SPOILERS? Mariusioannesp Reviews: "Stranger Than Fan Fiction"

WARNING!!! The following contains SPOILERS for the latest MLP episode “Stranger Than Fan Fiction”.

Now, without further a-real-adventure-with-Daring-do, here is my review of “Stranger Than Fanfiction”.

Rainbow Dash goes to a Daring Do convention where she meets a fellow fan named Quibble Pants who loves Daring Do as much as she does…. Well, at least some of it. Quibble has a great deal of animosity towards later installments of the Daring Do franchise, calling them “unrealistic”. Spoken like a true hard-core fanboy. However, Rainbow Dash ends up becoming embroiled in another real-life Daring Do adventure, and Quibble Pants is inadvertently brought along for the ride. Will Rainbow and Quibble be able to settle their differences concerning how realistic their totally real adventure is?

So what’s the verdict?

The triumphant return of Daring Do in the triumphant return of Season 6 of MLP!

So yeah, I liked it! I really liked it.

Let us begin again anew where I’ve always begun. At the beginning! Rainbow Dash is packing while Twilight Sparkle reads her the latest Daring Do book. I guess they don’t have audiobooks in Equestria. The scene from the book in question is rendered gloriously as it was in Daring Do’s first episode “Read It and Weep”. Twilight though is upset because she can’t go to the convention because Princess Celestia needs her help with a friendship summit in Griffonstone.

Wait, hold up! Friendship summit in Griffonstone! I want to see that. But what about Daring Do? Oh yeah, there’s that. Okay fine, episode, but I want to hear about this Griffonstone friendship summit later this season. Rainbow assures her that despite how awesome the convention will be, it doesn’t change the fact that they already know A.K. Yearling personally and know the secret that she’s actually Daring Do, just as we saw way back in Season 4’s “Daring Don’t”. Yes, it seems that actually happened. I don’t care; I loved it!

So, Rainbow arrives at the convention in Manehattan. Wait, is it in Manehattan? Promotional material for this episode said that Rainbow was attending a convention in Manehattan, but there’s nothing in the episode itself that actually confirms that. Anyway, while checking out the cool stuff at the convention, Rainbow meets fellow Daring Do superfan Quibble Pants.

She quickly becomes impressed by his devotion to the minutia of the Daring Do books, deeply analyzing individual lines to conclude things like how many arrow holes are in Daring Do’s helmet.

See that there.

This is what I like to call a dry dock because upon that a ship is built.

Derpibooru seems to have already settled on “QuibbleDash” as their ship name.

I’ll ship it. I’ll ship it like FedEx. Bow chicka wow wow.

So Rainbow and Quibble then take part in various activities of convention-time merriment.

And that is a Daring Do body pillow. And she’s tied up.

Rainbow and Quibble are grabbing a drink feeling oh so glad that they met each other. Then, Rainbow happens to mention that so far, they’ve only visited booths and attractions related to the first trilogy of Daring Do books. Rainbow thinks they should hit up the rest after they’re done. Quibble doesn’t take too kindly to this. Apparently, Quibble doesn’t acknowledge any of the books that came after the original trilogy. He says they’re horrible because he doesn’t find what happened in them remotely possible. Of course, Rainbow knows all Daring’s adventures really happened, but she can’t say anything about it. All she can say to rebut his argument is just that she just knows everything in them is possible.

Unfortunately, Quibble is right. Rainbow wonders if Quibble hates Daring Do so much, why would he even come to a Daring Do convention. Quibble retorts that he doesn’t hate Daring Do; he appreciates the complexities of the original trilogy. (I keep saying “original trilogy” like the Star Wars fan I am!) He came to the convention to ask A.K. Yearling muzzle-to-muzzle why she sold out and dumbed down the rest of her books. Rainbow though argues that A.K. Yearling is awesome, and every new Daring Do book is better than the previous one. With that, Rainbow and Quibble declare that they can no longer be friends with each other because of their differing opinions on the quality of the later Daring Do books.

