The Best Damn Fics You've Ever Read.

[Epsilon Rose]

De-rec from me. Don't get me wrong what is there good but it is a start and end to a story that is missing its middle. Also resoulution came too easy making the story feel barebones. Decent bone structure for all that tough.

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I'm torn, for similar reasons.

The story's length is both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, it allows it to easily focus on a relatively small story, without having to justify the world spanning nonsense or giant pile of intersecting arcs that Worm easily invites. It also makes it a relatively easy read. On the other hand, it feels like there were a lot of concepts that were never satisfactorily explored and the ending does feel a bit too neat and clean.

I'm not going to derec, because I always want more, and the most of the writing is very good, but I'm also not sure if it warrants a rec. I think part of the problem was how quickly and seamlessly both Madison and Sophia switched over to supporting Taylor as soon as they got paired up. It almost feels like there was something priming them to switch away from Emma, especially with Madison's constant "I'm not Mads" lines, but we never actually see that and it doesn't really line up with them continuing to hang out with her. Actually, Madison constantly rejecting a nick name that everyone seems to use is another thing that's never really explored, despite coming off as a new development and the author constantly coming back to it. The ending is similar, with the trio going from completely in the dark to having all of the pieces and a perfect conclusion as part of an extended climax.

Finally, while I won't call Miss Militia out of character, there's definitely some oddness going on on the Hero side of things and some of the other characters might be ooc or holding idiot balls. I think the biggest example of this might be the attack on the BBQ and the way no one seemed to treat it like a big deal and there wasn't any police/prt presence, despite the attack apparently involving a lot of (possibly incendiary) explosives. Similarly, the Heroes continuing to go along with MM's claims of some sort of super Master, despite there being nothing to justify them and the Master never showing up again, strained suspension of disbelief.

To be clear, I could see someone in MM's shoes imaging such a Master to explain what happened, but they would be a large departure from the baseline and you wouldn't expect a Master that's strong enough to overwrite a fundamental aspect of their victim, while remaining completely undetected in all ways, to have an almost ridiculously narrow focus. Similarly, it's hard to picture the PRT or Protectorate leaving them unaccounted for, yet we never get any hints that there was a major push to find the Master, nor were there any real repercussions for not finding them.

 

[Liquid Ink]

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.}

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I'll have to throw a de-rec on this as well.

It's good. Actually I think it's very good, but for me it's marred by feeling like it can't make up its mind about where it wants to go. Anakin's story throughout feels quite strong, as does Padmé's and Nima's, and I think they build to a very satisfying resolution... except the story doesn't end or really even begin there, it's sandwiched between multiple slices of "yes, but there's a hell of slaves and this isn't an quick fix because politicians and criminals." Sidious and Tyranus show up once, only to confirm canon has not changed and everything is going to plan. This is only ever revisited during one of the last five paragraphs, little more than a footnote saying eventually "eventually, some day after this story closed, Palpatine and the Jedi (probably) got what was coming to them."

It's rather rushed, I think.

De-rec from me. Don't get me wrong what is there good but it is a start and end to a story that is missing its middle. Also resoulution came too easy making the story feel barebones. Decent bone structure for all that tough.

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I'm torn, for similar reasons.

The story's length is both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, it allows it to easily focus on a relatively small story, without having to justify the world spanning nonsense or giant pile of intersecting arcs that Worm easily invites. It also makes it a relatively easy read. On the other hand, it feels like there were a lot of concepts that were never satisfactorily explored and the ending does feel a bit too neat and clean.

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I'm also torn for the same reasons on The Case of the Disappeared Villain. Yeah it's borderline, or really close to borderline.

Major spoilers to follow. The tl;dr goes up here:
I'm tentatively de-recommending it, but I encourage folks to read it and then consider whether to recommend it yourselves.

I always assumed the weird super Master thing to just be bullshit ass-covering on the Heroes' parts, because it just doesn't hold up to long-term scrutiny. I thought the angle was meant to be "THE SYSTEM IS FUCKING INTENTIONALLY BROKEN" given how easily everyone rolled over and shilled for the supposed facts of the case, but... then the ending just happened, and (afaict) that possibility wasn't addressed.

