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Description
“the tiniest snippet from a work in progress. IT’S BAAAAAACK.”
(Looks like its an SDCC exclusive thing)
(Looks like its an SDCC exclusive thing)
Given what we have seen of both pairings of writers - Cook/Price have a better handle at pacing shorter stories (1 or 2 issues) than the longer four-arc ones, while the Nufner/Mebberson pairing have good pacing on the longer side but can’t easily fit all they want into the 2 issue runs.
All of these are - where do you end a single issue with a cliffhanger? The Nightmarity Arc seemed written from the start saying “we need to have them here by the first story, here by the second, and here by the third”, so that the cliffhangers were perfectly natural in the story (Rarity is taken, NMR is revealed, the Mane 5 are captured), using the B story of Luna dealing with her insecurity to fill out pacing. Contrast that to the Queen Chryssy arc , which felt more like that they knew they want to establish Chryssy at the end of the first issue, and have the epic battle set for the start of the fourth, but the journey between was iffy (and at end the of the day, mostly meaningless to the story). Similarly, this Reflections arc felt it had a specific cliffhanger highlight - specifically Sombra/Cele’s common love - but they put that in the mid-point of the story, forcing all the action into the last issue, it would have been better as the cliffhanger to #1 (forgoing the suspense of who was following Cele out of the mirror).
And in contrast, as I mentioned, the Nufner/Mebberson 2 issue stories feel rushed or packed with too many ideas to do justice in 2. The bookworm arc is “wait, hold on, what just happened” half the time and almost needed a 3rd issue to let the reader catch their breath. Same with the pirate arc. Both had a strong cliffhanger point but maybe had a bit too much to write before and after it.
All these are 20/20, armchair critic flaws. They’re still well done stories and for the target market (kids) they aren’t going care that the pacing is that far off, but that’s clearly a pattern going on. I’m sorta glad to see that we only have one and two-issue stories in the lineup for now (between both series). Four issue articles for something like pony just drag too long.
Yeah, the Chrysalis arc ending was… Pretty rushed and convoluted. The only problem with the ending of the Nightmarity arc was the… Pretty short epilogue, but the climax was well paced and executed correctly.
@bingo77
I didn’t mind the ending, though I suppose it was kinda swiftly handled.
Too bad Issue 4 was so terribad of an ending to what had been a good arc… TG the nightmarity arc was great from start to finish.