Where Is the Deej? · 1:13am Feb 7th, 2015
I've moved on.
A couple of months back, I realized I didn't know when Season 5 was coming out, and that I didn't care. As is probably obvious from what I've done around here, my interest in My Little Pony has largely moved out to the expanded universe as the show has descended further into fan-pandering and pop cultural references. When I walked out at the end of of Rainbow Rocks, though it had some merits and surprisingly good music, I realized I could take or leave more pony cartoons. I still read the comics and still insist that Cook and Price are the best thing in the franchise at the moment. I'll probably get the Fluttershy chapbook at some point to complete my collection.
But I've moved on, as I supposed I eventually would. I never had any intention of camping here permanently.
I am working on finalizing the manuscript of my original novel, which is more important to me than fan fiction, and which I have been procrastinating for far too long. I might still append a final chapter to Demon Slayer if I can get around to it, though as should be obvious by now I'm not a very fast or well-organized writer.
And I still watch girly cartoons, of course. At the moment, I'm on something of a Sailor Moon kick. The new series is pretty good.
If you want me, you can find me at www.scificatholic.com, where I write reviews and news and occasionally talk about ponies.
ADDENDUM: Looking back over this, I see it doesn't say quite what I meant. I'm not leaving in a huff, though my interest has waned somewhat over time (as is inevitable). My real reason for taking a prolonged or permanent hiatus (I do not promise not to be back) is that I need to focus on Rag & Muffin, my magical girl dungeon punk novel, and I lack the skill and organization to be writing multiple things at once. So I decided to abandon fan fiction for the time being to focus on my original work.
I don't think anyone can blame you for jumping ship for Sailor Moon. I mean, c'mon. A reboot of your childhood waifus?
B... b-but what happens to Brad?
Sailor Moon, I remember watching that along Dragon Ball Z and Outlaw Star.
Maybe Outlaw Star was after, kinda hazy.
If I remember correctly Sailor Moon was about a cat from outer space coming down to earth and brainwashing some derpy teenage girl into thinking she's a space princess in order to fight a evil space queen and give said cat free food and ear scratchies.
Good times...
Also I remember an awkward scene where a little girl was admitting her affections for a unicorn guy before she knew he had a human form. Like REALLY digging on this horse.
Good times...
...Whelp, fuck. The guy that inspired me to finally start posting fics to this site is gone.
Godspeed Deej, you magnificent bastard. Best of luck in writing your novel. One day, I'll be heading that way as well.
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Not my childhood waifus, actually. I didn't get into magical girl anime until much later. Never saw the original Sailor Moon until Viz started re-releasing it.
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I would happily stick around if I thought I could do this and my more important projects, but I think I've demonstrated to myself that I can't.
I weighed ponies against Rag & Muffin, and I had to go with Miss Rags. I have a twelve-year-old girl in my head, and she wants out. She has a gun, too, so I think I better do what she says.
You're a rare breed, DGD - I'd say of everyone else on this site, only horse voice, mcpoodle, and maybe ether echoes write fanfiction in that particularly high quality, especially well-researched way that you can. You'll be sorely missed.
Best of luck on your project, even if it means leaving Brad behind.
Aww, darn. That's what I'd figured had happened, though, so I'm not too surprised. (Pretty eager to see how Rag & Muffin eventually turns out though!)
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Thank you. That's a great compliment. Let me add Cold in Gardez to that list in case you forgot him, who is a gentleman besides.
I don't know that this is goodbye forever. It's just that I saw this was completely distracting me from Rag & Muffin, and I saw that had to stop. It isn't writer angst or stomping off in a huff or anything like that.
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I'm still angsty generally, but not about ponies.
Be sure to point us at the original fiction when it gets released on the world. Glad to hear the new Sailor Moon is good. I keep meaning to check it out.
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Here's a description of an Elysian soldier from my draft:
A man in runearmor is sometimes called a marine corpse because he has to be temporarily dead in order to operate the armor's systems.
I hope we see you again someday, especially since I and others want to know how, like, three of your long stories turn out.
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Aw shucks. Thx.
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Is this that not-quite-a-response-to-CelestAI that you were talking about, or something else?
Anyway, glad to hear you're still chugging along.
And that's what I feared.
Well, in that case, godspeed.
I have to admit I've been disillusioned with the direction the show's been taking lately. I felt Season 4 was a letdown. It largely ignored the issues it should have addressed and served as a big, fan-pandering distraction. I have some hopes for the Season 5 premier. However, I'm read to close the book on Friendship is Magic and its characters.
I want something new out of the brand or rather something very old. Bring back the G1 ponies and its scenario of a small enclave of ponies in a giant, mostly unknown world. I'd write you the series. I would even be open to change the ponies names and appearances if you don't want to use the originals (I could see Wind Whistler with G3 Merriweather's cutie mark). And bring back human protagonists. There, I said it. Transformers has done it, MLP can do it.
Good luck on writing Rag and Muffin. It's too bad you can't keep multiple things in the air. I would suggest keeping an agenda with certain days allocated to certain projects. However, writing doesn't necessarily lend itself to that.
Well, if you do come back, I'll be very happy. If you don't, thank you for the stories, and good luck with Rag & Muffin. I have greatly enjoyed your horsewords, sir, and I wish you well.
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I think My Little Pony, in a way, needs humans, because it needs straight-man characters to contrast with the talking horses. I rather think that's a lack Equestria Girls was trying to make up for, but it does it in about the worst way. I mean, the human and pony dolls aren't even to the same scale. If they're going to have humans and horses in the same toy franchise, they should be built to go together.
