Text version:

Games Ponies Play is a really mediocre episode of MLP, sprinkled with the kind of gold nuggets that the show is usually good for and, I suspect, wouldn’t hold up under episodes of this quality without.

Even though the plot was’t remotely engaging, I still smiled and laughed through most of the episode because the show is almost predisposed to providing great character-based comedy. The ongoing joke about Rainbow Dash’s childhood disappointment is good, and some of Pinkie Pie’s jokes are really good, though also some of them are stupid as shit. The scene wherein this season’s mane five put on a cheer is excellent and very well animated, though other parts of the episodes feature awkward animation and weird camera angles.

That comment about the mane five, by the way, was out of spite for this STILL not being a FUCKING Rarity episode. A thirteen-episode season, and we got TWO fucking Spike episodes, but no Rarity episode. At least Rarity already has two of the best episodes of the show, so she’s still in a better boat than Applejack.

The biggest problem with this episode is that the plot is fundamentally uninteresting and poorly done. The stakes are set up that if the games inspector doesn’t like what she sees, then the Crystal Empire won’t get to host the Equestria games. But the games inspector ends up relegated to a practically nonexistent role, while we instead follow some other random mare whom the ponies mistake for the games inspector and give a tour instead.
The only source of tension, then, is that we know they’ve got the wrong pony. The minute we saw the inspector on the platform, that bit of tension was established, but the entire time they’re giving a tour to the wrong pony, the tension isn’t expanded on at all. What was even the point of this plot thread? What did it add to the episode?

Even the tension over Rarity not being able to get Cadence’s hair right is botched because there’s never any close call with the inspector seeing it all wrong. It was just a way to tie up Cadence for the rest of the episode, and it resulted in also taking Rarity out of the group antics as well, cementing her into a season-long role of being largely inconsequential.

The resolution of the episode is incomprehensible. Harshwhinney claims that she’s now heard an unbiased opinion of the place, which makes no fucking sense, because in reality, she was the one receiving unbiased treatment. She’s admitting that her judgement of what town is deserving is based on how well they can pamper her, considering that the way the town treated what it thought was a regular-ass visitor was actually terrible.

So yeah, the plot is basically Swiss cheese, and impossible to care about. Nevertheless, Dave Polsky works in some of his unique brand of fun dialog. This episode isn’t going to make anyone start liking Polsky, nor make me feel good about defending his episodes in the past, but at least he gave me a reference to Neo-Gothic architecture out of nowhere. Also, Rarity said auspicious, which my fifteen year-old brother had to ask me the meaning of.

No but really, there’s genuinely excellent parts of this episode that deserve to be looked at.
Most prominent among these is the sub-plot of Princess Cadence teaching Twilight how to calm herself down. I adore that this entire sub-plot unfolded wordlessly throughout the episode. First, Cadence shows Twilight the technique, and Twilight picks up on its purpose just by feeling it. Twilight sees Cadence use it to calm herself when she gets the bad news, and is intrigued at the sight of it.

Twilight actually uses this technique to calm herself at all of the points where we’d expect her to start yelling in an ordinary episode. This is a brilliant use of her character, and the scene where she starts basically hyperventilating the technique is hilarious. It even ties in well with Just For Sidekicks, because when I watched that episode, I thought it was strange that Twilight expected Spike to have done a great job, even though she’d been suspicious about him. This episode reveals that she was only expecting as much because of her new found calming technique.

While I’m on the subject of subtle characterization, I should also mention how the unnamed earth pony is ultra-claustrophobic for some reason. Also I kept expecting that she was going to turn out to be one of the athletes or something, after watching her outrun Shining Armor’s entire track team.

And that’s about it. No, I’m joking, you know I wouldn’t have ended this video without metnioning Rainbow Dash’s PARENTS. That’s parents with an S by the way.

Now before I go for real, I know someone’s gonna ask if I’ve heard about Fighting is Magic, which I have. I will talk about it later in a video I have planned as a follow-up to the end of season three. In the meantime, check out AnY Pony’s video about the subject. And whatever you do, just keep calm and brony on.

Text version:

Winter Wrap Up is a great and popular episode, with the show’s first really big, catchy musical number in it. The concept of the episode is creative and totally awesome. Ponies have to physically clean up winter in order to change the seasons? Amazing!