There's some really great stuff in there. There's a real strength to it, but the ending is... quite unceremonious and extremely easy. After building up Miss Militia's character to be so disgustingly abhorrent and the system to be complicit and an antagonistic obstacle, the conclusion became very unsatisfying and it left me briefly wondering if the goal of the story was to specifically make her abhorrent, since otherwise it stumbles extremely hard. I'm glad it didn't go on longer, it's a good length, but it definitely felt like it needed more to reach the ending than what was presented.

The front and centre is "Two bullies and their long-term victim have to do a school project together" and that casts an awkward shadow over too much of story. The mystery and serious content feels unpleasantly disposable to that end. A means to these three characters having to work together. That doesn't work for me. I even dislike it when tv shows do it, most of the time.

To expand on that, my take away is that it goes in so hard on what has been perpetrated by individuals that it keeps directly victimised characters at arms length or in hiding, almost excluding them from the story or reducing them to an auxiliary presence, when the subject matter strongly suggests they should be nearer the front and centre. This is awkward in a mystery, but then the character in question is reduced to being a concealed mystery. As a result the impetus behind the story is about heroes and government agencies erasing the presence of trans people and concealing miscarriages of justice... in a story where narrative elements relating to a trans character must be hidden or misrepresented for the characters to uncover and reveal.

I strongly dislike that, but I haven't seen any similar comments by others, so maybe I'm imagining parallels that perhaps aren't actually there. Either way, it also comes close to criticising something on the principle of disliking the premise, which I dislike doing, but I've derecommended stuff for less than the ridiculous Sudden Master elements anyway.

At times I think it is extremely good, but key parts of it just don't quite seem to hold up.

 

[Wobulator]

I always assumed the weird super Master thing to just be bullshit ass-covering on the Heroes' parts, because it just doesn't hold up to long-term scrutiny. I thought the angle was meant to be "THE SYSTEM IS FUCKING INTENTIONALLY BROKEN" given how easily everyone rolled over and shilled for the supposed facts of the case, but... then the ending just happened, and (afaict) that possibility wasn't addressed.

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It's not a commetary on the system at all. Miss Militia had a trans kid and couldn't accept it at all, and she fought and fought to deny her daughter's right to be herself and everyone else believed the trusted hero.

It might be tempting to say that this is out of character, that you'd never get a respectable, well-regarded mother to act like this, but I've personally seen it.
Having a trans kid is... a hell of a thing, and a lot of people do not deal with it well at all.

 

[Epsilon Rose]

It's not a commetary on the system at all. Miss Militia had a trans kid and couldn't accept it at all, and she fought and fought to deny her daughter's right to be herself and everyone else believed the trusted hero.

It might be tempting to say that this is out of character, that you'd never get a respectable, well-regarded mother to act like this, but I've personally seen it.
Having a trans kid is... a hell of a thing, and a lot of people do not deal with it well at all.

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That is part of the story, but there's also a strong element of the sysetem actively enabling her and tacitly accepting anti-trans abuse, espesially early on. After all, the first obstacle they had to deal with was not simply MM's version of the story being taken as gospel, but the government actively redacting almost all information on Lustrum, far beyond what would have been needed to protect the "victim's" identity.

 

[Firedon]

Broken Cycles

Time and again, Homura Akemi has tried the impossible: To prevent Madoka from becoming a Magical Girl. Each time, she's failed. This time, she's not alone. This time, there just might be hope from an unlikely source. Hope can be salvation or damnation. Which will it be, this one last time?

The Doctor vs the Incubator(s). Someone told me the dark stuff was too dark so maybe fluff?

