Had an interesting discussion about the Pokemon Revolution story: “It is a fantasy. It is a satire. It criticizes both sides: the humans call themselves free, but aren’t they constrained by the schedules and laws they impose upon themselves? The pokemon want freedom, but what is freedom when they are ordered to boycott goods and collect water in the pursuit of “freedom”?”
Also, someone finally has a reasonable response to me saying not everyone has to worship Arceus. It’s a miracle!
Micah DebrinkA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12460192/ St Elmo’s Fire,I think I made my story too explicit of a metaphor, turning into a “farce”, like you describe. I may have deployed some “shock value” in places. But I’m going to have to disagree with you on your main points.
“Something seems to have gone wrong here.”
What do you mean? Like, a typo?
“How does that work? Few pokemon are urban creatures. Why would they be living in cities?” “Overall, it feels like you’re making pokemon far too human.”
This is an alternate world on my part, different from the canon. And my weakness is that I tend to give pokemon too many human traits. But I don’t think I do it *intentionally*. At the very least, I always try to retain my pokemon characters’ unique anatomy and their ability to use attacks. I would point you to PokeCJG if you really want bash someone on pokemon that are “too human”.
“Transformed zorua are mute in canon. Is it possible for pokemon to learn human language naturally in this, or is this some special magic ability?”
I made some inferences on my part. Individual pokemon are capable of learning human speech (Team Rocket’s Meowth is a classic example). I have written many fanfics where individual pokemon learn human language. While zorua in human form are generally mute, I assume that because Cory himself learned the human language as a pokemon, this ability can carry over into his human form.
“A zorua’s illusion breaks if it sustains damage.”
A grabbing of the wrist is nothing compared to a damage-incurring pokemon attack.
“Combining gibberish and translation just looks silly. It’s fine to just provide the translation and note in narration that it’s pokespeech.”
When human speech and pokemon speech are happening simultaneously int he scene, I actually think it makes it a lot clearer. The weird italics/curly brackets/bold/asterisks that other authors use for pokespeech just confuse me and drive me crazy.
“Also, as I said, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for wild animals to voluntarily choose to live in cities…”
They’re not animals. They’re pokemon.
“How does the human government simultaneously justify treating pokemon like human citizens while simultaneously allowing a practice that becomes identical to slavery by that same token?”
But they don’t. The human government never wanted pokemon to settle in cities. The shantytowns were created by pokemon, for pokemon, and were fenced in by humans to prevent hostilities. The human government, ideally, wishes for pokemon to be in the wild or with trainers.
“If humans hate pokemon so much, why are they providing even the token measures of the ghetto district instead of pushing them into the wild?”
To counter this, I would argue that the pokemon living in districts don’t want to return to the wild. City life is part of their culture, and they are far-removed from their fellow pokemon in the wild. If they were pushed back, the independent pokemon would either revolt or come into conflict with the wild pokemon already living there. Compare this to the efforts in the 1800s to relocate American slaves to Africa as free peoples: for the most part, they didn’t want to move. Slavery and America, as oppressive as it was, was an integral part of their culture and identity.
“Humans have extremely strong, ingrained responses to the suffering of others, even animals – even Hitler was upset at watching executions, for instance. Everyone has to be a complete sociopath for any of this to work.”
It’s not all humans. For example in my story, there is the young lady that pleads the police officers to stop beating the eevee. As for the sociopathy argument, I would ask you to research Milgram’s experiments. Most of the humans are just “following orders”.
“…so how is training still a thing?”
It’s a personal choice for pokemon. Do you want to be well-fed and secure, but be at the mercy of a trainer who may or may not be nice? Or do you want to have your freedom, but have a lower standard of living?
“…in favor of over-the-top torturemurder that’s pretty far divorced from anything in real life.”
It is a fantasy. It is a satire. It criticizes both sides: the humans call themselves free, but aren’t they constrained by the schedules and laws they impose upon themselves? The pokemon want freedom, but what is freedom when they are ordered to boycott goods and collect water in the pursuit of “freedom”?
No hard feelings, though. You’re making me think! I love it. Thanks.
