Friday, September 20, 2013

Fandom Classics Part 9: Once Bitten, Twice Shy

To read the story, click the image or follow this link

I've been having fun--for a particularly OCD definition of "fun," anyway--watching the "fandom classics" tag climb up the category list on the right-hand side of the blog.  It's right behind "episode talk" and "actual books" and gaining fast!

..."6-star reviews" looks like it'll stay in the top spot for a good long while, though.  Anyway, click below the break for my review of Wynneception's Once Bitten, Twice Shy.

Impressions before reading:  Ah, it's been a while since I've reviewed a main six shipping story.  On a very fundamental level, I just don't "get" sexually pairing platonic friends who've got an established history of interacting closely without showing any signs of romantic interest in one another.  Given that fanfiction of that exact sort makes up at least a third, often more, of any given fandom, I sometimes wonder if the problem is me.  Be that as it may, I've found several shipfics in my time within the pony fandom which I enjoyed, my own misgivings notwithstanding, so I'm hopeful that I'll be able to add this one to the list.

Zero-ish spoiler summary:  Twilight's head-over-heels for Fluttershy, but doesn't know how to tell her.  Enter Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie, to help her sound the waters and find true love.

Meanwhile...

Fluttershy's head-over-heels for Twilight, but doesn't know how to tell her.  Enter Rarity and Applejack, to help her sound the waters and find true love.

Thoughts after reading:  So, this is another one of those fics that assumes rampant lesbianism and previously unhinted-at sexual desire as a starting point.  So if you were looking for some reason for all that stuff in the summary, it ain't here.

If you can swallow that though, or if you can at least accept it long enough to read a fic predicated on the premise, then there's a lot to like about the story.  "Progressively disastrous first date" and "meddling friends on both sides" are both romance/comedy standbys, but Wynneception does a nice job of mixing situational humor and social awkwardness in consistently entertaining ways.  Twi and Fluttershy flub and fail their way through the day, but never do either feel so targeted that the humor begins to curdle.  The other four, meanwhile, are well characterized despite their supporting roles in the story.  On a few occasions their bits fell flat (Pinkie's fourth wall breaking being the most obvious example), but for the most part their "contributions" felt appropriate and were amusing.

The story's pacing was also excellent (again, assuming one accepts the assumed premise), liberally leavening setup scenes with one-liners and brick jokes while giving key exchanges their full weight.  For a story that might look kind of generic on paper, I can honestly say that I was never bored with Once Bitten, Twice Shy.

Unfortunately, the writing quality wasn't nearly up to the conceptual standard.  The author uses "epicenter" to mean "at the exact center of," and that's just wrong.  The epicenter is above the center, for goodness sake!

...Well, that, and some other, broader issues.  I'll pull out one quote in particular which highlights three consistent issues throughout the story:
"Hmm.  I understand," Twilight nodded, willing to acknowledge she had a darn good point.
First, there's the dialogue tagging.  The author uses dialogue tags over-liberally, which wouldn't be a major issue by itself.  But when you start substituting "nodded" or "winked" or the like, it's very noticeable.  Even if one were to leave aside the fact that you can't "nod" a sentence (I admit, the occasional odd tag doesn't bother me), ending every other line with "she implored," "she declaimed," or whatever else, calls unwanted attention to word choice, at the expense of the narrative.

Second, there's the narrator's voice.  Simply put, it's all over the place.  Sometimes, it's third person limited, following a character's thoughts and borrowing from her lexicon.  Other times, it's omniscient, a detached presence with a neutral voice.  And still other times, like here, it's doing God knows what.  "A darn good point" isn't something Twi would say, and it doesn't fit the vernacular used by the omniscient narrator.

Finally, nearly every line of dialogue contains a complete explanation of the speaking pony's logic in saying it.  This got positively silly by the end of the fic, but as a general rule, they were never more than superfluous; the dialogue was well-written enough, on the whole, that character logic was plainly transparent without spelling out that Fluttershy was quiet "because she was feeling nervous" every single time.

Star rating:  ☆ (what does this mean?)

This is a pretty poorly written story, really.  But I'll give it this much: it's consistently entertaining despite that.  Many, many fics are reduced to dull unreadability by similar issues, and it's a testament to this work's pacing and humor that it can still be enjoyed despite its flaws.  Of course, it'd also be that much nicer without said flaws, so there's that.

