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Fan Fiction Review No. 1
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Tag Team Fan Fiction Review: Memoirs of an OC, Outsider Character
Boq: Alright. So I am told that Arsenio has something 'special' that he wants to review with me. *cracks knuckles* Let's get this over with—*looks over to see Arsenio laying on the floor, foaming at the mouth and what seems to be smoke coming out of his ears* Oh... dear...
Arsenio: Blarglelargle...*twitches* Go on...with...out me...*goes limp*
Boq: Arsenio! No! Stay with me! *pulls a lifeless Aresnio into his arms*
Arsenio: Bleeeeeh...*looks like an absolute mess*
Boq: No! I shall give you the kiss of life! *puckers up and moves in*
*BOP!*
Arsenio: *punched Boq in the face* I liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiive!
Boq: Oh, you sod!
Arsenio: You didn't think it'd be that easy, did you? *eyes narrow suspiciously*
Boq: You know you're secretly gay for me. It's only a matter of time before you realize it. *clears throat* Anyways, what on earth brought on a reaction like that? Did you read Twilight again?
Arsenio: Good heavens, no! I read something possibly more annoying though.
Boq: ... House of Night?
Arsenio: *on the floor, curled up into a little ball* ............................
Boq: Good lord, man! You know how dangerous teen literature is! Why on earth would you read something like that!?
Arsenio: *sighs* Okay, okay, enough joking. *sits up* It's a bit hard to explain if you haven't read it yourself. It's actually a fan fiction. *points to a few tall stacks of paper*
Boq: *stares at the waste of paper* A fan fiction? Do you realize how many trees you've possibly killed by printing all of that out?
Arsenio: You know me; I don't believe all that global warming crap. Anyway! To the task at hand! It's called Memoirs of an OC, Outsider Character, a fic of the One Piece variety. Go on! Go take a look for yourself.
Boq: Oh, alright. I suppose I must to give a fair review. *reads first few lines* ... I think my brain just died.
Arsenio: *grabs Boq by the back of the head, shoves his face into the papers* Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeead iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!
*Hours Later*
Boq: *curled up in a fetal position* No more! Please! No more!
Arsenio: Oh come on, you child! Be a man! You were only halfway through chapter two!
Boq: It's too long!
Arsenio: Okay, okay, I think I'll just have to explain to you as much as I can without having your head explode. *clears throat* Memoirs of an OC, Outsider Character is a 'self insert fan fiction' about a girl from the real world being sent into One Piece by her older brother.
Boq: I see. You've told me about this story before. Didn't you review it?
Arsenio: Yes, I did actually, and from what I heard, the response I got was rather...'critical'.
Boq: Just what did they say?
Arsenio: Apparently I'm an arrogant bastard.
Boq: Describes you perfectly.
Arsenio: My thoughts exactly, anyway, enough banter we have a review to do!
Boq: Le gasp! You're actually being serious for once?
Arsenio: *shoves a muffin in Boq's mouth* Anyway, as I was saying, the plot is girl from the real world is sent to the world of One Piece by her brother. How you may ask? Well, we aren't really told just how.
Boq: Well that's not at all helpful...
Arsenio: Exactly, and that brings me to the issues I brought up in my original review. The story itself pretty much just jumps in without giving an introduction. We are imediately introduced to a young man named 'Clow', a fan of One Piece and a fan fiction writer. The story starts with him wanting his sister 'Fuu' to proofread a chapter of his fan fiction. She makes it clear that she is not a fan of One Piece and somehow this goes into her accidently insulting the characters and Clow suddenly starts writing Fuu into his fan fiction. Then poof! She's there...and literally that's it...she's just there. You saw it yourself, right?
Boq: I saw it, but I didn't quite get it. There's certainly a whole lot of... words. It's like that line between what we need to know and what the author—and I do use that term lightly with this—wants us to know has been crossed, spat on, and then had a nuclear bomb dropped on it.
Arsenio: You say things so eloquently. I swear it's like poetry.
Boq: It is my honest opinion. There's no real direction to the first chapter; it goes from a very bland conversation between two people with names stolen from a CLAMP manga and then leads into the eventual rape of a cannon that even I know about.