Micah Debrink
secs ago
[What do you mean? Like, a typo?]
Yes.
[This is an alternate world on my part, different from the canon. And my weakness is that I tend to give pokemon too many human traits. But I don’t think I do it *intentionally*. At the very least, I always try to retain my pokemon characters’ unique anatomy and their ability to use attacks.]
That’s not really what makes them quintessentially pokemon, though. Humanlike creatures with strange anatomy and magic powers are just normal fantasy races — you’ve basically described orcs and elves, for instance.
[A grabbing of the wrist is nothing compared to a damage-incurring pokemon attack.]
1 HP of damage breaks the illusion. Wrist-grabbing probably wouldn’t count in this one case, but Cory wouldn’t necessarily know that that’s all that would result from a human making a sudden movement on him. Like, what if she bumped into him by accident, or slapped him? It makes sense for zorua to have a quirk like this.
Are you familiar with the author Farla? She made a similar fanfiction a while back called Pokemon Revolution and does a lot of stuff with pokemon oppression. Recently she created an OC who’s a transformed zorua pretending to be human (Kit), which makes me think about things like this: https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/128021680/2/Character-Bio-Thread
This kind of thing is a big part of keeping them from drifting too far from just humans-with-powers — a lot of pokemon powers are strange and kinda crapshoot, so it’s fun to explore their implications when you use them in ways canon didn’t intend.
[But they don’t. The human government never wanted pokemon to settle in cities. The shantytowns were created by pokemon, for pokemon, and were fenced in by humans to prevent hostilities. The human government, ideally, wishes for pokemon to be in the wild or with trainers.]
Then why don’t they push them into the wild? Why enact even token legal protections? Pokemon have no power over humans. Humans should be able to do whatever they want. Humans dominated pokemon when they lived in the wild, humans should be able to push back a few lost, confused pokemon now. In real life, second-class citizen divisions like this don’t exist unless the government is getting something out of the deal and/or has at least a smidgen of sympathy for the people.
[Compare this to the efforts in the 1800s to relocate American slaves to Africa as free peoples: for the most part, they didn’t want to move.]
Yeah see this is exactly what I was talking about. Pokemon aren’t black people. Black people weren’t quadrupeds and sentient gears. Black people couldn’t breathe fire or use telekinesis. Using real-life oppression as a model for fantasy oppression almost never works because the circumstances are just too different. These pokemon, for instance, would totally dominate the wild, since trained pokemon are repeatedly said to be way stronger than wild ones.
The idea of free pokemon caught between trainer and wild life is an interesting one, but this portrayal just doesn’t feel like a natural outgrowth of canon pokemon behavior. Even though anime Meowth confirms they have human-level intelligence, their culture and overall behavior still seems a lot different than ours. Even just their physiology ensures that human infrastructure won’t work for them, since they don’t have opposable thumbs and have wildly varying body sizes. Like, how are they gonna accommodate both wailords and joltik? I actually had a discussion recently about the buildings and items in PMD and how they’re made — it’s possible you could have machop and psychic-types do all the building and tool-crafting, which would support the idea that they’re working together by filling niches, but any crafted tools would still only be useful to that small selection of pokemon. Can’t use a screwdriver with swords for hands, you know?
Basically, while I can totally believe these civilized pokemon would try to create some imitation of human civilization, it wouldn’t look like real-life shantytowns, because they can’t make and have no need for normal human civilization.
[As for the sociopathy argument, I would ask you to research Milgram’s experiments. Most of the humans are just “following orders”.]
Milgram’s subjects were so horrified by what they did that the psychology board said he violated codes of ethics. Milgram’s subjects had nightmares about the experiment for years after. Milgram’s subjects did not cackle as the actor was hurt. Just because people can be pushed to do awful things does not mean they *enjoy* it, that’s the key thing here. If the policemen and Arlene were visibly upset by the murder but brushed it off with “sure this is upsetting, but we have to do it, that’s just the way things are…” that would be chilling and a much stronger commentary on real-life oppression.
