enthusiastic nerds who want to do a concept (such as, for example, crossing Pony with Fallout)

You and I would make good friends.

Do you think we should we friends? You know, after what we might have both been through.

2279038 Well, actually, the theory came from that-site-which-shall-not-be-named:

The show shifting between adventure and mundane slice-of-life makes sense considering both Lauren Faust's philosophy and the show being based on a toy line. Just as there is no single way to be a girl, there is no one right way to play with My Little Pony.

And yes, I too believe that the poster didn't mean anything like throwing the toys at babies.

Second, funny or not, I believe you answered both questions nicely. So in short, the funniest jokes have the best timing and make sense. I have suspected that last detail for a long time; thanks for confirming it. :)

Something I neglected to say last time about this and those other cartoons: I swear shows like them really know how to distort the difference between people who are true sociopaths, and people who simply don't know better (Dee Dee of Dexter's Lab, the titular Johnny Bravo, and Cosmo of Fairly Oddparents, I'm looking in YOUR direction).

2278922 To answer Question 1, well... on its face "there's no right or wrong way to play with the toys" can be nitpicked to death. I mean I could "play" with the toys by throwing them at the faces of babies after all, though I doubt that's the kind of thing the person making that statement was thinking of.

More importantly though, the thing here is that a work of fiction sets out its identity from the get-go. If "playing with toys" was the idea, it should have been that way from the first. Instead what we get was something that seemed like it was gonna take the concept relatively seriously but then suddenly went "welp, playing with the toys!" later on. In other words it would be like if you were being frip-fed orange juice but then they suddenly switched it to Coca Cola without telling you.

For Question 2.... I might not be the best person to ask, as I'm genuinely not all that funny.

I think I can suggest two things though, though they're basically the same thing worded two different ways: The first is, "don't try too hard," and the second is, "not every line has to be laugh-out-loud hilarious." I remember Sokka from ATLA used to always get on my nerves back in Season 1, because he was just the "I'm gonna arbitrarily do something funny" guy who would interrupt the serious events I was interested in. By season three though, he was actually genuinely funny. Likewise, the early videos of Linkara/Atop the 4th Wall were somewhat painful and cringe-inducing to watch, but he got to a point where he was better able to mix his humor with insightful commentary--and even then I find that his show is its funniest when the material itself is just balls insane, like the issue of Blue Beetle that had a crime lord named "Big Dix."

I tend to find though that real humor is in the details. Hitchhiker's Guide, for example--the base story is a pretty solid science fiction saga, but most of the humor comes from when he explains the logic behind events or mechanisms--logic that often makes perfect sense and that's why its funny. Or in Yu-Gi-Oh, a series that's full of world-shattering events and high drama that is combatted or resolved via playing a collectable card game--makes sense in context but its still kind of hilarious. A lot of bad cartoons tend to go for big, obvious and stupid--"hey let's just have Michelangelo, who by the way is an actual trained ninja--make this absurd WAAAAH sound and act all stupid!"--and that's when they fall flat and become just annoying instead.

Hope that helped to some degree.

Hello, it's me again. I have another two questions for you:

1. You and I are in agreement that FiM's action elements pretty much contradict everything else in it. But not too recently, I read a claim that this sort of thing reflects an idea that there's no right or wrong way to play with the toys. Personally, I would think that storytelling has stricter standards to follow than playtime. Any thoughts?

2. In our last conversation, you described Cartoon Network's Cartoon Cartoons as "vapid", "childish", "unfunny", "mean-spirited", and "shallow". I would add "nihilistic" to that list, and those terms would describe FiM's sillier and OOC bits to a T. Adding to my concerns in Question 1, I would call FiM one of the most nihilistic cartoons ever conceived. But with all of that said, do you have any tips on how to write humor?