When you think about it, this totally throws into question the relationship between Equestria and our world. I mean, if ponies control the seasons, does that mean seasons don’t occur in nature? How would the world operate without their weather maintenance  How can their world not have its own weather?! Do the seasons occur in the same conventional order as they do in our world, and if so, then how did the ponies come up with the idea of managing the weather this way? Was there a time before weather? Is it possible that season one really IS in chronological order, and the only reason Fall Weather Friends comes right after Winter Wrap Up is that the seasons operate in a way beyond our comprehension?
I could go on like this all day, but for the sake of my sanity, let’s carry on.

Spike is kind of a jerk in this episode, mostly out of being really tired. It got me wondering if Spike should actually be hibernating through the Winter. After all, neither Spike nor Twilight seems to know much about dragon physiology. The dragon from Dragonshy seemed intent on sleeping all god damned day. Maybe dragons hibernate, and Spike is accidentally living an unhealthy lifestyle.

Here’s a fun little aside: did you notice that Fluttershy isn’t the captain of the animals team? Later in the episode, she seems to be the outspoken member of the group, but she probably didn’t want to be captain because she was too timid for command.

Another aside: I just noticed that Pinkie Pie claims to have been performing the ice skating job since she was a very small filly. In my pony ages video, I wondered about how long Pinkie Pie has lived in Ponyville, and whether or not her rock farm is a part of Ponyville. Assuming that her farm isn’t a part of Ponyville, she must have moved there a long time ago, likely immediately after the Sonic Rainboom event.

Getting more into the technical side of this episode, I get the feeling that Winter Wrap Up may have been an early episode in the MLP production cycle. While the animation is more ambitious than the likes of The Ticket Master, there are a lot of awkward or wonky facial expressions which would never be seen again in later episodes. It definitely doesn’t feel like it was made some time after Applebuck Season, which was the earliest episode to have really sure-handed animation.

The lesson of this episode was unexpected. It’s interesting that the town’s stubborn tradition is represented as more important than Twilight’s magic. In fact, it’s strange that this supposedly Earth Pony founded town has a tradition in which Pegasi do most of the work. Surely it was Pegasus AND earth pony founded, right? You know… since they would’ve had a town with no weather otherwise? No ability to CREATE winter.

It’s nice that Twilight found her place in all this, but I don’t know how I feel about promoting counter-intuitive tradition. We do see that when Twilight tries to use magic, she fails at it, which makes it seem like magic is legitimately ill-advised in wrapping up winter, but you’d think they’d try and find some way to make it work.

On another more tangential note, if you’ve been watching my videos, you know that I consider the main pony design to be a catch-all for ponies ages fifteen to thirty. Well, now I’m going to add that the design is also representitive of multiple body types. My basis being the line in which Applejack says Twilight is moving “awful fast for such a little pony.” We, of course, do not see any difference between the size of Twilight and any other mare, but maybe in-universe, they’re meant to be different sizes. Or, it could just be that AJ was comparing her to the other ponies pushing plows, since the rest all appeared to be male.
And lastly, does the part wherein the Pegasus ponies strip all the snow away remind anyone else of Daicon IV?

So yeah, this is a solid episode, though it’s one that doesn’t really stand out except for having a bangin song in the middle. It also makes me think I should probably go ahead and wrap up winter myself.

[Parody clip]

Text version:

MMMMMMG. FUCK. YES. Guys. Seriously.

Sorry, I’m having trouble formulating complete sentences about this episode because MMMMMM

Okay, so. For starters, this is pretty much my favorite episode. No not of season three, not of MLP, just my favorite episode… period. I know, it’s too early to be saying that, but I truly do not care. This episode is, in my eyes, utterly perfect, and I’m going to try my best to articulate why that is over the course of at least two videos. Anything which I don’t address in this video, you can expect to see in the next one, which will take anywhere from a couple of days to a couple of weeks to make, depending on how hard it is for me to calm down and really take my time to work through every little aspect of this episode.

Because it is SERIOUSLY dense. I think I mentioned in my Applebuck Season video that density is a big deal for me, and this episode is possibly the most dense of the entire show, in terms of attention to detail, entertainment, and emotion.

