Nostalgia Month: Rainbow Factory

http://www.fimfiction.net/story/5381/rainbow-factory

Rainbow Factory is the story about Scootaloo and her two OC friendos and how they fail their flight tests and get to go on a magical journey to the mystical Rainbow Factory. Being so that this fanfic is shrouded in mystery by the beginning, I am going to incorporate one or two more spoilers than what is normally customary when writing these kinds of reviews in order to keep it more thorough. With that said, if you aren’t a fan of spoilers, run. Run like you’ve never ran before! Oh, and I recommend it for a read. Byes!

Disclaimer: The views and grammatical prowess expressed within does not necessarily reflect CW's of today.

You know, this story takes it to itself to present some pretty jarring facts about cloudsdalian culture. To have it be so that pegasí are publically rejected and downright outlawed because they were unable to pass this, flight test. And guess what, through a series of unfortunate events, this is exactly what happens to poor Scootaloo, Orion and Aurora. Orion, a long-time friend of Scoots, decides to sacrifice himself for the sake of Aurora Dawn after she’d failed by chance because of a recent, heavy sickness our poor, poor foal had the misfortune of catching. He does this in a corny but regardless, fairly admissible manner, resulting in him himself being failed by default. Orion deliberately distracts Scoota in order to not make this their final moment, seeing one and another. I am surprised this was only very vaguely touched upon in the story, it could have served as good means for the sake of chemistry and character development.

In fact, when you really do look at it, how much chemistry between characters does this piece of fiction actually have?  Not much, not much, that’s for sure. I would have liked to see relationships develop before we saw them all being mangled to oatmeal. This way, I didn’t quite see myself factually caring about them at their hour of final judgement. Instead, it relies on putting itself forward in more of a: “Look at this, look how horrible this is.” kind of way, still not relying on gore for the sake of suspense which I thought was refreshing. Actually, I found the main protagonists to be toneless and just flat-out tame if I should go on. I want some main characters I am able to relate to, not some bonny, eviscerated, unrealistically good-natured bores that carries no semblance whatsoever in relation to actual youth. The only one I consider strong enough to be able to carry a story somewhat was Scootaloo who, unlike the others, was not left inactive for the majority of the story. No, she got to business, she made things happen, she, you can exclude from the bases of my earlier complaints. Even if she was a little bit, you know, not herself; not very “in character”, if you get my gist. But to meanly assume that a young filly should stay the same throughout the course of her adolescence would be pretty naïf of a notion, don’t you think? We’ve also got Dr. Atmosphere, the head engineer at the factory, who is presented in a good ol’ fashioned overly villainous kind of way; which is acceptable considering the amount of time he spends in-story. 

Ultimately, among major characters, there is Rainbow Dash. Funny how when Rainbow unveils an entirely unknown side of her personality, her Rainbow ‘Factory’ Dash personality, she does also appear more eloquent than before, who would have known? Maybe she’s been studying linguistics somewhere along the lines of these years. And well, yeah, her Rainbow Factory personality displays her as a sadistic, manic, overly rabid piece of schmultz which is highly disappointing to say at the mostest of the least. I am convinced the story’s emotional affectiveness would have put its grounds at one much higher level if the author had just kept her personality the same as always, still having her hold her position as supervisor. This way, the only character that appears credible (accounting for sequential development) is none other than poor ol’ Scootaloo. This does not do much to the stories advantage concerning us readers, caring about its characters and what would come to happen to them.

In which case now, the author decided to pick these little citations, taken directly from the song lyrics (that being the entirety of the song) and push them in there between paragraphs, in an attempt to establish something of an ominous tone, I suppose. What should I say? The song is certainly not a “pain to the ear” but I do not find the lyrics really making themselves well on paper either. The writing runs smoothly although the prose in and of itself appears a lil’ wishy-washy in contexture (every now and then, you’re forced to stop and question structural decisions made); environment descriptions are grounded on a constitutive level with one and another humorously meretricious piece of scenery shaping itself before you, I account the dialogue corny, to a fair extent. Too, keeping an all-knowing eye on each of its characters as is done may not have been the best choice in regards to its writing style. At last, I only remember myself finding one persistent grammatical error being the capitalization of the word pegasus over and over again, no doubt the result of having the tale run in spell check which I know for a fact has the tendency of doing that with gracious lack of concern regarding your consent. Rest of the piece was reasonably well-edited with a couple glaring flops from quick moment to quick moment.  

I caught a liking some of its ideas surrounding cloudsdalian culture and was able to feel the amounts of creativity going behind them. However then, in its plotting, it should reflect the cute but competent atmosphere Friendship is Magic has established against the dark, sinister and outright unpleasant atmosphere surrounding the idea WoodenToasters original work placed its foundations upon because on a conceptual level, it works so well. Settling on holding this grip on the what-huh of a perennial unpleasantness can be brought out of this idea from the beginning to the very end of this piece of fiction. Try and reminisce for a bit, the flight test was performed under some pretty uneasy circumstances, and how about those trashy, evil-boding stallions handling the wagon? Furthermore, was it such a bright idea to have the protagonists immediately be greeted with every palpable morsel this narrative implying evil high jinks being in the process of doing? My sentiment, it would have worked better should the story have built itself up as one gaily cheerful, jocund kind of experience instead of taking its place as the impending-doom-incoming kind. We may compare it to the system used at the camps back in the time of the Holocaust which were designed to appear good-natured and inviting on the surface, but once inside…  

Finally, there is the ending. Alrighty, let me give ya a little background, Scootaloo flies halfway through the factory, up and down, left and right, diagonally and subvertically, trying to escape from insano Dash. She finds her way to what looks an air shaft (or something) and decides to go for it. El Scooto flies through, and guess what’s on the other side. Well, let’s just say it’s impending death, you naggers. Our main protagonist ends up right at the place from which she had once begun. I have a problem with this, you shouldn’t get me wrong though, I’m all for killing off Scoots. You may appreciate the way the story take its attempt at developing upon Stootaloo’s escape, tempting you to think things might still end well, only to pull all hopes out of your grasp at the moment of redemption. This is a great mechanic serviceable for creating suspense when needed. But I don’t think AuroraDawn was quite done yet. I don’t think Scooahoophoop’s escape had been developed upon to enough of an extent and the “moment of no return” came a well bit earlier than I would have preferred it to. On top of that, this “moment of no return” from start to finish, did sadly end up forcing me into a state of unfulfillment.

Conclusively, Rainbow Factory lays its foundations on an enthralling idea and manages to come off at least passably entertaining on an average. It is to be noted, the jarringly bad decisions made as regards to storytelling put it down a remarkable bit. The same can also be said for the ignobly percussive excuses for characters that infest it. Go ahead and give it a read it if you wish for a little more of a glimpse of the mentalities of your fellow bronies, even those ones of you who feel a little weak concerning the gory stuff would probably not bother much since there is very little of it involved and although the what of it that is present is put under delineation, it is carried into effect under imperturbable circumstances. AuroraDawn’s Rainbow Factory does carry steady semblance vis-à-vis the lines of ingenuity, you might hardly like what you see, no doubt, but you will nevertheless have picked up on its ideas which are all that it is worth reading for. The mythos surrounding the Rainbow Factory can [and has] only be[en] built upon. Good afternoon. 

Unrated