Later, Rainbow is at a hotel begging the concierge to let her see A.K. Yearling because it’s an emergency. Luckily, A.K. Yearling herself happens to show up and escorts Rainbow away to somewhere they could talk in private. Daring Do suspects that the emergency is that Dr. Caballeron has reared his ugly head. Rainbow then explains that the problem actually is Quibble and how he thinks everything in the books after the original trilogy is bad and unrealistic and now she needs Daring to prove him wrong. Daring however has bigger problems than dissatisfied fanponies, and she shows Rainbow what she’s got on her right now.

It’s the Amulet of Culiacan. It’s the key to the lost Seven-Sided Chest of Chicomozotoc. Caballeron of course wants to sell it to the highest bidder. So, Daring has to find it first. Daring is at the convention in the first place because it’s the safest place for the amulet given the security, and if she runs into trouble, she can just blend in with all the other Daring Do cosplayers. Wait a minute! They just said “cosplayers” on MLP itself! Anyway, Daring sends Rainbow back onto the convention floor to keep an eye out for Caballeron and his henchponies.

Turns out, Caballeron is out on the convention floor, expressing his disstate over such celebration of his archenemy.


And one of the henchponies bought one of those body pillows.

Rainbow is back at the convention keeping an eye out when she happens to run into Quibble again. Then she just has to spot Caballeron at that moment. She tries to get out of their way, but Quibble ends up following her out. Quibble then gets reasonably disturbed when Rainbow claims that Daring Do told her that Caballeron is after the Amulet of Culiacan and now she sees him and his henchponies heading their way. Quibble tries to go back inside, but then he and Rainbow are thrown into sacks by Caballeron’s henchponies. When they emerge from their respective sacks, they’re in the middle of jungle with Caballeron, and he has them surrounded by his henchponies. Caballeron suspects them both to be agents of Daring Do since she seems to have shared his plan with them. Rainbow, however, thinks she’s got Quibble beat when it comes to how realistic Daring’s books are, but he’s not buying it. He believes she’s roped them into one of the Daring Do Experience Adventu-cation things they were selling at the convention, and he starts poking holes in everything about the situation.

I can’t tell if this is true, but it’d be really funny if it was.

He even calls Caballeron’s plan to use them to lure Daring to the jungle so he can get the Amulet of Culiacan and use it to get the Seven-Sided Chest of Chicomoztoc overly complicated. Caballeron then goes off to continue his search for the temple and has Quibble and Rainbow chained up and secured with a Griffon’s Lock. I’m sorry, Rainbow, but screaming out its name doesn’t tell me what it is or why I should be concerned about it. Though since it does bare a passing resemblance to a cryptex from The Da Vinci Code, I imagine it works along similar lines. Either way, Quibble reluctantly goes along with the scenario, tossing one of his convention badges into the jungle, and feigning rather unconvincingly that Daring Do is on her way to rescue them. All four henchponies that are supposed to be guarding them run off to look for Daring Do. I’m with Quibble on this one. Those guards would have to be incredibly stupid to just run off and leave them there. Still, Rainbow doesn’t think they’ll be able to solve this Griffon’s lock to get out before the henchponies come back, but Quibble just does it. He must be really into puzzle solving. I wonder if that’s important. Rainbow convinces Quibble that the only way he’ll get back to the convention is if he comes with her and off they go.

After meandering through the jungle all the while Quibble taking apart Daring Do books’ logical flaws, they come across a rickety rope bridge. Quibble ends up stepping on the wrong plank at the wrong time as tends to happen in Daring Do books and gets stuck. His struggling then causes the bridge to collapse, which also tends to happen in Daring’s books apparently. Rainbow swoops in and secures him with a rope from the bridge and jet-skis him down a river, but he ends up flying off a waterfall, crashing into some trees, and landing as softly as possible on the ground below.


Quibble babbles excitedly over how awesome what transpired was. Rainbow points out that if he had read that in a book, he might think it was unrealistic. Quibble grants her that, but then he realizes he could have died and starts complaining about what the ponies behind this alleged Adventu-cation were thinking. But that’s when Caballeron and his henchponies show up because it just so happens they landed near the Lost Temple of Chicomoztoc. Wow, that’s convenient.

