Fic recs, August 19th: Lemur Needs Princess Fics Badly edition! · 12:26pm Aug 19th, 2016

Well, that's more or less what it's called. This is all shortskirts's doing, if you couldn't tell. You can read that journal yourself to find out what this is and why it happened, as well as skirts's take on the entries I'm just here to mash the "post blog" button as fast as humanly possible. :V

H: 1 R: 1 C: 1 V: 0 N: 4

Disney Princesses in Equestria by silvadel
Genre: Comedy
Having four chapters while being barely over 1k words was something of a warning sign. I'll admit the writing was a good bit better than I expected, fast-paced, but otherwise decent. Still, this is a bit more "funny in concept" than in execution. I mean, "Snow White steals all of Fluttershy's animal friends", that's funny, but the chapter devoted to it doesn't have any real buildup or punchline. The one about Aurora does, but it's pretty weak. (I was at least pleased that the appearance of humans in Equestria is not treated as a major cause for concern.) The other two are more or less not worth comment. One thing I'll keep telling myself is "these weren't written for my pleasure" (and indeed, skirts liked it a lot), but this one doesn't really have much going for it.
Not Recommended

An Apple a Day Keeps the Lemur Awesome by destinedjagold
Genre: Thriller?
After an attempt on her life, Snow White ends up in a strange land.
This opens with a long retelling of Snow White running through the forest after the huntsman spares her life. And I mean, yeah, that movie's pushing 100, some people probably need a refresher, but you could just as easily watch that scene in the film and lose nothing by comparison. Or you could just skip it entirely, because the interesting stuff comes in the second chapter, when things switch to Angel's POV, and we get a close-up view of the animals conspiring, not that it lasts. The writing is okay, relying a lot on modifiers and occasionally suffering a poor word choice. I wish this had played up its comedic potential more, or done something: the ending really isn't, and the plot is overall stretched and derivative of the movie. Better than the previous one, I suppose, but not by much.
Not Recommended

99 Bottles of Chaos on the Wall by AppleTank
Genre: Random
This isn't actually part of the event, but AppleTank's entry is marked as its sequel, so fuck it, it gets to be in here, too. I would dearly love it if someone read this and told me what the hell it was about. Not once did I have any idea who these people were, what they were doing, or what was going on while they did it. I get that by the end, they make Discord, but that doesn't amount to anything, it merely happens as much as anything in this piece happens. I just don't know what this is, and not in a good way.
Not Recommended

SkirtsWatch by AppleTank
Sequel to 99 Bottles of Chaos on the Wall
Genre: Overwatch Crossover
This is considerably better, having nothing to do with the previous story until the very end, and only a tenuous connection at best. But it doesn't matter. When a story starts out with Snow White sniping changelings from a rooftop, I find I can just flow with anything it throws at me. It wasn't until Jasmine was a robot that I realized just what this was, though. (I feel dumb, it's right there in the title.) This is admittedly not much of a story, more just a few scenes with a few weird running gags leading up to an ending, but I laughed at least a couple of times, and I appreciate how over-the-top it is. This is how not to make sense the right way.
Recommended If You Like Over-the-Top Action

PrincessPrincessPrincess by zaponator
Genre: Comedy
Once again, Twilight's done something to threaten the very existence of their world.
This is the story that 'won' the event. (I'm not really sure how contest-y it actually was.) I can see why. Very little of it is not laugh-out-loud hysterical. The scene with Twilight, Applejack and Rarity is a fantastic comedy of errors, echoed by the bickering of the CMCs later on. The princesses are perfectly over-the-top. Rainbow's embellishment drags on just long enough to culminate in something ridiculously epic. Of course, there's some wonky POV, Rarijack ship teasing, a random reference, and Rainbow Dash breaking the fourth wall to lampshade the author giving up on the ending, but there's also this exchange:

"Please don't panic!" Twilight exclaimed, panicking.
"I ain't panicking!" Applejack responded, also panicking.

You really can't go wrong with this kind of thing, and I loved it.
Highly Recommended

Genius by ConsciousHaze196
Genre: Random
Once again, I'm totally lost. This story needs considerable proofreading, and then it needs a point. It's random for the sake of randomness, and it just doesn't work. It could be a trollfic, but I'm not honestly sure, nor am I able to get in on the joke if it is.
Not Recommended

Belle of the 7.62x51mm Ball by Hap
Genre: Kaizo Crossovering
Drawn into a world not their own, Belle, Lumiere, Chun-Li and Annie Oakley must fight a horde of aliens to return home.
This is not an actual entry in the contest, having been on my RIL for probably a year now, but skirts listed it as an honorable mention, and that gives me a good excuse to read it! You can't ask for a more "written for skirts" fic. It opens, for instance, with Belle, obviously having returned home at the end of the story, popping open a bottle of Applejack's hard cider with a Walther PPK after emptying the chamber. I just kind of had to sit and marvel at that scene for a while. From there, things only get more and more ridiculous. There are cameos from just about every franchise you can think of, and quite a few I couldn't. And if there's anything wrong with this, it's that: there are so many characters I couldn't identify that I felt lost when the action was focused on anyone other than ponies or our protagonists. (The author has kindly provided a handy guide for those who've read the story.) Things get a little distracted in the middle as the protagonists are just caught up the goings on, which turn into a training montage/pep-talk for Belle. But afterward, it quickly becomes "Belle mowing down enemies with a minigun", and if you're not here for that, then why are you here? :V So yeah, in total, a pretty great read.
Recommended