Episode Talk: S6E12, Spice Up Your Life

Ponies!  They're a thing!  Let's chat about that thing!

Pony-chatting-thing, below!

For a Change, Let's Talk About Actual Books (Part 20)

So, I thought to myself yesterday "boy, it's been a while since I talked about what I'm reading, hasn't it?"  Turns out it's been about nine months!  Boy, time sure gets away from you.

Anyway, I do in fact read things other than pony-themed fanfiction!  Here's what I'm reading right now, along with my thoughts to whatever point in the book I've reached.

Fandom Classics Part 167: A Perfectly Ordinary Day In Ponyville

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

Don't forget about hockey!  Tomorrow might be your last chance to watch the NHL in action this season, with the Sharks facing elimination in game five against the Penguins.  At the very least, tune in near the end so that, if the Penguins do win, you can catch the customary "lusty booing of the commissioner as he tries to pretend he can't hear the undiluted hatred of the entire hockey world pouring down on him as he blathers through his pre-Cup-awarding speech."  A tradition unlike any other.

Speaking of the natural order of things... here's a story about the natural order of things!  My thoughts on The Equestrian Gentlecolt's A Perfectly Ordinary Day in Ponyville, below.

Mini-Reviews Round 138

For the third week in a row, we have an episode about which the strongest sentiment I can muster up is, "Yup, that was an episode of FiM, alright."  I liked Fluttershy's portrayal, and they did a good enough job of making her brother a shiftless layabout without turning him into some self-assured scriptwriter's idea of what one of them "millennials" looks like, but it felt like the episode couldn't decide what it wanted to preach on the "jobs" front.  On one hand, it's putting out the "go get a job, any job, just start working" shtick, but on the other, Fluttershy (and, to a lesser extent, Dash) keep emphasizing how, if Zephyr works hard and commits himself, he'll find something he loves.  Call it a hunch, but I don't think washing Twilight's windows is going to get him any closer to the job he loves.  Anyway, it's not like the two ideas are antithetical--you can work hard at a job in the short term while, separately, pursuing your passion/education--but the whole thing felt muddled to me.

This scene is really weird, if you re-watch it while focusing on Carrot Top.  Moments after this still, Carrot Top opens her mouth in a wide smile, and stares ahead, blinking occasionally but otherwise motionless, for several seconds.  The camera cuts away for less than two seconds, and when it comes back to the wide shot, Carrot Top has vanished without a trace.  Guys, I'm not saying that some eldrich abomination just offscreen melted Carrot's brain before seizing the rigid, mindlessly smiling husk of her body with one of its appendages and slithering back to the Everfree with its latest victim in tow...  

I'm just saying that, if we never see Carrot again, I hope that Dinky's new mother takes good care of the newly-orphaned foal.

Okay, enough horror!  Have some short reviews of happy stories, below the break.

Fandom Classics Part 166: Princess Twilight Sparkle's 500th Birthday

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

One more week of school!  We're almost there, and you can bet that the kids know it; the checked-out ones are even more checked-out than usual, and even the on-the-ball ones have their attentions turned elsewhere.  But while school may have a (fast-approaching) offseason, fanfic-reading sure doesn't!  Click below for my thoughts on Princess Twilight Sparkle's 500th Birthday, by Autumnschild.

How Responsible Is a Reviewer?

Today's post is not about how not to be an ass when you review something: that's as easy as "don't be an ass" in general, and while plenty of people seem to have trouble with even that, such issues are outside of the purview of a single blogpost (even by someone as transcendentally brilliant as yours truly).  I'm also not talking about any sort of obligations or outside standards to which reviewers are subject, because frankly, there aren't any.  Talking about fanfiction comes with no prerequisites.

But, of course, just because you can do something, doesn't mean you should feel no responsibility for what you do.  So what I want to talk about today is the intersection between authorial and reviewer action.  I don't have any conclusions, but you can at least see some of my thoughts on the matter, below.