Coup d'etat by Colonel Waffle (I don't even know why I'm trying anymore)
Sometime in August, two years ago, I wrote my first review. It was a year or so after I found the MLP-fanfic community, and I'd read the reviews other people wrote and thought: I can do better than that. I was mistaken of course, and what followed was a train wreck, or a series of them. Yes, I've learned a lot but I don't quite know not to be ashamed of myself––and by extension, what made me the person I am today––yet so this month will be my therapy month.
I've become a lot less productive lately and for no good reason too because penning reviews is one of my favorite pastimes. This is actually the reason I started this blog, as a showcase and a motivator. I don't want to be suffocated by absent-mindedness, just because I can only keep one damn thought in my head at a time, which is why I'm posting some old stuff while rattling my brain against the computer screen. I'm not sure what will happen next, but at least I'll have something ready and posted this week. Future me, get to work!
Disclaimer: The views and grammatical prowess expressed within does not necessarily reflect CW's of today.
I don’t know how much into what element ROBCaceran53 thought himself to be when writing this. There is a lot that could be said about this piece of fiction but little that needs to be heard. The author obviously did not understand the full signification of what he was writing before flinging it outwards for the world look over. Whether this is the case or not now is no less than the speculation, it lies beyond me at the very least.
My Little
Dashie is the story of a man whose life is coming along less than firmly. It
starts off with narration done by our beloved whoever, telling us about just
how tremendously vacant his life is. Both of his parents are dead, both of
them, for unknown reasons, and everything they ever wanted was for him to be
happy. But one day, it is all put to sudden change, this, the day when he finds
a filly in a box on the middle of the sidewalk. Supposedly, this is to lead
over to some captivating moments, character development in shape of serious
emotional growth and a life the main character would not even had been able to
dream of. What follows is a series of discombobulating events, each one eager
to stretch your suspension of disbelief in one way or another.
Then again,
that really goes without saying, does it not? Or at least it should do, but who
am I to pinpoint the opinion of an as expansive mass of people as the follower
base this story grounds itself on. What really matters is whether a story can
succeed in being captivating or not, confidently carrying out its attempts at
distracting you from plot holes, contingency errors or whatever bitter demerits
might hide itself in the writing on varying scales, to the largest extent
conceivable.
So what are
the substantial values making themselves able to estimate from the beginning,
all the way over to the end of this story? How about characters? Characters do
stand among the cornerstones for a person being made able to be enthralled upon
reading a fascinating piece of literature. Well, the main character is dung and
is not to be judged as such on a proportionate level. Essentially, he is empty.
There is not much more to it than that, he is a surface, he could quite
literally, be anyone. When I think about it, does it not put ground for an
innuendo hinting at the more disgusting kind of self serving? Certainly the
wrong reason to be willing to read (or write) a story if put singularly in this
particular context. Even beyond that, I’d argue that the story may very likely
be too blank, even to be able to fill this deterrent purpose.
The
narration is tasteless; does it come in an attempt at depicting the character
for all intents and purposes? Sounds like a load of barnacles to me, but a
valid one nonetheless. Disregarding that, it should not have been done, more
so, even considered. Dialogue does too go beyond unconvincing, I would consider
an example but the ample library of lines actually uttered in this story are
few and thankfully so. The colourless narration, the clumsy dialogue, the lack
of any semblance of further thought regarding the art of writing fiction or
dealing with linguistics in general is ultimately disregarded. A total jumble
of an inaesthetic mess, to be sure.
Up until
now I have been nothing but negative, as I feel it, I have not been given room
to be anything but negative. Heheh… heh, that’s what for you right there.
Although really, there were in fact some things I quite appreciated about My
Little Dashie, quite. I liked some of the setups for a couple scenarios, like
Rainbow Dash and Whowhatwhywhere’s moments at that abandoned park. Sure, the
story didn’t make much out of the settings but I would always be able to use my
sense of imagination in trying to make something out of them. This is of course
still unacceptable on the behalf of the author. Whether he was trying to write
a freaking dairy from the main character’s perspective or if he was actually
trying to depict events as they went along, (the amount of time you face pieces
written in present tense is scarce but all is depicted in first-person without
dispensation) he failed. Also, I did like the bits of narration showing this
light sense of doubt, having him ponder about, touching upon the differences
between worlds and how he is to handle each and every situation coming into his
way.
Problem is,
no particular part of Dash’s life is advanced upon, those couple heart-warming
moments that could have been are all kind of lost on us in the heavy war the
story has apparently decided to declare on, even the merest hint at ‘showing’. What
about Dash and the Humbadubguy’s little attempt at making… b-b-baking something
for the blue spectacle of bright colours and flapping feathers on her birthday.
I would have loved seeing that actually come into realisation, but no. Instead,
I get a fly-by-night excuse of an attempt at compelling an audience. Am I just
expected to take in the ideas, scrambled down and turned into rough drafts, and
imagine them put into reality myself. Seems more than a little senseless, don’t
you think?
Character
development? Psh, the story does barely even know how to develop upon itself,
let alone showing how both Rainbow and Ravioli has changed and how their
changes has come to affect as time passes. We, the readers, go completely
without knowledge concerning exactly how this main character has become a
better person as the finish ticks in. The majorly, monumentally, gigantically
unexpected ending to this eye-socket-squeezing masterwork of a story. Okay, so
I’d been told what the ending was more than a year before I read this story… or
was it the other way around? In any case, sure, we know that he has got a new
house and that he won an unspecified amount of money at the lottery or the
casino or whatever but what is that supposed to tell us? The story doesn’t want
to take any time to itself in projecting an image of just why exactly we are
supposed to care, care with our emotions, about ‘whatever the ending may be’,
for the no ones of you out there that doesn’t know of it. And when I say “no
ones”, I do not refer to you as nobodies. When I say “no ones”, I refer to the
fact that it is very difficult being a brony and not knowing the entirety of
this tale from start to finish. Even for ones such as myself who just turned
away from it the moment they saw it because of disinterest before clambering
their way back, puzzled at the enormous burst of popularity it has accumulated.
Everything
appears prodigiously flat and jarringly impassive. Where’s the energy? Where’s
the emotion? This entire story, taken from beginning to end, is a mechanic, one
that successfully manages to be hurtfully insulting (e.g. I hope the ending
raised more than one couple eyebrows as it acted the cherry on top of the
insensate construction this story is) at more than one occasion. You don’t get
dragged in, you throw yourself into it. You don’t get thrown off, you fling the
thing out of thought. You think there is some kind of ostensible bond between
this Mashahugy and Rainbow Dash, you haven’t actually read this story. You’ve
read the scenarios off of your own mind, you have had a physiological trick
played on you and you should attempt at revising the story, again and again and
again and again until you realise that, until you’re healthy again.
I very
honestly have a more than a very tough time recommending this to anyone,
verily. My Little Dashie is shallow, harsh, empty and ultimately superficial,
in its attempts at evoking any kind of emotional rebound. It is a story that
does what it has to do for the sake of doing it, without even hinting at a
depiction (not even a zany, discombobulated one) of a believably procured,
emotional connection. But at that, I did sincerely like some of the ideas this
story had going for it, one and another of the concepts it had for its
scenarios were actually really neat. The way they were conclusively carried out
however… stay away! No, wait, on the other hand, you should probably read this.
I mean, it has placed it marks as brony history, has it not? Then again, the
ones of you that doesn’t already have probably are doubtful enough to make this
review tip them over the edge, into the “I don’t wanna” territory… do whatever
you’d like. Okay? Later, dudes and gals!
Unrated
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