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I'll derec it. I did enjoy it, mostly in the early parts, but towards the end, especially wrt the Walpurgis fight I just kept tuning out various combat parts to the point where I just dropped it around the big reveal with Wal. Maybe I'm not that big of a fan of the "just take characters x, y and z from something else and plop them in with only the mildest of changes to them? I usually don't have that big a problem with it, but I do prefer that at least the names are changed so that recognizing what a character is based on is a neat little "aha!" moment instead of just "do you know this name?" Apart from that I feel like the pace of the fic is just... slightly too fast? I suppose everyone falling together as quickly as they did here works with the Hope theme but it still felt pretty eyebrow raising at times. Looking at you, Kyoko and Donna. Although I suppose even in canon Kyoko was pretty quick in latching onto Sayaka but I just feel there's a sort of direct connection missing like the shared magical girl-ness.
But yeah. Did not finish but especially the early parts were enjoyable so I do recommend maybe at least checking it out but not to the point of putting it on the list.

 

[Liquid Ink]

It's not a commetary on the system at all.

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Like Epsilon Rose says, there is a systemic element. I would say throughout, with the prevalence of consistent misinformation, uncertainty, dismissals, and (maybe) suspicious interest by Protectorate and PRT staff.

Within the fic Lustrum was railroaded to the Birdcage, with a suspect legal team, prevented from defending herself with explicit comparison to Paige Mcabee's treatment. All the while, files have been redacted, Armsmaster is less than helpful (if not directly complicit or at least very suspicious from having handled the initial arrest with MM and Dauntless), and Miss Militia is running around directing PRT squads to hunt down anyone capable of revealing the truth with the catch-all lie/delusion of there being another super powerful master, allowing her free reign to take down anyone she pleases. Again. For at least the second confirmed time. It's a process she falls back on, and the only peer that is suggested to be questioning it is Armsmaster, who has been framed as suspect or untrustworthy by the story/Taylor's POV right up until the very end, and even after that.

Maybe it's not an intentional comment on the system, but I think it's very much there.

This might be a stretch, but the end of the fic also points out that the entire castration narratives surrounding Lustrum are nothing but transphobic rumours, and there's only one person directly identified as involved and it's extremely unlikely there is anyone to actually come forward and MM isn't going to be boasting... so since all hints at there being a trans individual aided by Lustrum have been shut down hard, where do the public rumours originate? As far as I can tell the only place they should have been able to start is leaking from within some part of whichever branches of the system are looking to put Lustrum away forever.

But the majority of the problems are hung on MM, and once she is brought in, the story glosses over the rest by summarising it as Taylor, Madison, and Sophia's school presentation. It's very tidy, and I think at odds with the story up until that point.

Also, slight ammendment to part of my previous criticism:

The front and centre is "Two bullies and their long-term victim have to do a school project together" and that casts an awkward shadow over too much of story. The mystery and serious content feels unpleasantly disposable to that end. A means to these three characters having to work together. That doesn't work for me. I even dislike it when tv shows do it, most of the time.

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This is partially inaccurate. Taylor, Madison, and Sophia's relationship is the core of the narrative, so it can't really overshadow the rest. There's something there, that I can't quite put my finger on that perhaps doesn't work, or may be I'm missing.

 

[The Meddler]

On the one hand, I think the fix could have done with showing a bit more of the PRT/Armsmasters POV, just so we could get a better sense of what went 'wrong' so to speak with the original investigation, and why it looks like everyone else went along with MM.

On the other hand, the fic might lose something if it showed a non-Taylor POV, so I dunno.

FWIW, I enjoyed the fic, but I'm not gonna rec or de-rec.

 

[Vyslanté]

I'm going to recommend The Case of the Disappeared Villain by Stabbyunicorn. (CW: Transphobia). It's a Worm mystery/horror fic, and I found it to be both painful and fascinating to read. It's hard to describe it in a way that doesn't spoil the fic, so I'll just give you the author's own description:

"Did Mr. Gladly hate her? A half-semester group project with Sophia and Madison, and they had to write fifteen pages on Lustrum? "Radical feminist who castrated men" didn't quite cut it.

But as Taylor, Sophia, and Madison investigate, they begin to wonder if Lustrum was really a villain at all… and someone doesn't want them to ever learn the truth."

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That's a rec from me. There were comments about the length, but for me it felt quite appropriate for the story it was telling.

