Thank you so much! It was a lot of fun to write. That you rank it so highly means a lot to me.
The Best Damn Fics You've Ever Read.
- Thread starter Phearo
- Start date
- Discussion
Thank you so much! It was a lot of fun to write. That you rank it so highly means a lot to me.
SolipsistSerpent
Endlessly Devouring
Is this something I'd need to be familiar with Daria to fully enjoy?
- Location
- Massachusetts
Hard for me to say? I'm pretty familiar with the main character but I was never a religious episode watcher and I still managed to enjoy the fanfic chapters focusing on side characters I didn't remember at all.
Fortunately, the story is set up in episodic form with most "chapters" being self-contained shorts, so it should be easy for you to dip your toe in and decide for yourself if you can get into it.
I don't think so. I try to introduce the characters to the readers as if they are new, so you don't really need to have any familiarity with the series. I'd say that Outlanders is probably easier for readers who are only familiar with TES than for those who are only familiar with Daria.
SolipsistSerpent
Endlessly Devouring
Well, I have my own nomination. It's an exploration of Wakaba having to find herself after the end of the Utena TV series (warning this fic will make no sense if you haven't seen the Utena TV series). It really manages to nail the weird atmosphere of Ohtori Academy while talking about the nature of stories, cultural progress, and Wakaba herself. Because Ohtori Academy is like that.
The Limitations of Wax.
The Limitations of Wax.
Chloe Sullivan
Subdefective
- Location
- 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale CA
1. Okay I mentioned this one before but apparently didn't link:
The Anatomy of Melancholy
Re-contextualizes the original work (Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya) entirely in one short character sketch. Has a music video inspired by it.
2. In case canon Veronica Mars didn't have enough suffering for you,
In the End
Lamb finds a new suspect to pin Lilly's murder on. (who had means and opportunity and is our MC?)
3. For Tatooine Slave Culture fans:
eleutheromania
{There's a rumor going around the Quarters that there's a general in the Republic Army who was seen wearing the Amarattu, a general who calls himself Sky-Walker and Rain-Bringer, a warrior unfettered and fearless. They say that he's a Jedi Knight, that he wields a blue lightsaber and calls the slave-clones by the names they chose for themselves. It's probably bantha shit, but Nima has to admit that even if it is a lie, it's by far the prettiest one she's heard in years.}
4. Please gimme more Sakura Haruno, stories, I think someone said?
Xenograft
In which Orochimaru needs a Lab Assistant. It turns out about a well as you'd think. (oh how we rationalize the paths we take)
The Anatomy of Melancholy
Re-contextualizes the original work (Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya) entirely in one short character sketch. Has a music video inspired by it.
2. In case canon Veronica Mars didn't have enough suffering for you,
In the End
Lamb finds a new suspect to pin Lilly's murder on. (who had means and opportunity and is our MC?)
3. For Tatooine Slave Culture fans:
eleutheromania
{There's a rumor going around the Quarters that there's a general in the Republic Army who was seen wearing the Amarattu, a general who calls himself Sky-Walker and Rain-Bringer, a warrior unfettered and fearless. They say that he's a Jedi Knight, that he wields a blue lightsaber and calls the slave-clones by the names they chose for themselves. It's probably bantha shit, but Nima has to admit that even if it is a lie, it's by far the prettiest one she's heard in years.}
4. Please gimme more Sakura Haruno, stories, I think someone said?
Xenograft
In which Orochimaru needs a Lab Assistant. It turns out about a well as you'd think. (oh how we rationalize the paths we take)
Derec
Eleutheromania built up the story in a way that was sort of working with Padme trying to free slaves via politics and Anakin's scanner without people being able to do anything about it because of how Slavery was illegal and then it jumped the shark by having Anakin solve all of his various problems offscreen.
He was talking to Obi won about leaving the Jedi order and then the story might as well have stopped then and there because the rest of the story was a quick summary that could be called and then Anakin wins everything forever.
- Location
- Southampton, Great Britain
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I'm going to derec for pretty much the same reasons. It starts off alright, but then it loses any dramatic tension as it becomes a fic where Anakin just solves everything without any issue. I could buy all of those issues getting fixed if showed them happening and any difficulties along the way, but the story just seems to want to have its cake and eat it by having a golden ending without any real struggle or difficulty along the way.
