 emROARS 2009-08-07 . chapter 2Lal and Colonello are awesome, but imagine Bel going.
...no, he'd try to kill everyone, but so would Suqallo and Xanxus.
Anyway, why is this not updated? =[
I need to read moar! ;.;
So update soon 'kay? ^^ |
 Shinnie The Meanie 2009-04-10 . chapter 2The chapter was good and all, just a few issues with Demeter not sounding anything like a child. Even for an intelligent child, it was a bit off. If she was a prodigy or something, I can see her being socially awkward with everyone and confused by the way children her age act, you know? Or, she could try using big words she knows but doesn’t understand and amuse people that way.
When Demeter and Xanxus were showing each other their abilities, there could have been more of a childlike curiousity or excitement from Demeter as being five and raised in a place where it's okay to show your emotions, she wouldn't have been able to contain it. Maybe she could have overwhelmed Xanxus with a lot of questions which would aggravate him but confuse him all at the same time. Something to show that she’s a five year old but intelligent enough to be perceptive, even if she doesn’t understand the little details which would come to her later in life.
Also, you’re beginning to fall into the habbit of “telling, not showing”; be careful of that. I know you probably want to jump into Demeter’s school years at Hogwarts more quickly, but it would have been better to take your time and flesh out Demeter and her relationships with the various people in her life. A chapter or two dedicating itself solely for character development and relationship development as she grows older in the Mafia society would have been so much better, instead of having flashbacks, which might have worked in Goal, but given that you placed the beginning of the chapter BEFORE she got into the Mafia and Hogwarts, it just wouldn’t work as well in the same way.
Also, Tsuna wasn’t that young when Timeoto came to visit- I’d say he was at least five. Young enough not to remember the details but old enough for him to remember Timeoto visiting him as a kid. You could also have taken the time in the chapter to show what exactly her green aura was- maybe she could have healed injured animals while she was at the Vongola castle or heal someone else that was hurt by Xanxus- that sort of thing.
And as for Lal Mirch and Colonello and all the other characters you’re thinking of joining Demeter...keep in mind that they're all older than Demeter- Xanxus, Squallo, Lal Mirch and Colonello especially so. And yeah, Lal and Colonello are suppose to be arcobaleno- (probably turned into their child forms by this time, since Xanxus around the same age as Dino, who Reborn would have been training at the time). If you do want Lal or Colonello to join Demeter at Hogwarts, it can’t be as students. As instructors for fitness or something(because it’s quite obvious the kids at Hogwarts get no exercise at all. You can tie in the philosophy that the mind, body and spirit aka magical energy are all in sync and strengthening the body strengthens the mind and spirit etc) would probably be a better idea. Though I can’t see Lal or Colonello willing to do that either because face it Mafia(and family) trump everything and Lal is loyal to her faction of the Vongola. And Lal only teaches those she thinks have potential – a bunch of snot nosed kids where half would probably try to look down on her is just a no-no.
Putting Bel in would be a disaster too. He’s too cocky, too willing to kill people with glee- can you really see Dumbledore willingly allowing him into his school? Bianchi could work but then there’s the whole thing about why would Bianchi willingly go to a school in Scotland when there would be schools in Italy that could cater to her needs. And again, Bianchi wasn’t in the Vongola at this time. It was only when Gokudera joined the Vongola that Binachi followed him- perhaps as an allied family, yes but not as a Vongola to begin with.
So, TL;DR: If you want to have the Reborn characters join Demeter at Hogwarts, a lot of thought has to be put into it and you must flesh out Demeter because she’s coming off as a blank slate with no personality and her relationships at the moment feel flat. God, I haven’t given you critique like this in a long time, have I?
Oh and remember that Demeter grew up in an Italian-speaking environment with bits of Japanese mixed in. So it’s okay for her English to have an Italian accent that she would gradually lose as she gets older and for her not to understand British slang, which would lead to some amusing scenarios between her and the other characters. And I think you should just ask someone who’s native to Britain to help you with their slang in order to make it more natural. Or try to find a copy of the books where the dialect and British slang would have been kept intact. |