[It criticizes both sides: the humans call themselves free, but aren’t they constrained by the schedules and laws they impose upon themselves? The pokemon want freedom, but what is freedom when they are ordered to boycott goods and collect water in the pursuit of “freedom”?]
Uh…
en . wikipedia . org /wiki/False_equivalence
25m ago
Oh boy, this could escalate real fast. Oh, excuse me, “really” fast. I’ll keep this short.
But honestly, I am sorry that you didn’t like my work. I respect your view that pokemon are more animal-like than human-like. I think otherwise, but I think I’ll be wasting time debating on which side is “correct”.
A fandom is already the creator’s unique imagination, so why not leave it to the fan writer’s imagination to form their own perspective? The way I see it, fan fiction is not a “purist” art form like classical poetry that must conform to specific rules to be deemed “legitimate” and “worthy”. Fan fiction is, at its heart, writing. Original writing. And the author has their right to have their unique interpretation on the fandom. There are excellent “purist” fan fiction writers and excellent “reformist” (for lack of a better term) fan fiction writers. How liberal of an interpretation that you can tolerate is a matter of personal preference, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Okay, so do you win this debate? If it makes you happy, sure. You win. I didn’t join FFN to debate, I’m here to write. And I would agree with you that this is not my best piece of writing, and it could use some work. Also, zorua I think is one of the toughest pokemon to make an OC with, because of its unique ability to have a human form. Perhaps it was too big of challenge for me at this point.
We’re all not perfect. I think I’ll pick up my mistakes and move on. Thanks.
Micah Debrink
secs ago[The way I see it, fan fiction is not a “purist” art form like classical poetry that must conform to specific rules to be deemed “legitimate” and “worthy”. Fan fiction is, at its heart, writing. Original writing.]
No, it really isn’t, kind of by definition? If you want to write whatever you want, original fiction is always a perfectly valid option. Derivative works are constrained by their source material. That’s kind of what they’re all about, work based on a shared body of work your readers are already familiar with. There’s definitely wiggle room there, but if you deviate from that base, your readers will no longer have that familiarity, which is just confusing if you keep insisting they should. If your work doesn’t comply with canon, you’re not writing fanfiction, you’re writing original fiction inspired by the original work. Which is, uh, totally valid? I honestly don’t understand why you’re so upset about this. This isn’t a “mistake”. There’s nothing wrong with original fiction, or fanfiction inspiring original work.
Agh, they seem to be giving me radio silence now. Unfortunate.
I continue to not understand how pokefandom manages to screw this up. They’re right, canon is so vague that virtually any interpretation is valid. All you have to do is not contradict what little information we do have! Why is that so hard??? Like they actually have an interesting idea here but… opposable thumbs! Pokemon do not have them!
Adv4eternityA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12460114/
Thanks for your suggestions for my story. I do have to say that, if you are going to correct me on my writing, to pm me. I know I should have stated that somewhere, but I’d like the review section to be entirely composed of content/story-related suggestions and comments. I hope you understand, and I know that you are only trying to help out, but if the review isn’t about the actual story, I’m going to have to remove it. This is only to let any potential viewers to see if they are interested in the actual story. I will use your suggestions for the future, though.
Posting grammar information publicly allows other writers to find it and educate themselves. You really don’t need to worry; no one judges by reviews.
Linkin-PhoenixA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12460517/
Thank you for your feedback.I will try to do better going forward and keep your advice in mind.
Was there anything about the chapter or the story you liked?
beberspejorativeA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12446439/
thanks, i posted them almost as first drafts, cleared them up a bit and now i’ve changed the format.
MikeV1A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12462731/
Hello! I just read over your review, and it seems you’ve torn into me. Rightfully so. Let me address your points here, starting from the beginning.Your comments about the shoes sinking into the concrete are spot on, and I thank you for pointing that out.
As far as the comments go about Arceus, in the Pokemon canon (or at least from what I see/interpret) there’s only reference to one Pokemon being a God or a creator, and that one Pokemon is Arceus. Also, seeing as how the Kalos region is based largely off France, their main religion is Roman Catholicism. The way I see it, the Pokemon that most fits the definition of our God is Arceus.