Arsenio: You could be the next Shakespeare—in ass-ness. Anyway, that is a pretty good summary none the less. Getting back on track, here were the main issues I had with the fiction: the use of complicated words, the plot, the OCs and—of course—the portrayal of the cannon characters.
Boq: So basically the entire story?
Arsenio: ...More or less. But anyway, let's focus on the first point, the use of the over complicated words. This is an issue because as a reader, they really stuck out to me. It came across as unneeded and to be honest a little annoying. This is the problem with the overuse of more advanced vocabulary; people may think that it makes them sound more professional. Instead it can backfire horribly.
Boq: Like this…
Boq: And that is in the very first chapter—right after an extremely long author's note and a Japanese dictionary, but we'll get to that later. I get what the writer is trying to say, but why not just say that Clow couldn't find the words to retort? I'm not impressed. Amateur writers use this trick all the time. They feel that picking out the biggest word in their thesaurus may make them sound smart—though it has more of a habit of turning around and biting the author in the bum. Just because a word may be listed as a synonym, it does not mean they have exactly the same meaning. You can make a rather embarrassing mistake of using a word completely off the desired effect you wanted.
Arsenio: Exactly. This can be a turn off to readers. This point was actually one of the things people griped about in my original review.
Boq: I will have whoever wrote that know that most people say that 'simple is best'. You're not just writing for yourself. You have an audience and they may not have the same vocabulary as you. Just because the 'teen writing' style is a bit too simple with all the repetitive plotlines and horrid story telling, does not mean it's all horrible. And a little off topic; do these people read things other than Twilight and all that other rubbish? Read an adult novel and you will see that they don't exactly use big words either. The whole fancy words and purple prose thing IS teen writing.
Arsenio: Hmm, yes, quite right. Well said. In the end though, being that the author of the fiction is not a native speaker of English, it might actually be more beneficial to the author because it'd be easier to describe what they are trying to say.
Boq: I honestly don't care whether someone's native tongue is English or not. If you're going to write in a language that is not your own, you better do it right. *bangs head on desk* It's like listening to those little anime fan girls run around abusing the poor Japanese language. You feel insulted for those who actually speak it.
Arsenio: *shrugs* What can you do? Anyway, I think that's enough on the use of vocabulary, I think I see your eyes are starting to bleed. So time to move on to the plot.
Boq: ... There was a plot?
Arsenio: *facepalm* Girl sent to One Piece world by her older brother. Remember?
Boq: Well that's what it's supposed to be about. But in the drivel I read, there wasn't much point to anything that happened. Poof! She's there! Ta-da! She beats everyone at everything and everyone adores her! Snore! I've lost my interest...
Arsenio: Well true, but that was just the first chapter. Fuu actually moves on to save Portgas D. Ace in the second chapter. The story then has their 'romance' as a subplot while they travel to different worlds. Like Narnia and the world of Duck Tales.
Boq: ... I think... you just blew my mind.
Arsenio: Well, actually I do have to give the fiction a little props on part of it. Apparently Fuu is supposed to be a 'paradox hunter'. She's going from world to world to fix paradoxes caused by her interference in the One Piece world. It's different for a fiction with One Piece, and it has potential for becoming an interesting plot. It's just that it could use improvement and a bit more focus.
Boq: It sounds like a bad shoujo manga, though. Sure, you can get creative with these sorts of things, but crossing One Piece with a plot like Kingdom Hearts takes a lot of effort to make work. And I got this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that this just did not work at all. And Narnia!? Oh! Poor Narnia!
Arsenio: Well I give props to the idea, I just think the execution could be done better. Part of the problem is that there is too much dialogue and not really enough description. We're not given a lot of description of the scenes or substance. Also the use of the sound effects could really be toned down. The use of sound effects can actually be useful if timed properly. Say if you want to bring attention to something or to bring a sense of surprise.
Boq: I'm just annoyed with the entire idea, really. And that writing is atrocious. There's no excuse for it to be that bad at all. TILT? What is that even supposed to represent? Are they tilting their heads? Is the ship tipping over? I have no idea to what's going on here!
