Ponyfic Roundup 436

Read it Later story count: 96 (-1)

Words read this week: 40,638

Have any of you fine folks read D G D Davidson's A Mighty Demon Slayer Grooms Some Ponies? I'm debating with myself whether to read it for a Spotlight at some point. The fic has been marked "on hiatus" for a decade with the last chapter unpublished, so normally the answer would be no, but there's a blog post by the author which apparently does at least provide a full final scene. Also, the ides of an extended G1/G4 crossover set on Earth and with a [Dark] tag intrigues me. Still, 90k words is a lot for me. I dunno, really. Anyone? Today's fics are one mid-length story and four quickies:

Not All Peaches and Cream by Garbo
Felt Heart by Tchernobog
The Line by Axan Zenith
Possibly, Probably, Positively Platonic by DualSoul1423
Confessions in a Canterlot Statuary by Daffodil

★: 0 | ★★: 1 | ★★★: 4 | ★★★★: 0 | ★★★★★: 0
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I enjoy an average amount scores two stars.

My Little Repeats 140: "Where the Apple Lies"

"Granny's going to report us all for using that logo, isn't she?"

S6E23: "Where the Apple Lies"

8 Oct 2016

My original rating: ★★★
IMDb score: 6.9

The one with eye-bandaged Derpy

Thoughts: A bit of a step up from "P.P.O.V.", though not enough to bring it above "quite good" territory. Big Mac is great value here, with the largely flashed-back plot allowing him to say plenty for once. He and Applejack spark off each other nicely as siblings – although it's odd that neither Apple Bloom nor her parents are anywhere to be seen, which makes you wonder about the exact time this is set. Filthy Rich is better here than his human analogue in Legend of Everfree, though I still don't know what he sees in Spoiled Milk. (Brilliant name, though it raises even more questions about pony naming conventions...) It's another good-looking ep, with plenty of fun touches to enjoy in the background, not least 80s Cheerilee! Granny seems very broadly characterised, but I suspect she knows more than she's letting on. Not a thrill-a-minute episode, but a character-focused one with a pleasantly laid-back pace. I still rather like it, and I'm happy for it to keep its three.

Choice quote: Granny Smith: "I'm sorry, Applejack, but you's just gonna have to un-promise."

New rating: ★★★

Next time, it's "Top Bolt", an episode which is largely seen (including by me) as one of the best of this era of the show's run. I am certainly looking forward to watching this ep again.

Ponyfic Roundup 435: mushroompone Edition

Read it Later story count: 97 (+1)

Words read this week: 33,706

It's been a while since I wrote a Roundup spotlighting a single author. In fact, it was PR 364 in October 2021, when I reviewed five stories by Lets Do This. As with LDT, mushroompone's account dates back only to 2018 (although apparently they've been around since 2013) and I've been somewhere on the scale from pleased to blown away by what I've read from them so far. Womb (PR 405) in particular was extraordinary. Of today's five, two were deliberate picks: The Head as the author's most recent story and Debt to Society as a Scootafic. The others were chosen randomly. Off we go!

Comet Day by mushroompone
The Great Hearth's Warming Bird Count by mushroompone
The Head by mushroompone
Debt to Society by mushroompone
Symbiosis by mushroompone

★: 0 | ★★: 0 | ★★★: 3 | ★★★★: 1 | ★★★★★: 1
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I enjoy an average amount scores two stars.

Non-Pony: I've started that His Dark Materials reread blog

 I'm not going to make a habit of posting non-MLP stuff here, but I did say that I'd give a heads-up when I started this, so here it is. It's on my Dreamwidth and you can use this DW tag to see all the relevant entries. As I've only just started Northern Lights, which is the first book of the trilogy, there aren't many just yet!

GPT-4 and Claude+ write ponyfic

It seems that if you log into Poe.com, you get one free query to each of the new GPT-4 and Claude+ engines in each calendar day. Given the vital importance of Pony, I chose to use today's free query to re-run the test I gave ChatGPT in December. I used exactly the same prompt as I did then, so you can compare the outputs of each model.

Prompt: Please write a My Little Pony story in which Fluttershy and Rarity discuss a sensitive issue over a cup of tea. The two ponies are very long-standing friends and trust each other completely. Both of them are quiet conversationalists, so the conversation should have a restrained emotional tone. However, the much brasher Rainbow Dash barges into the cottage halfway through.