[All of this until they could no longer keep their hats, pans, and from overflowing with the appreciation and reverence of passersby.] – I agree, I could have said this better. I’ll change it to something that works better. Say maybe something along the lines of “The eyes of the performers glistened with the reflection of coins hitting their collection hats and pans.”
[For Reuben, each morning he would wake up to walls that were once verdant, but after nearly fifteen years of staring at them they had dulled to a boring, almost sickening shade.] – I realize this is worded quite awkwardly, and I had a bit of trouble with not only this sentence, but the transition from the imagination sequence to Reuben waking up. I actually meant to imply that staring at the walls had dulled their color, at least in his eyes. But perhaps I could just say the paint had grown old and began to chip and leave it at that.
[and it wouldn’t open not since he tried to climb out of it last year to run away.] – You’re right about the comma after the word “open”, and there isn’t much else to say about that.
[Rachel scoffed] – I meant for Rachel to be kind of an abrupt/surprised character with little to no explanation. I’d hate to spoil the story, but her abrupt appearance with no explanation is actually a somewhat critical part of the story. You’re not meant to know about her yet. She’s supposed to be this random person that follows him around, at least until you get to know Reuben better and find out why she’s following him. As far as Reuben’s hair and eye color, that was just giving detail about the main character.
[Go away, he thought aloud] – This is actually a typo from when I originally had him speak this line. I just forgot to get rid of the “aloud”. Thank you for pointing this out.
As far as the capitalization rule goes, I’m well aware of the controversy over capitalization in the Pokemon fandom. I adhere to the anime, manga, and games, which clearly always capitalize the name of a Pokemon no matter the context, and simply use their name as written as the plural form when referring to more than one of a certain species. I understand and am well aware of the rules we have in place in the English language, and I’ve often caught myself referring to a group of Pikachu in my head as “Pikachus”, but when it comes to stuff like this, I make an effort to stay as close to the source material as I possibly can. Besides, seeing something like “pikachus” is jarring to a lot of readers, and just looks unnatural in my opinion.
[The second his foot hit the carpet of the living room, one of his older sisters, Abbigal, who he simply called “Abby”, rushed over to him.] – I agree, this sentence needs to be split up. Thank you for pointing this out.
And as far as your opinions on my opening goes, I can understand where you’re coming from, and even agree with you. But there isn’t exactly much that hasn’t been done to death in terms of opening a story. I used a scenario that I thought best laid the framework for Reuben’s character, his situation, and the tone of the first chapter. I know you aren’t asking me to be original, just to be a little more creative and attention-grabbing, and I agree. There’s always room for improvement in my eyes, no matter how good a story may seem to be (not saying my story is good by any means). Also, I agree. Not many people care what the character is eating, but I felt it important to what happened later when Rachel accussed his family of wanting to fatten him up.
[Good Lord Arceus Above] – Now this is where I somewhat disagree with you. While I agree in the sense that having a sentence like this seems odd as far as “Lord” and “Arceus” put together like this, unless someone is referring to Arceus as a Lord, I disagree with using something like “Arceus Above”. This is like our version of “Jesus Christ” and I feel that implementing sayings like these and making comparisons to Pokemon and Pokemon moves helps to get the reader immersed within the story. I think you’re actually the first person to have a negative view on it, and I find it to be interesting. You do raise a very good point in saying that no one in the history of the show, games, or manga adaptations, has ever said anything like “Arceus Above” I don’t necessarily think its a stretch to think that someone in this world would have said something similar. Pokemon is by all means a franchise and brand for kids, though it does grab the attention of many teenagers and adults as well. However, this story I’m writing is something more grown-up and mature. And again as I said earlier, I personally see something like taking things commonly said in our world and defamiliarizing them by putting reworking it for the Pokemon world helps the reader stay immersed, which is what I want.