Once the henchponies have Rainbow and Quibble secure again, Caballeron leads them into the temple. Quibble finally admits that this isn’t an official Daring Do Adventu-cation, but he still thinks it’s a knock-off run by incompetent ponies with no regard for safety. As Quibble goes on a rant, he ends up stepping on a tile boobytrap that starts filling the hallway with mud. Another causes a trap door in the floor to open. And just as he’s ranting about how the only thing that’s missing was a monster that’s just an Ahuizotl knock-off, which he deems beyond their capabilities, he turns around and comes face to face with an actual factual monster.

It’s apparently an Aztec mythological creature called a Cipactli.

This finally causes Quibble to accept Rainbow’s reality and not substitute his own, and he and Rainbow run away from the Cipactli as it gives chase. Caballeron manages to lock a door behind him, trapping Quibble and Rainbow with the Cipactli. But that’s when Daring Do swings in and brings them both to an upper level of the temple. Quibble is quite agog to be meeting Daring Do in the flesh.

He’s also surprised to see that Rainbow is friends with her.

Rainbow: We’re like the bestest of friends.
Daring: I wouldn’t go that far.

Daring still intends to get the treasure, and they have to do it before the temple fills up with enough mud for the Cipactli to swim up and come after them. They find the secret chamber that contains seven doors, behind one of which stands the treasure.

As Daring examines a couple of the doors, she hears Quibble surreptitiously indicate that it’s not any of those. When Daring questions Quibble’s behavior, Rainbow assures her that he does tend to be right most of the time. So, Daring asks him which door is it, and he explains how six of the doors are three matching pairs depicting Unicorns, Pegasi, and Earth ponies fighting other creatures. However, only one door doesn’t have a match, the one with the alicorn on it.

Look at how smug Quibble looks.

Turns out, he’s right though. That ends up being the door with the Seven-Sided Chest of Chicomoztoc behind it. With the treasure in tow, Daring and her companions try to hightail it out of there, but the temple has already filled up. The only way out is a skylight in the top of the temple, which Quibble points out is pretty much how Daring always escapes from temples. Since they can’t carry Quibble out, Quibble suggests they pull off that jet-skiing trick Rainbow tried before with some vines he found. Daring and Rainbow manage to pull Quibble out though they end up pulling him above the Cipactli when he said around because they misheard him. Once they’re outside, they spot Caballeron and his henchponies looking for them. Daring quickly hatches a plan. She throws a rock at the temple wall, which attracts Caballeron’s attention. It also causes the wall to collapse, releasing the Cipactli that then chases Caballeron and his henchponies away. All the while, Daring, Rainbow, and Quibble are hiding in a pond breathing through reeds. Quibble calls this not particularly inventive or inspired, but it still worked. With that, Daring points out the way out for Rainbow and Quibble and thanks them for their help as she goes off to take the Chest to a museum. As they make their way back, Quibble admits that Daring’s books are more realistic than he thought, but he still doesn’t like the later ones. Before Rainbow has a conniption, Quibble explains that he liked the original trilogy because it focused more on Daring solving puzzles and uses her brain to solve problems. Rainbow likes the Daring that’s awesome and ends up on top no matter what. And it’s okay that they don’t agree on what makes Daring cool. Friends don’t have to agree on everything to get along. Okay, I admit this episode’s plot was a really convoluted way to get at this lesson. I don’t care; I had fun. It's a lesson I stand behind. Also, Quibble also admits that he thinks Rainbow is awesome, and Rainbow admits Quibble is awesome too in his own egghead-y, puzzle-solving kind of way. Awwa. The episode ends with Quibble talking about if possibly A.K. Yearling could let him write her next book.

But that’s not all folks. Instead of the regular theme or any kind of music over the end credits, we get more of Quibble talking about how this book would pan out while referencing his own fan fiction and his status as a “Yearlite”. Is that what a Daring Do fan is called?

And now for another installment of amusing background pony moments!

Did you happen to see Derpy around in this episode?

Yes, that’s right. That’s Derpy in what has to be the worst Dr. Caballeron cosplay imaginable. Well, at least you tried Derpy. I still love you.