A few people have told me that they didn’t like the pacing of this episode, and if you feel that way, I’m going to first ask you to watch the episode again; and once you’ve done that, if you still feel that way, then if you could explain to me what’s wrong with the pacing, I’m curious to know, because I thought it was flawless.

Then again, pacing has always been my biggest issue with MLP two-parters in the past. Two-parters usually have to introduce a lot of new concepts, which means a lot of exposition, and when there’s a lot of exposition, it means there’s also a lot of filler jokes thrown in to balance out the dialog. Because of this, it always takes longer than it should to introduce the concepts, leaving each part feeling either over-long, or rushed.

Magical Mystery Cure does not fuck around. It establishes the point IMMEDIATELY, using a musical montage to show us that five of the mane six have had their cutie marks mixed up, leading them to switch lifestyles. There seems to be some kind of memory problem involved in all of it, and tying this whole thing into my previous destiny video is going to deserve a video all on its own, though for now let me just say that I fist-pumped every time the word “destiny” was used in this episode.

Once it’s been established that the mane six have the wrong jobs, we get a sad song (awesome) which shows us that living the wrong destinies has left them all depressed; their lives in shambles.

Then Twilight realizes that if she gets her friends to help one-another out, then each of them will realize what they were meant to do all along. This takes form in a fucking EPIC music montage that has so far made me cry twice; and the whole situation is sorted out.

So I ask, why does this need more time? What was not fleshed out here? If anything, we got the point twice over that the ponies were leading the wrong lives, and then Twilight fixes it by getting her friends to help one-another. It’s an incredibly simple concept for an episode, and probably would’ve been just a normal episode if not for what was going to come afterwards. Because of what was to come, the writers decided to be succinct, and cut out the usual antics and slower pacing, replacing it with musicals that could communicate a large amount of emotion in a short amount of time. During the sad song, we don’t even need dialog to get the message loud and clear that this has gotten to be a really dark time.

After the true friends song, we go right into Twilight meeting Celestia in this fucking AMAZING ethereal plane area, where Celestia tells her that Twilight’s understanding of friendship has reached the level where she can surpass even the most powerful unicorn and become an alicorn princess.

Um… yes?!

You may have noticed that I was fairly tight-lipped about the whole alicorn thing ever since it was leaked two weeks ago, even though people asked me about it constantly. The reason was that my first impression was that it sounded fucking awesome. I had no reason to doubt that it would be awesome, so I just wanted to look forward to the episode and see what happened.

And, uh, IT WAS AWESOME. Seriously, what could possibly not be awesome about this? Twilight fulfilled her character arc and the purpose which she came to Ponyville for. All of her deeds up until now prepared her for her role as a master, no longer a student. The scene where Celestia and Twilight’s friends bow to Twi was like the “you bow to no man” scene from the Lord of the Rings, and equally tear-inducing on my part. Er, I mean, liquid pride inducing.

But Digibrony! Doesn’t this mean the end of Twilight’s character arc? Yes, it means the end of ONE character arc. But now this show gets to do what only a few amazing shows ever get to do: start a whole new arc. Yeah, if MLP had ended right here, it would’ve been pretty satisfying, but you know what’s even more satisfying? Fucking GETTING TO SEE MORE, DUH. Of course I want to see the adventures of Princess Fucking Sparkle and friends! THAT IS THE BEST POSSIBLE THING. Just think about how many new doors this opens up for plot and character development! There are so many new possibilities to explore!

This episode, probably would have been one of my favorites even if the plot had just been a throw-away deal. If you took out the whole princess thing and just had a musical episode about the friends all switching destinies, that would’ve been enough for me. I am a giant fan of musical episodes in shows, and while I’ve loved all the musical numbers in MLP, I’ve always wanted there to be a full-on musical episode.

Even more than that though, there was so much going on visually that my eyes melted out of my skull. This episode had the kind of epic imagery that made me love A Canterlot Wedding so much, but it had even bigger moments and even more unexpected areas.

On the level of sheer visceral entertainment, this is god tier stuff. But it’s not only that. It’s also a damn great episode of MLP. It utilizes the show’s continuity more beautifully than any other episode, which we can thank M.A.Larson for since, as I proved in my Magic Duel video, he’s pretty much the biggest driving force towards a unified storyline in MLP. Yeah, I know it all springs from Lauren, but as sad as it is to say, Lauren isn’t around anymore. And as long as writers like M.A. Larson are still holding the show together this brilliantly, I’m okay with that.

