20231203 - Mandamon - Dotch Masher and the planet 'MM' - 4776 words, (S,V)

[Mandamon he/him]

Hi Folks!

This is a very silly story I'm going to submit to an anthology before Dec 17, so feedback before then will be appreciated!

Let me know of any comments you have, and bonus points if you guess what it's an homage to!

[Silk she/her]

On 12/4/2023 at 5:27 AM, Mandamon said:

and bonus points if you guess what it's an homage to!

ooh, I know! Pick me!

...oh, all right. I'll take myself out of the running. Comments:

I think all you changed with the introductory bit was a paragraph bit or two, but it worked. The introductory bit is much clearer now.

I forgot to mention this in my first read, but... the hair cream. I'm supposed to be thinking of whales, right? Because I'm thinking of whales.

Hmm. It's still a little ambiguous to me during Doctor T's introduction whether D knows M, knows him by reputation, or doesn't know him at all and is just humouring Dr T.

p3 "Huh. Must have still been on." LOL. So I actually interpreted this as Tw still answering the comm for D

"...due to my gigantic intellect." Picky, but "due to" as in "caused by" seems odd here. "Thanks to"?

"He'd never seen M in person before." Ah, there we go. By reputation, then.

p4 "'You will never defeat me,' M preened" hah. I love it.

p5 "D ran his hand over the controls for the..." why is he just now playing with the controls if he already disabled the projector? I would assume from this that M had already bypassed the controls with his gigantic intellect.

HAH. Thank you for that last line.

These edits work well! The addition of the golf courses to Dr T's dialogue works well, but if anything I think there could be one more tiny reference in that conversation that hints at M becoming a more sympathetic character. Reference to some of M's people also disagreeing with golf courses, or being refugees (even without explanation), or something to that effect. I think it can (and probably should) be very small. Just that tiny bit more to get us ready for the change of sympathies at the end.

That's all from me!

Edited December 6, 2023 by Silk

[Mandamon he/him]

11 hours ago, Silk said:

I forgot to mention this in my first read, but... the hair cream. I'm supposed to be thinking of whales, right? Because I'm thinking of whales.

Yes. I was trying to come up with something to rhyme with "bryl creme" and that popped into my head.

11 hours ago, Silk said:

p3 "Huh. Must have still been on." LOL. So I actually interpreted this as Tw still answering the comm for D

I meant that M patched through regardless, but either works.

11 hours ago, Silk said:

p5 "D ran his hand over the controls for the..." why is he just now playing with the controls if he already disabled the projector? I would assume from this that M had already bypassed the controls with his gigantic intellect.

Added a sentence.

11 hours ago, Silk said:

These edits work well! The addition of the golf courses to Dr T's dialogue works well, but if anything I think there could be one more tiny reference in that conversation that hints at M becoming a more sympathetic character. Reference to some of M's people also disagreeing with golf courses, or being refugees (even without explanation), or something to that effect. I think it can (and probably should) be very small. Just that tiny bit more to get us ready for the change of sympathies at the end.

Good idea. Added one sentence there and one near the end. Yes, I think it works better.

Thanks!

[Appol PhD they/he]

It’s nice to be able to critique something of yours again!

Overall: I think I’m very much not the target audience for this kind of thing, which probably comes through in my LBLs. I enjoyed the later parts (from page 8 onward) while wanting the story to lean into being more over the top silly earlier on. Specifically, I think the dynamics with D and T and especially D and M have the potential to be played up more—getting a clearer sense of the enemies to lovers with D and M could give me the investment I was missing earlier in the story. Their interest in each other was obvious in retrospect but I didn’t get it as the story was progressing since everything was over the top, and I think being very stark about their interest in each other could add to the silly tone with T being a good straightman to balance them out.

Thanks for sharing! It’s nice to not be the only one submitting haha.

As I go:

Pg 1. I think for the lighthearted dialogue to land for me here I need more of a traditional character hook. Right now I can identify the dialogue as well-written but I don’t have a reason to be invested/entertained by the interactions.

Pg 2. Okay ASSMUNCH got a snort laugh out of me

-As someone who isn’t super versed in pop culture and doesn’t know what this is a homage to, I wonder if these moments could be even more over the top and absurdist. Right now if I stumbled in blind I think I’d just take everything at face value and lose interest

Pg 4. The interactions between D and T are more entertaining now that I get a better idea that T is the one actually making everything happen.