There is a niche for those sort of stories and I won't begrudge anybody who enjoys them, but all of the problems just getting solved without any apparent struggle or difficulty keeps me from calling it one of the best ever.
SolipsistSerpent
Endlessly Devouring
I did quite enjoy Xenograft as a body-psychological horror piece.
I'm not quite sure I can say it's one of the best damn fics I've ever read, so I won't second it, but I won't derec it either.
I'm not quite sure I can say it's one of the best damn fics I've ever read, so I won't second it, but I won't derec it either.
Raj
Master of Procrasination
- Location
- Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Going to derec Anatomy, it's a good story and one that I've enjoyed reading before.
But if a one-shot is going to make it to the best ever list it needs to be a lot more emotionally evocative or thought provoking in my opinion.
- Location
- Maryland
Gonna have to third this derec, for different reasons.
While I deeply enjoyed it, the premise of the fic is better suited for a far, far longer story, and it being a oneshot makes the whole thing suffer because of it.
Chloe Sullivan
Subdefective
- Location
- 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale CA
Anakin is not the protagonist of that story, Nima is, if anyone.
all it takes is one child pointing out that theemperor has no clothes system is broken to bring Palpentine's plans crashing down.
the emotional core of the story is Anakin having a breakdown because he got called out by the kid, not the "and then they fixed it" which is pretty much incidental, and if you feel that being wrapped up causally makes it the story not hold up well, then yes, I get that. Derec away.
what I don't get is the complaint that "Anakin fixes it easily" because lol what, when did Anakin fix anything in this story? Anakin doesn't get to fix anything, he's the one in need of help. That's the point.
Mod, you people are giving me Xanderzone flashbacks. No, he is not the hero of the story just because he's the obvious white male present.
all it takes is one child pointing out that the
the emotional core of the story is Anakin having a breakdown because he got called out by the kid, not the "and then they fixed it" which is pretty much incidental, and if you feel that being wrapped up causally makes it the story not hold up well, then yes, I get that. Derec away.
what I don't get is the complaint that "Anakin fixes it easily" because lol what, when did Anakin fix anything in this story? Anakin doesn't get to fix anything, he's the one in need of help. That's the point.
Mod, you people are giving me Xanderzone flashbacks. No, he is not the hero of the story just because he's the obvious white male present.
- Location
- Somewhere down the road~
Heya guys, update inbound! As usual, I'll be doing a sweep that should stop at about this post- see you all soonish!
- Location
- Southampton, Great Britain
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Or maybe it should be another mark against the story that it fails to portray its actual protagonist as the protagonist. Because to me, it reads as Anakin as the protagonist with Padme and Nima as deuteragonists.
Maybe you could not be salty that people disagreed with your rec and resort to accusing anyone who disagrees with you of prejudiced as surely that has to be the season that anyone would disagree with your preferences. Did it seriously not occur to you that people might think the protagonist of the main work is still the protagonist in the fanfic due to his continued prominence? Or the fact that the story revolves around Anakin and he is the one doing most of the stuff in the story could make people might think he is the protagonist? Or perhaps people might consider the adult canon character doing the stuff to be the protagonist instead of the OC kid tagalong character?
It is really so impossible that something other than prejudice might be the reason that people might disagree with you?
Chloe Sullivan
Subdefective
- Location
- 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale CA
I wouldn't say prejudice. I'd say convention and social expectation. but whatever.
The story revolves around the fact that Nima, a slave and a child, actually has more agency than Anakin, an adult and a trained Jedi and a General (and realizing this causes Anakin to have a breakdown).
I don't think it's at all unreasonable to find it absurd and even distressing that people make an assessment centered on "Anakin is the protagonist" when the core narrative conceit of story is his lack of agency.
You see, I've been there. That people think you're smart and doing well and on a trajectory to success and acclaim and you're so suffocated by expectation and pressure on you that you feel utterly powerless to assert yourself and are emotionally suffocating and want to die place.
So yeah, I take it a little personally when people say the guy who was in this state and had to be rescued is "winning too easily."
Liquid Ink
Contains Sleep Deprived Rambling
I'll have to derec this one.
