First of all, I cruised over to your info and HOLY CRAP YOU LIVE IN INDIANA? ME TOO!
*hoosier fistbump*
This reply is going to be hard to write, so I'm going to just quote you and reply by individual items because you covered so much.
...okay normally I am like "ugh Giovanni" and am resistant to things that make him sympathetic but THIS IS SO ADORABLE AND I WANT TO GIVE HIM A HUG. He'd probably dump me in a ditch afterward but that's fine. Writing sympathetic Giovanni is tricky and I have no idea how I pull it off so well, especially 10k words of it. In general for this one I just included lots of verbal abuse directed at Zager. Because writing Giovanni being a sarcastic douchewaffle is actually pretty fun once you really get into it. Persian and Giovanni's friendship is something I've always liked writing and getting deeper into, because as someone with kitties, I identify with it so much. They really have adorable chemistry and Persian is such a big adorable ball of fluff and SQUEE.
Less flailily, I really like how you handled this. The start was maybe a smidgen slow, but once their relationship was built up I really cared about them. I liked the secretary managed to be crisp, competent, and caring while remaining a little crazy (fire!). Which I guess is sort of true of Giovanni too. It's also very funny to think of him stuck doing paperwork when he's this hardcore mob boss and Pokémon trainer. Yeah, I feel like the slow start was unavoidable in some ways but in others, I learned a lesson from it. This was the first time I ever did Big Bang and so I had no idea 10k words were so many, so I spent a lot of time on the story buildup. On the other hand, I really wanted to establish three things: that Giovanni and Persian are bros, that Zager and Giovanni have a rocky relationship, and Giovanni's personality in general.
Secretary is fun to write about! She's a minor character and I somehow ended up reading "this woman is probably unstable" into her from the show... and write her that way now. But one of my favorite things to do is take obscure minor characters and make them deeper and really flesh them out.
And of course Giovanni is frequently swamped with paperwork. It's the reality these days of running a successful criminal enterprise. I think it's good to have him disillusioned by the job he's pretty much stuck in, where yeah, he wants world domination/money/insert canon/headcanon motivation of choice here, but he has to go through this unpleasantry to keep things working. Having to sign off on things all day makes perfect sense really, and based on how much he's usually at his desk in the show (as in, nearly always), it fits.
Persian is awesome and I really liked the inclusion of Thunderbolt --- of course Persian knows Thunderbolt. (Actually, Persian has a way more diverse movepool than I realized!) Also, saving Giovanni from the beedrills: <3 <3 <3
Thunderbolt was actually a suggestion from enigma_shadow1. Persian does have a great moveset, it's a shame they're useless statswise. Otherwise I'd rock one in a team.
Okay that wasn't that much less flaily. But thank you for writing and sharing this, I enjoyed it way more than I expected to. I was all ready not to root for Giovanni and you brought me in. :)
You're welcome. I'm happy I succeeded at what I set out to do with this story.
sorry this post is so long winded, I don't normally need to reply to reviews this long and in-depth
*hoosier fistbump*
This reply is going to be hard to write, so I'm going to just quote you and reply by individual items because you covered so much.
...okay normally I am like "ugh Giovanni" and am resistant to things that make him sympathetic but THIS IS SO ADORABLE AND I WANT TO GIVE HIM A HUG. He'd probably dump me in a ditch afterward but that's fine.
Writing sympathetic Giovanni is tricky and I have no idea how I pull it off so well, especially 10k words of it. In general for this one I just included lots of verbal abuse directed at Zager. Because writing Giovanni being a sarcastic douchewaffle is actually pretty fun once you really get into it. Persian and Giovanni's friendship is something I've always liked writing and getting deeper into, because as someone with kitties, I identify with it so much. They really have adorable chemistry and Persian is such a big adorable ball of fluff and SQUEE.
Less flailily, I really like how you handled this. The start was maybe a smidgen slow, but once their relationship was built up I really cared about them. I liked the secretary managed to be crisp, competent, and caring while remaining a little crazy (fire!). Which I guess is sort of true of Giovanni too. It's also very funny to think of him stuck doing paperwork when he's this hardcore mob boss and Pokémon trainer.
Yeah, I feel like the slow start was unavoidable in some ways but in others, I learned a lesson from it. This was the first time I ever did Big Bang and so I had no idea 10k words were so many, so I spent a lot of time on the story buildup. On the other hand, I really wanted to establish three things: that Giovanni and Persian are bros, that Zager and Giovanni have a rocky relationship, and Giovanni's personality in general.
Secretary is fun to write about! She's a minor character and I somehow ended up reading "this woman is probably unstable" into her from the show... and write her that way now. But one of my favorite things to do is take obscure minor characters and make them deeper and really flesh them out.
And of course Giovanni is frequently swamped with paperwork. It's the reality these days of running a successful criminal enterprise. I think it's good to have him disillusioned by the job he's pretty much stuck in, where yeah, he wants world domination/money/insert canon/headcanon motivation of choice here, but he has to go through this unpleasantry to keep things working. Having to sign off on things all day makes perfect sense really, and based on how much he's usually at his desk in the show (as in, nearly always), it fits.
Persian is awesome and I really liked the inclusion of Thunderbolt --- of course Persian knows Thunderbolt. (Actually, Persian has a way more diverse movepool than I realized!) Also, saving Giovanni from the beedrills: <3 <3 <3
Thunderbolt was actually a suggestion from enigma_shadow1. Persian does have a great moveset, it's a shame they're useless statswise. Otherwise I'd rock one in a team.
Okay that wasn't that much less flaily. But thank you for writing and sharing this, I enjoyed it way more than I expected to. I was all ready not to root for Giovanni and you brought me in. :)
You're welcome. I'm happy I succeeded at what I set out to do with this story.
sorry this post is so long winded, I don't normally need to reply to reviews this long and in-depth
Reply
Reply
Leave a comment