Partly, the problem was executive meddling. They wanted stand-alone episodes they could syndicate in any order, and that's what they got. If they were to let the show have the adventure-focused arcs it deserves, they would have to get over that.
2776064 I fully agree. The "You're a pony in one world and a human another" was the worst way to introduce humans. The advantage of having a modern human in a fantasy or science fiction world is they give a reason for exposition of how the world works as well as a human perspective of it. They also learn about the world along with the audience. I thought they had it backwards with Megan where it should have been the ponies teaching and protecting her instead of the other way around, but I think MLP has lost something without ponies and humans interacting with each other.
And I remind myself of where MLP was in 2009 when Friendship is Magic want into production. They were releasing shorts so badly animated I've seen people make more convincing animations using Super Nintendo sprites and it had been more than 15 years since anything tied to the brand was made specifically for television. The episodic formula had also taken over as king in western animation as the ability to stream episodes as a block to let a consumer watch them in sequence had not become mainstream yet.
I'm actually okay with Friendship is Magic itself remaining an episodic situation comedy. The writers' attempt at an arc where the endgame was not spelled out for them by Hasbro was a complete disaster. I really don't trust them to be able to keep the big picture in mind enough to pull off an extended arc unless someone from the outside has already laid out the general framework for them. The episodes I liked most from Season 4 were the simpler comedy episodes where the writers didn't try to get too cute and went for the jokes and fun.
Season 5 might surprise us with Larson returning and Berrow joining the team. We have to see whenever it gets its act together and arrives.
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I think with the arc in Season 4, they were trying to have it both ways. It is episodic, but also has a season-long story arc built in. Season 1 had something similar.
I think my interest remains strong in the comics in spite of its extreme variability in quality because the comics let the ponies get out of Ponyville, and it maintains an adventure focus. They haven't had an arc longer than four issues, but some creators, and by "some" I mean Cook and Price, have managed to pack a lot into four issues.
And "Reflections" is still best MLP story of all time. I say that as a guy who normally loathes the alternate universe conceit and isn't too big on secret love affairs, either.
2776405 I was actually talking about the Equestria Games arc. That thing blew up in their face. Rainbow Falls made it impossible to complete the arc with a satisfying conclusion.
Comics certainly do give us more variety of location and conflicts. I'm hoping Season 5 will give us that as well. I think Cook and Price might go for the joke when it's not appropriate which hurts their storytelling at times, but they have great premises.
Perhaps not shockingly, bronies in general hated Reflections. I thought it was a fine concept and avoided many of the traps of both subjects. Mirror Sombra got on my nerves a little (and how did he survive so long with Mirror Celestia and Luna after him), but not too badly. Bronies complained about how Celestia did harm to their worlds traveling back and forth to see Mirror Sombra. However, it was to show she's a person, not the infallible goddess one extreme wants her to be or the tyrant/pervert/troll the other extreme wants her to be.
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The Mixed-Up Life of Brad excelled in this theme. It´s a shame if it never gets finished.
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My biggest complain on Reflection was the old fallacy of the dualism between Good and Evil aka Good Sombra forcing himself to absorb Evil Celestia and Luna´s bad mojo because suddenly the elements cannot simply erradicate evil. It´s the absurd notion about the world needing a minimum quote of thieves, murderers, rapists, etc... to balance the acts of compassion, generosity and love.
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I don't remember anything in "Reflections" about evil being needed to balance good, but it's possible that I simply forgot it. I've seen that conceit often enough in fantasy, it probably doesn't register on me sometimes.
And yes, I agree it's erroneous. If you think the world needs evil, you have a very odd conception of evil. I think the origin of this notion that evil is necessary to balance good comes from Taoism, but I may be mistaken; it's been a while since I read the Tao Te Ching, and I don't claim to have mastered its contents. I think it is, like many philosophical mistakes, simply a category error: it is the confusion of moral corruption with natural corruption.
In any case, the idea of evil as a substance, whether it is believed to be a necessary substance or not, opens a metaphysical can of worms that most cartoon shows are not prepared to deal with, but it's a common conceit in cartoons nonetheless Darkwing Duck and Kim Possible have done it, and that's just off the top of my head, though the implication, if either show had bothered to tease it out, would be that what they call evil is not in fact evil properly so-called, but a sort of disease or even a morally neutral difference.
I'd like to say I'd miss seeing you around the place, but I haven't exactly been 'around' much myself. Still: I'm filled with melancholy right on up to the brim and over. It's been a good ride, man. Glad to have had you in an adjacent car.
Have fun with your Rag & Muffin project, and do drop a note when it's done. It's something I'd like to read.
And also, Rainbow Rocks is the best thing to have come out of FiM since season one, how dare you not be excited by it, and I'm honestly surprised you weren't spitting rage at the 'evil as substance' thing mentioned above in Reflections -- I know I was.
First off, while I'm sorry to see you go, if it's what you've gotta do, it's what you've gotta do.
I'd also like to thank you for the inspiration you've given me--your realistic portrayal of ponies and willingness to research for accuracy have been influential on my own writing, and even when I, too, have moved on to other things, that will surely stay with me.
And good luck with your novel. Be sure to let us all know when there's a way we can buy it. I'm certainly willing to part with some of my bits to see what kind of world you can create when you're not playing in someone else's sandbox.
--admiral biscuit