Tomorrow I’m going to be talking about this episode in the Crepuscular Bronies livestream led by AnY Pony, though I’m probably going to be a huge bastard and rant about how this is the best thing since sliced bread every time I open my mouth. So check that out. I’ll also be putting out an overview of season three some time in the next few days. Once that stuff is done, you’ll have my permission to start bugging me about making part two of this analysis. Until then, I’ll be continuing to torment everyone I know by incoherently screaming about how much I love this episode.

Text version:

Every time you state an opinion about something, you are making a highly informed decision. You are choosing to believe a certain thing, which will become your truth. Truth is not an inherent property after all—it’s something that you create through belief. So when you say that an episode is “good,” it’s not that the episode is inherently good, it’s that you’ve chosen to believe that it’s good. And if an episode is incongruent with what you have decided is good, then you may wish to decide that that episode is bad.

Here are some decisions that I’ve made.

I’ve decided that I like The Crystal Empire. I could have decided that I hated it, because the plot is a jumbled mess, and no one gives a shit about Sombra or the crystal ponies, and the representations of the mane characters are extremely basic. If I wanted to, I could decide that those things matter to me, and I could focus on those things. However, I’ve decided that those things aren’t that big a deal. What is a big deal to me, though, is Rainbow Dash eating corn. And Rainbow Dash being a bully. And Applejack’s head tilt. Because of those things, I’ve decided to have a sort of ambivalent positive feeling towards the episode.

I’ve decided that I don’t like Games Ponies Play. I could have decided that I liked it, because Pinkie Pie has a cinnamon bun, and Rainbow Dash crashes into the ceiling. These things matter to me, but I also can’t get over how utterly inept the episode’s storytelling is, and how much I didn’t care about the incidental characters. Even though I’d ideally like to love every episode of MLP, I’m comfortable enough with not doing so that when a mediocre episode like this comes along, I can feel a very satisfying dislike for it. The satisfaction comes from defining the dislike so well that I fully understand what disliking it means about me.

But before I continue to talk about season three’s episodes, let’s talk about the structure.

Unless you’re a big fan of this season more so than you are of the other seasons, and I have met some people like that, Season Three was always going to be the worst season by virtue of being only thirteen episodes. I’ve chosen to believe that Season Three has the same density of quality episodes that seasons one and two had, but having half as many episodes necessarily means that it isn’t as good.

That said, I think this is the only manner in which the season is not as good. In my opinion, the first thirteen episodes of season one contained one amazing episode, three or four great episodes, six or seven good episodes, three or four mediocre episodes, and one bad episode. Comparitively, I think that season three contained one amazing episode, four great episodes, four or five good episodes, four or five mediocre episodes, and one or two maybe bad episodes.

Obviously these counts will vary heavily from person to person, but I want to ask that you actually go and MAKE those counts. Before you claim that season three was generally weaker, go back and pick a thirteen-episode stretch from season one, and compare notes. I DO think that the first thirteen episodes of Season Two were much better than either of these thirteen-episode stretches, but my point is simply that I don’t think season three is sub-par for the course.

Now, a lot of you are probably still wondering, why WAS season three only thirteen episodes? And why has Hasbro been pulling the episodes from youtube, and taking down a ton of fanworks with them? What’s going ON?!

From what information I’ve been able to gather, the most likely answer is that Hasbro is preparing MLP for syndication. What this means is that Hasbro will start selling broadcast rights to other networks, so that they can air the show. 65 episodes is the industry standard package size for selling rights to kids’ shows, and after season three, MLP now has that many episodes, making it a clean three-season package.

If this is why season three was thirteen episodes, it would also explain the takedowns. You may have heard the rumor that Hasbro was trying to sell the show’s broadcast rights to China, but that the Chinese networks had said that they wouldn’t pay for what could be had for free online. I’ve still never seen the source of this rumor, and it sounds pretty batty to begin with, but if you replace “China” with something like “Cartoon Network,” it’s a very reasonable idea. Why would a network want to pay to air reruns of a show which are easily available on youtube? Considering that the majority of the blocked videos are blocked solely in the United States, this makes way more sense than the whole China explanation.

