Another belittling review of Transformer porn
http://anime.adultfanfiction.net/story.php?no=544199264
How Can I Help You? by Phoenix
Aah, Transformer porn. Nothing beats this “genre” for sheer pointlessness. But fear not! This particular tale is an attempt at a “serious” romance story - something quite different than “a scripted romance novel”. Doesn’t that fill you with hope?
Yeah, me neither.
The fic is set in a magical time when the Autobots are no longer waging a battle to destroy the evil forces of the Decepticons, which leaves plenty of time for soapy shenanigans. We join our heroine, Elita One, Optimus Prime’s canon girlfriend and leader of the female Autobots. She and Prime are Cybertron’s new power couple. But all is not well. You see, Elita’s been having problems coming lately, and OH GOD THEY’RE GIANT ROBOTS WHY WOULD ANYONE EVEN WRITE THIS ARGLEBLARGH. Anyway, Elita reads one book - sorry, datapad - about sex problems and decides to skip things like talking to her partner, taking control in bed, or, ahem, getting to know herself, and go straight for the incredibly risky surgery - an implant which makes her totally randy and ensures she has absolutely ska-reeeeeming orgasms. And wears Prime out. But oh! suddenly her web of lies becomes untangled! She starts having dizzy spells! Maybe she’s pregnant! Maybe the implant is backfiring! Sadly we’ll never know, as the author abandoned the story here.
Oh well, most romance fics tend to be short on plot anyway. At least the author kept everyone in character, right?
Right?
Elita One’s list of favourite shops consisted of any shop which had items to sell. She was a very proud shopping addict. [...] She had Optimus Prime’s much-loved and well-used, ‘no limit’, cred card in her hip compartment, in case her own card had problems and she needed a back-up.
Look, everyone! Wimmin be shopping! Wimmin be maxing out their man’s credit card - credit card? Transformers get paid now? What, does Optimus have a job hauling energon cubes across Cybertron? Is Roller paying him rent for living in the trailer? Do they all get cheques from Alpha Trion every week? Someone help me out here.
Telling Optimus had been her first priority when she’d initially realised she was experiencing problems with their intimate activities, but she hadn’t been able to open her mouth. She KNEW he would blame himself, and question how good he was at pleasing her. He wasn’t completely confident in bed.
Elita can’t talk to Prime, because he’s a man and his fragile ego might be crushed if she doesn’t pretend that he’s a stud. Because men be insecure, yo!
[The datapad] was hidden in her subspace pocket. She had made excuses why Optimus couldn’t use it. He sometimes asked her permission to use it or borrow items from it (she never cleaned it out, it was packed with all kinds of crap)
Wimmin don’t clean out their handbags! Oh the hilarity of it!
I’m surprised there isn’t an exchange about why Prime can’t use Elita’s “subspace pocket”:
“Honey, can I put my WD40 in your subspace pocket? It won’t fit in my subspace wallet.”
“Why don’t you use that subspace man-pocket I bought you?”
“Do you WANT the Decepticons to think I’m gay?!”
“Now you’re being ridiculous! And why do you never come with me when I visit my mother? And why don’t you take the garbage out when I ask you?”
“*mutters*”
“What was that?”
“I said let’s transform and roll out!”
Well, so much for characterisation. Let’s get to the pr0n.
It always amazes me when an author makes the leap to writing giant robot porn, and then forgets that the characters are giant robots. I mean look at this:
[Elita] was a definite ‘back-and-butt’ femme.
“Butt”? Transformers don’t have “butts”. Seriously, look at them. They’re a mass of metal rectangles. Butt my arse. Why can’t Elita comment on how much she likes Prime’s big red cab? That has the added bonus of sounding vaguely filthy.
We also have an absolutely nonsensical “undressing scene”:
[Prime] went after the armor on his body and piled it up uncaringly on the floor.
Lovely, except Transformers don’t wear armour. The author’s just had Prime take all his skin off.
And of course, LOL ROBOT DICK:
[...] one of her hands slipped lower, moving down to touch the armor between his legs.[...] He shifted his weight from foot to foot, still holding her hand where it was pressed to his groin.[...] He was already willingly erect and ready.
Yes.
You know, if Transformers do have sexual urges, or have to “interface” (as the author coyly puts it) to make new Transformers (there must be some reason for the existence of male and female Transformers after all), why would it be accomplished using LOL ROBOT DICK? Why not power cables? Why would the “interfacing apparatus” be located in the groin? Why not higher up, in the torso? And by now you’re probably all snickering and saying “Wulf wants more realistic robot porn!”, but seriously, when the author can’t even be bothered to treat the characters as though they’re Transformers in the sex scenes, you’ve got to wonder why they’re even writing in the fandom.
You could take this fic, swap the names out, change a couple of details and voilá! A fic for any fandom you want. The marriage bed holds no attraction for Arwen, so she sees an old crone about a magical plant. Hermione finds herself faking it with Ron, so she does a spell. Troi knows that Riker suspects she’s just going through the motions, so she gets an implant. John and Mary down the road blah blah blah. Try it yourselves.
And the worst part is, you could write serious Optimus Prime/Elita One fanfiction. Their relationship was touched on very briefly in the original cartoons, so there’s a lot of “room”, canon-wise, for fanfic. How did being rebuilt as war machines affect their relationship? Did it take Elita One a while to realise that Optimus was still the robot she fell in love with? How did Prime react the first time Elita came home shot full of blaster holes? What about the hopes and dreams they had for their future back when they were Ariel and Orion Pax? In a war for survival, do they dare even talk about them? If you really have to go down the sexual dysfunction route, the stress of war, the pressures of command, or even being apart for four million years, neither of them knowing if the other is alive or dead, could all throw a spanner in the works.
Instead the author goes for clichéd, cookie-cutter crap. Laaaaame.