-I still wonder if there’s more room for more detailed descriptions to make some of the humor elements—like the missile buttons—stand out more

Pg 6. At this point the spaceship maneuvering is starting to feel a bit samey with what happened the last few pages

Pg 8. This is a good change of pace. I’d say this is the first place I’m pretty thoroughly entertained  

Pg 9. The displacement/refugee thing feels a bit serious for the tone (though again I’m reading this as someone without the cultural context for this kind of narrative). I’d expect something more like the T is using it for some over the top silly cartoon villain kind of thing

-I mentioned wanting some things played up earlier and I think the romantic/sexual tension between D and M could be one of those since I didn’t get a great feel for it before now

[Mandamon he/him]

Thanks @Ace of Hearts!

Great comments. Yes, I think you might not be the target audience especially if you haven't seen the thing this is parodying (hint, it's here).

1 hour ago, Ace of Hearts said:

Pg 4. The interactions between D and T are more entertaining now that I get a better idea that T is the one actually making everything happen.

Glad this came through!

1 hour ago, Ace of Hearts said:

Pg 9. The displacement/refugee thing feels a bit serious for the tone (though again I’m reading this as someone without the cultural context for this kind of narrative). I’d expect something more like the T is using it for some over the top silly cartoon villain kind of thing

I wanted to have a little more context to the "why" here since the original short is very light on motivation (or reasoning in general).

1 hour ago, Ace of Hearts said:

-I mentioned wanting some things played up earlier and I think the romantic/sexual tension between D and M could be one of those since I didn’t get a great feel for it before now

Did you not see anything until after page 8, or is this including the innuendo through the rest of the story?

[Appol PhD they/he]

35 minutes ago, Mandamon said:

Did you not see anything until after page 8, or is this including the innuendo through the rest of the story?

Including the innuendos. There were enough scattered throughout that I didn't get that the ones directed at each other really meant anything

[Mandamon he/him]

2 hours ago, Ace of Hearts said:

Including the innuendos. There were enough scattered throughout that I didn't get that the ones directed at each other really meant anything

Got it. Thanks!

[Cathy Lim]

This is a fun reversal- ha ha! Oh boy- the double entendre, innuendo is off the charts here and I feel like I'm missing half of it despite the fact that I regularly read and edit my brother's gay erotica.  Fun story though I must have been super tired or something for my first read through because it wasn't flowing into my brain well, but I read it through a second time and it's much better now. Just a few notes-

Page 1- Tw his faithful assistant. The first time I read this I kept reading it as Tweeky- as in the Buck Rogers TV show mini robot Tweeky. Oh boy, I'm old.

"Never a wrinkle, and it shows" Shortly after that you have a showing. Not sure if you're wanted to eco that twice. I know in some spots it's clearly on purpose, but I also tend to get stuck on one word and reuse it for a whole page. I often catch it in edit, but not always. It's just something that jumps out at me because of my academic writing training. 

Page 2- "T peered at the back of the display, frowning at the rear of Doctor T's head." This visual was awkward for me to place.

Page 5- "M called, swimming through slices of blue pepperoni" My first read through of this I thought the asteroids had turned into pepperoni. Now I can see it was his background on the screen. With the phasing asteroids and changing communication screen my brain got confused. 

Page 8- "resist d-rays at close range.’” I love the mention of the fine print at the beginning and now emphasized at the end. Stupid 'resistant" fine print! 

There's really not much to say- great story! It was cute! 

[Mandamon he/him]

16 hours ago, Cathy Lim said:

the double entendre, innuendo is off the charts here and I feel like I'm missing half of it despite the fact that I regularly read and edit my brother's gay erotica. 

Awesome. That's what I hoped for!

16 hours ago, Cathy Lim said:

"Never a wrinkle, and it shows" Shortly after that you have a showing. Not sure if you're wanted to eco that twice.

Ah, thanks. I'll change that.

Great comments!

 

Edited December 10, 2023 by Mandamon

[Mandamon he/him]

16 hours ago, Cathy Lim said:

Page 1- Tw his faithful assistant. The first time I read this I kept reading it as Tweeky- as in the Buck Rogers TV show mini robot Tweeky. Oh boy, I'm old.

Oh yes, I actually looked this up when I came up with the names!