Recommendation:  This isn't a story that's going to change anyone's mind about shipping, so those who aren't fans of the genre needn't bother.  Anyone who's looking for a well-conceived (if hardly revolutionary) light romantic comedy though, and who doesn't mind some clunky, redundant writing, will find this a suitably rewarding experience.

Next time:  The Combinatorics Project, by Ringcaat

35 comments:

  1. If you want something bad enough, it doesn't matter that it's not there. It just should be. A few may even see something where it's not, like a parched traveler discovering an oasis among the sand dunes

    What I don't get is the desire to see these particular characters romantically involved. You have all fictional and non-fictional characters, from every setting imaginable, at your disposal. Why choose mares?

    This isn't to say I haven't enjoyed a pony shipfic either, but it was never due to the shipping itself

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    1. I think some people just can't resist the power that matchmaking promises them. They are in control of people's feelings and lives. It's like playing god, but on a smaller scale.

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    2. God*, or "a god"

      Sorry, that's just a pet peeve I can't seem to shake. You're probably right that it's a power trip. Personally, when I want to feel like God, I'll lie down and listen to a full album straight through, focusing on every little detail. It's a practice I highly recommend (try Sgt. Pepper or The Postal Service's Give Up)

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    3. No, 'god' is perfectly acceptable. The capital is only required when referring to a specific god in a titular aspect. If referring only to the vage notion of dominance and power, and not any specific god, then the capitalisation is inappropriate.

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    4. In that later case, one would say "a god", as I noted above. One would not say you "have the strength of bear", but rather "the strength of a bear"

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    5. Not at all. 'Playing god' is common colloquial saying that may, but does not have to, refer to a specific deity, usually Yahweh.

      It would, for example, be perfectly normal usage to ask 'who's playing god today' regarding a senior person in a hierarchy or someone with an over-inflated ego. This is no different to something like 'I'll play nursemaid until you get home'.

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  2. The problem is you, Chris.

    JOIN US

    Also oh shit, Combinatorics. :D An ambitious project that falls all over itself in places but nevertheless serves up some really memorable character interactions and maintains a high position in my esteem.

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  3. The problem is just that you're moderately sane. Whether you want to change that is up to you :P

    -Scott

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  4. I think part of the problem is that most of these highly rated ship fics are not that great. I was crazy into Avery Strange when I first entered the fandom, but that stuff has been surpassed by other ship fics by a whole pile.

    You should probably check out some of the higher quality stuff, like Donny's Boy, Bookplayer, Bats, and Kits. I don't even really understand a discussion of shipping without Twilight's List as one of its components. It's a bit of a tired argument that, "You just haven't read the right thing," particularly because it spirals infinitely, but that might be the case.

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    1. I don't think that's the issue. Chris stated that he's enjoyed some shipfics, and I know he's rated a couple highly. What he doesn't get is the appeal of the genre itself. Why go out of your way to specifically read stories about Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy falling in love? I'll read anything of high quality, but that's certainly not something I'd seek out, even after reading a shipfic I enjoyed

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    2. Well, maybe not ones about Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy falling in love, because those tend to be of an oddly low quality, but maybe one about Rarity and Pinkie Pie falling in love, because those tend to be of an oddly high quality. Most of the reviewed stories are also of a lower quality than the best of what has been produced, even though they are six starred.

      In any case, the reason I would seek out a story of that nature is that it's a natural extension of the show we watch. The show, at its best, is about the relationships formed by these six characters, and romantically inclined stories tend to dive into those relationships to a level that other stories often don't. Romance stories are also often heavily dialogue based, and I'm a man who can appreciate some well written dialogue. Finally, ship fics tend to have a high adorableness and heartwarmingocity quotient, which are metrics that are of some value to me.

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    3. I think you're missing the point, Eggynack. To many of us this explicitly isn't an extension of the show we watch. It's a perversion because you have to disregard the show in order to do it. You have to explain exactly why what we see in the show is out of the window, and it's many times worse when the story doesn't even bother with such an explanation, which is what Chris hints at above.

      The assumption of romantic interest is an exceptionally poor show when it comes to the storytelling factor.

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    4. This butts up against a catch-22, in some ways.