Arsenio: *smacks Boq* Then lets move on to the OCs, shall we? We have Fuu and Clow, Shoujo manga fan and a One Piece fanatic.
Boq: If that 'Clow' *cough* Card Captor Sakura *cough* is truly a fanatic of One Piece, then why would he allow his precious cannon to be mutilated like this?
Arsenio: I... have no idea. Anyway, apparently he has a devil fruit known as the 'Kari Kari no Mi'. He can peer into the One Piece world with mirrors, can interfere with stuff, and change things.
Boq: Wait... if these are people from the normal world then why on earth would they have devil fruit powers? How does it effect them? Shouldn't different rules apply to them since they aren't of this fantasy world? Where do they bloody get these powers!?
Arsenio: Clow just gets it. He gives Fuu her devil fruit, the 'Hoshi Hoshi no mi'. Or in good old English, the 'Wish Wish fruit'.
Boq: *singing in the tune of When You Wish Upon a Star* When you wish upon a fruit~ Boq will give you a nice boot~ up the backside and out the door~ god I hate you~
Arsenio: *dressed as the blue fairy* I feel so pretty...
Boq: ... Take that off. You're scaring the children.
Arsenio: *flutters off, as he passes and people get a peek up his skirt blood goes gushing out of people's eye sockets*
Boq: Oh dear lord. Why do I put up with you?
Arsenio: Because I'm a sexy bitch. *smacks his skirt wearing ass*
Boq: And as we go right back on topic... let's talk about the personalities of these 'original characters'.
Arsenio: Ah, this is a big one; I mean no sarcasm when I say that these two come across as 'flat'. Part of it is because we are not given much background on them at all. Like I said earlier we are tossed into the plot at an odd point. I can't say that I'm all that invested in the characters at all. That's a pretty big problem because they are a big focus of the story.
Boq: So we know next to nothing about Clow and Fuu. Nothing about their backgrounds. Nothing about how they get their godlike powers and they have next to no personality. This is... irritating. At least for the intelligent reader. As for what I have seen of Fuu in the bits I've read... she seems to be a little—now excuse my language—bitchy.
Arsenio: I suppose, she seems modeled after the concept of a shoujo female character. She has an ability where she can shock 'perverts' kind of like a pikachu.
Boq: Now that's no fun. And what does she exactly describe as a 'pervert'? I mean... this is a story that takes place in a Japanese manga. The standards for perversion should be set pretty high. At least I think so. This is a country that has no problem giving a woman a full-frontal in a children's show.
Arsenio: *grabs Boq's head and shoves it into the papers* See for your self.
Boq: NO! I WANT TO KEEP MY IQ!!!
Arsenio: REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAD IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!!!!!!! People like Sanji and Ace are considered perverts.
Boq: Whaa...? We know absolutely nothing about Ace's attraction to the female of the species! If I recall correctly, Ace didn't even show any hint of attraction towards Boa Hancock. So if he doesn't go crazy for someone that's supposedly the most beautiful woman in this franchise, why would anyone get the notion that he's a playboy? And as for Sanji... he's a horny bastard, but he doesn't go around grabbing bums. Again, if I remember right, he's a chivalrous gentleman most of the time.
Arsenio: Well, that brings me to the next part of the review, the cannon characters.
Boq: Oh god... it gets worse?
Arsenio: Well, in my opinion it does. Now I'm normally fine with writers taking some liberties with cannon characters. Do not get me wrong on that. But this is one of those cases where I seriously think that it can be done better if the effort was put into it.
Boq: Looking through this story I would say all cannon characters have become a little... warped.
Arsenio: ...Luffy knows about girls?????
Boq: My thoughts exactly. And why, whether it was a gift to say his thanks or not, would Ace hand over a piece of his Vivre Card? No! I actually don't care if it was a way to show thanks. He really would not do that for someone he knows next to nothing about. Would you give a piece of paper that represents your very life to a complete stranger!?
Arsenio: *still trying to wrap his head around Luffy knowing about the opposite sex* I know he's paired with Nami, but still...Explain a little!
