Title: The Hokage Great and Terrible
Author: lord of the land of fire
Rating: T
Genre: Drama/Tragedy
DLP Category: Other Fandoms --> Naruto
Pairing: Naruto/Hinata [not overly improtant, or at all eekie]
Status: Complete [Words: 25,939, has a sequel]
Summary: What if someone other than Namikaze Minato had been chosen to be the Yondaime? Things might have worked out very, very differently. AU, a bit dark and a bit tragic. A little Naru X Hina
Link

Very, very nice. Not at all packed with action, which would usually be bad for a Naruto story, but the other aspects of the story are more than enough to make this story great.

The idea itself, and the characterization behind it, is great. A fascist Konoha ruled by Orochimaru is unsurprisingly interesting, and I don't understand why there aren't many more Yondaime!Orochimaru.

Anyway, great idea with good execution. 4.5/5, rounded to 5.

 

Great idea with a poor execution. I read it through, but I didn't feel for any of the characters and just went through the motions. It's not as bad as a list of stuff happening, but it's in that direction. 3/5.

 

Well, I've just finished reading through the entire thing, and haven't read the sequel.

In terms of writing it is decent: no parts of it blatantly threw me off, and surprisingly it was very easy to get into- the action starts straight away, and the plot is involving enough. Certainly, the setting is well-constructed. The writer pulled off the systems of this land well, and as you've said, it is interesting to explore.

I have to admire the author for having the audacity to end it quickly: many others would have let it drag on, when in reality past that point it is both likely not as interesting unless you treat it as an entirely separate story - The Hokage Great and Terrible centres around Minato pretty much exclusively. As such I'm glad it was kept short.

On the other hand, having a story that short means it can only focus on one small plot element. While it was executed decently, the chosen plot is honestly not that interesting. The reader knows what will happen just as soon as the dilemma is presented- and the rest of the story is just a wait to see it happen.

The plot isn't dramatic, it isn't gripping. The only thing that makes the reader read on is the interesting setting, and perhaps the notion that something better will happen. In reality, once you reach the end you can only look back and realise that you've simply read twenty-five thousand words of pure background information with the smallest dab of plot dashed on the side. Now I think about it, even the plot is barely a plot, seeing as but one thing happens, and there wasn't really much of a dilemma to get to that point.

There are many times in it that I've realised the writer has actually avoided writing the interesting elements- it's all been glossed over in an effort to get to the end, and of course to fit more useless background information in. Take when Naruto goes to rescue Haku, for example: you've got him breaking into the prison with no effort at all and there is a little more useless background info introduced as he meets Temari, but then it's mentioned that it will be much harder to escape with Haku again (or something like that) and suddenly the reader is interested- will he escape unharmed? Where will he hide Haku, and how? What will be the consequences of his actions?

Skip to the next paragraph: it's already over. There are more points like that, where the story takes a semblance of a more gripping story, but ultimately the author is lazy as fuck, and will instead throw in some more tame background information for the reader to skim past.

I give this a 3/5 because while it's not spectacular, it's not bad. Nothing really happens, but the setting is wonderful.