Ponyfic Roundup 434

Read it Later story count: 96 (-3)

Words read this week: 54,228

Not a bad word count this week by my standards, although around two-thirds of that total comes from a single fic. Quite a varied selection of stuff today, and that's the way I usually like it – although, if you cast your eyes down to the end, you'll see that there'll be an author spotlight edition next time. Here's what I've got for you all now, though:

Luna Thinks the Sun is Made of Custard by Art Inspired
Beautiful Lives by Impossible Numbers
Bigger Than Any Heart by Coltured
In Markmoriam by FanOfMostEverything
The Perfect Little Village of Ponyville by McPoodle

★: 0 | ★★: 2 | ★★★: 2 | ★★★★: 1 | ★★★★★: 0
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I enjoy an average amount scores two stars.

My Little Repeats 139: "P.P.O.V. (Pony Point of View)"

🎵 And I know that my hat will go on... 🎵

S6E22: "P.P.O.V. (Pony Point of View)"

1 Oct 2016

My original rating: ★★★
IMDb score: 6.8

The one with Rarity confronting a giant crab

Thoughts: Quite a fun episode for the most part, but one severely let down by its feeble ending, one that's become almost legendary – largely for the wrong reasons. It's so disappointing to come off quite an enjoyable ride and find out that "Ha, it's a bunyip who eats cucumber sarnies and who we'll never see again" is the best these writers can do to round it off. Okay, it's just about given clues in the episode, but come on. That's not the only irritation, either: as just one example, Applejack late on sounding surprised that Pinkie bringing a pile of games was intended for her friends. The Rashomon-style approach is quite nicely done, and allows the animators to go to town once again: compare the ship's flag to British Columbia's. Twilight does some fairly good work on friendship, though I'm iffy about her outright lying to the others to get them to arrive together on the pier. No doubt that Arrrplejack steals the show, though! All in all, I think this is more a highish two than a three for me now.

Choice quote: Rarity: "Oh, don't worry dear. Luxury cruises never sink."

New rating: ★★

Next time, it's on to "Where the Apple Lies". A slightly strange episode, that, and one which I had mixed feelings about back in the day. I suspect that might still be the case, but we shall find out.

Back to FiM rewatches tomorrow

I should be back with "P.P.O.V. (Pony Point of View)" tomorrow. Which isn't all that likely to make anyone that excited – but the sooner I get moving again, the sooner I'll reach "Top Bolt", and that one might be a different matter. Heh, to think that when I started "My Little Repeats" the plan was to get through two episodes a week. I'd have been finished by now had I actually kept to that!

Ponyfic Roundup 433

Read it Later story count: 99 (+1)

Words read this week: 45,329

As I type this, there's snow in the local forecast. How can we have mild weather almost the entire winter and then go back to freezing conditions just as spring is around the corner? I blame Discord. Well, either him or the weather pegasi. Anyway, the now customary five fics to review this week, and one in particular really stood out. Here's the list:

A Moment in the Sun by Chengar Qordath
Destiny or Coincidence? by TalB
The Crepuscularity of an Alicorn by PsychicKid
Flashing with Flash Sentry by Spring Romp
You're Majesty by Ninjadeadbeard

★: 0 | ★★: 2 | ★★★: 2 | ★★★★: 0 | ★★★★★: 1
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I enjoy an average amount scores two stars.

My Little Repeats E4: Legend of Everfree

Dock around the clock

Legend of Everfree

Written by Kristine Songco and Joanna Lewis
24 Sep 2016 (Discovery Kids Latin America) / 1 Oct 2016 (Netflix)

My original rating: ★★★
IMDb score: 6.4

The one with Pinkie's marshmallow pillow

Thoughts: Another writing change for this movie, with Kristine Songco and Joanna Lewis taking over from Josh Haber. The only one of the four EqG feature films not to receive a cinema release in the UK, so I watched it when it eventually made its way to the Pop channel over here. I still feel it's a relatively weak instalment when compared to Rainbow Rocks or even Friendship Games. The music in Legend of Everfree is generally good (I love "Hope Shines Eternal" at the end), Sunset gets a pretty good part and even Flash Sentry gets some decent material to work with, while the different setting makes it visually appealing. The plot itself is okay if not brilliant, and at least the geodes made a comeback in the specials – even if Sunset's ability is a bit on the creepy side when you think about it. On the downside, I'm still iffy about a camp counsellor like Timber getting romantically involved with a student, Filthy Rich is pretty one-dimensional in his few appearances and Gloriosa/Gaea¹ isn't exactly the greatest villain MLP has ever had. This is... well, maybe "bland" is overdoing it, but it doesn't really stick in my mind. Still a three, but a weak three and I'm not absolutely confident it's even that any more for me. Probably Sunset and the songs tip it over the line, but only just.
¹ I still don't know why she's not "Gaia", but she isn't

Choice quote: Spike: "I think you're just gonna have to pick it up."