Boq: I honestly haven't the slightest clue where to begin. You've read more of this than I have.
Arsenio: Well, that is a huge problem, actually. The pacing of the story is pretty bad; I have a hard time remembering what's going on and who does what. There's so much dialogue and thought going on all at once that it's actually hard to get a sense of the characters. Sometimes the personalities seem to crash into each other. At others they seem to take a more 'shoujo' kind of feel. It's a little hard to explain. But I think there needs to be more of a chance to breathe...
Boq: That's the exact sense I got. Everything just goes on and on and on with really no chance to take in what's happening. It's rather confusing. And the paragraph after paragraph of thought is really irritating as well. I know we should be talking about the portrayal of the characters but it all comes back to the writing. It's bad. I mean... it's extremely bad.
Arsenio: In all seriousness though it can be improved. With all joking aside it does have potential of being a much better story. In later chapters it does improve a bit over time, but it would be a good idea to look back on earlier chapters and improve them.
Boq: This is where I have to disagree. I have this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that this entire plot has been done in something else. I just can't put my finger on it. My cousin is saying it sounds like something called Tsubasa. And as I said before, this 'Fuu' sounds like a lot of CLAMP characters all mashed together in one big mess. It's one thing to be inspired by your favorite anime, movie or book - it's a completely different thing to put all creativity aside and stealing the ideas off well-established cannons.
Arsenio: Touché, but it does seem to be a crossover fiction too. Though it might be a good idea to express that a little more.
Boq: In all honesty, all I can see is a mess. A big, sloppily put together mess. Being a crossover gives it absolutely no excuse.
Arsenio: Well then what suggestions do you have?
Boq: Delete what you have, buy a few lovely books on how to write properly, get a better grip on the English language and do it again. And actually do a little research on your desired cannon before getting keyboard-happy. This will certainly work in your favor.
Arsenio: Ouch, as subtle as ever. Well, I'll take this opportunity to disagree; I don't think one would have to go that extreme. I'll stand by my comment of going back and improving the story. But that is just my view point.
Boq: Well everyone has the right to their own opinions. But as a wise man once said: all good writers rewrite. Sure, it can be improved, but you have to go over the writing, the pacing and the characters. Basically everything. I will give them a little creative freedom when it comes to playing with cannon characters, but that is pretty much it.
Arsenio: *shrugs* Fair enough. Well folks that is our opinion. We'd love to hear yours. Agree? Disagree? Tell us what you think.
Boq: And remember that we do not respond kindly to insults. Bring up a mature and reasonable argument and we will be civil.
Arsenio: *flutters around in the background in the blue fairy outfit again* When you wish upon a fruit~!
Boq: *sighs* And there is my nightmares for the next week...
Arsenio: Ta-ta darlings! *flies off into the sunset*
Boq: *takes out giant fly swatter* Until next time.
Boq: Alright. So I am told that Arsenio has something 'special' that he wants to review with me. *cracks knuckles* Let's get this over with—*looks over to see Arsenio laying on the floor, foaming at the mouth and what seems to be smoke coming out of his ears* Oh... dear...
Arsenio: Blarglelargle...*twitches* Go on...with...out me...*goes limp*
Boq: Arsenio! No! Stay with me! *pulls a lifeless Aresnio into his arms*
Arsenio: Bleeeeeh...*looks like an absolute mess*
Boq: No! I shall give you the kiss of life! *puckers up and moves in*
*BOP!*
Arsenio: *punched Boq in the face* I liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiive!
Boq: Oh, you sod!
Arsenio: You didn't think it'd be that easy, did you? *eyes narrow suspiciously*
Boq: You know you're secretly gay for me. It's only a matter of time before you realize it. *clears throat* Anyways, what on earth brought on a reaction like that? Did you read Twilight again?
Arsenio: Good heavens, no! I read something possibly more annoying though.
Boq: ... House of Night?
Arsenio: *on the floor, curled up into a little ball* ............................
Boq: Good lord, man! You know how dangerous teen literature is! Why on earth would you read something like that!?
