When Anthropology first came out, it was one of many stories focusing on Lyra's supposed obsession with humans. Unlike the rest of the genre, however, it was also intelligently written. I loved how the narrative weaved through the actual episodes, building up an amazing level of tension and suspense while also remaining very funny. The characters were interesting, and the payoff to the whole mystery, while a tad cliche, was also well handled and masterfully executed.
And then the thing kept going.
A little less than halfway through the story, the entire narrative changes from "Lyra wants to know about humans" to "Lyra is actually human and must go to another world to live with humans." Everything remotely pony related is dropped for incredibly dull, cheesy, and utterly uninteresting tidbits of Lyra trying to find her birth parents. The humans are all unspeakably, annoyingly perfect, especially compared to the very nuanced and multifaceted pony characters from the beginning. All the cleverness from the beginning vanishes entirely for almost ten whole chapters.
Finally, right at the end, the author apparently remembered that this was supposed to be a FIM story, and awkwardly slammed Discord into the picture and turns Lyra back into a pony. Setting up for a bittersweet ending, right? Nope, her condition gets reversed almost immediately, she goes back to Equestria to gather the Elements of Harmony, recruits some human friends, and defeats Discord in less than three chapters.
Anthropology's early chapters are definitely worth recommending, but everything after that barely counts as a My Little Pony fanfic. JasonTheHuman has a brilliant set up here, but failed to capitalize on it in favor of a clumsy, poorly-executed tumor of a plot that damn near made me drop the entire story. Read the first ten chapters, but just know what you're getting in to if you decide to continue.
Started out strong, and then fell flat on its face
When Anthropology first came out, it was one of many stories focusing on Lyra's supposed obsession with humans. Unlike the rest of the genre, however, it was also intelligently written. I loved how the narrative weaved through the actual episodes, building up an amazing level of tension and suspense while also remaining very funny. The characters were interesting, and the payoff to the whole mystery, while a tad cliche, was also well handled and masterfully executed.
And then the thing kept going.
A little less than halfway through the story, the entire narrative changes from "Lyra wants to know about humans" to "Lyra is actually human and must go to another world to live with humans." Everything remotely pony related is dropped for incredibly dull, cheesy, and utterly uninteresting tidbits of Lyra trying to find her birth parents. The humans are all unspeakably, annoyingly perfect, especially compared to the very nuanced and multifaceted pony characters from the beginning. All the cleverness from the beginning vanishes entirely for almost ten whole chapters.
Finally, right at the end, the author apparently remembered that this was supposed to be a FIM story, and awkwardly slammed Discord into the picture and turns Lyra back into a pony. Setting up for a bittersweet ending, right? Nope, her condition gets reversed almost immediately, she goes back to Equestria to gather the Elements of Harmony, recruits some human friends, and defeats Discord in less than three chapters.
Anthropology's early chapters are definitely worth recommending, but everything after that barely counts as a My Little Pony fanfic. JasonTheHuman has a brilliant set up here, but failed to capitalize on it in favor of a clumsy, poorly-executed tumor of a plot that damn near made me drop the entire story. Read the first ten chapters, but just know what you're getting in to if you decide to continue.