The brony stuff on youtube is just caught in the crossfire. The mechanism youtube uses to remove copyright material is automated, and removes whatever it detects as infringement. Fair Use and the definition of derivative works is too unclear and youtube doesn’t have the time or interest in arguing with it. It doesn’t particularly matter to them that the content is gone if it means the problem is off of their hands. More than being a problem with Hasbro or youtube, this is a problem with the shitty, inefficient modern copyright laws.

Moving along, let’s talk about the artistic differences in this season:

Some viewers have felt that season three was a massive departure from previous seasons. That its fundamental goals, and the driving force behind it, are different. Many have cited the fact that series creator Lauren Faust is no longer around as the reason things feel different. I have my doubts about how different the season really is, and which things would or wouldn’t have happened if Faust were still around.

Trying to read creative intent into an animated series is incredibly difficult. I would know, because I’ve been doing it obsessively for six years. As an anime blogger, my specialty was keeping track of who contributed what to different works, and trying to figure out what stuff came from what minds in the production. It’s very possible that whatever Lauren contributed, that is the one thing which is truly missing, and it’s possible that this one thing resonated with you. While I have an appreciation for all of the things contributed to this series, it’s possible that if your greatest appreciation was for that one thing, and that thing no longer exists, then you might hate this season altogether.

But for me, again, I’m in love with every part of this series. I love all of the things that have remained all consistent across the seasons, which is the bulk of the show, and I also love the new things that have become a part of the show. I perceive this subtle difference in the show’s nature, and I enjoy both natures equally.

Okay! Now that I’ve basically set the stage for the season, let’s go ahead and talk about it, shall we?

For starters, the episodes that I’ve decided I don’t really care about.

Games Ponies Play is, for me, the most forgettable episode of the season. The plot is altogether uninteresting and unengaging, and there’s nothing in there that makes me feel like I need to go back and see it again.

Spike At Your Service and Just For Sidekicks are also episodes that I’ll probably forget about before long. In Spike at Your Service’s case, it’s an episode with a weak structure and plot that isn’t quite saved by the good ideas that it does have. It’s a “gems in shit” kind of episode, whereas Just For Sidekicks is more of a flatline episode. That is to say that it’s entertaining, but it’s also so difficult to really give a shit about that I can’t say I’ll go back to it much. Neither is a bad episode, they just don’t make me care, which is true of every Spike episode.

Apple Family Reunion is just depressing for me. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the episode, but it failed to engage me on any level whatsoever, and this is distressing for me because it’s an Applejack episode, and I want to be engaged with her.

And last of this section is Keep Calm and Flutter On, which is probably the most confusing episode of the season. It’s a great concept with botched execution, simultaneously having ideas so good that I wrote a positive review of it, but also with things that were so detestable that I didn’t disagree with Strebiskunk’s downright scathing review of it either. When it comes right down to it, I personally am not invested enough in Discord as a character to care much about what this episode’s failures, and while I’m interested in the way it portrays Fluttershy, so much of it was what I read into the episode that I don’t feel the need to actually watch it.

Now, some episodes that I’ve decided I liked.

The Crystal Empire appeals to me for some reason. Maybe it’s the feeling of adventure, seeing places like the inside of Sombra’s castle. Maybe it’s just that the individual character moments are so fun and ultimately valuable in a capacity outside of how they relate to the actual story. With or without Sombra and the crystal ponies, there’s something in this episode that engaged me and makes me enjoy rewatching it, as I’ve done a number of times. Plus the failure success song might have the stuck in my head record for the season.

One Bad Apple meanwhile is an episode that I didn’t like nearly as much at first as I do now. The episode is a barrel of fun and has a meaningfully engaging storyline, alongside brilliant visuals, and an addicting song. Did I really say I didn’t care for that song in my initial video? The other day, when I heard it come on while watching in a livestream, I just about lost my shit. One Bad Apple is never going to be one of my favorite episodes, but it’s rock solid and easy to rewatch again and again.

So now let’s move into my favorite episodes of season three!

Too Many Pinkie Pies is an absolute joy. The concept is awesome, the execution is flawless, it’s funny the whole time, and marks a moment where the show’s animation reached a new level of quality. It’s an episode packed with fun stuff, and was the inspiration I needed to get back into MLP analysis, leading eventually to this video series.