New rating: ★★★

Next time, back on the FiM beat, it's the lumberingly titled "P.P.O.V. (Pony Point of View)". Originally I felt this was a fun episode with a feeble ending. We'll see how it goes in 2023.

Non-Pony: I'll be doing a His Dark Materials reread blog soon

Those of you who read either my Fimfiction blog or my Dreamwidth will already know about this, but just to complete the set: the recent BBC adaptation of Philip Pullman's classic fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials has really got me interested in rereading the books. So I thought about doing that, and then I thought, why don't I do that as a blog that people can follow along with if they wish?

After putting out a couple of feelers, it seems that there's at least a little interest in reading my ramblings on such a thing. As such, it's happening. (You'll have to imagine the accompanying GIF.) I don't yet have an exact date but I hope to get going this month. Not on Louder Yay, of course, but on my Dreamwidth. Posts will be public, so you won't need to have a DW account to read or comment.

I think two chapters a week, with one post for each, is a pace I can keep up pretty well over a fairly long period. They'll be fairly short: think my FiM rewatches rather than my reviews of new episodes. That's all for the moment. If you're interested, please keep an eye out on DW. I'll try to remember to give an update here when the reread is ready to start, but you know what I'm like!

The fandom and me in 2023

Which kinda sorta rhymes woo. Anyway, I've been idly musing on how I relate to the MLP fandom these days. I think it would be silly to pretend that I have the intensely excited relationship with it that I did a decade ago. The fact that there are no longer any new episodes of Friendship is Magic has a fair bit to do with that, plus of course it's inevitably no longer fresh and new.

That said, my interest in Pony hasn't faded as much as it clearly has for some people. I'm still maintaining Louder Yay, after all! I'm still reading a ton of fanfic. I'm even (dun dun dun) writing ponyfic again, though so far at least nothing more than a couple of silly small one-shots that aren't likely to blow anyone away. And I'd still call MLP my number one fandom, even now.

What I think I may be starting to cool on, just very slightly, is going to conventions like UKPC. They're getting more and more expensive (and maybe just a little samey¹) and I'm starting to reflect on what else I could be spending with the same money. Set against that, I get to see friends I don't meet any other time. But that's above it being because these are Pony events specifically.
¹ Apparently a Briticism. I had no idea!

However, that does not mean that the MLP angle is no longer a big deal for me in the social fandom. For meets, even though they're vastly less expensive, it still really matters to me that they're Pony-centric. I'd still go to some if they'd turned into just a bunch of friends talking generally, but I seriously doubt I'd attend as many as I do at the moment. So yeah, Pony still matters a lot there.

So... yeah, I wouldn't deny that I've cooled on My Little Pony since 2013 or so. But I was starting from such a high temperature, so to speak, that I'm still a long way above lukewarm. I think I'll consider myself an MLP fan, and quite a serious one, for a very long time yet – quite possibly forever. It just doesn't entirely dominate my online life the way it did a decade ago, that's all.

Ponyfic Roundup 432

Read it Later story count: 98 (-4)

Words read this week: 30,969

Still drained from the thrilling Test match, but... castles. They're quite the thing in Equestria. The one in Canterlot, Twilight's place, the Castle of the Dead-End Plotline Two Sisters, you name it. I occasionally wonder whether that has a little less impact on this side of the Atlantic where "Have you ever visited a castle?" is barely more of a question than "Have you ever visited a river?" I mean, I can reach a pretty decent castle with a 40-minute bus ride. But I digress. Again. Let's get to today's stories...

All Skin and Bones by redsquirrel456
Chilly by kits
Power by Darkswirl
Omelet by GaPJaxie
The Palace Bird by silver hands

★: 0 | ★★: 1 | ★★★: 2 | ★★★★: 2 | ★★★★★: 0
Note: I use a skewed rating system. A fic I enjoy an average amount scores two stars.