John de Lancie at Bronycon · 1:20am Aug 10th, 2015
I don't have full transcripts up yet. I do have links to my audio recordings: Friday session and Saturday session. I do have some transcription done. I'm going to post some of the funnier highlights from the first day, and then the spoilers he dropped for the episode he just recorded.
“Oh, I iust finished an episode of My Little Pony. I’m not supposed to say this, but I can give you a little hint: there’s a, a glue factory involved?” (audience laughs hysterically) “Remember the character I play.” (He repeated a joke about this on the second day, saying you'd soon be able to get Fluttershy in a squeeze bottle)
The next question was: “If you had an idea for a prank Discord could play on any of the ponies, what would it be?” JDL: “I think I just mentioned it.”
“There’s a video called ‘Let’s Go Meet John de Lancie?’ That’s horrifying. There are certain things that are probably best unknown. Okay, I know you people want to tell me where to find it. Please, do not!” (said in a comical, mock-pleading voice)
“I watch almost no television. We have a room in our house which is dedicated to that, with a beautiful, you know, whatever, flat-screen television and… I don’t know how to turn it on. I go like this, and then like this, and then the other one” (making gestures as if with remote controls), “and then I say ‘screw this’ and I walk out.”
Question: “If you were a pony, what would your cutie mark be?” JDL: “Nothing that has come into my head can I say.”
“What would I do to hang out with Discord? Well, you know what, it would be a little bit like hanging out with myself. I have brought – what Lauren wrote, or conceived of, I sort of, you know, created the third dimension. So, I guess in a way, I would find sitting across the table at lunch with Discord to be a very trying time.”
Question (asked by a tiny little girl): “In the show, are you friends with Tree Hugger?” JDL: “Very good friends.”
To the question “Who is best pony?” “The right thing for me to say is I am best pony.”
To a question as to whether he would change Discord’s design or does he think Discord is “perfect as he is”: “Well, I think he is perfect as he is, he works in the world, in, in the terrestrial world. It wouldn’t quite make sense as a, in the aquatic world. But I think it would be sort of fun to see that he has the ability to re-change himself to go into the aquatic world.” (He mentioned this again on the second day. New headcanon!)
To the question of shipping Discord and Celestia: “We have had a few interesting nights…”
Now for the spoilers. The opening joke about the glue factory is obviously not a real spoiler, but the following are:
Friday session:
49:12: Questioner (attempting a sinister voice): “It seems that with your recent reformation, Chaos in Equestria is at an all-time low now. Being that it is, if you could choose an alternate job title, what would it be?”
JDL: “Oh, well, you know, I, I actually think it should – it should spin up again, in terms of the chaos part. One doesn’t need to be too nice. So I’m hoping I don’t need to answer that question in terms of a new job title, because I’m hoping that in the future – and there is a future coming – that I’m going to be ‘naughty’ again.”
Saturday session:
43:45: Questioner: “Do you think Discord would ever turn back to evil?”
JDL: “Hmm… Evil is as evil does.” (said in an evil voice, audience laughs) “Well, you know what, one little thing that is, is that, um,” (cutting brief interjection here referring back to the last questioner, who has a cell phone on speaker), “on Days of Our Lives, I came onto that show and saw that they wanted a psychopath. But I saw who they needed me to be. I could play a psychopath, but as time went on they began to make me funny. And I kept saying to them, ‘You know, if you take me too far up too close to the ceiling, I don’t have any manueverability. And I’m going to have to start having to undercut.’ It goes to the same thing here. If you write – I start out with characters who are evil – I mean how evil can I be? but anyway,” (I can’t make out this phrase), “but if they sort of neutralize me too much, I lose some of that… element. So I would hope – and I know that in this last one – I was a little concerned with, I forget, one of the episodes I did.” (Someone suggests Twilight’s Kingdom) “All right, Twilight’s Kingdom. I was a little concerned it was getting a little too, too… sparkly.” (Audience laughs.) “So this last one, I could feel that we were trending back toward, toward a little darker. Which allows a greater range, okay? So I’m hoping that I do actually stay in that zone where you can’t tell what I’ll do.”
55:14: “…and, this next one, which comes very close to an issue, which I can’t – I’m not going to tell you, which I go, ‘Ohhh, this is very interesting. They are now beginning to use the show as a way to actually target this audience.” (gestures at the crowd)
Thank you for sharing this
You are awesome
Also, how have you been? It's been probably long enough for you to forget me
3308074
Naah, once I actually bother to memorize an author's name I don't forget it. You wrote Starbreaker, a bunch of Fluttercord fluffy erotica fics (I don't really consider a fic with sex in it clop unless it's pretty graphic), and a couple of cute fics with Screwball.
I've been really busy with work lately -- July was just insane.
Wow...glad I made a worthy impression on the author who wrote Hit Me
Well, I hope busy isn't a bad thing for you
Busy for me means 'still employed'
Huh. At times trolling, at times insightful, at times intriguingly cryptic...