Ditto everything I just said for Magic Duel, but add in that it has TRIXIE. You know, I’d almost forgotten just how valuable that is until I watched the episode on TV the other day and I went HOLY SHIT TRIXIE IS AMAZING. This can’t be understated.

Sleepless In Ponyville is probably the fan favorite of the season, and stands out as feeling particularly out there for an MLP episode. It’s the debut of writer Corey Powell, and possibly the first time an episode of MLP has evoked real feelings of terror. For me, it’s a bit of a thrill ride, watching what Scootaloo goes through all by herself, and then being so unsure about how this whole thing will work out. For the feelings of fascination that I had with the idea that Rainbow may or may not be a good older sister, this ep gave me a lot to think about.

Wonderbolts Academy is possibly one of the most serious episodes in terms of how it presents its leading character, and provides Rainbow Dash with a crowning moment of awesome more effective than any other such moment in the show. But besides that, the animation is just utterly unbelievable. Between this episode and the finale was some of the most appealing animation that I’ve ever witnessed in any cartoon, and I’ve seen thousands of them.

And of course, that leaves us with Magical Mystery Cure, which is kind of like the last episode of Madoka or Gurren Lagann or something in terms of presentation, but has the distinction of NOT being the actual finale. This was for me, the most satisfying piece of animation that I’ve seen in years, and currently my favorite episode of My Little Pony. Some time in the near future, I’m going to livestream a shot-by-shot analysis of this episode, so look forward to that announcement.

For those who want an actual ranked list of the season’s episodes from me, pause the video now.

1. Magical Mystery Cure
2. Wonderbolts Academy
3. Too Many Pinkie Pies
4. Magic Duel
5. Sleepless In Ponyville
6. One Bad Apple
7. The Crystal Empire
8. Keep Calm and Flutter On
9. Spike At Your Service
10. Just For Sidekicks
11. Apple Family Reunion
12. Games Ponies Play

Overarching statements about the season: it had a lot of big, satisfying moments. Twilight’s ascension, Rainbow’s moment, Trixie’s redemption, and for many, Scootaloo’s finding a sister. The animation quality continued on season two’s line of improvement, and many of the episodes easily belong on a list of the show’s best (which I’ll probably make sometime).

Ultimately, looking back on this season leaves a good taste in my mouth. I enjoyed more than I didn’t, and I’ve always been pretty good at just forgetting about episodes I don’t like (except Boast Busters, which I am damned to never, ever forget). I can safely say that I’m extremely pumped for season four, especially since it’s going to return to the twenty-six episode structure.

In the interim between seasons, you can expect me to continue my steady stream of video releases. In fact, right now I’m announcing my new bonus channel, Digibrony After Dark. On this channel, I’ll be talking about some of the more strange and expressive aspects of the fandom, as well as making my own fan works and posting them there. It’s just a way of keeping that stuff out of the main channel so those of you who are only interested in analysis of the actual show don’t have to see it. If you’re interested in stuff like fanmade songs, possible fanfic readings, and analysis of things like the pony hypnosis project, you should definitely subscribe to the new channel. So far I’ve uploaded one video, which is my retelling of Luna Eclipsed in rap form.

I hope that all of you will continue to enjoy and support my videos as we move into the off-season, and rest assured that I’ll still be here to cover season four when the time comes.

From now on, this will be a general page on which I’ll embed and link all information related to this project. That way we don’t have to hunt down comments and stuff.

Introduction:

The document: https://docs.google.com/document/d/135UFEsaCEgWuQ3w0-KMb_f8BEFac26bPrJx2HCpeTrA/edit#

Updates:

Readings:

Twilight (1)

Text version:

In the wake of season three, I’ve been giving a lot more thought to the idea of creative intent in MLP. I mentioned at one point in my season three overview that reading creative intent into an animated series is quite difficult, but also that it’s something I’ve more or less specialized in for years while writing my anime blog. I don’t know that divining the creative intent behind MLP would enhance the show in any way, and in some cases, proving that the creators intended for something to be seen a certain way might actually prove that the writers have failed in places. I’m not interested in arguing whether the writers have made good or bad decisions, though—I’m only interested in determining what those decisions were.