 

[Tasoli]

here were comments about the length

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No length could have been good enough. But rather it lacks some narrative steps from A to Z so I don't feel like ending was earned.

 

[kitsune9]

Broken Cycles

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I enjoyed it and I think it's worth a rec but even with the handful of Doctor Who aliens showing up on earth to cause problems and him calling in other aliens to bug Kyubi's planet it didn't feel like the doctor was actually from the Madoka universe. It felt more like he'd fallen into a different timeline then anything else. I mean we know that didn't happen because of the unit magical girl but it read like it wasn't the doctors earth and given that Homura was mentioned to be jumping between alt universes with the bad guy being an alt Homura and the fact that Kyubi barely knew that the doctor existed despite everything and it felt like she'd pulled the doctor into a different timeline.

 

[kaeim]

I'd like to recommend Purple Days by baurus which finished after many years on Monday. It's a Groundhog Day version of Joffrey Baratheon, and it's a story that held my attention throughout the whole thing and kept me awake for several nights the past week as I binge read it

Purple Days (ASOIAF Joffrey Timeloop) (AU)

Blurb: From one day to the other, Joffrey Baratheon wakes up a changed man. Far from the spoiled...

forums.spacebattles.com

 

[Arawn_Emrys]

I'd like to recommend Purple Days by baurus which finished after many years on Monday. It's a Groundhog Day version of Joffrey Baratheon, and it's a story that held my attention throughout the whole thing and kept me awake for several nights the past week as I binge read it

Purple Days (ASOIAF Joffrey Timeloop) (AU)

Blurb: From one day to the other, Joffrey Baratheon wakes up a changed man. Far from the spoiled...

forums.spacebattles.com

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Seconded. I had read it off and on but binged from the beginning after the finale. Best I've ever seen in that fandom.

 

[MooGoesCow21]

I'd like to recommend Purple Days by baurus which finished after many years on Monday. It's a Groundhog Day version of Joffrey Baratheon, and it's a story that held my attention throughout the whole thing and kept me awake for several nights the past week as I binge read it

Purple Days (ASOIAF Joffrey Timeloop) (AU)

Blurb: From one day to the other, Joffrey Baratheon wakes up a changed man. Far from the spoiled...

forums.spacebattles.com

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I also support this I should also mention that I actually really liked the Yi Ti arc

 

[Spiritofpower]

I'll also rec Purple Days.

There are parts of it that are rough. Really rough, early on. Some of the jokes miss pretty hard, and Joffrey really, truly is despicable in the early chapters, and that's especially hard to read through because Baurus improved as a writer massively over the course of the fic. And while the Yi Ti arc had a 10/10 ending, it really was rather too long, especially when reading it "live" and having to wait between updates.

So if the main character starts as an asshole, and the writing is kind of rough early on, and there's this one arc that's really controversial, and yada yada yada... Why rec it?

Because Joffrey, like the story itself, like Baurus himself, grows. Joffrey gets broken down completely, and rebuilt from the ground up. He struggles, he fights, he fails, he succeeds, but always, with each and every passing loop, with each experience lived, he grows as a person. After his total breakdown, he starts small: Learn how to be a vaguely functional human being, without murdering people for fun. Then he starts learning how to be a properly functional human being, able to relate to others. Then he starts learning how to lead, how to bring people together for a common goal. And so on. And he never stops growing, not even until the very last chapter.

But more importantly than all of that - more importantly than all of the wonderful character moments, all of the raw humanity of so many of the scenes in Purple Days, all the incredible growth Joffrey goes through as a person - it sticks the landing. The final battle - more properly, the final campaign, since Purple Days forgoes the TV show's route of lazily wrapping things up in a single engagement - lasts a stupendous thirteen chapters until the epilogue. Battles are hard-fought; Heroes are made and killed, fortifications are destroyed, villages razed to the ground and then reanimated to bolster the Walkers' army. It is, frankly, the kind of Long Night we should have gotten in canon Game of Thrones/A Song of Ice and Fire. And that is the reason why I think it is one of the best fics ever written; So few works of fiction in general, fanfiction or original fiction, published or not, written or not, can manage to have an ending this satisfying.

