnastics or ice skating move, now that I think about it.)
I don't think you were around these parts back in the days of PR 100, which was an attempt to give some exposure to little-noticed stories -- I only looked at fics with under 100 views at the time of downloading. It went... less than brilliantly. Six fics reviewed (I had more time back then!), consisting of four twos and two ones. Oh dear.
DeleteI wasn't even in the *fandom* then, let alone a reader of this fine site. But oof - the intentions were good, at least! (Although I'm sure I've read the Cherry Berry one before!)
DeleteOuch. (Relevant to jab or stories, you decide.)
ReplyDeleteI had just the apparently very common side-effect of a sore arm for a few days, so I'll take that.
DeleteSame here so far. I was a bit ill for a day or two after the first Pfizer/Comirnaty dose back in the spring, but doses 2 and now 3 have just given me a sore arm. The whole process for the booster shot was very much improved and streamlined compared to the others, though.
DeleteOof, poor batch indeed. I'd read the Chess Club one before and found it just as muddled and rough and all over the place as yourself. The other two were quick enough for me to read and give a go, and I largely agree, they both failed to stick the landing for the reasons you'd mentioned. I'd seen the Nightmare Moon as a sales pony one on the Featured Box for what felt like weeks, so I was mildly curious, but man, does the early S1E01 recreation and especially the ending meta jokes drag down what was, honestly, only just a decent, safe fic in its execution of its concept to begin with.
ReplyDeleteI did, however, read Sun Princess out of curiosity from your mention of it, and that was pretty good. So not a total washout this week!
Skywriter is generally a pretty reliable author. :)
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