"The Weaker One"

Author: sunflowerpots

Main Characters: Kris and Tao

Genre: Abuse, Angst, Romance, School Life, , [Trigger Warned]

Status: On-going

Description of Story:
Kris and his gang always liked to bully people, especially Tao. We know for a fact that bullies like to bully just for fun right?
Some bullies though, aren't bullying with the same reason. Just like what Wu Yifan does to Huang Zitao.

 

 

Critique:

Story Title: 3/5

First of all, your story title sounded a bit cliché for me at first, especially since there wasn’t any sophisticated word or something that was used. No other story with the title “The Weaker One” is present in Asianfanfics though, which is definitely good, but with the simplicity of the words used, there are still a lot of similar sounding story titles out there, which is still considered as your competition. Remember that for every cliché idea, there is always an original idea that had started it. It can’t be avoided, but most readers to indeed avoid cliché titles since they’d expect the story to have a similar storyline with the one they had previously read.

To tell you the truth, the title didn’t really entice me. Like what I’ve said before, it doesn’t sound too original. In fact, it sounds a bit cliché for me. It’s fine though. As long as you make your story known to a lot of people and make it featured here on AFF, your story will be remembered, and every time they here of any title similar to yours, they’ll think of your story, which is good. Now, through this things that I’ve said, I’m not saying that you should change your title. It’s your call, but yeah. I don’t think you should change it. You already gave us an image of your story already.

 

Graphics: 9/10

Can I just say that I totally love your poster? I mean, WOW! It was jaw-dropping. I had only met a few designers as good as the one that made yours, and wow, he/she just made it on my list! You did a good job in choosing the right graphics shop for your poster. Anyway, the poster clearly depicted the genre/s and what the story was all about. The blood on the upper left side of the poster had already told me that the story involved violence, abuse, and whatnot. The black and white effect of the other elements had also driven more of my curiosity, and even though it was a simple black and white effect that was done, the way the poster was overly edited was superb!

The only thing that bothered me, however, was the fact that only Kris, Tao and Jaejoong were featured in that poster of yours. Jaejoong’s picture, where he was seated on a chair (backwards), was also placed repetitively on the poster as well. I didn’t quite understand the relevance of that one. Anyway, I think it would’ve been better if Sehun and TOP was shown on the poster as well, since they were also mentioned on the character’s list and the character chart as you scroll down the main page. Also, the picture looked quite a bit fantasy/supernatural-like and a bit… traditional (Especially with the houses on the upper right corner)? I think it would’ve looked better if it was based on a gangster-like theme. I mean, Jaejoong and Tao were even wearing suits. As opposed to the story, they were all in school. It would’ve been better if they looked more like students, but then again, I understand as the pictures would’ve been limited. They were sons of rich people, yes, but they were still students, but yeah.

Anyhow, I guess the poster was fine. As for the background, well to be honest, I didn’t quite like it. It didn’t really look complementary with your poster, especially with those barb wire thingies on the side of the title. All in all though, the graphics were fine, and a reader would definitely be interested with reading your story once he/she sees that poster. Kudos to the designer!

 

Description and Foreword: 6.5/10

After reading your description, I was like, “Wow. They’re all messed up.” That simple and short description had already given me quite a view of what the story was all about, and surprisingly, I like it. Though the description didn’t really sound enticing, the fact that there seemed to be a mystery behind it made everything better. Tao being madly in love with his bully had caught my attention as well, and I definitely felt curious as to how the other characters would contribute to the story. I did felt like you told us too much though, as I already knew that Tao and Kris would have a love line in the story. Moreover, it was clear enough that Kris “secretly” loved Tao because of what you said, making me feel like the story would end up being like those typical and cliché stories out there, so I think you should revise your description into something that’s more mysterious and less revealing. Though the story really didn’t say that he was in love, it implied that idea, and some readers might feel turned off by the possibility of a cliché plot line.

I noticed quite an issue with the relation of the sentences though. The first two sentences seemed to be connected, as they both talked about Kris bullying Tao and liking the results. However, the third sentence kind of gave it off. It suddenly talked about the other characters – Jaejoong, Seunghyun and Sehun. Like, why did they suddenly appear in the description? More so, what did Jaejoong’s self-harm, Seunghyun’s fondness of smoking, and Sehun’s care for his best friend, had anything to do with Kris bullying Tao? It was confusing, to be honest.

