Reviewer: It Was Me Signed [Report This]
Date: February 19 2024 6:30 PM Title: Chapter 1 - The Planning Meeting

After reading your response, I just wanted to clarify my comments on Stella's game. When I said it was worse than I thought, I was referring specifically to the things that were revealed by Stella. I think your execution of those segments came off flawlessly, especially after reading all of the things that you were hoping to convey about her. In particular, starting with Stella's parents helped paint a picture of how a person like this could come to be, as the combination of a strict, demanding, manipulative mother and a weak, incompetent father willing to spoil his daughter makes someone like the would-be intern more plausible, I think.

I just wanted to make sure that my comment wasn't taken as a criticism of your writing in these segments, which, again, I thought was phenomenal.

But while I'm writing another review, I also had some more thoughts on your comments about Claire. Morality is fun, mostly due to its subjective nature. And I agree that Claire is a good person overall (and that she's a deep character, as I've been intrigued by her from the start). But, in my view, imposing this game on Stella was still an immoral choice. I see what you're saying about consent, but I think the misleading nature of how she obtained it from Stella needs to be considered as well. Let's say Claire sat down with Stella before handing her that drink and said this:

"So this drink will remove some of your inhibitions and compel you to say whatever is on your mind. Once you drink it, I'm going to show you pictures of several people I have reason to believe that you have wronged. Then I'm going to present you with questions that will more or less force you to tell me your thoughts about and actions against each one. Once we're finished, I, a complete stranger to you, will sit in judgment of your actions and determine which shrinking solution to give you as punishments for your past misdeeds, the worst outcome for you being shrunken to one inch tall for two whole days. [insert whatever the plan for Stella was after the shrinking here.] Are you ready to begin?"

Can you honestly say that Stella would agree to that? I have a hard time believing that she would, even if it meant losing out on that internship (although I'm pretty sure she's smart enough to figure out she was set up by Victoria at that point anyway). And I'm pretty sure Claire felt the same way, hence the fact that she resorted to deceiving the would-be intern in order to get her to go along with this.

This is why I think Claire was in the wrong here, although I do believe her intentions were noble. And again, one morally bad choice has started to lead her down a dark path with those noble intentions, with her starting to consider that the solution should be used to punish certain people.

Honestly, I think the morally right thing for Claire (and the Fab Four in general) to do in this situation was reject Victoria's idea in the first place and not allow Stella to be sent at all. Now, Victoria is in a position to pressure them to do this, sure, but sometimes doing the right thing involves making sacrifices.

So I guess what I'm saying is that Claire is a good person who has fallen into a moral trap and made a mistake. To be fair, that mistake might turn out for the best, as it allowed for the discovery of Tara and Stella just so happens to be a terrible human being who deserves whatever is coming to her. But I don't think that makes Claire's actions here right. Like I said before, in my view, it's the actions of the person committing the act that matter, not those of the one having the act committed on them that determines the morality of that first person's choice.

Thanks for humoring me on this. I love philosophical debate, and I the scenario you constructed here is ripe for that.

Wow. You've already written Victoria's big reveal? You're even more of a nonlinear writer than I am. I jumped around a lot during each of the first two chapters of my story, but I don't know if I'm ambitious enough to write that far ahead. You know, I thought I might have been overestimating Victoria a bit so far, but the way you worded this makes me think I may actually be underestimating her a bit. I'm kind of excited to see this scene now.

Author's Response:

Wow, you and TerryLarka are both too good to me.  Not only do you leave me incredible chapter reviews, you even respond to my responses.

I appreciate the clarification about the "worse than I expected" comment.  I inferred that was the intent of your statement, but I could have seen it as, "that ended in a far worse state than expected," or "the content of that game was more simplistic and manipulatove than I expected," which would both be fair and valid criticisms.

