Dan Vs. A Small Amount of Ambiguity(Season 1 spoilers)

Spoiler warning for anyone who has not read Season 1 of Dan Vs. The Magic of Friendship.

So, honestly I should've been doing spoiler warnings a long time ago but eh, it is what it is. Anyway, something ambiguous about Dan Vs. TMoF was the ending. Rice and Vice both appear at the end, unscathed, and Vice saves Dan to "return the favor." It's revealed that Rice and Vice, when they entered the time portal in Equestria's past, it did not transport them back to the immediate time Dan and Rice were sucked into it, but allowed them to return to roughly 10 years prior to that moment. This allowed Rice to raise his son to maturity; Vice is now an adult, about 20 years old, and resembles the Vice Grip Dan was first introduced to in the early episodes.

Used to have a drawing of Vice from a long time ago but, lost it. Either way, Vice is a brown pony with a sandy-blonde mane, he wears a labcoat and of course, has gauntlets and boots attached to his forelegs and hindlegs respectively. The gauntlets' design was based on the Silver Gauntlets from Legend of Zelda, while the boots were based on the Long Fall boots from Portal, though quite a bit bulkier for the latter. The idea was for Vice to be an antagonist with scars that were inward, and outwardly he appears extremely advanced, but strange for a pony.

Towards the end of Episode 17, Vice appears and kicks everyone's ass, appearing invincible. However, it's revealed that this is not Vice, but Rice Puddinghead IV, the former chancellor of the Earth Ponies. It's stated that he was impersonating his own son using an elaborate form of self-hypnosis, another reference to Liquid Ocelot from Metal Gear Solid. Rice does this to obfuscate his true goals from Luna, who is capable of reading minds through dreams, and to cope with the intense grief he feels at the loss of his son.

But... now we know he never truly lost Vice. Or somehow he did, and somehow Dan got him back. When Vice appears at the end, he looks pretty much the same as before Episode 17, before Rice revealed his true identity. But was that pony before really Rice all along, or was it Vice acting on his father's behalf? When Dan fought him in the Crystal Empire, was it Rice impersonating Vice or was it Vice playing his part to preserve the timeline? Being villains is definitely a fun father-son bonding experience, it would seem. I leave this entirely up to interpretation of the audience.

The only mark Vice has on him is a tiny scar on his chest, completely obscured by his coat so it's completely unnoticeable. Rice and Vice have been living in Equestria, staying out of the way until Dan finally returned from his 'punishment' on the moon. Dan has always had a strange relationship with magic.

So, thanks to time travel shenanigans, there were two versions of the main characters that existed throughout almost the entire story. Dan was both active on Equestria and trapped on the dark side of the moon until his sentence ended. The Director and Chrys were both two alternate versions of Queen Chrysalis from other dimensions. And Rice and Vice both returned earlier than expected, so while one Rice was either plotting revenge or impersonating his son, the other was off tinkering and helping Dan with other secret projects.

There are a few other things that I leave up to audience interpretation. This story will always at least partly belong to the readers and those who enjoy it and these characters, so you are free to come up with your own ideas as well. Who knows? Maybe you'll see them expanded on sometime...