For your second to last point (I won’t copy and paste it here because I’m running out of room), you’ll have to keep reading the story to find out why Reuben hasn’t called the authorities or necessarily done anything else outside of attempting to run away. However, I would like for you to go back and read over the conversation Eckhardt and Abby have. Specifically, when Eckhardt expresses his concerns about Reuben journeying out into an “increasingly violent world”. We see that Kalos isn’t exactly a safe world. When Reuben talks to Reed online and Reed says “These monsters just keep on coming” and later near the end of the story when Reuben turns to the news and sees the “latest” monster attack, these all could imply a large frequency of these events, or events similar to these happening. I’m not in any way condoning Eckhardt’s decision to keep Reuben locked up, but I am asking you to take a second look at it and think about it. Would you let your child walk across a region that has to employ a superhero organization to fight genuine, bonafide monsters of an unknown origin that have been refereced to do terrible damage numerous times?
[Reuben’s hand gripped the blade and slid it across the soles of his feet. Up and down, across and back, diagonally, in a circular motion, – there was no coherence to it. He tore into the flesh of his foot.] – As evidenced by Reuben putting three socks on his feet in an effort to cover it up, we see he’s taken extreme measures to hide it. However, no one said that no one outside of Rachel knows what he’s done, but conversely, no one has said that anyone else doesn’t notice it. Much like the previous point, you’ll have to keep reading in order to find out exactly who knows, if anyone even knows at this point.
Thank you for this review! I hope you reply and we’re able to have a discussion about this.
secs ago[As far as the comments go about Arceus, in the Pokemon canon (or at least from what I see/interpret) there’s only reference to one Pokemon being a God or a creator, and that one Pokemon is Arceus. Also, seeing as how the Kalos region is based largely off France, their main religion is Roman Catholicism. The way I see it, the Pokemon that most fits the definition of our God is Arceus.]
…You are aware that the Judeo-Christian God does not have a monopoly on the creator deity job, right? Vishnu, among others, says hi. Arceus is not God, Arceus is Arceus. Arceus is also from Sinnoh and there are absolutely zero references to it in the canon games, implying it heads a dead or obscure religion. Furthermore, Kalos isn’t Roman Catholic. Kalos has its own religion and its own deities (the XYZ trio).
[I meant for Rachel to be kind of an abrupt/surprised character with little to no explanation. I’d hate to spoil the story, but her abrupt appearance with no explanation is actually a somewhat critical part of the story. You’re not meant to know about her yet.]
I didn’t get the sense that she was supposed to be unusual until a while in, though, and given this fandom has a lot of psychic pokemon who can talk to their trainers and other supernatural stuff it’s hard to be certain what’s intended. Some hint like “Rachel was always with me” at the very start or something like that would make it clear that the weirdness was intentional.
[When Reuben talks to Reed online and Reed says “These monsters just keep on coming” and later near the end of the story when Reuben turns to the news and sees the “latest” monster attack, these all could imply a large frequency of these events, or events similar to these happening. I’m not in any way condoning Eckhardt’s decision to keep Reuben locked up, but I am asking you to take a second look at it and think about it. Would you let your child walk across a region that has to employ a superhero organization to fight genuine, bonafide monsters of an unknown origin that have been refereced to do terrible damage numerous times?]
No, but I would try to convince them to stay home of their own free will like they’re a thinking, feeling individual and not an unruly pet. (Also, he says 10-year-old trainers are still the norm, which means it can’t possibly be that dangerous; the legal age would increase if the result was wholesale slaughter.) Keeping your child under house arrest is still, legally, child abuse, and child protective services can get him on that regardless of his reasons. But you say there is an actual reason why the authorities can’t help him, so, alright, fair.
You might want to read this though: https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/142926917/1/TRAINERS-START-AT-TEN
[As evidenced by Reuben putting three socks on his feet in an effort to cover it up, we see he’s taken extreme measures to hide it.]
I’d describe those measures as more “standard” than “extreme”. Does he also scrub the blood out of the floor/carpet? Shouldn’t people notice he looks like he’s walking on broken glass all the time? Don’t his parents ever clean his room or look in his drawers? He doesn’t hide the knife very well.
2h ago
You’re right about the fact that I could have said something like “She was always with him” when Rachel first appeared. I’ll be sure to reference that in the next chapter since I’d hate to go back and make that kind of change to something already posted and throw people off who have already read the first chapter.
