At least, that's how I'm counting them.
...
1) I was introduced to another site which does fanfic reviews yesterday! The City of Doors posts irregularly, averaging 1-3 posts a week and reviews mostly MLP fanfiction, along with some original fiction and D&D-related material. The reviews are mostly concise, and balance observations and personal impressions. Personally, I found them very readable in their own right, and the page is definitely worth checking out. I've added it to the links page, but if you're looking for some reviews to tide you over until Friday, you should make a point to go see what Griffin has to offer.
2) Just a friendly reminder: if you didn't get an advent calendar in November like the punctual and forward-looking person you no doubt are, you can probably get for, like, half-off right now. Plus, you get to eat the first ten days worth of sweets all at once!
I'm not saying you have to celebrate Christmas, and certainly not that you have to do it with an advent calender. I'm just saying that any holiday tradition which revolves around waking up and immediately shoving a piece of chocolate into your mouth is one I can get behind.
3) I lost my fantasy football league again. I know, nobody cares, but I've got to vent to somebody.
4) Back on nominal blog topic, to wit, ponies: What's the deal with all the video reviews of episodes that have been popping up on Equestria Daily lately? I haven't ever watched one of these, so I'm really clueless as to the appeal here. Is this something that's this prevalent in other TV-based fandoms? Why are they all so long? Seriously, it seems like half are 8-12 minutes long, and the other half are longer than the episode they're analyzing (all numbers pulled straight from my nether regions, I admit, but that's my impression). Maybe some of these are really impressive or allow viewers to appreciate the show on a whole new level, but I'm thoroughly flummoxed by the way so many seem to have sprouted up.
I am very much enjoying The City of Doors. Griffin shares my appreciation for adventures like "Fallout: Equestria" and "The Immortal Game", relationship stories like "Eternal" and "Salvation", and comedies like "Martial Bliss" and "Whom the Princesses Would Destroy...". He's upfront about how these stories have shaped his perception and enjoyment of later fics, which resonates with me. I'd say his reviews aren't as in-depth as yours are — he doesn't catch all the literary and thematic elements — but his preferences are closer to mine. I added a dozen fics to my reading list.
ReplyDelete(On the off chance that anyone's curious about my recommendations, I'd like to mention that I've just updated my user page with a number of them fancy gallery modules.)
I'm as confused as you are about the popularity of video reviews. The written word is far less time-consuming to go through. If Griffin did video reviews, there's no way I'd be able to consume all of his reviews in one go.
1) D&D-related? I may have to check this out (thus giving myself an even tighter schedule instead of loosening it up like I've planned!)
ReplyDelete3) Not a fan of the foosball, but that does suck you lost. I certainly don't mind you venting, as I've done so here before (Tolkien/Niles!) and it's not even my blog
4) Blame Digi. EqD's been posting more of them since he joined. I've learned to just skip most of them, though I'm subbed to KP and will check out some of the others from time to time. You're absolutely right that they're too long, and this is probably the main reason I tend to avoid 'em. Overanalyzing a children's cartoon sounds awesome to me. Two minutes of material stretched out to twenty? Not so much
Completely unrelated to either this post or ponies (though it does involve literature): has anyone read The Saga of Cuckoo? I found it at the Goodwill near my work and, despite never having heard of it before, decided to buy it. I later found out one of the authors, Jack Williamson, was listed in Appendix N of the DMG. I'm only about 100 pages in, but it's pretty cool so far and has me thinking about combining Dyson spheres with the Dying Earth genre. Also, it'd be pretty cool to see Twilight copying herself with a tachyon-transporter box and dealing with the existential crisis it creates through her countless deaths (see, now I've made it about ponies)
Tachyon-construct copies? Oh my. I wonder how old this book is.
DeleteThe reason that caught my interest is that back in high school, I used to read Star Trek novels, and this turned up as the plot of one of them. They made a transporter-generated tachyon copy of Spock so it could go into a hazardous environment, but when the mission was over, it didn't want to be destroyed and took the real Spock's place. They only found him out because he had a small stuttering problem, a result of his being a mirror image, and so left-handed, and forcing himself to be right-handed.
It's actually made up of two stories. The original, Farthest Star, was originally published in 1975 (Spock Must Die! predates it by five years), while it's sequel, Wall Around a Star was published in 1983. Except where they've been intentionally altered to better fit certain environments, the copies in this are completely perfect, though they're also thousands of light-years apart. Participants still have to sign legal forms regarding property issues before they can be copied, of course
DeleteThe video review thing seems to have popped up during the Long Summer of No Pony, and like Oats said, is a consequence of having Digibrony on EQD staff. He's pretty much got free reign over what to post, from what I've heard.
ReplyDeleteOf course, the only analysis videos you ever need to watch are Kimi Sparkle's. :V
Hmm, that's a tough one. One one hand, Griffin is glowingly positive about Movements of Fire and Shadow, yet seems to think that Eternal is one of the best stories going.
ReplyDeleteIt makes it really hard to form an entirely subjective, baseless, and generally ridiculous first impression. How will I ever cope?
Roll 2d6:
Delete2-5 You hate him
6-8 Unsure
9-12 You love him
Make it a D12 and you're on.
DeleteI'm a little iffy about his love of Eternal as well. Then again, I've been discussing Fallout: Equestria with him all day, and I don't hold a love of that story against Chris, so I think he might be okay. :V
DeleteThe video reviews actually served as some damn good inspiration for me. In effect, they showed me how the crap reviews I was regurgitating on my Fimfiction blog were not worth the 0s and 1s that held them together, and that I had wasted my life writing those pieces of crap. At least now I'll have fewer regrets, I guess.
ReplyDeleteAs others have said, the video review format took off because of Digibrony, who was one of the more popular reviewers on YT, when he got a place on the EqD staff and started up his own little corner of analysis there and on Reddit. Some of the reviewers are less 'analysis' and more 'this is why this episode sucked/was great' spread out over 14 minutes, though. I know that's way more info than you asked for but here it's on the house.
ReplyDeleteI think the reason that review/analysis videos are rising in popularity is that the best of them are as much entertainment as they are thoughtful discussion. ( Exactly 8 minutes, yes, but not 8 minutes wasted. Ending joke's worth it if nothing else.) Plus it's nice to hear a human voice (and pony face) talking about ponies instead of just reading people's internet words all the time. And the old 90% and such all applies as usual.
ReplyDeleteI watched that, and I guess I see the appeal--I mean, there are jokes, there's some simple animation, it's got a good pace. But considering how little depth he goes into (the title is a grown-up reference! There are hijinks in this episode!) it just feels like eight minutes spent telling me something that could have been communicated in less than 90 seconds via one or two dozen bullet points. It's dressed up nicely though, and if it's not for me (even the ending joke didn't make me love it), then at least I can understand why something like that'd be popular.
Delete