"It's okay, Twilight. It's over." · 5:40pm Sep 18th, 2018
From WandererD's Discord chat:
Petrichord at 9:54 AM
I just miss the idea of writing fanfic from back when there was only one season of the show
heck, even half a season
before worldbuilding and the villains and everything else was crazy
and a lot of fan stories, as far as i remember, were basically just inter-mane 6 shipping
GaPJaxie at 10:17 AM
Okay
@Petrichord We can fix this.
Twilight feels that adulthood is weighing on her. Life seems so grey, so complex, so pointless -- it doesn't have the simple joys it used to. Problems don't get quick resolutions, they just go on. She wishes things could go back to the way they were.
One day, she voices this thought aloud. Discord feels like playing genie, and snaps his fingers: "Done!" In a puff of chaos magic, he sends Twilight back to Season 1.
Twilight arrives in a world with no Starlight, no Discord, no school she had to administer, no castle she feels she has to live up to. She doesn't have princess wings or princess responsibilities, and the world isn't going to explode unless she runs off to save the day in some improbable fashion. She stands in Golden Oak library, surrounded by her little life and her book collection and the tree sprout she watered on the windowsill.
Then Rainbow crashes through her window and says: "Twilight! I need your help. Pinkie Pie is going to strap rockets to my body so I can speed up and become a Wonderbolt even sooner. But Applejack is being a bad friend because she keeps saying it's dangerous."
Then Rainbow pauses and asks: "Twilight, why are you crying?"
Tears streaming down her face, Twilight says: "Because I'm home."
She gives Rainbow Dash a hug. Because things are okay again, and they always will be.
GaPJaxie at 10:21 AM
Then you can go back to writing Season 1 fics like before.
Simple!
welp
lol
Anyone who misses it either wasn't there for it or has nostalgia glasses.
The absolute prime was like S3-S4.
S1 is like the Soviet Union.
"If you do not miss it, you have no heart. If you want it back, you have no brain."
4939796
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4939798
I agree, though I do wish a few S1 worldbuilding elements had been preserved. I love Cadence as a character, but I preferred there only being two alicorns. It made Luna/Celestia more special.
4939798
I kept track of my ratings for all the episodes for a while, all of them made fresh. S1 was the best by a pretty wide margin.
I still think the only unusually good season of the show was the fifth one. I've always liked it and always will, but the rest of the time I'm not sure why people get so angry over any of it.
Does anyone remember when S2 was the bad season?
That got some feels from me. I really do miss the fandom from the first two seasons. Even now my to read list is all stories that I can at least pretend happened within them without using any Princess+ elements.
4939799
I'm of the camp that likes every episode as it comes along and doesn't really have any "bad" or "weak" episodes.
Except for Pinkie Pride and Mysterious Mare-Do-Well.
Wouldn't using rockets to boost your speed be cheating?
4939812
You didn't like Pinkie Pride?
Jax, you are actually the best person in the world to me right now.
Like, I know nostalgia glasses are nostalgia glasses, but that doesn't mean I don't get up some mornings and find them secured snugly over my eyes. Even the delusions of simplicity and innocence are wonderful to get lost in from time to time, since they're an accessible - and sometimes the only - way to rekindle feelings of security and comfort.
In other words, maybe I'll roll my eyes at myself over this tomorrow, but I really need it today.
Thanks, dude.
4939821
De Lancie did Discord with a slightly snarky eye-roll and was just in it for a paycheck, and only became involved more later after he got fanmail as Discord and found out the show itself was pretty legit.
Weird Al was just full-on "Hey let me shit on this thing you like", like every word that he speaks drips with making fun of the whole thing, and he was extremely unprofessional and threw a shitfit over having a script rather than free reign.
Watsonian (in-universe) I dislike them for the same reason- everypony just went "Hey you know that thing that's a cornerstone of your personality and how you find value in yourself? Yeah we're taking it away, get fucked."
It entailed Rainbow Dash, one of Pinkie's favorite ponies and vaguely hinted on-screen OTP ditching her for some new guy because fuck Pinkie and her feelings.
My story Drop easily could have been an alternate ending to it, where Pinkie ends the episode literally left hanging.
Hmm, now I want to read a character study of Twilight who has gone through four cycles of this or so. Because with Twilight being Twilight she's totally not going to stop at doing this once.
Nice. :)
Reminds me a bit of this story, though the situation isn't quite the same.
A week later, Twilight found herself longing for the greater shelf space of the castle, the convenience of wings, and friends who—among other failings they'd yet to outgrow—didn't slam into her house on a biweekly basis.