I also appreciate you sharing your arguments on the morality of Claire's actions.  Morality is very subjective, even if there objective trends in how morals affect society, and that subjectiveness tends to skew arguments on an idea or a stance towards arguments against the people with those ideas or taking that stance, and it tends to pre-empt discussion or productive argument entirely.  I'm really glad to see your thoughts on Claire's questionable first steps onto a very slippery slope.

I would agree with you that Claire's approach to this "game" (*cough*interrogation*cough*) was immoral.  My point about consent wasn't intended to defend her actions, but to highlight a piece of the explanation for them.

The way I attempted to setup Claire's decision, was to provide her with three ideas, or rationales, that could support her actions.  I in no way intended for these ideas to be an argument for the morality of her actions, but rather ro highlight the pressures that led her to make the immoral decision.

Receiving Stella's unconditional consent for experimentation was the last piece.  It is a case of misconstruing an absence of legal wrongdoing as moral superiority, and that is a fallacy.  As you said, just because Claire was technically correct that she had Stella's approval to put her in an altered state of mind, she did not have express permission to use that state of mind against her.

The second rationale she had was a degree of separation.  The idea to use the drugs on Stella to aid the questioning, and the idea to let Stella's own success extend her sentence, as well as several of the misleading phrasings, were dictated by Victoria Vane.  I tried to keep this subtle, but I think it was mentioned in one of Claire's thoughts about the dosage size.  The fact that this is framed as an interview by proxy, with much of the groundwork dictated by Miss Vane, their backer, could be incorrectly interpreted as placing the responsibility on another's shoulders.

And finally, the first reason that Claire rationalized this, is that Stella is supposed to be problematic.  It's not clear just how dangerous she is, but Claire was told that someone had died, and it might be tied to Stella, and that very much could be used as an "the ends justify the means" fallacy.  And so, with these three separate rationalizations: it is justified; the blame lies on another; and the subject has technically agreed, Claire made the understandable, but still immoral choice to go through with this.  And with the fallout, she is in a situation where she may come to another such rationalization.

I do want to clarify that Claire was the only one aware of the details for Stella's interview by proxy.  It was a special project leveraging Claire's contact with Victoria Vane, and her mind-altering substances.  I tried to clarify that with Olivia's scene where she turns Aidra away from saving Tara, when Claire had told Olivia to focus on her own tasks, while Claire handled Stella.

As for Victoria's big reveal, yeah, that's been written (and tweaked) for a while, along with a scene we should see soon, when Titania talks about her family.  I'm a big discovery writer - I know my goals for the story, a few key details, and an intended end, but then I let the characters help me get from point A to point D, filling in B and C as we go.  In some ways, it's like playing a game of croquet - the hoops (plot points) are there, but the ball may not take the straightest course between them.  We might take an exciting detour first.

Still, some details need to be fleshed out from the start, to inform actions even as early as the first chapter.  Having Victoria's endgame written near the start helped me to properly frame and contextualize events as I wrote, and as I continue to write.

Thanks again for your time, and for interacting with both me and this work in progress.  It means a lot, and I'm really enjoying your take on things, especially your theories regarding Victoria.

Reviewer: It Was Me Signed [Report This]
Date: August 29 2023 2:24 AM Title: Chapter 1 - The Planning Meeting

So where are they going to do the presentation for the investors, the Ross Geller Auditorium and Center for the Creative Arts?

Seeing the Fab Four together for the first time was pretty interesting. You did a really good job of giving us a quick glimpse of the different dynamics within the group. Obviously, Titania's teasing of "Claire Bear" took center stage, but the latter's interactions with Olivia and especially Melissa were perhaps more insightful. The unique balance between the professor-student dynamic and the friendship they formed when Claire was a TA (and probably Missy's natural need to be dominant) made her interactions with Melissa stand out for me, even though they weren't necessarily vital parts of the chapter. Likewise, the slightly more friendly manner in which Clair treated Olivia, who we learned is her academic peer, as well as the way Livy seemed to be able to "manage" Claire's seemingly rigid personality (more on that in a minute) shows a somewhat unique understanding between the two.

