The End is Near · 3:17am Oct 13th, 2012
Old Man McGuckin up there is right, true believers. It's hard to believe that after just a little under a year of working on it, "Head Full of Cotton Candy" is nearly complete, with only a short and sad epilogue and an alternate "bad" ending left.
It's hard to believe how far this story came and how much it's grown since I first planned it while writing "Heavenly Turmoil" for EqD. I never expected to get this much attention for it, and with the feedback from all my great fans and my great editor, TheGreyPotter, it's been a great trip.
It's funny to think that this story, which has been more of an emotional roller-coaster than anything else I've ever written, was originally something much different. If you'd care for some behind the scenes info, the story was originally just going to be an aimless, pointless comedy of Discord romping around Equestria, alternating between wanting to "help" ponies and wanting to just cause mischief, while outwitting and making fools of the Spirits of Chaos who were more jealous that he got a body than outraged he was destroying the world. So imagine a longer version of Chapter Ten and you're about there. Oddly enough, I think I had planned to do a few spoofs of that chunk of Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" where the monster was wandering around for years and interacting with different people he met. I kno
I decided that the story just would never be anything good enough to follow in the footsteps of the acclaim "Heavenly Turmoil" got me, so I scrapped the basic plan while keeping a few basic ideas. Namely, the Spirits and Savoir Faire. Originally, Savoir Faire was going to be a stallion and only appear in one early chapter where he accidentally sets Discord loose on the world. In fact, just about all of the conversation Screwball had with Discord in the Prologue was carried over from that original concept.
But then I was all
So I decided to make the story more "serious" in that I gave it a plot. And I think for the most part, I'm pretty satisfied with it. It's definitely the longest and probably one of the better stories I've written, but I still think I could do better. Truth be told, there were a lot of times I felt that I was pulling myself out of my comfort range with certain scenes, mainly the sad ones. I can do light-hearted and funny fine enough, but the rest of your hu-man emotions are still a mystery to me.
So I'd like to thank you all for staying around for so long with this story. I think that this would be as good a time to ask as any, I would love to hear your thoughts on the story as a whole. Well, 95% of a whole. What got you interested in the story in the first place? What were your favorite parts or least favorite? I'd really love to hear from you guys, so please, don't be shy.
"Forget about all the bad and the chaos… Just think about the laughter… And don’t forget about me after I’m gone."
Noooo-yaaaaaaayyyy-nooooooooo-yaaaaaaay!
Gah! So...conflicted!
I first started reading the story for whacky Discord antics, and to see how your characterization of Screwball was.
I really couldn't tell that you were going out of your comfort zone with the sad scenes. You got tears out of me on numerous occasions!
My favorite parts were the relationship building with Screwball and Discord in the early chapters, and anything dealing with the Spirits. Seriously, those guys were crazy interesting. The whole concept of them and how they worked was neat, and their actions even moreso, especially those of Time and Death.
It's been a long while since I've read the earlier chapters, so I'm sure that I've forgotten quite a few details. I think I'll read through the story all in one sitting once it's finished.
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You know, the earlier chapters were the more fun for me to work on, too. Just making the dynamic of this helpless pony trying to reason and trick and chastise the Spirit of Chaos was so enjoyable. It was just a blast to explore.
And I'm glad you loved the Spirits too! I swear, I've fallen in love with them. Death was always my favorite, but Harmony snagged second place during the big fight, haha. Time was neat to write dialogue for. I wanted something unique about him, since otherwise he'd be completely emotionless and boring, so I started making him talk like the G-Man from Half-Life and then started going my own direction.
But if you like the Spirits, then you're in luck! Because they'll all be getting their own short spin-off sequel after this, called "The Life and Times of Love and Harmony," focusing on the latter two spirits as they try to keep the peace in Equestria under the disguise of Cadance and Philomena for the centuries leading up to the show. And there also might be some Hearts and Hooves Day chaos and Nightmare Moon fiasco and a wedding dilema. It's going to be barrels of laughs.
