Greetings Darians! This is the second review, which, though I promised to go in alphabetical, is simply for one of my favorites. The review follows:
Review: As Luck May Have It, by Nessy Thompson
Overall: *** 1/2
Well, I've pretty much raved constantly about this fic, and as of the writing of this review, it's almost noon, and I've come to realize something: this fic is not all I cracked it up to me. I realized that, to get the full effect, it has to be 11:00 PM, and I have to be in a lonely and depressed mood.
I'd recommend this to anyone who needs a shipper picker upper, and wants one that is very well written. It's available at Outpost Daria, in the Romance section of the Fanfic area. http://www.lawndale.net
atd rebuttal: Not yet rated
***************************************************************************
And the remainder of this review may qualify as a ***spoiler***
don't look now!
read the fic!
or you could just read the review, I don't give away *too* much.
**************************************************************************
Characterization: **
Halfway decent characterization. I have a few complaints. First off, there's the Jane-Jesse connection, which has absolutely no real existance in the series. I think it arose due to a misinterpretation of a scene in "That was Then, This is Dumb," where Jane and Jesse go off in search of food. This combines with the sheer convenience of the fact that Daria and Jane hang out, Trent and Jesse hang out, so why not combine the two groups?
Anyway, then there's the fact that Daria didn't seem to have excessive difficulty talking to Trent. Now, it might not be that unrealistic now (at the end of season 3) but this was written no later than season 2, if I remember correctly.
But wait. I just noticed a comment by Daria, immitating Brittney, saying "I don't think that's something you can teach." I remember reading this back during the S2 to S3 drought, yet that comment is from "The Old and the Beautiful," an S3 episode. Perhaps Ms. Thompson has done some editing since? Must be, since I originally read it on good old Planet Daria.
And Bevis and Butthead? Their antics certainly add something to this story, but their dialogue is poorly done, particularly at Burger World.
And, of corse, there's Daria's pressure to "say something." That's not something I can see happening, but I suppose it's vital to the story. She's just too animated, shows too much emotion. Not even hearing her thoughts in "Road Worrier" do we see this much emotion on her.
Coherance: ****
Despite the less than great characterization, one thing I can say for this fic is that it is _very_ well written. It uses a good screenplay style, and none of the dialogue sounds completely inane. There's absolutely nothing wrong witht the writing that I can think of, but I still save the fifth star for that thing I can't think of, but may see in a future fanfic.
Actually, I'm writing this while I read it, and I stand corrected. The arguments between Nessy and Mike in the scene intros (that is Mike, right?) detract from the coherance. But they're damned funny, so I can forgive that. >:)
Story: *****
Comment: I am wondering if my friend Colin had anything to do with the "raining Spam" scene? Very reminicient of a certain episode back during our... sophomore year? Urglesnurtfurtzer!
Anyway, it is a really... sweet... story. It is done well enough to get me back into the story even though it's noon (or, actually, 1:00; this took me an hour to read). I enjoy it thouroughly, even though Daria's character goes through a complete transformation and seems to be completely non-Daria like at the end. Still, it changes slowly enough to have the "boiling the frog" effect. And if one must force Daria and Trent together in the space of a week, I suppose this is a better way to do it than most of the "shipper" fics I've read.
One last comment I can make is that it appears to have been written by two people. Some silly scenes were just dropped in out of nowhere, like the one with "arrow boy." I've seen some truely great stories written in this way, and the funniest scenes involved actual keyboard wrestling between the authors.