As advertised, it is basically misery porn, but It's strangely contrived misery porn, that leads to no payoffs or conclusions. That sounds more critical and judgemental than I want it to mean, but I can't think of a better way to summarise it. In short, I'm not a fan. With Veronica's death the whole thing falls apart, and Logan is too much of an incidental character (and the story too short) for him to sucessfully function as the main character or display relatable or sympathetic traits or ambitions. It almost has to coast on what the reader knows of canon (and future canon) to work, which is a big nono for me.
Aaron fucks himself over the moment he opens his mouth, so everything that happens is entirely coincidental and could have happened the moment anyone found lily's speeding tickets, so within the overall story Veronica exists just to be the victim of a misery conga that has no narrative purpose, except to set up what I feel is a weak tragic "reveal" that readers should already know or expect.
It's much too abrupt and short for my liking.
On the positives, Logan, Dick, Madison, and particularly Lamb feel so in-character it hurts. They're fantastically awful people.
Mac is introduced for no reason, and while the AN makes special note that Lianne is present... she doesn't seem to appear in the fic, so that's a weird thing to draw attention to. Lamb's treatment of Veronica is consistent with how he treated her canonically, but it definitely raised an eyebrow that he'd do it while she had legal representation present, and that McCormack was so indifferent over it.
Veronica is accused of murder, gets ostracised, is brutally assaulted, then raped, continues to be ostracised, falls over, and gets run over by a car. That's the entire story arc of the main POV character, and theoretical protagonist. Logan is well and truly second fiddle, and is at the point in canon (and fic) where he is at his most repulsive, delusional, and a/pathetic, and surrounded by even worse friends and family, and there's not enough time between the handover and the end of the story to explore anything there, so stuff just happens.
I feel the kind of subject matter this fic includes needed careful handling and space to explore the emotional impact or moral weight, or just any kind of development, but here it feels like it was thrown in for the sake of Being Veronica Mars is Suffering, or maybe because the author didn't want to touch it for too long. In fairness too them, canon could have also done a lot better, but here it's just here. It takes canon Veronica's "Life's a bitch until you die" and turns the screws until they snap off.
Veronica is accused of murder, gets ostracised, is brutally assaulted, then raped, continues to be ostracised, falls over, and gets run over by a car. That's the entire story arc of the main POV character, and theoretical protagonist. Logan is well and truly second fiddle, and is at the point in canon (and fic) where he is at his most repulsive, delusional, and a/pathetic, and surrounded by even worse friends and family, and there's not enough time between the handover and the end of the story to explore anything there, so stuff just happens.
I feel the kind of subject matter this fic includes needed careful handling and space to explore the emotional impact or moral weight, or just any kind of development, but here it feels like it was thrown in for the sake of Being Veronica Mars is Suffering, or maybe because the author didn't want to touch it for too long. In fairness too them, canon could have also done a lot better, but here it's just here. It takes canon Veronica's "Life's a bitch until you die" and turns the screws until they snap off.
Last edited:
5-26-2021 Update
- Location
- Somewhere down the road~
Updated up to post #5,538!
5-26-2021
-Added The Last Turn by pirateaba (Erfworld)
-Added Force Bond by KittandChips (Star Wars)
-Removed Just an Unorthodox Thief by The Infamous Man (Fate/Zero)
-Added Now You Feel Like Number None by Omicron (Bleach)
-Removed Delenda Est by Lord Silvere (Harry Potter)
-Added Lament by grayimperia (Fire Emblem)
-Removed Anderson Quest by Tricia (Hellsing)
-Added Mission of Honor: Retold by General Battuta (Honorverse)
-Added It's Good to be Neighborly by comicbooklovergreen (Terminator)
-Added Waiting by coffeebuddha (Calvin and Hobbes)
-Added Motion Parallax by Laughsalot3412 (Leverage)
-Added Audience: 822,000 and Homeland Security by WerewolvesAreReal (Leverage)
-Added The Star Treks are Right by QuantumBranching (Crossover - H.P Lovecraft & Star Trek)
-Added Interregnum by Admiral_Byzantium & DrMckay (Star Wars)
-Added Hello Operator, Please Give Me Number Nine by Starlingthefool (Calvin & Hobbes)