I got recommended it by a friend. I'm not usually one for heavier reads, and this has been a heavy read, but it yet sits firmly at the top of my list of all time favourite fics, and has withstood the trial of time that other fics have fallen to. *cough*TULLOD*cough*
The characterisation is great (Screwball is a favourite of mine due to this fic) and the story is incredible. It saddens me that it's nearly at an end, though the promised spin-offs are welcome news. My favourite part would have to be the reunion between Discord and Scroob after the 20 years of chaos. To find a least favourite bit I'd have to read through again, which I'll be joining MonochromaticJelly in doing once you conclude (joining in the act, not at the same time. That'd be weird
It's a shame Discord fics apparently aren't very popular on this site, this deserves 1k+ upvotes.
Edit: Just read through chapter eighteen (I hadn't realised it was up when I wrote this). Least favourite part was what happened to Scroob. You monster
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You know, part of the experience writing this wasn't just about that Discord fics aren't popular. It was that everything I ever saw in Discord origin stories were almost always the same.
>Discord creature born in woods/live among draconequus race
>Taken in by Celestia's family/secretly elopes with Celestia against everyone's wishes like some kind of pony Romeo and Juliet
>Heartbreak
It's always romance and childhood and friendship and Daddy Discord with Screwball. So in proper Discordian fashion, I decided to turn it all on its head. Discord was always Discord, Screwball's the one who raises him, and if you read Heavenly Turmoil, then Celestia has a hand in Discord's origin that I didn't mention in Head Full.
But I'm so glad that your least favorite part about the story is the part that I wanted to be the most soul-crushing. Well. Second most. The end is yet to come.
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My favorite part would yes perhaps be the relationship between Discord and Screwy. Overall the way you've written them has actually made me cry for freaking Discord of all things, though I believe Screwball's side of the story holds the most tragedy. There was probably more room to explore with Celestia and Luna though, with the whole "our dad is dead and we're basically banished from what's rightfully ours". But it seemed their side story was mostly about embarrassment, frustration, and comic relief until the end. But maybe that's not so much of a bad thing after all.
And I would never have guessed that sad isn't your strong suite, given my first impressions of your work with Heavenly Turmoil. But on the flip-side, on Facebook you're as wacky as can be.
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I just wanted to keep the Princesses away from the main plot as much as I could until they were needed at the end for three reasons.
The first was because of my effort to make this Discord origin story unlike any other out there. And the two big recurring characters were always Celestia and Luna. Maybe they were friends or eternal nemeses or love interests or family or something, but they were always a big part of it. So to keep it fresh, they had to be demoted to comic relief.
The second reason was because it simply isn't their story. If they were going to have a bigger role in it, then I would have had some check-ins with them. In fact, in the original "wacky" plan I had, we would see what they were up to from time to time, usually dealing with some trouble as a result of a long string of circumstances caused by Discord. Like having to defend their cave home from an army of bears trying to move in. Or Luna on a sugar high from drinking too much rain. And that led to the third reason...
I just thought it was a funny idea. From their perspective, they were crusading for centuries to try to overthrow Discord, battling endlessly until they finally achieved victory. But in the grander scheme of things, they were mostly insignificant until the last moment. And because of the distinction I wanted to draw between the Spirits' power in comparison to the rest of the world, they couldn't be anything threatening. Then at the end, Discord doesn't try to save himself because he still thought they couldn't harm him.
And as far as sad goes, it's not that I think I do a poor job of creating sad and tragic situations. I just don't feel like I'm terrific at writing out the sad scenes when it's time for them. In Heavenly Turmoil, the sadness comes from the sympathy you have for Celestia, but there was never any time where we read about her feeling sad herself. The sadness came from the reader's reactions instead of something I felt like I invoked in them. And in HFoCC, I thought it was more that the emotion came from the absence of the familiar happiness in the story than the presence of the sad scene.
Then again, I could just be trying to put myself down to push myself to try harder, so that might be it. But writing these two stories have definitely given me some ideas about ways to improve my technique, or just different ways to handle the situations.
And I'm thrilled to hear that you love following on Dopey Discord!