Arsenio: *sighs* Okay, okay, enough joking. *sits up* It's a bit hard to explain if you haven't read it yourself. It's actually a fan fiction. *points to a few tall stacks of paper*
Boq: *stares at the waste of paper* A fan fiction? Do you realize how many trees you've possibly killed by printing all of that out?
Arsenio: You know me; I don't believe all that global warming crap. Anyway! To the task at hand! It's called Memoirs of an OC, Outsider Character, a fic of the One Piece variety. Go on! Go take a look for yourself.
Boq: Oh, alright. I suppose I must to give a fair review. *reads first few lines* ... I think my brain just died.
Arsenio: *grabs Boq by the back of the head, shoves his face into the papers* Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeead iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!
*Hours Later*
Boq: *curled up in a fetal position* No more! Please! No more!
Arsenio: Oh come on, you child! Be a man! You were only halfway through chapter two!
Boq: It's too long!
Arsenio: Okay, okay, I think I'll just have to explain to you as much as I can without having your head explode. *clears throat* Memoirs of an OC, Outsider Character is a 'self insert fan fiction' about a girl from the real world being sent into One Piece by her older brother.
Boq: I see. You've told me about this story before. Didn't you review it?
Arsenio: Yes, I did actually, and from what I heard, the response I got was rather...'critical'.
Boq: Just what did they say?
Arsenio: Apparently I'm an arrogant bastard.
Boq: Describes you perfectly.
Arsenio: My thoughts exactly, anyway, enough banter we have a review to do!
Boq: Le gasp! You're actually being serious for once?
Arsenio: *shoves a muffin in Boq's mouth* Anyway, as I was saying, the plot is girl from the real world is sent to the world of One Piece by her brother. How you may ask? Well, we aren't really told just how.
Boq: Well that's not at all helpful...
Arsenio: Exactly, and that brings me to the issues I brought up in my original review. The story itself pretty much just jumps in without giving an introduction. We are imediately introduced to a young man named 'Clow', a fan of One Piece and a fan fiction writer. The story starts with him wanting his sister 'Fuu' to proofread a chapter of his fan fiction. She makes it clear that she is not a fan of One Piece and somehow this goes into her accidently insulting the characters and Clow suddenly starts writing Fuu into his fan fiction. Then poof! She's there...and literally that's it...she's just there. You saw it yourself, right?
Boq: I saw it, but I didn't quite get it. There's certainly a whole lot of... words. It's like that line between what we need to know and what the author—and I do use that term lightly with this—wants us to know has been crossed, spat on, and then had a nuclear bomb dropped on it.
Arsenio: You say things so eloquently. I swear it's like poetry.
Boq: It is my honest opinion. There's no real direction to the first chapter; it goes from a very bland conversation between two people with names stolen from a CLAMP manga and then leads into the eventual rape of a cannon that even I know about.
Arsenio: You could be the next Shakespeare—in ass-ness. Anyway, that is a pretty good summary none the less. Getting back on track, here were the main issues I had with the fiction: the use of complicated words, the plot, the OCs and—of course—the portrayal of the cannon characters.
Boq: So basically the entire story?
Arsenio: ...More or less. But anyway, let's focus on the first point, the use of the over complicated words. This is an issue because as a reader, they really stuck out to me. It came across as unneeded and to be honest a little annoying. This is the problem with the overuse of more advanced vocabulary; people may think that it makes them sound more professional. Instead it can backfire horribly.
Boq: Like this…
Clow couldn't even articulate a riposte, way too shocked by the heartless description of his heroes.
Boq: And that is in the very first chapter—right after an extremely long author's note and a Japanese dictionary, but we'll get to that later. I get what the writer is trying to say, but why not just say that Clow couldn't find the words to retort? I'm not impressed. Amateur writers use this trick all the time. They feel that picking out the biggest word in their thesaurus may make them sound smart—though it has more of a habit of turning around and biting the author in the bum. Just because a word may be listed as a synonym, it does not mean they have exactly the same meaning. You can make a rather embarrassing mistake of using a word completely off the desired effect you wanted.
Arsenio: Exactly. This can be a turn off to readers. This point was actually one of the things people griped about in my original review.