But Claire, being the new character (we didn't get much of Titty in the original story, but she's exactly what her brief appearance there advertised), caught my attention a bit more than the others. Of course, she comes off as very stiff and stuck up in this chapter, but we saw some cracks in that persona and maybe got a passing glance at that "pretty cool teaching assistant" sprinkled throughout. The way she accepted Olivia's "snack-bribe," Melissa's comfort in making fun of "the stick up her ass" despite not being on a first name basis with her, her blush at getting called out by Titty for wanting to be "the biggest one in the room," and even that little cough to make sure she got co-credit for the size reduction tonic: all of this hints at a softer, more fun-loving side that Claire's trying to conceal, seemingly because of her position with the college. I think that as the story advances, we might get to see Claire cut loose, and the seeds planted here will make that moment that much sweeter if she does.

So Missy's sister is their chief investor so far? That's interesting, especially once we were given some insight into that particular family dynamic. I wonder how Victoria will react when she learns that the Fab Four are sticking with their sex-oriented idea rather than marketing each product individually, which would probably be more profitable. Then again, maybe she should have expected this from a group of women working/studying at SMUT (I love that school name, by the way).

As far as the business discussion itself, I was glad to see that the Fab Four are trying to address potential misuse of their products, particularly all of those tonics. The potential for malicious misuse of chemicals that can alter size and memory is pretty ripe. I'm curious exactly how they plan to counter that. Maybe their plan is to open "clinics" and sell the experience rather than the products themselves? Otherwise, I'm not sure how they can regulate their products' use if it's available on shelves. I'll be interested to see what the group comes up with (or has already come up with) in this regard.

Oh, and in a minor note, I love the little quirks for each character in this chapter are much appreciated as well. It really helps bring the characters to life and make them relatable, and I appreciate that effort.

And don't worry about taking a couple of chapters to build before getting too smutty. If done right, building toward the smut can make those scenes that much more effective, and this chapter (and the entire previous story) certainly feel like you're building toward something great. Besides, you snuck in a nice little scene at the start of this story that was pretty hot in its own right. At this point, seeing Livy with a tiny Missy just feels natural.

Great start overall. It feels like you're picking up right where you left off. I'm looking forward to seeing how this one shapes up!

Author's Response:

I'm so glad to see you back, and asking all the right questions!  You came out of the gates swinging with an excellent question, though the answer you're looking for will be in my back pocket for a few chapters for Plot reasons.

I'm ecstatic to have confirmation that all the little behavioral quirks I'm including are being picked up on; I can't properly elucidate how happy that makes me.

I'm intrigued that you focused on Claire so much (though I suppose that makes the most sense, she's the newest character and I put a fair bit of detail into her.)  I admit, I'm of two minds about how I want to take her at the end of this story.  Both give effectively the same result, but the framing makes them tonally different, and will affect where the focus is.  I'm hoping for more feedback as the story progresses to tailor it to the contributing readers.

Victoria Vane will be an interesting background character (I hope).  What's that?  The naming convention is evocative of a comic book supervillain?  No, that's gotta be just a coincidence, I'm sure she's perfectly on the up-and-up!  Admittedly, the idea for the University's name is in no small part inspired by "Accepted," the 2006 film starring Justin Long.  My train of thought didn't even have to jump the tracks as it passed South Harmon Institute of Technology,

Creative responsibility and consumer misuse may not be a huge focus of the Fab Four series, but these are crucial topics worthy of consideration, and that's even before we consider the possibility of a sexy Skynet.  Regardless, our lovely ladies just want to make a fun and sexy experience available to all, and bringing suffering to innocents would be a big damper on that goal.  Of course, no matter how much protection and regulation is put in place, misuse is inevitable when adequate dedication and resources are tasked with engendering such ill ends.  Huh.  I wonder if that will come up at some part in the story.  *Slow, deliberate wink*

Thanks again for the review, it's great to have you back, and I hope to see what you think of our investors when the next chapter drops on Wednesday!