As I watch more interviews with the creators of the show, I feel like I may understand them even better than I’ve given myself credit for. I was shocked to find out that Meghan McCarthy had been directly inspired by Sauron from the Lord of the Rings in creating Sombra, which is the same comparison that I made in my Crystal Empire video. Again, this is interesting to me not from the standpoint of gauging whether or not Sombra really is like Sauron, but simply out of the fact that I was able to make the same kind of connection.

Seeing interviews with M.A. Larson and reading his twitter feed makes me feel pretty confident that I get what he’s going for in his episodes too.

I don’t feel like I’m taking shots in the dark by pointing out which things are consistent across episodes written by a single person. I’ve always felt I had a pretty good idea of what Studio B brings to the show as well. So there’s really just one person who’s creative intent I’m trying my hardest to wrap my head around, and it happens to be the most important creative mind to have worked on the show: Lauren Faust.

The influence of Faust on Friendship is Magic is pretty absolute. If everyone else that works on the show has left an indelible mark on it, Faust was the one who provided the canvas and half of the original picture. That said, I do think that her part in making the show GOOD can be overstated, depending on what in the show you happen to think is good.

What fascinates me the most is that Lauren Faust is credited as the creative developer, executive producer, creative director, and character designer of MLP, as well as having been credited for storyboarding and writing certain episodes and scenes.

A lot of these are roles that we ordinarily take for granted when talking about a show. Moreover, the role of “creative director” isn’t something that most shows or movies have. Rather, there’s usually someone who’s just called the “director” that people tend to look to when they’re looking for creative intent. MLP doesn’t just have a director—it has at least two people with the title of director, being James Wooten and Jayson Thiessen, as well as the creative director, Lauren Faust. Now, it’s not uncommon in animation for there to be a director and a supervising director, and it’s also not uncommon for there to be a lot of individual episode directors. Faust herself has been an episode director for certain episodes of the Powerpuff Girls and Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends.

MLP doesn’t have episode directors though, it has the two main directors who have worked on all three seasons, and are probably responsible for keeping the show consistent in tone and pacing. Out of three seasons of MLP, there are only a couple of episodes that don’t really feel like any others, and most of those are season bookends.

So, let’s cut to the chase. Lauren Faust laid the groundwork on which MLP was built. She was heavily involved in the beginning, and had less of a role in producing season two, and was gone entirely by the time season three was produced. Outside of laying the groundwork that is consistent across every episode of MLP, what else did Lauren Faust bring to the table? Where is her mark on the series most clearly noticeable?

This is the hardest question to answer, because it’s not obvious. My Little Pony’s animation has remained consistent, with the only change being a steady improvement. The voice acting has followed the same trend. The style of directing and the tone and pacing of the show have never changed in any significant way. There’s only one really big way in which any episode of MLP seems to be different from any another, and that’s in the way that each episode is written.

That’s why the writers seem to be so noticeable in MLP, and why I’ve made a habit of mentioning them when talking about each episode. This is not always true of a show. In anime, it’s very rare for the writers to make a huge difference the way they do in MLP. If I was analyzing an anime, I might talk about the influence of a studio, or a specific animator, or an episode director, but in MLP, the big point of interest is in the writers.

And this is precisely the reason it’s so hard to pick out Lauren’s creative intent in comparison to the intents of the other writers: Lauren Faust has only been credited as a writer on three episodes.

But as it happens, these episodes do stand out, and are every bit as indicative of who wrote them as the episodes by any other writer. In fact, the three episodes that Lauren wrote, which are the first three episodes of the show, by the way, form a pretty clear arc, and I think identifying this arc is very telling about what Lauren wanted to do with her part in the show.

Here is my thesis: the first three episodes of MLP form an arc, in which each episode is intended to establish some facet of the five ponies that Twilight Sparkle becomes friends with. The first episode is meant to establish who these characters are, in terms of what they do and what they’re all about. The second episode establishes what kind of friend each of them is, in terms of what kind of benefit they bring to Twilight. And the third episode is meant to establish each character’s flaws—how each of them fails as people and as friends.