As far as the whole Reuben being forced to stay home thing and 10 year old trainers bring the norm, there’s still a lot about that situation that has yet to be revealed, especially when taking into account the fact that Finley and Abby were allowed to go on their own adventures and Reuben isn’t. I do not in any way dispute the fact that what Eckhardt is doing is child abuse. I just want to make that clear. But there’s more to it that gets revealed later in the story. Not saying he’s justified, but there’s a deeper reason for his actions.
I’ve just started reading that link you sent about the trainers starting at ten, and for the most part I agree with mostly everything Farla says in her post.
And finally, for the way Reuben harms himself and what he does to hide/cover things up, again, there’s no evidence to suggest his family has or hasn’t noticed it in the past. Maybe in the second chapter if he decides to go downstairs, someone will notice the limp and immediately check his foot and call him out, or perhaps he’ll gain a painful infection on one of his cuts. These things still remain to be seen.
secs ago[It would seem odd to me for them to worship those Pokémon when the only thing to have hinted at being a God is Arceus. But yes, I am aware God does not have a monopoly on the job as creator. There’s Dialga and Palkia who watch over space and time.]
You’ve missed my point, which is that the Judeo-Christian God isn’t the only creator deity people worship in our world. Why do you assume everyone on the planet must worship the deity that’s most similar to him as opposed to, say, Vishnu? Why assume they worship a creator god at all, when there are tons more religions that worship nature gods like the Norse pantheon, the Greek pantheon, and Shintoism? You’re betraying extreme ethnocentrism by assuming not only is Arceus a stand-in for God but that everyone worships it to the exclusion of all else.
[If Kalos has its own religion, then what is it? Because I’ve never found anything or evidence suggesting that they worship Zygarde, Xerneas, or Yveltal.]
True, but nor is there any evidence anyone worships Arceus, or Dialga or Palkia for that matter. But each region has myths and stories about their own legendaries, and that’s the best we have to go off of. You’re right that there’s little reason to assume there is a literal religion around the XYZ trio, but there’s even less to assume there is a major Kalos following for an ancient deity which, and I want to emphasize this, is from a country on the other side of the planet.
You’re ignoring canon information to substitute the mythology and religion from our world that you’re familiar with, and I don’t think that’s good fanficcing. I wouldn’t be so bothered by it if this was an isolated example, but everyone and their dog has this interpretation and it’s really tiring (not to mention ethnocentric). Pokeworld mythology is vague in many respects, but it’s just uncreative to declare that it’s all exactly like ours.
(Or if you don’t want to engage with it at all, you can say that they’re just myths and we don’t see the religions people actually follow in-game at all — gods doesn’t need physical avatars to catch on, after all.)
You know, I can actually agree with you on that. I think I’m starting to see your point a little more clearly now. Perhaps I could have definitely looked into the myths and considered many more avenues when implementing something like this in my story.I actually have a question for you. I know it might be a bit difficult seeing as how I’ve only posted just the first chapter, but putting grammatical and punctuational errors aside, did you have any criticisms on my writing style?It’s quite slow so far, but otherwise, no. The language flows nicely and you have good descriptions.
soullegend60A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12462089/
I guess it’s a rite of passage in the pokemon section to get a long as review from you haha.The word said? I do try to experiment with other things; if you read my other stories you’ll find I have a good grasp on how to use upit but that’s irrelevant. Can’t blame a guy for tying right?
Never knew that about semi colons; I’ll take that onboard. Am I doing it right?
Lastly, just ‘cos Curtis is a little salty about losing a few friends doesn’t make him all edgy and shit lol. I’m trying to make it clear that at times the league can be ruthless; Curtis never claims to enjoy the miurder of the Slugma.
