This Is Bad And You Should Feel Bad: Episode 4 - The Holy Trinity, Part 1 · 5:24pm Oct 11th, 2014
I've many times espoused the belief that anything can be done well in the right hands. And while this is true, there are a lot of ideas that can only really be done well if they were literally written by God, and even He would probably only do it as a self-challenge. What I mean by this is that there are some ideas that, while you probably could make them work, you probably would be better off not trying. Not everything deserves to be salvaged, you see. And by that guiding principle, in this trio of blogs (in which I will cover the three central elements of a story that I spoke of last time: characters, plot and themes), I'll also take the time to explain the don'ts as well as the dos. Some story tropes are so overused as to be cliché. Some character ideas are just plain terrible. And yes, there are ways that you can screw your story at the theme and message level too. Let's talk about that.
We are, in this scenario, writing MLP fanfiction. Let us ask then what distinguishes MLP? Every work of fiction is set apart by its characters, its setting, its story, and its themes/messages/tone etc. In MLP's case we have the characters of the ponies, the setting of Equestria, the story of the show that we build our own stories around, and the feel of the show is generally a light one, being either warm or comic or just fun.
Remember that last one, because it's important. In a serious context, you wouldn't write a Strawberry Shortcake fanfic about the futility of human existence, and you wouldn't write a story in the Cthulhu mythos about how love and friendship conquers all. MLP is a little more malleable than either of those, and you can stretch it a little more. The world of Equestria has just enough implied darkness that you can get away with writing a horror story or a war story or what have you. The basis is there. But you really can't push it.
People generally read MLP fanfic because they like MLP, I assume. Therefore, fanfiction will usually be expected to make use of at least two (preferably three) of those four elements. In your humanised AU, we're no longer in Equestria, so you'd better keep the characters' personalities intact and make it still feel like MLP. In your crossover where Twilight Sparkle visits the grim world of Warhammer 40K, you have neither the feel nor the setting, so Twilight had better be in-character and you'd better have some story elements that link back to MLP other than just Twilight being in this world, otherwise she's out of place and you might as well be writing 40K-fic. In your OC-focused adventure story, we don't have the main six, so use Equestria as a setting strongly and either keep the feel of the show or take advantage of story elements (like if it were set in the ancient past and you're exploring the history of Equestria). I'll stop listing examples now. You get my meaning.
So as one of the big four, the feel of the show is something you generally don't want to drop unless you can't tell the story you wanted to tell without it. But the fact is that it's the one that amateur writers of fanfic ignore the most.
Trouble is, and I'm just going to say it, most fanfic writers are teenagers, and teenagers can be some moody motherfuckers. I would know. But your personality tends to bleed into your work, no matter what you do, and if you're a generally cynical person, then what you write may come with a darker edge to it. It's hard for a cynic to write an optimistic story, and it's hard for an optimist to write a depressing and cynical story. Or at least, it's hard for them to want to write from the perspective of an ideology they oppose. So if you're a moody teenager writing fanfic, chances are that your fanfic is going to be pretty moody too.
Like I said before, you have a lot more wiggle room here with MLP. There is plenty of potential for sad or tragic stories set in this world and with these characters, and there are plenty of dark undertones for you to explore if you want to. That's why we have those tags. But (and I cannot stress this enough) there is a limit to what you can get away with if you're trying to keep a tone in line with the show. If you have graphic depictions of death or rape or other similarly horrible things, for example, then you've probably left the show's tone behind.
Now, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, because if you have other elements of the show in play, then you still have the potential to make a compelling story that's worthy of being called an MLP fanfic. Fallout: Equestria and The Immortal Game are both examples of ultraviolent stories that feel nothing like the show tonally, but which I think are still way closer to FiM in spirit than a hundred other fanfics I could name. But that's because they have other parts of the "meta" of FiM. Both of those stories maintain the themes and messages of FiM, primarily the importance of friendship and virtue. They share FiM's inherent optimism, even amongst all their grimdark grimness.