This episode was written by Mike Vogel and Josh Haber. While Haber has already written a bunch of episodes this season, this is Vogel’s third this season and pretty much his third ever. Vogel in the past has made known his love of our humble fandom. That could be seen in his last episode “A Hearth’s Warming Tail”. While I expected more direct reference to the Brony fandom, Vogel shows in this episode that he understands how a fandom works, probably from observing not only the Brony fandom, but other fandoms as well. As for what Haber contributed to this episode, I don’t know. His episodes don’t tend to stand out as much. I find it a missed opportunity though that G.M. Berrow didn’t get to be involved in this episode, but her presence is still known. There are two occasions where a Daring Do book called Daring Do and the Trek to the Terrifying Tower is mentioned. It was first mentioned in G.M. Berrow’s book Twilight Sparkle and the Crystal Heart Spell and the events of it were briefly mentioned in Berrow’s other book Daring Do and the Forbidden City of Clouds.

And what of the colt of the (half-)hour Quibble Pants? Quibble Pants is portrayed by Patton Oswalt, an actor and stand-up comedian as well as a self-professed nerd. This is a role made for Patton Oswalt. Quibble’s design and Oswalt’s voice fit together so perfectly. Quibble also gets props for being a likeable portrayal of a type of fan most other fans might consider obnoxious. Certainly, Patton Oswalt’s acting ability helps in that regard. I also liked Quibble’s insistence on poking holes in the reality of everything going on around him despite the fact that it’s really happening. He does a good job of keeping this episode a bit more grounded than a typical episode of such a fantastical series like MLP. The end result is a pretty nuanced character who can admit when he’s wrong but still stands by his beliefs. As it stands, I think Quibble Pants is going to be my favorite new character of this season. He’s definitely someone I’d like to see make further appearances on the show.

Especially if he’s filibustering a Ponyville town council meeting with his idea for the next Daring Do book.

I’m actually admittedly surprised we got another Daring Do episode like this. I know that a number of people didn’t really like “Daring Don’t” because they thought the idea that Daring Do was actually real was patently ridiculous. I was all for it because I was already a fan of fan fictions that did the same thing, and I’m still in the process of writing one myself. (I might need to find another editor though.) There was though an argument among the naysayers that perhaps the whole episode was a dream because in the opening, Rainbow gets hit in the head crashing into a tree. I admit that’s pretty compelling. However, this episode lays such speculation to rest as it further builds on the premise of “Daring Don’t”. And it’s not just Dave Polsky, the auteur of “Daring Don’t”, who thinks that. The very guys at the top, Haber and Vogel, gave us this episode. (Haber and Vogel… That would be a great name from an Austrian rap group.)

I will admit though that this episode might be better than “Daring Don’t”. I think it helps that the focus is not on Daring Do herself but the relationship between Quibble and Rainbow. Quibble also keeps things more grounded here with his realistic concerns considering everything that’s going on around him.

This episode also gets props for its excellent use of Mesoamerican mythology. For example, there’s the Cipactli that attacks them in the temple.

In Aztec mythology, Cipactli is a primordial sea monster that’s part crocodile, fish, and frog or toad that eats everything due to its insatiable appetite. You can totally see that here. There’s also the references to Culiacan and Chicomoztoc. In Aztec mythology, Chicomoztoc was the legendary ancestral home of the Aztec people that contained a series of seven caves. And in this episode, the Temple of Chicomoztoc has seven chambers and the Chest of Chicomoztoc has seven sides. Also, Culiacan is a real place in real-life Mexico that is believed to be the true location of Chicomoztoc. How’s that for doing their research?

As for what I didn’t like, Quibble Pants takes way too long to realize that he’s in the middle of a real Daring Do adventure. I know it’s a common trope, but it’s one I’ve always felt makes a character look unnecessarily stupid. I know that when presented with something one is pretty certain is supposed to be fictional, it’s reasonable to deny that it’s actually happening even when it seems obvious. Still, I would like to see for once someone just accept that whatever is happening is real and save everyone the trouble.

Overall, “Stranger Than Fan Fiction” was a really fun episode that introduced us to a cool new character. It also featured a return appearance of our favorite formerly fictional adventurer Daring Do. It’s a great way to start the second half of Season 6.

What did ya’ll think of “Stranger Than Fan Fiction”?

God bless you all. God bless America. And God bless Equestria.