-^)--)~
How Can I Help You? by Phoenix
Aah, Transformer porn. Nothing beats this “genre” for sheer pointlessness. But fear not! This particular tale is an attempt at a “serious” romance story - something quite different than “a scripted romance novel”. Doesn’t that fill you with hope?
Yeah, me neither.
The fic is set in a magical time when the Autobots are no longer waging a battle to destroy the evil forces of the Decepticons, which leaves plenty of time for soapy shenanigans. We join our heroine, Elita One, Optimus Prime’s canon girlfriend and leader of the female Autobots. She and Prime are Cybertron’s new power couple. But all is not well. You see, Elita’s been having problems coming lately, and OH GOD THEY’RE GIANT ROBOTS WHY WOULD ANYONE EVEN WRITE THIS ARGLEBLARGH. Anyway, Elita reads one book - sorry, datapad - about sex problems and decides to skip things like talking to her partner, taking control in bed, or, ahem, getting to know herself, and go straight for the incredibly risky surgery - an implant which makes her totally randy and ensures she has absolutely ska-reeeeeming orgasms. And wears Prime out. But oh! suddenly her web of lies becomes untangled! She starts having dizzy spells! Maybe she’s pregnant! Maybe the implant is backfiring! Sadly we’ll never know, as the author abandoned the story here.
Oh well, most romance fics tend to be short on plot anyway. At least the author kept everyone in character, right?
Right?
Elita One’s list of favourite shops consisted of any shop which had items to sell. She was a very proud shopping addict. [...] She had Optimus Prime’s much-loved and well-used, ‘no limit’, cred card in her hip compartment, in case her own card had problems and she needed a back-up.
Look, everyone! Wimmin be shopping! Wimmin be maxing out their man’s credit card - credit card? Transformers get paid now? What, does Optimus have a job hauling energon cubes across Cybertron? Is Roller paying him rent for living in the trailer? Do they all get cheques from Alpha Trion every week? Someone help me out here.
Telling Optimus had been her first priority when she’d initially realised she was experiencing problems with their intimate activities, but she hadn’t been able to open her mouth. She KNEW he would blame himself, and question how good he was at pleasing her. He wasn’t completely confident in bed.
Elita can’t talk to Prime, because he’s a man and his fragile ego might be crushed if she doesn’t pretend that he’s a stud. Because men be insecure, yo!
[The datapad] was hidden in her subspace pocket. She had made excuses why Optimus couldn’t use it. He sometimes asked her permission to use it or borrow items from it (she never cleaned it out, it was packed with all kinds of crap)
Wimmin don’t clean out their handbags! Oh the hilarity of it!
I’m surprised there isn’t an exchange about why Prime can’t use Elita’s “subspace pocket”:
“Honey, can I put my WD40 in your subspace pocket? It won’t fit in my subspace wallet.”
“Why don’t you use that subspace man-pocket I bought you?”
“Do you WANT the Decepticons to think I’m gay?!”
“Now you’re being ridiculous! And why do you never come with me when I visit my mother? And why don’t you take the garbage out when I ask you?”
“*mutters*”
“What was that?”
“I said let’s transform and roll out!”
Well, so much for characterisation. Let’s get to the pr0n.
It always amazes me when an author makes the leap to writing giant robot porn, and then forgets that the characters are giant robots. I mean look at this:
[Elita] was a definite ‘back-and-butt’ femme.
“Butt”? Transformers don’t have “butts”. Seriously, look at them. They’re a mass of metal rectangles. Butt my arse. Why can’t Elita comment on how much she likes Prime’s big red cab? That has the added bonus of sounding vaguely filthy.
We also have an absolutely nonsensical “undressing scene”:
[Prime] went after the armor on his body and piled it up uncaringly on the floor.
Lovely, except Transformers don’t wear armour. The author’s just had Prime take all his skin off.
And of course, LOL ROBOT DICK:
[...] one of her hands slipped lower, moving down to touch the armor between his legs.[...] He shifted his weight from foot to foot, still holding her hand where it was pressed to his groin.[...] He was already willingly erect and ready.
Yes.
You know, if Transformers do have sexual urges, or have to “interface” (as the author coyly puts it) to make new Transformers (there must be some reason for the existence of male and female Transformers after all), why would it be accomplished using LOL ROBOT DICK? Why not power cables? Why would the “interfacing apparatus” be located in the groin? Why not higher up, in the torso? And by now you’re probably all snickering and saying “Wulf wants more realistic robot porn!”, but seriously, when the author can’t even be bothered to treat the characters as though they’re Transformers in the sex scenes, you’ve got to wonder why they’re even writing in the fandom.
You could take this fic, swap the names out, change a couple of details and voilá! A fic for any fandom you want. The marriage bed holds no attraction for Arwen, so she sees an old crone about a magical plant. Hermione finds herself faking it with Ron, so she does a spell. Troi knows that Riker suspects she’s just going through the motions, so she gets an implant. John and Mary down the road blah blah blah. Try it yourselves.
And the worst part is, you could write serious Optimus Prime/Elita One fanfiction. Their relationship was touched on very briefly in the original cartoons, so there’s a lot of “room”, canon-wise, for fanfic. How did being rebuilt as war machines affect their relationship? Did it take Elita One a while to realise that Optimus was still the robot she fell in love with? How did Prime react the first time Elita came home shot full of blaster holes? What about the hopes and dreams they had for their future back when they were Ariel and Orion Pax? In a war for survival, do they dare even talk about them? If you really have to go down the sexual dysfunction route, the stress of war, the pressures of command, or even being apart for four million years, neither of them knowing if the other is alive or dead, could all throw a spanner in the works.
Instead the author goes for clichéd, cookie-cutter crap. Laaaaame.
-^)--)~