      Those of us who can accept the idea of two characters from the show getting into a relationship tend to (but not always) want to see stories where that relationship is established, so we can see what happens next. Those who can't accept it rightly need to be shown how it happened, but then you end up with a plethora of stories about characters falling in love or getting together or whatnot, and ending on "I love you". It seems to be a choice between samey nonsense or requiring a severe suspension of disbelief.

      But really, I have to ask: how is romance not an extension of friendship? Shouldn't people in relationships start as friends? I find that a more realistic starting point than just having the mane six grow up and randomly meet the stallions of their dreams. Y'know, after going through magical mirror portals. :V (Of course here I'm mostly talking about mane six shipping. Crackships and whatnot need not apply.)

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    5. It can be good for a relationship to start from a friendship, but we don't see even a hint of interest in the show. THAT's what a shipfic needs to do: handle the transition between the two states, showing a desire for such a change and how it comes about. I can understand the desire to have it already established, but then it becomes an element of backstory that needs to be addressed

      I think we've gotten away from Chris' real issue. He may enjoy a shipfic that is well written and satisfactorily explains the romance, but he doesn't get the genre itself on a very fundamental level. He doesn't, after watching the show, feel any need to pair the characters or romantically or read a story that does. It's not something hinted at in the show that could be further explored. If anything, it's suggested there's no sexual/romantic interest between the ponies. Lacking any precedent, it doesn't make sense to him that such a subject is so popular. But because it is, he wonders whether there's something he's overlooked

      At least, that's my interpretation. Chris, correct me if I'm wrong

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    6. I wasn't really saying that there's no reason for a person to not like ship fics. It's a somewhat fair position to hold, if only from the perspective of taste. What I was, and am saying, is that I wouldn't really consider any of the romantically focused works Chris has reviewed a pinnacle of the genre.

      I don't know if he's separately read stuff like Twilight's List or Seeking Beauty, and just didn't mention it, but he probably should, because that's some fantastic writing right there. There's not really much of an argument I can make for shipping that one of those fics wouldn't be able to make for me. It's not like I'd expect someone to read these things and go shipping crazy, but it might produce some increased understanding.

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    7. Twilight's List oughta be on the list of stuff for Chris to review. I mean if nothing else, Past Sins just joined it in the realm of printed, bound fanfiction! :V

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    8. My problem with Shipfics is that they tend to treat Romance as a ladder, as if it was just a Higher form of friendship. For one that is wrong, since love and friendship might be similar in some aspects, but aren't necessarily dependent to the point that one is a superior form of the other.

      Furthermore, I find it also completely antithetical to the message of the show, which treats friendship itself as a higher value, something powerful and important. When you look at it this way, saying that "They were just friends, but NOW they are lovers" is pretty insulting to the vision of the show, and something that a lot of shipfic writers tend to neglect – kinda like when grimdark authors forget that the show itself isn't exactly gritty.

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    9. "But really, I have to ask: how is romance not an extension of friendship? Shouldn't people in relationships start as friends?"

      Romantic feelings and companionate ones are utterly different. The former is about very powerful feelings bordering on obsessive towards another person, often on superficial grounds but with a lot of conviction and possibly a sexual component. The latter is about general everyday feelings of warmth and ease towards someone, usually because the two have a lot in common and explicitly trust each other, and are basically genial co-passengers on the train of life. The two engage different parts of the brain and different emotional and physiological responses, are based on different relationship logics, and are basically like the difference between drunk excitement and everyday sober familiarity.

      The two are very much not the same. At all.

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    10. You could have a point, but then again I don't think it's that cut and dried. How many couples do you hear exclaiming "He/she is my best friend"? I don't think romance necessarily means obsession, and if it does? That's not romance.

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  5. Yup, I don't get it either. I don't get it so hard that Bookplayer had to write me a whole blog post about shipping. I mean, I understand the appeal of romance in general, but it's just hard for me to feel the romantic love between characters that don't normally display that kind of affection toward one another. It seems much more logical to me to write a story about Big Mac and Cheerilee or Shining Armor and Cadence.

    I certainly understand that a lot of the point of fan fiction is to do things that the source material wouldn't do, but that just doesn't resonate with me. At least, not yet. I don't rule it out because I might get bored and start looking for new challenges.