 

[veteranMortal]

Derec. Too long for what it is, poor spelling and dodgy prose makes the opening difficult to get into, and it gets lost as it goes on, complete with lengthy uninteresting derails.

 

[spiritualatheist]

Derec. Too long for what it is, poor spelling and dodgy prose makes the opening difficult to get into, and it gets lost as it goes on, complete with lengthy uninteresting derails.

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Agreed. I couldn't get through the first paragraph without bouncing off.

 

[Oshha]

I'm going to derec Purple Days. It isn't a bad fic, but it has a poor start that gets better as the author improves. That isn't a bad thing and the fic is still good, but it doesn't qualify for being one of the best ever.

 

[TheDarkMist]

I'd like to recommend Purple Days by baurus which finished after many years on Monday. It's a Groundhog Day version of Joffrey Baratheon, and it's a story that held my attention throughout the whole thing and kept me awake for several nights the past week as I binge read it

Purple Days (ASOIAF Joffrey Timeloop) (AU)

Blurb: From one day to the other, Joffrey Baratheon wakes up a changed man. Far from the spoiled...

forums.spacebattles.com

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That's a hard De-Rec for me while it was a fun read I just find myself skipping whole chapters to try and get to the better parts of the story the Grammar can be quite bad at times with errors in most chapters that you read, definitely not bad enough that you will probably stop reading it but still noticeable.

 

[Tasoli]

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.

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Guys. I have reccommended this but have got not recs or de-recs. So I am shilling it a bit more.

 

[Raj]

Guys. I have reccommended this but have got not recs or de-recs. So I am shilling it a bit more.

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Alright I started reading it and got 10 chapters before dropping it.

Overall I'll give it a Derec, while it's certainly a good story I can't really call it one of the best Young Justice or Justice League stories I've read.

In my personal opinion it fell a little flat, and overall didn't really make me feel anything in particular.

 

[Ness]

Definetely another rec for Purple Days, one of the best pieces of fanfiction i have ever read, and definetely worth the growing pains that are the first couple of chapters

 

[Wateryblue]

Anyone heard of this Show Chapter | Archive of Our Own

Its just really good all around. Seeing Shirou interact with all these servants in surprising ways

I mean just look at this Kiara interlude

The Saga of Shirou's Summons - Chapter 11 - Aberron, nd7878, PallanMinerva - Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms [Archive of Our Own]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

archiveofourown.org

And his interaction with Florence Nightingale

Show Chapter | Archive of Our Own

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Why does the embedded link not work correctly...? Anyhow its called
The Saga of Shirou's Summons

 

[Grue]

Is this a rec for it as a whole(in which case A)what see the thread rulings on oneshot compilations again? and B)Derec on account of the MHX chapters, where they somehow manage to get the gag character significantly OOC and losing fights they should win), or reccing specific chapters from it(once again, anyone remember rulings here?)

 

[Tallamee]

Why does the embedded link not work correctly...? Anyhow its called
The Saga of Shirou's Summons

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I would derec, if it were complete, but it is not, so I do not need to. Some parts are good, but most are not and none of the paths are complete in any meaningful way.

The Circe story, if it were complete might make it. Tamamo and Florence are going places as well. But the rest vary between the cheap seats of crack fiction writing and solidly average.

A)what see the thread rulings on oneshot compilations again?

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Irrelevant, on account of the referenced story collection not being an actual oneshot compilation. Several of the story paths span multiple chapters.

 

[NinetyNineLies]

Not Homer's Iliad - Chapter 1 - kaufmanl - Multifandom [Archive of Our Own]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

archiveofourown.org

I would like to rec Not Homer's Iliad by kaufnaml. It's a high-school AU of the Iliad, with events within paralleling the original Iliad. It's told from the perspective of Patroclus trying to get closer to his crush Achilles and getting tangled with the famous kids' drama. Bit unrealistic for a high-school, but so does most teenage movies set in high-school.