"Besides, even if some terms are old-fashioned I know countless people who prefer that to repetitive teenage writing style with no more than two words of vocabulary."
Boq: I will have whoever wrote that know that most people say that 'simple is best'. You're not just writing for yourself. You have an audience and they may not have the same vocabulary as you. Just because the 'teen writing' style is a bit too simple with all the repetitive plotlines and horrid story telling, does not mean it's all horrible. And a little off topic; do these people read things other than Twilight and all that other rubbish? Read an adult novel and you will see that they don't exactly use big words either. The whole fancy words and purple prose thing IS teen writing.
Arsenio: Hmm, yes, quite right. Well said. In the end though, being that the author of the fiction is not a native speaker of English, it might actually be more beneficial to the author because it'd be easier to describe what they are trying to say.
Boq: I honestly don't care whether someone's native tongue is English or not. If you're going to write in a language that is not your own, you better do it right. *bangs head on desk* It's like listening to those little anime fan girls run around abusing the poor Japanese language. You feel insulted for those who actually speak it.
Arsenio: *shrugs* What can you do? Anyway, I think that's enough on the use of vocabulary, I think I see your eyes are starting to bleed. So time to move on to the plot.
Boq: ... There was a plot?
Arsenio: *facepalm* Girl sent to One Piece world by her older brother. Remember?
Boq: Well that's what it's supposed to be about. But in the drivel I read, there wasn't much point to anything that happened. Poof! She's there! Ta-da! She beats everyone at everything and everyone adores her! Snore! I've lost my interest...
Arsenio: Well true, but that was just the first chapter. Fuu actually moves on to save Portgas D. Ace in the second chapter. The story then has their 'romance' as a subplot while they travel to different worlds. Like Narnia and the world of Duck Tales.
Boq: ... I think... you just blew my mind.
Arsenio: Well, actually I do have to give the fiction a little props on part of it. Apparently Fuu is supposed to be a 'paradox hunter'. She's going from world to world to fix paradoxes caused by her interference in the One Piece world. It's different for a fiction with One Piece, and it has potential for becoming an interesting plot. It's just that it could use improvement and a bit more focus.
Boq: It sounds like a bad shoujo manga, though. Sure, you can get creative with these sorts of things, but crossing One Piece with a plot like Kingdom Hearts takes a lot of effort to make work. And I got this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that this just did not work at all. And Narnia!? Oh! Poor Narnia!
Arsenio: Well I give props to the idea, I just think the execution could be done better. Part of the problem is that there is too much dialogue and not really enough description. We're not given a lot of description of the scenes or substance. Also the use of the sound effects could really be toned down. The use of sound effects can actually be useful if timed properly. Say if you want to bring attention to something or to bring a sense of surprise.
"Humph! You just have to take his navigator in hostage and he's not worth anything anymore! In the end, he's just a brat with an elastic body and no guts!" despised the Commander.
TILT!
"And this girl doesn't even fight back! She only knows how to move her magic wand, I wonder how she managed to get a bounty on her head!" laughed the Commander.
TILT!
"Humph… This crew is infamous but it's just a bunch of good-for-nothing. There are two girls we didn't have much trouble to make faint, a strange plush-toy completely useless and a guy who is awfully weak at close quarters combat…" enumerated the Commander with a quick glance for the prisoners.
TILT…TILT…TILT !
Boq: I'm just annoyed with the entire idea, really. And that writing is atrocious. There's no excuse for it to be that bad at all. TILT? What is that even supposed to represent? Are they tilting their heads? Is the ship tipping over? I have no idea to what's going on here!
Arsenio: *smacks Boq* Then lets move on to the OCs, shall we? We have Fuu and Clow, Shoujo manga fan and a One Piece fanatic.
Boq: If that 'Clow' *cough* Card Captor Sakura *cough* is truly a fanatic of One Piece, then why would he allow his precious cannon to be mutilated like this?
Arsenio: I... have no idea. Anyway, apparently he has a devil fruit known as the 'Kari Kari no Mi'. He can peer into the One Piece world with mirrors, can interfere with stuff, and change things.