All in all thanks.
pokemongirl101618A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12461093/
Hey! I would like to thank you for your review from the other day! I understand my grammar is not the best but I will definitely try to improve on it. I guess I just wanted to personally thank you because you really did run the first chapter through a fine tooth comb and I’m glad you didn’t sugarcoat anything, it was super helpful. Therefore, thank you for your constructive criticism on the fic, it really did help. I’ll be sure to make the changes as well and fix the errors.
dynamesx16A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12456028/
Thank you for your review. You are right on many points and I write in English because I want to share this story to as many people as possible but I really should get a beta reader. It’s also a challenge to myself to write this in English. I’m currently working on the planing of the story and I’m confident.
St Elmo’s Fire,
A new review has been posted to your story.
Story: Pearl
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: jeremy1555 ( https://www.fanfiction.net/u/2236308/ )
Reply URL: https://www.fanfiction.net/pm2/post.php?rwid=249697528
——————-
It’s not that bad, don’t let the haters make you quiter, chug on and finish this story!
——————-
You have received a message from:
Negai4Life
https://www.fanfiction.net/u/5753354/
Reply link: https://www.fanfiction.net/pm2/post.php?rid=200307811#new
——————–
People can write how they want to, you self-centered, close-minded idiot. You’re such a kid! Stop attacking people because you don’t like the way they write.
——————–
This is someone who first contacted me back in December. No idea why they chose to speak up again now.
Story: Blood is Thicker than Water
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: Guest
——————-
:Farla’s email: Midnightdragoness
——————-
Story: Blood is Thicker than Water
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: Guest
——————-
:Farla’s email: Midnightdragoness
At
Juno
Dot
Com
——————-
This person continues to be very unobservant.
St Elmo’s Fire,
A new review has been posted to your story.
Story: Rotten Heart
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: Guest
——————-
:…holy s***
——————-
???
Motley World StudiosA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12436312/
Finally updated the first chapter.
They did actually implement all the changes I asked for, including making an actual first chapter! I’m very impressed.
St Elmo’s Fire,
A new review has been posted to your story.
Story: Blood is Thicker than Water
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: nolifer (Guest)
——————-
nolifer:Uh, summa-lumma, dooma-lumma
You assumin’ I’m a human
What I gotta do to get it through to you? I’m superhuman
Innovative and I’m made of rubber
So that anything you say is ricocheting off of me
And it’ll glue to you and I’m devastating
More than ever demonstrating how to give a mothafuckin’ audience a feelin’ like it’s levitating
Never fading, and I know the haters are forever waiting
For the day that they can say I fell off, they’ll be celebrating
‘Cause I know the way to get ’em motivated
I make elevating music, you make elevator music
——————-
Okay then.
St Elmo’s Fire,
A new review has been posted to your story.
Story: Blood is Thicker than Water
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: Dragonsrule18 ( https://www.fanfiction.net/u/2155053/ )
Reply URL: https://www.fanfiction.net/pm2/post.php?rwid=249831631
——————-
I’d like to say that I think this story is amazing. This is exactly how I see Hau in the games. He tries to make others proud, but battling is not his thing and he simply likes bonding with his Pokemon. I’m glad Lillie, Gladion, and Luna in her own rough way got him to see this.
And for those reviewers of this story that flamed because he reviewed your stories negatively, calm down. It sucks to get a negative review, I know, but sometimes those negative reviews can help you improve. I haven’t gotten a review from St. Elmo’s Fire yet personally, but I’ve seen them, and he’s less harsh than Farla. And though grammar guides in reviews can be a tad annoying, they can also help you with issues you’re having trouble with. And even if I don’t or you don’t completely agree with his opinions, he has the right to them, and it’s wrong to review his stories and tell him to die! Or to try to spread his and Farla’s emails around. That’s invading privacy. Yes, negative reviews can suck, but bashing the reviewer or worse, threatening them, does NOT make you look any better!
——————-
I made some inferences on my part.
Have you ever seen fics that used Meowth’s ability to convey a pokemon’s perspective to the human cast the way the anime does? This seems like the trainer covering his ass a bit, but if only one pokemon in a story is capable of speech and it’s blatantly indicated how unusual that is, I don’t think there should be a problem with that. Hell, within the framework of this story, giving one pokemon the ability to speak might actually be the straw to break the camerupt’s back (he says, realizing on a second pass that he did the same thing people do when they write “Arceus damn it”) and force the society to change. That’d be pretty interesting.
the weird italics […] [used] for pokespeech just confuse me
Wow, you finally found the one person who actually needs those dialogue punctuation keys!