-Added The Enemy of My Enemy by Katsuhiro (Halo)
-Fixed Misc. Formatting Errors
-Slightly reworded de-rec conditions in OP
5-26-2021
-Added The Last Turn by pirateaba (Erfworld)
-Added Force Bond by KittandChips (Star Wars)
-Removed Just an Unorthodox Thief by The Infamous Man (Fate/Zero)
-Added Now You Feel Like Number None by Omicron (Bleach)
-Removed Delenda Est by Lord Silvere (Harry Potter)
-Added Lament by grayimperia (Fire Emblem)
-Removed Anderson Quest by Tricia (Hellsing)
-Added Mission of Honor: Retold by General Battuta (Honorverse)
-Added It's Good to be Neighborly by comicbooklovergreen (Terminator)
-Added Waiting by coffeebuddha (Calvin and Hobbes)
-Added Motion Parallax by Laughsalot3412 (Leverage)
-Added Audience: 822,000 and Homeland Security by WerewolvesAreReal (Leverage)
-Added The Star Treks are Right by QuantumBranching (Crossover - H.P Lovecraft & Star Trek)
-Added Interregnum by Admiral_Byzantium & DrMckay (Star Wars)
-Added Hello Operator, Please Give Me Number Nine by Starlingthefool (Calvin & Hobbes)
-Added The Enemy of My Enemy by Katsuhiro (Halo)
-Fixed Misc. Formatting Errors
-Slightly reworded de-rec conditions in OP
Last edited:
- Location
- Somewhere down the road~
If you guys are worried about what the last line entails- it's just me attempting to word it more accurately (well hopefully lol) since most total vote counts for a fic do settle for around a handful and all.
Oh, and in terms of formatting errors- there was a crossover fic that didn't get duplicated between its 'verses, and some missing names that were fixed. If you guys see more, just let me know and I'll try fix it in an addendum or the next proper update!
(here's to also hoping that time v.3.0 doesn't disappear again, it's getting kinda creepy >.<)
Oh, and in terms of formatting errors- there was a crossover fic that didn't get duplicated between its 'verses, and some missing names that were fixed. If you guys see more, just let me know and I'll try fix it in an addendum or the next proper update!
(here's to also hoping that time v.3.0 doesn't disappear again, it's getting kinda creepy >.<)
Epsilon Rose
The King of Unrest
I haven't read the story yet, but I'm not sure why that would mean Anakin isn't the protagonist. Quite the contrary, in a story that explores his lack of agency I would expect him to be the leading character despite said lack of agency.
- Location
- America
Still listed underneath Lupin III
Still listed underneath Bloodborne
Mopman43
Mountain-Hermit of Nitpeak
- Location
- Vermont
People de-recced them.
Why yes my reading of the story being a story about how it should have kept Padme as the hero of the story is entirely because Anakin as a white male has to be the main protagonist and not because rather then continuing with what Padme was doing aka making actual changes which included creating ways to free slaves and freeing Nima.
What I was saying was that Anakin's actions at the end made the story objectively worse. If the story had ended on his determination to change things without showing what he decided to do it would have been a better story. If he was going to storm Tatooine it should have been shown in the story in my opinion Nima is at most a supporting character to Padme's story.
The story starts with Padme acting to make the world a better place and it should have stayed that way it would have been better if they had continued with the bill storyline with Anakin realizing that Palpatine isn't such a good guy or using the scanner to free slaves on Coruscant with the scanner without anyone being able to do anything about it because slavery is illegal. Hell it would have been better if Anakin had used the fame that was specifically referenced as a reason to stay away from Corusant because they didn't want to influence things to Influence things and come out in support of Padme's bill and dare the Jedi to say anything about his actions but no the solution running off to Tatooine and lightsabering everyone well all of the people that would have stood in the way get killed offscreen.
Tasoli
Life is for Living
- Location
- Behind the Keyboard.
-Added The Star Treks are Right by QuantumBranching (Crossover - H.P Lovecraft & Star Trek)
This should be also listed under the Cthulhu Mythos. It is just in the Star Trek atm.
Edit: I unrelated news,I do have another rec for the recs throne;
Fixations By: MathIsMagic
Summary; The Flash is rescued from the Legion of Doom by the turncoat villain Tigress. Things go downhill from there as she brings in other members of Wally's old 'Team' to combat a mysterious force that is eliminating the Wally Wests of every universe. Spitfire. Team and Original 7 centric. Spoilers for Endgame.
