Fimfiction:

[Grimdark] is for when you want to write a story that’s a few shades darker than the feel of the show. In these fics, there is gore and violence and swearing – well, not always. You’ll see variations like [Dark] and [Grimlight] around a lot, because no-one can agree on exactly what this tag is actually supposed to mean.

Google:

dark
därk/Submit
adjective
adjective: dark; comparative adjective: darker; superlative adjective: darkest
1.
with little or no light.
"it's too dark to see much"
synonyms: black, pitch-black, jet-black, inky; More
antonyms: bright
hidden from knowledge; mysterious.
"a dark secret"
synonyms: mysterious, secret, hidden, concealed, veiled, covert, clandestine; More
archaic
ignorant; unenlightened.
"he is dark on certain points of scripture"
(of a theater) closed; not in use.
"on Tuesdays he'd wait tables because the theater was dark"
2.
(of a color or object) not reflecting much light; approaching black in shade.
"dark green"
(of someone's skin, hair, or eyes) brown or black in color.
synonyms: brunette, dark brown, chestnut, sable, jet-black, ebony More
antonyms: blond/blonde, pale
(of a person) having dark skin, hair, or eyes.
"both my father and I are very dark"
served or drunk with only a little or no milk or cream.
3.
(of a period of time or situation) characterized by tragedy, unhappiness, or unpleasantness.
"the dark days of the war"
synonyms: tragic, disastrous, calamitous, catastrophic, cataclysmic; More
antonyms: happy
gloomily pessimistic.
"a dark vision of the future"
synonyms: gloomy, dismal, pessimistic, negative, downbeat, bleak, grim, fatalistic, black, somber; More
antonyms: optimistic
(of an expression) angry; threatening.
"Matthew flashed a dark look at her"
synonyms: moody, brooding, sullen, dour, scowling, glowering, forbidding, threatening, ominous More
suggestive of or arising from evil characteristics or forces; sinister.
"so many dark deeds had been committed"
synonyms: evil, wicked, sinful, immoral, bad, iniquitous, ungodly, unholy, base; More
antonyms: virtuous, good
4.
PHONETICS
denoting a velarized form of the sound of the letter l (as in pull ).
noun
noun: dark; noun: the dark; plural noun: darks
1.
the absence of light in a place.
"Carolyn was sitting in the dark"
synonyms: darkness, blackness, gloom, murkiness, shadow, shade; More
antonyms: light
nightfall.
"I'll be home before dark"
synonyms: night, nighttime, darkness; More
antonyms: dawn, day
2.
a dark color or shade, esp. in a painting.

Hope this helps and clears some stuff up

War out! (cuz peace is overrated)

That is all. Equestria is ours.

1655749 while this is useful, you shouldn't lock the thread. let people have the chance to discuss because rarely will we perceive things as they are directly defined and we shouldn't imply that that's our standards of what dark and grimdark is.
at the very least let me know when you're going to lock something so I can put my thoughts on it too without unlocking it and relocking it

1655936
Okay!

No problem *goes to unlock*

That is all. Equestria is ours.

1655749

You left out the most common definition, which is a setting which is so dark and cynical that it's essentially impossible for good to win without becoming evil themselves, and the setting is horrific. This version is especially prominent when Noblebright and the mixes are being brought up as it enables a concrete definition the distinguishes between Nobledark vs Grimbright. Essentially Grim vs Noble determines cynical and hopeless verus idealistic and hopeful, whereas Dark vs Bright describes a cruel environment versus a (at least seemly) paradisal one. The fimfiction only works with fanfiction, when it wasn't used to describe fanfiction when it was first used (The term originates from Warhammer with "In the grim darkness of the far future there is only war.", and it was solidified when wizard of the coast declared that their game Shadowmoor was less than grimdark because there is still a glimmer of hope. ), and that definition is pretty much only used within the brony fandom, which is also notorious for improperly using literary terms like Breaking the Fourth Wall. The dictionary definition is nonsense as that's just two words put together, which doesn't work as the phrase has gestalt meaning.

1659092
I've never heard that definition before

Is there anywhere where you can link me to this definition's authenticity? I've never seen it before, but it sounds very... interesting.

That is all. Equestria is ours.