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    1. I don't see how it's necessarily a step down to go from regular romantic novels, in which the characters presumably start out with little to no knowledge of each other, to ship fics, in which the characters know each other but haven't yet begun a relationship. I understand not enjoying the genre, but I don't understand setting a limitation that a ship fic should only cover established couples.

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    2. I don't have an issue with it as long as the author shows me the steps involved. I'd want to see them moving from friends to lovers. I've tried to read a few ship fics and they all seem to start out with the characters already being a pack of lesbians that lust after one another. It's jarring, since they aren't like that in the show at all. If an author lets me see the transition, I'm cool with whatever they want to do as long as it's logical, but I don't support out-the-gate shipping any more than I support Pinkie showing up as a serial killer. It's too out of character to me.

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    3. "They all seem to" is unnecessary hyperbole. Some of them have started with them as rabidly lusting over one another. But I still haven't read one where the characters start as friends and move into love. They have all started with one of the characters pining for the other.

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    4. There are a good number that begin with an assumed relationship, and that's generally just because the author wants to explore an aspect of a ship that is not the genesis of said ship, but there's a good amount that show the growth of a romance. Donny's Boy's longer fics tend towards the characters beginning as friends and ending as lovers.

      The same is true of Twilight's List, and there're a few Cloudy Skies stories that have a relationship's beginning as a component. I'm particularly fond of Twice as Bright for that category. Bats fics also tend to have relationship genesis as a component, even if that component isn't at the beginning of the story (I'm talking about Spellbound Fireflies, in which TwiDash is an assumed ship, and their coming together happens in a flashback later). I could probably name more, if you want them.

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  6. Oh man, dialogue tagging. One of the first big mistakes of writing that I learned about.

    I once wrote this story when I was younger (not available on the internet, thank God) in which I used the word "said" only once in the whole thing. I remembered my English teacher of the time going on a huge diatribe about how the word "said" is lazy and that good writers use loads of synonyms instead. So literally every time I had any dialogue tagging, I used a different word to describe the character speaking.

    I didn't even need an editor or reader to come in and tell me what an idiot I was being. I took one look at the document once I was done writing, realised it was the biggest mess I'd ever seen in my life, and then sulkily looked up proper writing technique before redoing the whole thing from scratch.

    And that's how I learned the importance of editing.

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    1. I somehow think the concept of using lots of synonyms for everything being a good thing comes from education like this. c.c Maybe it's just a case of tides changing quickly.

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    2. My early education didn't teach me bad habits like this directly so much as it rewarded them, making me think that's how you're supposed to write. For instance, after Twilight came out, I overloaded my writing with adjectives and ended up getting better grades

      As for dialogue attribution, I figured one should use synonyms to avoid repetition. Problem is, I was attributing too much, not realizing I could use separate paragraphs for each speaker. It wasn't until recently that I realized why my dialogue sounded so awkward

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  7. 1: Shipping is stupid but it does exemplify a very important social truth that a huge part of the population are in total denial about: a significantly greater portion of people and especially young men are far more interested in romance themes than ever admit.

    2: The biggest problem with shipping occurs when a fan takes it too seriously and begins to impose their fantasy on the fandom or even on canon. This is a psychological illness and rational fans should be less indulgent of this often destructive obsession.

    3: Honestly, in fanfiction, if you write romance it will probably be shipping since there is rarely enough canon romance in any property due to people lying about how interested they are in romantic themes.

    4: The reason many shipfics are not especially interesting to non-shippers is because shippers are a vocal minority and therefore have the false impression that they are a majority. A good shipfic is not one that you can enjoy if you like shipping, a good shipfic is one you can enjoy despite the shipping.

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    1. I'd revise the first clause of that last sentence to "A good shipfic is not one you can enjoy because you like shipping,"

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    2. "Because of..." would have been ideal. Damn lack of edit ability.

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    3. "Shippers are a vocal minority and therefore have the false impression that they are a majority."

      I used to think the same thing, but then just looking at the sheer amount of views that ship fics seem to pull in in comparison to others makes me think that that minority may not as minor as I thought.

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    4. Nah. A shipper isn't anyone who reads a shipfic. It's someone who advocates it or is invested in the shipping outside the context of the story.

      Like some people read and liked this fic for the comedy and story, others came for the shipping.

      Big difference, but same views and votes.

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    5. Spoken like someone trying to convince himself that he's not a shipper. :V

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