Essentially a crossover between Young Justice and Justice League cartoons where Kid Flash of Young justice and Flash of Justice League Unlimited is the same person, with pretty interesting mystery about why that is important thanks to a hidden enemy that seems to hell bent of killing every Wally West across the multiverse.
Decent mystery and conflict with pretty good characterisation and how it interplays between verses. Considering it is one of the few stories I can go back and re-read I think it is good and probably should be up there.
Oh when it says spoilers for Endgame author means the last episode of the YJ cartoon not Marvel.
Last edited:
Epsilon Rose
The King of Unrest
Ok, after having finished it, I'm also going to have to derec Eleutheromania.
The story has some really interesting ideas it wants to play with: the experience of a Tatooine slave girl held in the heart of the Republic, despite slavery being illegal; the way the clone troopers resemble slaves; and how Anakin was never truly free, he just traded his old masters for the Council and Palpatine. Unfortunately, those ideas are let down by both the writing and the general structure of the story.
Arguably, the biggest flaw is that none of those ideas are given enough attention or weight. The story starts with Nima and being taken to Coruscant, and we get a general idea that being a slave is bad, but we don't really see or life anything of how being a slave in the capital of a supposedly free republic effects her situation. There's no insight or depth there; it's just an uninspired rehash of "being a slave is not great." Of course, it jumps almost immediately to Padme rescuing her; without any planning, difficulty, or repercussions; at which point she has no more problems because Padme is a loving parent with lots of resources and what are emotional scars. (We get some mention of her having trust issues, but those never ammount to anything.)
Anakin's ark covers the later half of the story and we get even less from it. Mostly we get some whingeing about how the council doesn't really trust him and keeps sending him on missions (in the middle of a war where their forces are spread incredibly thin) until his fame dies down. It also does a bit to re-contextualize Obi-Wan's relationship with him and the handling is ... not great. Beyond that, he spends a lot of time being in love with Padme and there's a brief bit where Nima confronts him on why Padme has done more to free slaves than he has and he breaks down while having an epiphany that he was never really free.
Once he has that Epiphany, he tells the council where to stick it and the three of them head off for Tatooine. After that, we get a brief epilogue where everything is fixed. The slaves are free, Padme's the Chancellor, Anakin's the Senator for Tatooine (because he's a good politician, right), and both the Jedi and the Sith have been thoroughly told off.
If it seems like I left out the part where the Clones are slave analogs, that's because the idea is barely used for more than set dressing.
This is way to much for a one-shot that isn't A LOT better at using it's word-count to convey multiple themes at the same time. It's introducing an OC, it's covering three major points of view and a fourth minor one, it's trying to tackle themes of slavery and personal empowerment in multiple contexts that each need to be set up. Even the treatment of slavery, in general, isn't so much a treatment as it is a veneer that is made to feel deeper by borrowing the language of another author who has put much more time and effort into their world building, despite slavery being the one running theme that unites everything else in the story.
For all of its structural problems, the basic writing also isn't great, but it's also not enough to warrant much consideration beyond two points: There are more than a few overwrought descriptions that don't really fit. For example, here's a description of Anakin's eyes "His eyes are blue, bright blue, and they shine like twin suns." and when I see that I picture two, bright, glowing points of light, surrounded by darkness, and I'm pretty sure that's not what they're going for. What's worse, and this might be a bit petty, is the way they use 'so' as an intensifies so, so, very often, in both it's single and repeated forms. By the time I finished the story I had grown sick of the word.
Finally, a note on the protagonist: The story mostly follows Nima in the first part and Anakin in the last and it seems to want to present them as dual antagonists; with Nima acting as a mirror to and catalyst for, Anakin. Unfortunately, neither of them really do anything and there's no greater exploration of their struggles. Padme does things and she gets enough focus in the middle that you might be able to call her a third protagonist, except this is very much not her story.
Also, yeah, it is implied that Anakin fixes everything in the epilogue. Nima's only real contributions are asking him why he's complainig to the Chancellor about his job, not the slaves he claims to care about, and if he's free. I could write a story that has Padme, Akosha, or even Obi-wan ask those questions and believably produce a similar effect. She is an OC character that is presented as a primary protagonist, but her contrabutions to the story are that of a secondary character.