FimFiction Link - Short ID: 78117/the-irony-of-applejack
Published: Jan '13 — Jul '13
One of my very first forays into reading fanfiction, the story caught my eyes due to the intriguing juxtaposition of turning a character, who "by design" can't lie into a creature that "lies" just by existing. While the story is not super deep by any means and the biggest plot points can be guessed, it does have its twists, has heartfelt and cool moments, builds nicely on already existing lore, while not being afraid to invent new stuff that respects the foundation, and ends on a high note. The dynamic of AJ, Big Mac, RD and Hyacinth works really nicely, there are only very few instances where I was a bit thrown out of immersion due to how the characters interacted. I also like how the M6's personalities are respected by the author and kept largely faithful to the original. My biggest issue with the plot is that it goes super overboard with its fight scenes, there are parts where it is implied that several hundred ponies are fighting on the streets at the same time, which knowing Ponyville isn't exactly huge provides a kind of a funny mental image. What also bothered me a little is how mustache-twirling the villain is until the very end where he does an ambiguous 180 , but I'm willing to forgive this, because it's very obvious that he's not the important part of the story just a "device" to drive the actual protagonists. Also once again Celestia proves to be practically useless... Authors! Please let that poor sungod do something for once, for crying out loud!
Overall, I'd rate it a 7/10, awesome concept, nice arc, mostly entertaining characters, a few bumbling scenes. I can recommend it if you want a not-too-sulking, action-packed drama that you can finish in around two days.
I read all 176k words of it, back when I had gotten into horsewords recently and was happy to slurp up anything. It starts off with so much promise, but then it feels the need to make everything "epic" and is completely ruined by that. The plot is far too big for what it is - apparently AJ is the daughter of the last queen of some now-dead hive or something, the old abandoned hive habitations are hidden in some forest within walking distance of Ponyville, a rival hive is making moves on Ponyville right about the same time as Applejack discovers what she is (out of pure coincidence, IIRC), and by the end of it things devolve into an epic battle of ponyville where a single guard detachment is being overwhelmed by some shitty force of changelings, and AJ has an epic 1v1 showdown with I don't remember whom in some epic tower (because Ponyville has that apparently). So there's like a 500v200 conflict or something that's treated as an epic war (not that small fights can absolutely make for great stories, but only if they're protrayed as "oh fuck we're sitting in this tiny town and we're all gonna die if we don't fight to the last pony standing!" - NOT if they're portrayed as "literally the fate of Equestria hangs on this battle between two rag-tag disorganised groups!"), and AJ "grows" into this epic hero that strikes down the villain in a way that purely serves to prop up how epic and heroic she is.