4939832
Where did you hear this? When asked at conventions "What was it like working with Weird Al?", Andrea Libman always says how professional he was.
Honestly as much as I LOVED Canterlot wedding and how much it opened up I still look back at the stuff before it as being... Better is certainly the wrong word but it's the one my mind clamps onto.
I miss touches like ponies handling everything in their mouths too.
I'mma say it
Season 1 was boring. Inter-mane six shipping is boring.
4939861
I know! Also clapping by stamping their hooves on the ground instead of by clapping their hooves together. When LF was providing art direction they acted way more like horses.
4939859
If I were actually going to write this story, that's the way I'd go.
Nostalgia feels great, but in the end, it's just rose tinted glasses. The future is way better than the past.
4939856
I loved that story!
4939824
Awww. Thank you! I'm glad I could help.
Just remember, you can write Season 1 fics at any time. Literally! Or metaphorically. Your childhood is always in reach even as you deal with the stress of adulthood is what I'm saying.
4939832
What the hay.
4939832
Curious as to your source on that info on Weird Al, as it contradicts several other anecdotal accounts. Can you help?
Hmmm. Since the subject is broached I always felt the golden age for fimficcing was post Season 2. The world had been developed just enough to feel big, but things like Discord and Chrysalis had showed us the world was bigger than we could see, and hinted at mystery and danger if you were into that.
It was just developed enough to give us questions, especially about the Princesses, but not developed enough to give us all the answers yet. Then, as time marched on, emotional conflicts that used to be fuel for the fire either got overplayed or the show either handled them on their own, or took things in a new direction that changed them so the old stories no longer really worked.
On the other hand, while I agree the general quality of fanfic has gone down, and I suspect it's because in part old story archetypes we relied on died, I still think the show has plenty of stories to tell, it's just a matter of finding them.
-> Silverstream seems to have severe trauma related to the Storm King. What was life like under his reign? How did it affect Silverstream personally? How does that affect most hippogriffs? Other kingdoms he subjugated?
-> Where did the Storm King come from? Why was Celestia so lax about dealing with a mercantilist conquerer gobbling up her neighbors?
-> Thorax had two episodes back to back that involved his friends going behind his back and fucking things up because they didn't trust him, and had his whole people turned against him because he tried to be loyal to the only one of them who ever showed him any compassion before their change. How does he feel about all that?
-> Thorax, in universe, is universally agreed to be a huge wuss, but the instant Spike was in danger he turned into a fucking Kodiak bear and tried to beat the shit out of someone. What does that say about him and his relationship with Spike?
-> Celestia has a long history of failing to save people, how would Twilight handle it if she made the same mistake?
-> The Tree of Harmony has begun acting on it's own and even destroyed magical creatures outright because they came too close to it. Why, and perhaps more importantly, why now?
-> Gallus. Just, fucking Gallus. There is a lot of angst there to mine.
-> Scootaloo in side material is confirmed to have absentee parents and is raised by her aunts for extended periods of time. What does that say about her relationship with Rainbow Dash?
-> Apparently Dreamwalking is Serious Business and actually kind of dangerous. How does Luna handle that night to night? What if she took a student? How would they handle it?
So, yeah, I think the show still has potential for people to chip away at and flesh out unanswered questions and implications... I just don't see people doing it. Myself included, mental fatigue and self doubt being a thing.
2>1>5>7>8>6>4>3 fight me
Is there where I go to make hot takes?
Season 1 was pretty good. Season 2 improved upon it somewhat. Season 3 I literally remember none of so I guess that doesn’t count. But seasons 4 and 5–in other words, the ones after Lauren Faust’s direction was scrubbed from the show entirely—were the beginning of the show’s peak, and the Season 7 finale was the show’s actual high point.
So, specifically, my hot takes are these:
1. Though her vision and character design were invaluable in getting FiM off the ground, Lauren Faust leaving was the best thing that ever happened to the show.
2. Adding Starlight Glimmer as a main character saved the show and made it inordinately better.
Come to me with your downvotes, children. Give them to me, so that I might bask in their inefficacy.
Glim-Glam for life, motherfuckers.
4939929
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4939890
Every time I rewatch S1 I always get a little happy seeing those details.
4939920
Given what Starswirl said about the Tree and the Elements, it was probably originally intended to be an automated self-defense system.
4939929
Yes, I am best pony.
