Rarity is in trouble. The fashion show that is her only hope to prevent her from a life in poverty is destined to fail when a technical problem occurs.
In this dire situation, she seeks out for the help of Sweetie Belle.
But Sweetie Belle's fears make it impossible for her to help her big sister, until she has an unexpected encounter with somepony that truly understands her.....
This is meant as a pre-episode fanfiction for "Filli Vanilli", explaining my theory how the plot will turn out.
It was written last minute, so, it's probably very rushed, but I hope you find something enjoyable in it!
Courtesy of the image I used belongs to Jiayi on Deviantart.
Chapters (1)
An interesting idea of how the episode might have played out.
Have a favourite and an upvote.
5035316
YAY, thanks!
The only I thing I regret is that it's so rushed, especially at the end.
But I couldn't help it, I wanted to get it out before the episode so badly!
Glad you still like it!
I was curious...
Ouch... talk about dark.
It was a placebo, wasn't it? I was surprised to see you never clarify that point in the story.
And no cutie mark... well, it makes perfect sense now, but I wonder why you decided not to make it appear back when you wrote that story. It would have made perfect sense (and I thought the whole time it was the goal of the story).
And there was the moral in the end: kindness over brute force. More efficient and more moral. Also brought me back in the days of season 4. Seems so far away now, but those are good memories. Filli Vanilli was a great episode and you got a good story out of it.
The potion looks like a deus ex machina to explain why Fluttershy would accept to come on the stage though. I feel like you wanted it to be a placebo (and therefore show that Fluttershy had it in her all along, which would be normal after Filly Vanilli), which is why I'm surprised you never mentioned it again.
As it is, the structure of the story gave me the following impression:
- Money crisis, Rarity risks to go bankrupt
- Sweetie Belle has to sing to realize it's her special talent
- Fluttershy takes a placebo to overcome her stagefright
- Kindess is better than brute force
It's a lot to digest in a short amount of time.
In the end, I'll admit what I liked the most about the story was that simple part:
it's a bit cheesy, but it's so positive it made me feel really great. As in "ponies really are nice creatures".
Also, the picture fits the story way too well for it to be a coincidence... (and is a big part of why I chose to read that story in particular). I' guessing you found the picture before you wrote the story?
6611406
What a coincidence that this scenario fits to your fic that I just read, huh?
I honestly had to read through my own story again to remember..... Sometimes I could slap this brain for being so forgetful.
But it's probably just because I rushed this story so much. Wrote it literally a few hours before the episode, completely spontaneously.
Anyway, no, actually not. It's a real, working potion and it had the intended effect.
Making it a placebo was too uncreative for me, so I decided to went into a different direction and to make the potion actually work.
That's something I thought about a lot, though.
The point here is, Sweetie Belle did not sing alone. Until up four weeks ago, when it still looked like her special talent is singing, I was always aware of it that, if she wants to realize her special talent for singing and get her cutie mark for it, she has to overcome her stage fright first. Which is why she would have been the last one of the Crusaders who gets her cutie mark if their special talents would be what we all thought they are.
Here, she did overcome her stage fright, but only with help from the outside, by someone singing with her together to give her the necessary confidence to do it. She was not singing alone, however, and thus didn't overcome her stage fright completely. She only suppressed it, basically. If she would after this try to sing alone on a stage, she would once again not dare anymore to enter it.
And stage fright doesn't miraculously disappear, it needs time. And with her stage fright still being intact, she couldn' realize the full potential of her talent for singing and thus, no cutie mark.
That's the only thing in this story that I really gave thoughts on, despite being in a hurry with it, because it's so major and I did not want to create a plothole.
I completely forgot that I wrote it that way; that Fluttershy got her key from Sweetie Belle and that Sweetie Belle is one of the Guardians of the Keys. Yeah, that was a nice idea I had there. Got it on the fly, during writing.
The only thing where it falls flat, that's something I realize now, is, that the Mane Six got the keys for the box from the ponies they had inspired or taught something, because that's what magically made those items the keys in the end, that they inspired other ponies with their element.
So, Fluttershy should have gotten her key from Rarity here, not from Sweetie Belle, because she inspired Rarity to be more kind.
But that would have been a little weird too, because Rarity is herself one of the Elements of Harmony, so, I wrote it a little strange there. xD That's what happens when you write a pre-episode fanfic last-minute.
"Out of it", yes, if it wouldn't be for the fact that I wrote it before the episode aired. But, here's a Fun Fact:
This fanfiction was actually inspired by this teaser picture for the episode:
http://i.imgur.com/BdFR4Re.png
I saw it, read the sentence and upon realizing that Fluttershy has stage fright too, I immediately thought on Sweetie Belle and her stage fright. I said that the episode will maybe turn out that way that Fluttershy and Sweetie Belle sing together and that they support each other in overcoming their stage fright. And I hoped this would happen, cause I knew immediately that it would be wonderful to see Fluttershy and Sweetie Belle sing together.
When I then got up on Saturday, after sleeping for too long, I suddenly had the urge to still write a fanfic for the episode to detail my theory how the episode will be. And I desperately wanted to get it out BEFORE the episode airs so that I, in case my theory turned out right, could say: "I predicted it!"