1659155

I can pull up countless examples of it.

http://archive.foolz.us/tg/thread/18111502/

http://4chandata.org/tg/Is-the-grim-dark-thing-a-fad-Will-it-end-one-dayAt-this-point-almost-every-campaign-tries-to-be-dark-grim-realistic-dark-disturbin-a113520

(generally it describes the setting, but here someone was using it to describe characters)

http://fav.me/d5b9yql

And alignment charts:

http://1-media-cdn.foolz.us/ffuuka/board/tg/image/1336/62/1336623665189.jpg

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://0-media-cdn.foolz.us/ffuuka/board/a/image/1360/55/1360557061274.jpg&imgrefurl=http://archive.foolz.us/a/thread/79923939/&usg=__NOZT1yZ01JZPLFRru8pH77Ao7_c=&h=701&w=900&sz=167&hl=en&start=1&sig2=jhWtNdl1dKIn6tpQpT6Q7w&zoom=1&tbnid=lTgclOK9ajwALM:&tbnh=180&tbnw=231&ei=-vojUu3wNcftrAfS-IDgAw&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dnobledark%2Bvs%2Bgrimbright%26safe%3Dactive%26sa%3DX%26hl%3Den%26biw%3D1436%26bih%3D722%26tbs%3Dsimg:CAQSXgmVOByU4r1qPBpKCxCwjKcIGjgKNggBEhCfBKAExAOBBLEB3gXzA90FGiCfiFFUhiV79apXBqvcjcu2pVbUaPy8gVnleXx_1Oum5hwwLEI6u_1ggaAAwhZrJijQ34zvY%26tbm%3Disch&itbs=1&ved=1t:3588,r:0,s:0,i:59&iact=rc&page=1&tx=184&ty=103

On it's own Grimdark doesn't have as solid of a definition besides from being extremely cynical and crapsack, but whenever the variations are brought up it's definition is pretty unanimous.

1659296
mmkmmk

Well, thanks for the contribution! Your help is much appreciated... yada, yada, yada.

I'll put the chart up. Stay dark!

That is all. Equestria is ours.

1659332

Now, if you want to look at some examples, FiM is extremely Noblebright. I guess the reason why grimdark is so hard to define within the fandom is that in comparison to the show any dark fiction would be Grimdark even if it's far from it by normal standards. Adventure Time is very bright, but it's uncertain whether it's more noble or grim, so it's solidly Neutralbright. I think Happy Tree friends would be Grimbright, but I haven't actually seen the show so I'm not sure. I assume Motor City is Nobledark, but again I haven't actually seen it. Metalcopaylse sounds like it's somewhere between Neutraldark and Grimdark.

Without going into the hybrids, here is a general comparison of Noblebright vs Grimdark http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Noblebright where it's pretty clear Grimdark isn't just a thematically dark story, it's an entire setting that's cynical and horrific. http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Grimdark

1659092

You left out the most common definition, which is a setting which is so dark and cynical that it's essentially impossible for good to win without becoming evil themselves, and the setting is horrific.

That's close to how I think of "dark", but without "the setting is horrific." I think of horror and dark as being nearly opposite: In horror, something horrible happens to good people. In dark, good people have to do something horrible. Horror is knowing that around the corner, someone with an axe is waiting to kill you. Dark is standing behind a corner, holding an axe, waiting to kill an innocent person for what seems like a good reason. In horror, some evil has entered the world and you're trying to fix it. In dark, there's nothing evil and nothing to fix--that's just the way the world is. Anything in which good and evil are distinct, like "Batman" movies, isn't dark.

Stereotypical horror would be most horror movies or Steven King novels: some evil force enters the community from outside, and must be killed to make things right again. Stereotypical dark is Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness or Apocalypse Now, or Kafka's The Trial. But dark can also have no violence, no tension, just the nihilism, like Hemingway's “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place” (the one where he writes “Our nada who art in nada, nada be thy name thy kingdom nada thy will be nada in nada as it is in nada"), or even DH Lawrence's "The Horse-Dealer's Daughter", which is a deconstruction of love.

And a dark story can have a hopeful ending, as long as it makes it clear it's only hope and not a solution. The 2006 movie "The Fall" is an example, where in the end, the main character resolves not to try to kill himself again for a little while longer.

5960962

Good analysis, though there is a difference between "dark" and "grim dark".

5961209 Yeah, guess I lost track of what we were defining.