They’re not animals. They’re pokemon.
“Also, as I said, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for wild pokemon to voluntarily choose to live in cities…” C’mon man, how can you not expect this response?
The shantytowns were created by pokemon, for pokemon
… Wow. Somehow his answer to your question of unfortunate implications actually made them far worse.
Compare this to efforts in the 1880s to relocate African slaves to Africa as free people
Oh my god dude please stop while you’re… well… not ahead, but at least while you’re not so far behind as you apparently intend on being.
Also, I’m really glad you brought up the problems raised by using an actually-dangerous-to-the-oppressors underclass. Some of the first critical thinking I had about comics, as a wee lad, were about how America interned the Japanese solely because of racism (apparently the reason for Japanese internment was so extremely unfounded that, according to my brother, who loves studying WW2 the way I love studying pre-modern Japan, a Japanese spy sent to Hawaii before Pearl Harbor to recruit Japanese-Americans to spy for Japan eventually gave up because they were, to a man, unshakably loyal to America) and not because they blow up a third of manhattan with psychic mind bullets on a monthly basis and another group of “heroes” blows up another third with concussive eye lasers while trying to stop them. It’s something more people need to take into account when writing about fictional oppressed groups as a metaphor for real oppressed groups.
It’s not all humans.
And then his cops used the Nuremberg Defence to justify beating a helpless eevee. Wow. This guy sees the extremely low hurdles before him and just pulls out a shovel, doesn’t he?
Would you let your child walk across a region […]
No, I wouldn’t, but that parents do allow this is kinda the core conceit of the setting, isn’t it? Is this guy trying to imply that he’s writing violent darkfic about how pokemon training is some hyper-dangerous thing or somehow so dangerous that sealing shut a kid’s window to prevent him from running away from home to engage in monster-fighting is supposed to reflect more poorly on his protagonist than on his parents?
Mini-Farla, how would you suggest parents who have children who keep running away from home to join a band because their parents won’t let them drop out of middle school to try to make it big as a rock star but are otherwise loving and caring parents who don’t abuse their child with house arrest and are legitimately acting in the child’s best interest should deal with that situation?
I’d hate to go back and make that kind of change
This raises an interesting point. To what degree is it acceptable for a fanfiction writer to go back and edit previous chapters of a serialized work in response to problems they faced later on or in response to criticism?
You’re betraying extreme ethnocentrism
All this talk of Arceus and ethnocentrism makes me want to figure out a way to create a more Shinto-inspired religion for the pokemon world. I had actually considered giving Ecruteak City a massive shrine complex in the east dedicated to the god of ninetales, but I’m still working out how it’d jive with people being able to imprison and subjugate ninetales, and the best I have is “it used to be a center of ninetales worship but now stands mostly as a cultural relic of days gone long by” and I don’t like that at all. The Fushimi Inari shrine complex is one of the most beautiful sites in eastern Kyoto (not to mention one of the most important sites in shintoism) and deserves far, far better than that.
Perhaps, because it’s a shrine dedicated to the god of ninetales, and not ninetales themselves (them being his messengers), the priesthood has a lot of semi-wild vulpix and ninetales running around but consider capturing them against their will to be slavery, or something? I dunno; Mini-Farla, do you have any ideas on fixing this?
As much as I want to make Ecruteak City more like Kyoto and highlight the unique charm of the city, I’d rather not touch on the topic at all if I’m at least reasonably certain that my attempt to subvert ethnocentrism doesn’t come out sounding like cultural appropriation. I absolutely hate when shows like Supernatural just decide to throw in a kitsune that’s about as inspired by kitsune folklore as their vampires are to their folklore just to expand their fantasy grab bag of monsters to kill and the last thing I’d want to do is anything like that.
Out of curiosity. Does regular-sized Farla get defender reviews to counter the negative ones that are spawned by revenge, or only the miniature version?