So, I sat down to write, without breakfast, without anything, and wrote furiously, completely stressed that I won't make it, and then submitted the fanfiction a few minutes before the episode began, copied the URL (I didn't wait anymore until it was approved) and slapped it into a comment under the Episode Streams & Discussions news for "Filli Vanilli" on EQD and quickly explained why I wrote it.
Then I rushed to catch the episode on Bronystate.
And because the teaser picture inspired the fic, I have directly built in Fluttershy's sentence that was on it and expanded it with what I thought she's going to say:
"It's..... I just don't think I could sing in front of an audience.", Fluttershy answered for her.
Strangely, I just found out now, upon looking into the episode again, that she didn't even begin the sentence that way and that The Hub has not printed what she's actually saying on the teaser pic, just something similar.
Anyway, the teaser pic inspired me, so I wanted to symbolize that in the fic.
That's what it did to me too now, after reading over it. Season 4 is the first season I watched right from the first second on.
I have the desire to watch it again now and I would do exactly that if we weren't during Season 5 right now.
Right so. That's exactly what it is.
I don't mind what people describe as "cheesy" in my stories. On the contrary, it's a vital element.
NIce things like that only feel cheesy to people, because the trend on Earth goes more in the opposite direction of being nice most of the time, so much even, that a lot of people deem being too nice as something negative and kitschy, hence why they call it "cheesy".
Therefore, "It's cheesy." is something I don't deem as valid (constructive) criticism on my stories.
Not saying you criticized it, but it's something you read often (I even hear bronies say about the show often that something in it is cheesy, while it's clearly not, but just positive) in the fandom when someone criticizes something and this is my stance on those kind of "criticism".
I'm glad you enjoyed it.
A good cover is never chosen out of coincidence. And neither is this one.
No, I didn't know it before (and I just checked and found out that I haven't even downloaded it after writing the fic, I was so much in a hurry that I completely forgot to do that!), I went on Derpibooru before I began to write (the first time I wrote a story directly here on FIMFiction.net, not in an extra document, by the way) and typed in "Fluttershy, Sweetie Belle, singing" and then I found this picture in the results:
https://www.derpibooru.org/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&sbq=Sweetie+Belle%2C+Fluttershy%2C+singing
Happened to fit perfectly, so I used it.
6611921
It's true it would have been a cliché.
This is a great anecdote
and in a way, you can say "you predicted it", as just as you did, the episode tried to show how stage fright takes time to be overcomed. I didn't realize or imagine the fic had been written "before" the episode. It's impressive. Not just that you got so close to the actual moral they went with, but also that you were able to make such a fic in such short time under such stress.
If I were to think that something "cheesy" was bad, I wouldn't be watching mlp. As you said, we call it "cheesy" because it has that "unrealistic" feeling to it, but that's what makes it positive. Cheesy is normal for Equestria. And Cheesy can be very good. Even in real life (tested and confirmed).
Just to make the reference from another show:
"You're Steven, you love Schmaltz"
Lucky you. It's usually such a pain for me to find a picture that fits
.
6613156
My exact thoughts were that it's done often, so I didn't and made it a functionable potion.
But I have nothing against using clichés. The perception of what is cliched and what not differs and is very subjective, depending on it what kind of stories has one read in the past. I, apparently, have read too many stories involving placebos. xD
Clichés are a good story tool like everything else and are good for a story if used correctly.
Well, not really, that was coincidental. The only thing I was predicting is that Fluttershy and Sweetie Belle will sing together, which didn't happen unfortunately.
But I'm holding out my hope that we will see them singing together one day!
Can't really see it that way, it could be so much better if I would have taken my time with it.
And I'm actually tempted to rewrite this story one day, with enough alterations and fresh things so that it can qualify as a new story here and be published as such, cause I wrote it so rushed and it could be much better if I wouldn't have had to do that.
6614148
Many things are coincidences. Some aren't. Who knows?
That would be nice. As long as it isn't "99 buckets of oats on the wall". Actually, even that would be nice, in another weird way.
6614547
Well, authors who wrote the story usually know if it's a coincidence or not.
But I understand what you mean.
That's a great song! Or, at least it became a great song because Sweetie was singing it.
Sweetie Belle can't sing bad, not even when she's exhausted because of carrying Rarity's cart miles through the woods.
If I made a comment on this it would be the same as on the earlier story, so I'm not going to leave a comment.
So what is this then? A non-comment comment.
11649467
Then let's see if we can un-paradox the paradox.
Writing skill aside, what are your thoughts on the story itself? Particularly, Fluttershy and Sweetie Belle hanging out and working on fixing a shared problem?
11649790
Here's my mini-review of the story
I leave you this review it bullet-point form as I don't feel like spending time formatting, contemplating and editing my thoughts on this tale, please accept my apologies for my laziness today.
The concept for the story is a solid one and Fluttershy and Sweetie Belle bonding is something nice to see. This is definitely a story worth revisiting if you ever feel that inclination.