Friday, November 25, 2011

Doctor Who: The Immortals (Update Part 4)

[Crossover] [Sci-Fi]


Author: Lennora

Description: The Doctor returns to Equestria after helping imprison Nightmare Moon and disappearing for one thousand years. Of course, where the Doctor goes, danger and adventure follow. This time he's dragging the newly-returned Princess Luna around with him as they investigate a series of disturbances in the Equestrian city of Fillydelphia.


Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4


Additional Tags: Adventure, Aliens, Luna, Doctor, Nightmare

11 comments:

  1. May I suggest that you open your fic to be read by the public? Nopony can access it and provide feedback unless you do. Up above the text pane, there is a link that for you probably says "Private Only to Me." Click on it, and change the viewing permission to public. Thanks.

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  2. Really sorry. Kind of new to posting on google docs. It should be set to public now.

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  3. No problem. Now that I've read it, I must say I'm enjoying it thus far, even if it's only really an exposition at this point. The dialogue flows very smoothly between Celestia and the Doctor. The descriptions too are nice.

    One thing to work on would probably be transitions from one scene to the other. I found that one second, you were describing the chamber, and then the next, the TARDIS materialized. If it works, it works though. You don't need to change anything you don't want to.

    Also, this is just my formatting OCD talking, but in the title, the text "By: Lennora" isn't centered. I think it would be a good idea to fix that up a bit. I'm also a tad bit confused as to the placement of the title. It doesn't really make sense.

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  4. Thank you so much for the review, I needed it.

    I'm glad I'm making the dialogue come out well, I didn't think I would be able to capture the Doctor's or Celestia's character well enough for them to talk to each other.

    As for the scene changes, I think I need to work on that as well, just overall I think it could move a little more efficiently. The TARDIS' materialization is okay with me, though. For the longest time I was worried the TARDIS appearing was just too sudden, but I settled on the fact that the TARDIS is usually a sudden change to any scene as it is.

    I fixed up the formatting error, so that should look better. The title is where it is because I'm trying to emulate Doctor Who where there's a small bit before the opening sequence. I'll leave it there for now, and hopefully it will make a little more sense and look better over time. If it doesn't I'll just move it up to the top.

    Thanks again for the feedback, this should help the second chapter look a little better.

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  5. Part 2 is good as well. The dialogue is flowing well, and the plot is about to jump right in, as far as I can tell. I can't wait for more of this story. It's great so far.

    There were a few technical mistakes. You forgot a period after "even with a throbbing migraine." Also, you mistakenly capitalized the S in "Said a bewildered Luna."

    Might I also recommend that you format the letter so that it's on the same page, because now, it is all on the same page, except for the very last line. I'm not sure how much you can do about that, but it would look nicer if it were all in one piece.

    Also, the fact that the narration focus seemed to shift from Celestia in Part I to Luna in Part II seems a bit confusing, as the mode of narration seems to be third person limited, but there isn't really a shift to indicate the change in subject. You really don't need to change anything here though, it works if you want to keep it.

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  6. Thanks for the attention to detail, I fixed both the technical errors and the letter spacing.

    I was hoping to make the transition between Celestia and Luna more fluid. Could you elaborate on the confusion of the narration shift, please?

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  7. Elaborate? Well the fact is, you're using third person subjective (you convey thoughts, feelings, and opinions), but there's nothing holding you to third person limited. You can shift between characters. It's just not very common. I think if you keep the POV constant throughout each chapter, you'll be fine.

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  8. Alright, I think I understand now. That was purely unintentional. I was just keeping the narration on the character I felt it to be appropriate for that chapter. I suppose putting in actual scene breaks in between character shifts, if there are any, might lessen the confusion.

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  9. Part 1

    Plot:
    I am quite intrigued already. Not much more to say since this chapter was primarily setup and exposition, good exposition at that.

    Characterization:
    I greatly enjoy the interaction between the Doctor and Celestia. They both seem very much in character and played off each other well.

