By Ellory
Status: Complete, Word Count: 4,200, Pairing: Harry Potter/fem!Draco Malfoy,
Read the Fic Here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12006807
Author’s Summary: Heir Harry Potter had lost count of how many times he had fantasized about claiming Heiress Dianthe Malfoy as his own.
My Thoughts:
Characterization: The characterization in this fic is fucking garbage. This honestly has the exact same issue for me as marriage contract/marriage law stories, because the author invents some sort of gimmick to force the romance to start off. In this story, that gimmick is “pureblood culture”. You see, the event that kicks this story into motion is the frankly ridiculous idea that a guy kneeling in front of a girl is the equivalent of a declaration of undying love, and that Nott tripping Harry so he falls down in front of Malfoy somehow fulfills this requirement. Now, while I dislike this because it. kind of takes agency away from the characters, if the rest of the story was good I’d be a little pissy about it, but I’d ultimately say fine. However, after getting all the proposal shit out of its system, this fic decides to have Ron bashing. Now, for those of you who read a lot of my reviews, you all probably know that I consider bashing of any character to be the antithesis to good storytelling, and….yeah I feel like calling this fic the antithesis to good storytelling is probably a reasonable thing to do, so….this is fitting. This fic uses the standard old “Ron thinks Slytherins are all evil and he throws a big public fit about it” trope, and….it’s just as painful as every other time a fic uses this kind of thing. However, the main issue here is Harry and Dianthe Malfoy, because neither of them are characters. Sure, the author tells us things about them both, but we’re never shown anything, and this makes the entire fic crash and burn because the main characters are just shitty romance robots. I can put up with a lot of dumb shit if the main characters pop and are interesting, but none of the characters are characters. They’re just slaves to both the author and pureblood culture. I wish this wasn’t the case, because the world needs more Harry/fem!Draco stories, but this ain’t it. The characterization in this fic is fucking abysmal, some of the worst I’ve seen, and it truly earns the label dogshit.
Romance: The romance here is very much generic fanfiction shlock. There’s no development, there’s no build up, and the payoff is just poorly written enough to fall flat. I’m fairly easy to please when it comes to fluff, but even I got no satisfaction from reading this. I already kind of went through the setup in the characterization section, but then after the Ron!bashing scene it just kinda ends. They kiss at the very end, but it’s the most cookie cutter fanfic boring and emotionless kiss I’ve ever fucking read. This fic’s romance is boring and forgettable, and it honestly isn’t even worth getting angry over. This is the epitome of creepy and weird romance being played off as romantic. Similar to the shit that went on in Twilight, and honestly just as bad.
Plot: So I’ve already gone over a lot of my issues with this fic’s plot. The Ron bashing, the boring romance, and the general lack of characterization all make this fic’s plot worse, because this is a fic that, if done well, would be carried by the characters. Ideally, you’d have the dumb contrived way to get it started at the beginning, and then you’d have some adorable, cute romantic scenes until the end when there was some sort of payoff. It wouldn’t be original by any stretch of the word, but it would do a good job servicing the characters and I’d probably give it a 3.5/5 or something like that. Unfortunately, the lack of characterization automatically lowers this into the 1.5-2.5 range, because there is suddenly a lack of anything for the plot to service. However, the final nail in the coffin is the pureblood culture shit that this fic does. Specifically, this fic says that the Weasleys and Malfoys are in a specific feud with each other, because one of Ron’s ancestors was seduced by a Muggle, and left one of Malfoy’s ancestors unguarded, which allowed her to be sexually assaulted, which kicked off a blood feud. Now not only is this unoriginal, ripping off other fics that execute concepts similar to this with far more nuance and finesse (like Prince of Slytherin, for example), the fic then has the gall to suggest that both the Ron bashing and the Malfoys’ hatred of Muggles are justified, because of the actions that his ancestors took. This is, of course, ridiculous because if that was the case, Harry would hate Malfoy for the role her father played in his parents’ death. But is this ever addressed? Of course not, this fic is too busy jerking off over its main pairing while bashing anyone in sight who has vaguely red hair. I absolutely despise it, and I am amazed that this fic found a way to make me angry over its fucking generic, boring ass plot.
Dialogue: The banter between Harry and Dianthe is actually half decent. I mean, it’s nothing to fawn over, and I would be hesitant to praise it in any meaningful way, but I would call it good. However, the dialogue in the bashing scenes is truly painful, and it drags this fic down into average, mediocre territory.
Writing Mechanics: This fic is mechanically fine. It has a few errors here and there, and there were a few sentences that took me a few rereads to understand, but at the end of the day, I have never been too fussed about writing mechanics, and unless it’s an absolute disaster, it is unlikely that I will ever be truly critical in this section.
Overall: So, as you can probably tell, I really don’t like this oneshot. However, I also feel like I need to make it clear that this is in no way an attack on the author or any of their other work. I am sure that they are a wonderful person, and nobody should go hate on them. In fact, I linked the fic above specifically so that anyone who reads this can go check it out themselves and form their own opinion on it. Who knows, it might be the perfect fic for you, even if I really don’t care for it. But…yeah as far as I’m concerned, this fic earns its spot in the dogshit tier. Ya know, I might actually try another one of this author’s stories at some point in the future, because I definitely saw some potential here and there. It’s just a shame that it’s all squandered here. Anyway, this is just a oneshot, so it doesn’t really need a final thoughts section, so….yeah this fic is bad. It’s gloriously bad.
Tier: Not Good
Written by 05/20/2021
The Master Archive 