Sheesh. He wasn't kidding. He rather is Discord, isn't he?
I am interested by this implication that Discord is even now continuing to do twisted things.
3308252 He nearly banished someone to an alternate dimension out of jealousy.
Aw, dangit. I wish I'd known when you were in Quills and Sofas. I'm an admin on Rage Reviews, among other things, and every single time there is a self-insert Seventh Element fic which comes up (and they come up a lot), I always say, "Not The Hero. You must read it. It's both a brilliant deconstruction and the ultimate antidote."
3308302 That was actually de Lancie's favorite episode -- he brought it up on both days as a response to questions. He thinks that the issue of being jealous because your friend has another friend applies to both adults and children. But the episode he's dropping hints about is a different one in the future, which implies that Discord's going to do something worse than trying to throw somepony into another dimension out of jealousy.
He seemed to have kind of forgotten about Twilight's Kingdom entirely; when someone asked him why did Discord betray his friends, he answered the question by referring to Make New Friends But Keep Discord, even though it was obvious from context that it was about Twilight's Kingdom.
3308302
What 3308333 said. I want to know what thing Discord is gonna do that's worse than that. I may enjoy writing a darker Discord and reading about a darker Discord, but I never expect darker moments in the show itself, which is probably why I like them so much.
Regarding Discord reverting to his naughtiness, is this meant to be the next Discord episode this season, or a future episode?
(Not that I don't expect some more naughtiness this season, but this episode sounds a lot darker than standard mischief.)
3308674
We don't know, because JdL is totally unreliable when it comes to questions like that. He didn't seem to remember the existence of Twilight's Kingdom when it was brought up; the only episodes he ever mentioned were Return of Harmony and the Gala ep. He thinks his episodes run about once a year (which was true for Q, but we've had 1 2-parter in 2011, 2 including a 2 parter in 2013, 2 including a 2 parter in 2014, and 1 so far in 2015), and he has no idea what season they show in, and no one thought to ask him if there had been an episode between the Gala ep and the one he just recorded.
Basically, he spends an hour and a half in the studio recording the thing, then he maybe watches it when it comes out, once (he says he never watches his work more than once, and a lot of things he never sees at all), so he doesn't have the memory for this stuff that we do. (I get the distinct impression that he's very easily bored -- he said specificially that he never wants to work on one thing very long, that he's always looking for something new.)
The truth is, given how he seemed to forget about Twilight's Kingdom (someone asked him a question about why did Discord betray his friends, and his response was about the Gala episode and made it clear he really didn't remember Discord doing that in Twilight's Kingdom -- the only reference he made to the episode was when someone prompted him and suggested the episode he was talking about being too "sparkly" was that one, and he was like, "yeah, okay, Twilight's Kingdom then", plainly still not remembering what they were talking about because he doesn't know them by episode title), it might be less "naughty" than what he did with Tirek, and JdL wouldn't necessarily remember.
3309205
I should also add: it is very unlikely that the episode deals with shipping. I've been
stalkingfollowing JdL in interviews and at cons for 20 years now, and one thing that's clear, he does not find shipping interesting. He actually specifically mentioned how uninteresting the question of whether Q was in love with Vash was to him when he talked about why he never went back to Deep Space Nine. So the fact that he thinks the "darker" episode is interesting suggests it doesn't have anything to do with shipping.Berrow said that her books contain hints toward future episodes. Was there something that JDL said that was similar to her Dramarama book?
Yes.
3309228
I'd be relieved if it wasn't shipping tbh. I couldn't see them going down that road without cheap drama.
Many thanks for the info!
3309395
No, the only references he made to the upcoming episode are the ones I transcribed. He did say that he believes the purpose of his character is to serve as a lesson -- that Discord basically illustrates what not to do, which is exactly what I thought -- and that's kind of what we saw in the Dramarama book, where Discord basically steals a house from a real estate agent and makes an enemy who tries to frame him for ruining everything.
The rumor going around the internet that Discord tries to make new friends would tie in with the Dramarama book. We don't know if that is the episode that JdL is talking about, or if he's recorded another one that hasn't shown yet, because he isn't real clear on the concept of what's actually aired and what hasn't. We know that he was dropping spoilers for the Gala episode a year before it happened, so if he just recorded an ep three weeks ago, it could very well be an ep from next season and the "What About Discord?" episode for Season 5 isn't the episode he's talking about. But we just don't know.
3309512 Perhaps he recorded his voice for 2017 movie? I woud expect THAT to be more darker like G1 movie with Tirek. I can't really imagine him being evil again except being mind controlled or fooled.'
The things that were in the book and could have been a hint toward future include:
-pet fish
-Hearthwarming Eve tea set (could be a reference to his possible appearance in the upcoming "Hearthbreakers" episode
-Turning into a pony for some reason
-more of his forgotten treasures
-Celestia giving him friendship assigments like Twilight