4939929
Season 3 should at least be remembered for "Sleepless in Ponyville", which I felt was quite a remarkable episode at the time; it focused on Scootaloo, the Crusader who hadn't had her own episode until that point, featured Luna Actually Doing Something™, introduced dreamwalking, cemented the until-then only fanonical Dash-Scootaloo sisterly bond, and kicked off the CMC mini-dream-arc that played out over the next two seasons.
Also Scootaloo makes this face, which is surely in the running for Best Face Of The Series when the show ends.
Sure are some wrong opinions in here. :V
(inb4 downvote storm)
4940009
All I said was that I could fix it.
And I can. We can.
We can always go back.
This is going to make me cry.
There was a lot more worldbuilding and epic fantasy, but at the same time it also felt smaller. So many stories just about Luna and Celestia, or only in Ponyville. Most of the stuff about famous background characters really came along during season 2.
4939805 Yeah, Season 5 was definitely the peak.
4939992
In total honesty, that was the only S3 episode I could remember offhand, so yes, I agree.
4940024
Yar, this leads into dark waters, matey. Waters fraught with queer beasties what no fanfic writer dares speak of above a whisper.
Things like... "fix-fics," and "series re-tellings," an' "Stories where everything is the same but my awesome OC gets to do everything."
Ye best turn away from this madness while ye still can, me hearty...
Also, happy Talk Like A Pirate Day, mateys!
I figure that's still the case…
4939893
Ah, heh, nice. :)
Pity it doesn't seem to be updating anymore, though the author is at least still active and hasn't marked it as cancelled.
God, it feels like the wake after a funeral in here.
The problem with the past is that it never comes around to being the future again
4940281
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“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.”
― Heraclitus
It's a good quote, I think, and one that has more practical application than it first seems.
There was a point in history where many reputable astronomers opposed the development of larger telescopes. While previous advancements in optics had yielded fascinating discoveries, for decades, larger telescopes had only revealed progressively deeper star fields. The behavior of stars was already well understood -- or perhaps, it was already understood well enough. What then was the point of these expensive and elaborate constructions, if all they were going to do was reveal more stars to catalog?
I think there is a point in the development of any creature, field, or society where novel discoveries wane. New things may perhaps be found, but they seem to be nothing more than permutations of old concepts.
It is possible to break out of this rut, as the astronomers did, by pushing forward until something truly unexpected is found (pulsars, in their case). But I don't think this is the only option for escape.
After all, sometimes a permutation -- or a mutation -- takes on novel properties all its own. Sometimes it lets you see things in a new way, or changes your understanding.
Even if you could shrink down and run through the woods again, you wouldn't be the same pony and they wouldn't be the same woods.
I could advise, like Celestia once did, "You must stop reading so many old books!" However, I think the advice would fall on deaf ears, and in any case the books you read are rather new. So instead I will say that I think your concerns are unfounded. We make the world bigger with our actions, and though novel discoveries may be finite, the treasures that await our creation are -- I think -- unending.
After all, you can always write fanfiction for real life.
Frankly, I'm a bigger fan of this website than the show.
Didn't "Empty Room", "Dangerous Business", "Fallout EQ", and a buttload of Octy Scratch fics appear in this time period?
4939798
Here's the point where I feel like you're just taking the piss. The second half of S3 was where I literally had to get drunk to make it through episodes, and somewhere in the first quarter/third of S4 I was one or two bad episodes from dropping the series and just sticking to fanfiction.
4939927
That's pretty close to mine, though I'm not sure of the exact order of 6, 7, and 8. Also I usually differentiate the first and second halves of 3 for the reason stated above.
4940009
There's always room for the bitter, dead-hearted oldies somewhere else. :V
4939799
I always felt like the end of season 3 was kind of the end of the show, and then they kept making more of it. Having Twilight become an alicorn sort of explained where alicorns came from and also why there aren't so many of them, and also created fertile fanfic fodder (and of course people in the fandom being angry because clearly the show was now ruined forever~).
Admittedly Cadance always was an odd duck, but when Twilight ascended, Cadance also served as a fellow newbie alicorn but not quite as new, so you had the ability to see someone who was ten years further into that role without being Celestia (who is a thousand plus years old) or Luna (who is... well, a thousand plus years old but debatably much younger than that and less mature, but with a lot of other random baggage).
I don't think her introduction would have been a good thing without Twilight's ascension, but I think with Twilight's ascension (and also Cadance's various attachments to Celestia and Twilight both directly and with Shining Armor) it had a lot of potentially interesting angles.
4940881
It was supposed to be, but then more seasons got hreenlit.
4940865
No, I'm completely serious. And then it just got better from there.
I never stopped writing season 1 fics in the first place.