Boq: Wait... if these are people from the normal world then why on earth would they have devil fruit powers? How does it effect them? Shouldn't different rules apply to them since they aren't of this fantasy world? Where do they bloody get these powers!?
Arsenio: Clow just gets it. He gives Fuu her devil fruit, the 'Hoshi Hoshi no mi'. Or in good old English, the 'Wish Wish fruit'.
Boq: *singing in the tune of When You Wish Upon a Star* When you wish upon a fruit~ Boq will give you a nice boot~ up the backside and out the door~ god I hate you~
Arsenio: *dressed as the blue fairy* I feel so pretty...
Boq: ... Take that off. You're scaring the children.
Arsenio: *flutters off, as he passes and people get a peek up his skirt blood goes gushing out of people's eye sockets*
Boq: Oh dear lord. Why do I put up with you?
Arsenio: Because I'm a sexy bitch. *smacks his skirt wearing ass*
Boq: And as we go right back on topic... let's talk about the personalities of these 'original characters'.
Arsenio: Ah, this is a big one; I mean no sarcasm when I say that these two come across as 'flat'. Part of it is because we are not given much background on them at all. Like I said earlier we are tossed into the plot at an odd point. I can't say that I'm all that invested in the characters at all. That's a pretty big problem because they are a big focus of the story.
Boq: So we know next to nothing about Clow and Fuu. Nothing about their backgrounds. Nothing about how they get their godlike powers and they have next to no personality. This is... irritating. At least for the intelligent reader. As for what I have seen of Fuu in the bits I've read... she seems to be a little—now excuse my language—bitchy.
Arsenio: I suppose, she seems modeled after the concept of a shoujo female character. She has an ability where she can shock 'perverts' kind of like a pikachu.
Boq: Now that's no fun. And what does she exactly describe as a 'pervert'? I mean... this is a story that takes place in a Japanese manga. The standards for perversion should be set pretty high. At least I think so. This is a country that has no problem giving a woman a full-frontal in a children's show.
Arsenio: *grabs Boq's head and shoves it into the papers* See for your self.
Boq: NO! I WANT TO KEEP MY IQ!!!
Arsenio: REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAD IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!!!!!!! People like Sanji and Ace are considered perverts.
Boq: Whaa...? We know absolutely nothing about Ace's attraction to the female of the species! If I recall correctly, Ace didn't even show any hint of attraction towards Boa Hancock. So if he doesn't go crazy for someone that's supposedly the most beautiful woman in this franchise, why would anyone get the notion that he's a playboy? And as for Sanji... he's a horny bastard, but he doesn't go around grabbing bums. Again, if I remember right, he's a chivalrous gentleman most of the time.
Arsenio: Well, that brings me to the next part of the review, the cannon characters.
Boq: Oh god... it gets worse?
Arsenio: Well, in my opinion it does. Now I'm normally fine with writers taking some liberties with cannon characters. Do not get me wrong on that. But this is one of those cases where I seriously think that it can be done better if the effort was put into it.
Boq: Looking through this story I would say all cannon characters have become a little... warped.
"Hotarubi." said Ace while lighting up a single bubble of green-white fire between his fingers, inside which the sand started melting.
From the molten sand, he blew a small pear-shaped glass pearl, trapping the fireproof roll of his Vivre Card inside it. Then he once again took Fuu's right hand and delicately tied up the pearl to her leather bracelet.
TILT. Fuu lifted the bracelet at the level of her eyes, quite puzzled. The new translucent pendant was now floating of a few centimetres, pointing in the direction of Ace, lifted up by the power of the Vivre Card.
At seeing her graciously arch an eyebrow of perplexity, Ace seemed momentarily struck with realisation and felt himself obliged to say something.
"A thank you gift." stated he in a casual tone, but with a confused smile quite difficult to interpret.
"Th… thank… you!" uttered Fuu with difficulty, both surprised and somehow embarrassed.
"Oh, Ace, so you do know that girls like jewels?" whistled Luffy with admiration, thinking: Wow, Ace is really smart, as expected!
Arsenio: ...Luffy knows about girls?????