This is another of those things that you want to stick closely to. Keeping the show's tone is hard, but keeping within the spirit of it is quite easily done. You don't want to always do that, of course; a horror story without a sense of crushing despair wouldn't be much good to anyone. But if you don't need to drop that aspect of the source material, it's good to keep it. Those themes and messages are characteristic of the show, and if you're here reading fanfic of it, I assume that you like the show and want to see something that could plausibly be called an offspring of it.
In fact, many readers do. Some readers even refuse to read grimdark or stories with sexual content because the whole reason they're on the site is for stories that capture the feel, rather than necessarily using the characters or world of FiM. Are those people being overly picky by that? Well, let's not judge others' tastes. But know that such people will level the accusation of "not feeling like FiM" towards your story as a criticism, and if your story didn't need to do that, then that would be a completely valid complaint.
This is one of the big reasons behind a lot of the hate for a number of big concepts or stories in this fandom. The "herding" headcanon started by Xenophilia, the Fall of Equestria universe, Conversion Bureau or similar stories featuring wars between humans and ponies where either of the sides are depicted as horrible, irredeemable monsters... All of these are criticised for (amongst other things) not keeping within the spirit of FiM, instead twisting their worlds to accomodate wish fulfilment or some ideology of the author. You might think "Humans, fuck yeah! We'd totally steamroll ponies in an actual war!" But not everyone particularly wants to read about ponies getting slaughtered by humans so you can make a point, and you need to know that before you start writing.
Don't be grimdark if you don't need to be. Don't put in swears that we wouldn't hear on the show if you're trying to present your world as the normal Equestria we know. If you're writing a story that's been fairly light until now, don't start suddenly dropping casual character death. If your own outlook is more cynical and your personal morality strongly disagrees with the ethos of the show, try to divorce yourself from the narrative and don't impose your own opinions over your fic. And especially don't try to insert weird headcanon that contradicts what we actually know of the world.
I leave it up to the individual writer to decide what rules to break and when. Follow or ignore this advice as you see fit. But be aware of the perils of choosing to create something that stands in ideological opposition to its source material. You can write all the Prototype fics you want about Alex Mercer eating people and throwing babies at helicopters, and I'll laugh with you just fine, but once he starts doing the same thing in your FiM crossover, you and me have a problem, y'hear?
Next time, we'll talk character.
And yes, I am very much aware of my own hypocrisy in this blog, thank you very much.
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To respond to what you said under the spoiler bar, the reason why Human worked for me was exactly what I said in your blogs about its cancellation: it deconstructs those very fics that don't contain any semblance of FiM's tone or themes. I feel this was best explored by the whole meta idea of the story taking place in a movie/reboot of the series. In your story, the movie flopped because the Pantheon spent so much time trying to cram zombies, warships and as much ridiculous stuff into it as possible that they lost sight of what made FiM so great in the first place.
All Human discussion aside, I'm definitely in the camp that won't read grimdark or clop because they don't capture the feel of the show. That's not to say that I'm completely opposed to violence or sex in my ponyfics, but they need to be done tastefully and most importantly, need a very good reason to be in the story at all. If you're writing a story about, say, a soldier in a war in Equestria's past, violence may be necessary to tell that story. If you're telling a story about two characters' romantic relationship, at least bringing up sex may be necessary to show their development.
You also mentioned crossovers, which I can say from experience are probably the most difficult kind of fic to pull off. Not only are you trying to stay true to FiM's themes and tone, but those of the thing you're crossing over with as well. Like you said, if you put Twilight in the middle of a much darker world, like Raccoon City or on board the Ishimura, then she has to bring some of MLP's themes with her. But you have to be careful not to bring too much cheeriness and optimism otherwise you betray the themes and tone of the other side of the crossover. Writing a crossover is all about hitting that balance between tones.
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Good crossover is exceptionally difficult, but I think what makes it hardest to do is that some people can't accept that not everything can or should be crossed over. Some stories are just too different to work together in that way. And not just because of tone, either. Sometimes it's just because they have almost nothing in common. I actually talked about this in a group thread recently when someone suggested a crossover between FiM and (of all things) The Thick of It.
I do believe that any idea can be done well. I really and truly do. But some ideas would take a borderline genius to make work.
Hey, let's not be singling out angsty teenagers. Us former teenagers can get a good unbreakable angst going too.
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I apologise for my grevious error.