    Prose:
    One thing I think you have to work on here—excessive descriptions. Though detail is excellent, one can over-do it. I think a lot of your descriptors could be condensed. A primary example would be the first few paragraphs. The reader doesn’t need to know the size of the room down to the feet measurements. It bogs down the progression and makes it harder to get sucked into the story.

    Grammar:
    There were one or two errant words but nothing major at all.

    Part 2

    Plot:
    Doctor Whooves and Luna off to solve a mystery, eh? That could be all sorts of interesting. My stamp of approval, you have it.

    Characterization:
    Depressed-But-Seeking-Repentance Luna and Doctor Whooves seem to go well together. I can see that developing into an interesting dynamic.

    Though I like how you had a quick shift to the guards outside Luna’s chambers, it was rather sudden. As Enigma stated if you’re going for third-person limited it’s jarring to switch without any set transition. If you want to switch perspective in the middle of the chapter I would suggest you do so with line breaks and more importantly—provide a good reason. When a reader goes through a chapter in third-person limited they get accustomed to the view they’re put inside. They get comfortable. In order to make them not mind being overturned from their cushiony chair you need to provide them a quick-latching purpose for the switch, something that adds to the story in a way that sticking with the previous character could not. So though switching to the guards was an amusing snippet, it could have used more meat.

    Keep in mind it wasn’t some drastic faux-pas, just informing you for future-reference.

    (Did I mention that Phalanx and Buckler are awesome guard names?)

    Prose:
    One again I should point out the sometimes excessive descriptions. Now don’t get me wrong, descriptions are great, and it seems to me that you’re aiming for a more epic style with this story which lends itself to more detail than most, however, the ultimate goal for an author is to keep every word interesting (that’s hyperbole of course, but you catch my meaning). Small blocks of pure description are fine in the right moments, for instance I enjoyed reading how the color scheme for Luna’s room was darker than Celestia, it made sense and was a “oh, that’s pretty cool” moment. Very large blocks of description, however, tend to make readers gloss over. One way to remedy this is to combine your descriptions with action, therefore moving the plot along while at the same acquainting your readers with the setting and environment.

    Grammar:
    Once again, not many mistakes. One thing, though, when you have line of dialogue followed by a tag expressing who just said it (and how), then the line should end in a comma (unless it’s a question or exclamation) followed by an un-capitalized tag.

    Correct: “I hate pears,” said the Doctor.

    No So Correct: “I hate pears.” Said the Doctor.

    It’s a very common mistake. I made it quite frequently before someone came along and beat me over the head with the grammar stick.

    All in all I very much like this. Doctor Who is such a fun character and many awesome premises can be had by combining him with MLP. This is no exception.

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  10. Hmm you post your 4th chapter around time as I decided to revive my 4th one. Interesting...

    Anyhow. I like this story, mainly brcause I'm 'biased' towards any Doctor Who crossovers. I think your characterization of thr Doctor is great even though it seems that it's still Matt Smith. But that's alright, you're still doing a great job with this. I don't have any grammatical advice or corrections for you except for one. When Doctor talks about his plan of dealing with the parasite you used 'we have to' twice in one sentence.

    Other than that I think it's good.

    I'm just wondering, how will your story fold out? I'm having trouble wording this... Is It going to be a story that can be considered a single episode? Or will this have a feeling of being an entire season of the show? You don't have to tell me if you think that's going to spoil anything, I'm just curious.

    So yeah, great job so far.

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  11. That is some strange timing. Maybe writer's block has a universal timer for some people?

    It's supposed to be Matt Smith's Doctor, yeah. Most crossovers I see with the Doctor usually come out as David Tennant, which is great, he's 'my' Doctor. But I feel like Matt's a great Doctor, also, and I figured he deserved some attention.

    Error fixed, thanks for noticing.

    I don't have enough ideas or skill to span this into a whole season type of deal. I was going for more of a episode feel, whether it's short or long remains to be seen.

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