A common Zelda fanfic trope is to turn the games' conflict on its head. Specifically, have Zelda turn out to be evil. While it is an interesting idea, it kinda runs into one major problem.
I have yet to see a fanfic that is able to adequately reconcile an Evil Zelda with the fact that Zelda possesses the Triforce of Wisdom. Power, and even Courage, are entirely corruptible. But no author has managed to convincingly portray Zelda as both evil and wise.
And this author is no exception. Oh sure, his Zelda knows a lot of things, and uses that knowledge. But to paraphrase, "knowledge is the beginning of wisdom, not the end." I never got the impression that she was particularly insightful or understanding about anything.
The closest she gets to that is when she almost instantly captures the main characters in a well-laid trap. But even that fails, because while she did do damage to Ganon's rebels, enough survived to mount a full-scale uprising later.
So the conflict is ultimately between a less-evil-than-usual-Ganon and an Evil Female Ganon-wearing-Zelda's-face.
The setting is rather imaginative; it's basically Hyrule-as-Sigel, where characters from across the many games interact with one another in a giant, oppressive Hylian cityscape. A degree of care is taken to integrate characters from different games, so that they don't feel entirely out of place.
The principle characters are Link, Ganondorf, and Midna, who are working together to bring down the tyrannical Zelda. Link is a new arrival to the city, and he functions as a way for the author to explain what's going on. Fortunately, the author does something with this, as the first third of the story is about Link trying to decide who to support here, Zelda or Ganon.
Indeed, this is probably the best part of the story. I enjoyed the way that Zelda and Ganon both tried to woo Link into picking their side, in order to break their stalemate. It made for great character conflict, especially when Link actually joined Zelda temporarily and she tried to seduce him. I think the story should have focused on his ultimate choice, and made it the ultimate climax of the story: who Link picks and why.
Overall, the story is pretty solid and reasonably well-written. If you can ignore that Zelda isn't Zelda here, it's not bad.
FanFic Execution of a flawed premise
A common Zelda fanfic trope is to turn the games' conflict on its head. Specifically, have Zelda turn out to be evil. While it is an interesting idea, it kinda runs into one major problem.
I have yet to see a fanfic that is able to adequately reconcile an Evil Zelda with the fact that Zelda possesses the Triforce of Wisdom. Power, and even Courage, are entirely corruptible. But no author has managed to convincingly portray Zelda as both evil and wise.
And this author is no exception. Oh sure, his Zelda knows a lot of things, and uses that knowledge. But to paraphrase, "knowledge is the beginning of wisdom, not the end." I never got the impression that she was particularly insightful or understanding about anything.
The closest she gets to that is when she almost instantly captures the main characters in a well-laid trap. But even that fails, because while she did do damage to Ganon's rebels, enough survived to mount a full-scale uprising later.
So the conflict is ultimately between a less-evil-than-usual-Ganon and an Evil Female Ganon-wearing-Zelda's-face.
The setting is rather imaginative; it's basically Hyrule-as-Sigel, where characters from across the many games interact with one another in a giant, oppressive Hylian cityscape. A degree of care is taken to integrate characters from different games, so that they don't feel entirely out of place.
The principle characters are Link, Ganondorf, and Midna, who are working together to bring down the tyrannical Zelda. Link is a new arrival to the city, and he functions as a way for the author to explain what's going on. Fortunately, the author does something with this, as the first third of the story is about Link trying to decide who to support here, Zelda or Ganon.
Indeed, this is probably the best part of the story. I enjoyed the way that Zelda and Ganon both tried to woo Link into picking their side, in order to break their stalemate. It made for great character conflict, especially when Link actually joined Zelda temporarily and she tried to seduce him. I think the story should have focused on his ultimate choice, and made it the ultimate climax of the story: who Link picks and why.
Overall, the story is pretty solid and reasonably well-written. If you can ignore that Zelda isn't Zelda here, it's not bad.