Boq: My thoughts exactly. And why, whether it was a gift to say his thanks or not, would Ace hand over a piece of his Vivre Card? No! I actually don't care if it was a way to show thanks. He really would not do that for someone he knows next to nothing about. Would you give a piece of paper that represents your very life to a complete stranger!?
Arsenio: *still trying to wrap his head around Luffy knowing about the opposite sex* I know he's paired with Nami, but still...Explain a little!
Boq: I honestly haven't the slightest clue where to begin. You've read more of this than I have.
Arsenio: Well, that is a huge problem, actually. The pacing of the story is pretty bad; I have a hard time remembering what's going on and who does what. There's so much dialogue and thought going on all at once that it's actually hard to get a sense of the characters. Sometimes the personalities seem to crash into each other. At others they seem to take a more 'shoujo' kind of feel. It's a little hard to explain. But I think there needs to be more of a chance to breathe...
Boq: That's the exact sense I got. Everything just goes on and on and on with really no chance to take in what's happening. It's rather confusing. And the paragraph after paragraph of thought is really irritating as well. I know we should be talking about the portrayal of the characters but it all comes back to the writing. It's bad. I mean... it's extremely bad.
Arsenio: In all seriousness though it can be improved. With all joking aside it does have potential of being a much better story. In later chapters it does improve a bit over time, but it would be a good idea to look back on earlier chapters and improve them.
Boq: This is where I have to disagree. I have this nagging feeling in the back of my mind that this entire plot has been done in something else. I just can't put my finger on it. My cousin is saying it sounds like something called Tsubasa. And as I said before, this 'Fuu' sounds like a lot of CLAMP characters all mashed together in one big mess. It's one thing to be inspired by your favorite anime, movie or book - it's a completely different thing to put all creativity aside and stealing the ideas off well-established cannons.
Arsenio: Touché, but it does seem to be a crossover fiction too. Though it might be a good idea to express that a little more.
Boq: In all honesty, all I can see is a mess. A big, sloppily put together mess. Being a crossover gives it absolutely no excuse.
Arsenio: Well then what suggestions do you have?
Boq: Delete what you have, buy a few lovely books on how to write properly, get a better grip on the English language and do it again. And actually do a little research on your desired cannon before getting keyboard-happy. This will certainly work in your favor.
Arsenio: Ouch, as subtle as ever. Well, I'll take this opportunity to disagree; I don't think one would have to go that extreme. I'll stand by my comment of going back and improving the story. But that is just my view point.
Boq: Well everyone has the right to their own opinions. But as a wise man once said: all good writers rewrite. Sure, it can be improved, but you have to go over the writing, the pacing and the characters. Basically everything. I will give them a little creative freedom when it comes to playing with cannon characters, but that is pretty much it.
Arsenio: *shrugs* Fair enough. Well folks that is our opinion. We'd love to hear yours. Agree? Disagree? Tell us what you think.
Boq: And remember that we do not respond kindly to insults. Bring up a mature and reasonable argument and we will be civil.
Arsenio: *flutters around in the background in the blue fairy outfit again* When you wish upon a fruit~!
Boq: *sighs* And there is my nightmares for the next week...
Arsenio: Ta-ta darlings! *flies off into the sunset*
Boq: *takes out giant fly swatter* Until next time.
Boq Rates: 
Arsenio Rates:
Fan fiction can be found here: [link]
All original characters belong to their rightful owner while One Piece rights go to Mister Eiichiro Oda and Toei Animation, I believe. Other copyrighted material mention also belong to their respectable owners. All we take credit for is this little rant/review and, of course, our own opinions.
Review was typed out on skype by Arsenio and Boq then later copied, pasted and edited on Word by Boq. Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed. ^__^
Arsenio Rates:
Fan fiction can be found here: [link]
All original characters belong to their rightful owner while One Piece rights go to Mister Eiichiro Oda and Toei Animation, I believe. Other copyrighted material mention also belong to their respectable owners. All we take credit for is this little rant/review and, of course, our own opinions.
Review was typed out on skype by Arsenio and Boq then later copied, pasted and edited on Word by Boq. Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed. ^__^
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