On the other bad side, we still have to get down with the grammatical errors. There were a lot. I noticed that you kept combining two words together, like “inlove,” which should’ve been “in love” instead. Here is my revision of your description.

(Original Version) Kris likes the sound of Tao screaming from the pain he inflicted towards him. He does it for fun. But is that really the reason behind his fondness of bullying Tao?Jaejoong does selfharm, Seunghyun smokes, Sehun can’t afford watching his bestfriend being vulnerable but what can he do? Tao is madly inlove with his bully.

(Revised Version) Kris likes the sound of Tao screaming from the pain he inflicts towards him. He does it for fun, but is that really the reason behind his fondness of bullying Tao? Jaejoong does self-harm, Seunghyun smokes, and Sehun can’t afford watching his best friend being vulnerable, but what can he do when Tao is madly in love with his bully?

Never, ever forget to put a space after punctuations, especially those that ends sentences. You also have to put spaces between necessary words, like “bestfriend.” It should be separated with a space instead. On the other hand, if you use hyphens, remember that there should be no spaces whatsoever on either side of the said punctuation.

If you have read my other reviews, then you’d know that I hate starting sentences with coordinating conjunctions. Like what I’ve been saying from my previous reviews, it’s not entirely prohibited. Rather at times, they are mostly considered as grammatically incorrect, since coordinating conjunctions are primarily used to combine sentences, not start them. Hence, I combined the two sentences as seen on my revision. Needless to say, you are not prohibited in doing so, but do limit yourself. At the very least, start your sentences with “but” if the sentences calls suspense. If not, you’d better be off combining the two independent clauses instead.

Aside from that, I think you should do some improvements with regards to the alignments of the text and the font styles used. I think aligning the description at the center would do the thing. Also, try to change the font style used. It doesn’t really suit the feel of your story. As for the character chart placed in the foreword, I think it’s only proper to align the pictures at the center as well, as they looked quite out of place. In choosing your pictures, too, I think it would be better if the individual pictures were black and white as well, complementing the black and white features of the graphics. Other than that, all was fine. Oh, and I’m not telling you to change anything or whatever. It’s your call. I’m just giving your advice. ^^

 

Characterization: 7.5/10

First of all, I thought that Jaejoong and TOP were inappropriate with their roles. I mean, they don’t really look like high school students, to be honest, in real life. I can imagine Kris as one since it’s easier as Tao is still young, as well as Sehun, but for Jae and TOP, I think not. Anyhow, I guess it was still fine as I could still view them as rich people, like heirs of their companies or something. The fact that all characters had their own fair share of problems made things more complicated yet interesting in its own way as well. Anyway, I made individual assessments for each main character involved.

Tao.

Tao was the sort-of-shy-and-reserved type of guy at first. He was the typical nerd that was smart enough to conclude that his favorite subject was Biology. I didn’t get how nerdy he was though as you never described his appearance at the very first chapter. Was he the typical nerd that wears thick-rimmed glasses and flat hair, or was he the normal kind of guy that was only deemed smart? Moreover, there wasn’t much of an introduction to his side as well. Perhaps, how did he drown himself into his studies? Did he focus too much from when Kris had started to bully him, or was he smart from the very start? You kind of describe your characters indirectly, yet lacking at some point, so it was hard for me to determine what his character really was.

I had also encountered a problem with his character when he and Kris reconciled. On that chapter, Tao had been kind of neutral all of a sudden, his expression void and stoic, as if Kris’ bullying didn’t affect him at all. I was confused as to why he acted like that all of a sudden. He did smile later on, and that made me think that he had only done that to attract Kris’ attention, but then again, based from his seemingly frightened character from the previous chapter, it was a bit contradicting. He seemed to be too frightened at first, and the “I love him so him bullying me is no big deal” part didn’t exactly match that chapter.

Kris.

To be quite honest, I thought that he had some sort of psychological issue or something since he broke down when he went home the day he bullied Tao. He even curled himself in the corner and such, as if he was having a mental breakdown, like the shop’s name. Haha. Okay. That was lame. Moving on~ The part where he confessed that there was a possibility of him ending up with Jaejoong was a big blow to me as well. That was really unexpected! Was that really planned from the very beginning? Honestly, that made me even more confused with the love lines concerning your story. I mean, yeah. It was a possibility. They did bond together for a year, but then again, there’s a saying that you don’t really love the