The first episode does a pretty amazing job of establishing all kinds of shit in a very brisk fashion. Coming back to this episode with a bigger knowledge of the show, it’s kind of crazy to see just how much exposition was crammed into such a small space. Here’s a list of things that you can learn from this episode:

1. There is a land of ponies called equestria
2. Equestria is ruled by princesses
3. In this world, there is magic, and it is used to actually run the world, i.e. raising the sun and the moon
4. The whole history of Celestia and Luna
5. Twilight cares more about books than friends
6. Twilight has a dragon assistant named Spike
7. Twilight lives in a library
8. Twilight can use magic to do stuff like read books
9. Twilight is the understudy of the princess and communicates with her via notes sent by dragon flame
10. There’s a town called Ponyville, and Twilight will stay in a library there
11. Pinkie Pie is insane
12. Applejack lives on a farm and kicks trees
13. Applejack has a southern accent and mannerisms
14. Applejack has a massive family who all seem to work in the apple industry
15. Rainbow Dash is a reckless and cocky
16. Rainbow Dash wants to join the Wonderbolts, which are the most talented flyers in all of Equestria (by the way, where the hell were they at the celebration)
17. Rainbow Dash is very fast
18. Spike is in love with Rarity
19. Rarity is a very passionate fashionista
20. Canterlot is a glamorous, sophisticated place that Rarity wants to live in
21. Fluttershy is really shy, and also talks to animals
22. Dragons don’t seem to be very common in pony society
23. Fluttershy will open up and become passionate when dealing with non-hooved animals
24. Twilight can be manipulative
25. Pinkie Pie throws surprise parties and talks too much and knows everyone and has a very strong physical constitution
26. Twilight is extremely irritable
27. Ponyville has a mayor
28. Rainbow Dash is really aggressive
29. Applejack holds things together
30. Pinkie Pie jokes in the face of danger
and I’m sure I’ve forgotten some things.

Episode two slows things down a lot, exposing way less about the world and how it works, and more focusing on providing an exciting adventure story while establishing what each of these ponies contributes to the magic that is friendship.

And please note how I’ve chosen my words carefully here. I think it’s important to realize that MLP was never trying to say that these ponies are the embodiment of whatever quality they are characterized as, but actually meant to say that they embody those aspects OF FRIENDSHIP. What does that mean exactly?

Well, for instance, I would say that the best thing I bring to my group of friends is some element of leadership. I always play the role of the leader in my group of friends, leading what we talk about and adding some kind of officiality to the things that we try to do. It’s not so much that I’m a good leader, or that people really follow me, as it is that I bring that sense of togetherness to the group. Outside my group of friends, though, I very rarely take leadership roles, preferring the role of a close contributor to others. That’s why I’m not the type to lead a collaborative effort, but I am the time to join in one that’s already been established.

If one of my friends were to be in the position of Twilight Sparkle, where they were declaring what element of friendship each of their friends brought to the table, and they called me the element of leadership, and then you got to watch my every day life the way that you get to watch the characters on the show, you’d probably call bullshit, just as many people have called bullshit on the elements in the show. People ask how can Rarity represent generosity when she’s so often selfish? But the point isn’t that she embodies generosity itself, so much as that she brings a heavy element of generosity to the spirit of the group. You could even say that she might foster generosity within the group, kind of like a status buff to a party in an RPG.

Even after clarifying all of this, though, I still think that the elements could have been presented better. The idea that Applejack represents honesty is iffy, especially because the context for Twilight saying this makes little sense. Okay, was Applejack really going to lie about the fact that it was safe to let go? Would she have been anything but honest here? If anything it’s just a weird scene, because AJ didn’t tell Twi why she was going to be safe. I’ve always thought this was a badly done and worded scene, and I think that AJ’s element should have been something like “dependability.” Especially because in the first three episodes, Lauren seemed to really want to represent her as the most dependable member of the group, holding everyone else together; and in the fourth episode, the entire plot was about how her stubborn pride got in the way of the dependability she was known for.

Of course, “dependable” is practically a synonym for “loyal,” which then brings us to Rainbow Dash, who I do think is very loyal. There was a great joke in Friendship is Witchcraft about how Rainbow and Applejack’s elements should have been reversed, and in a way, being the element of honesty would make episodes like Read It And Weep fall more in line with episodes like Sweet and Elite, Applebuck Season, and Party of One, by showing how the character’s element could be flipped on its head. Still, I don’t really have a problem with Rainbow Dash being the element of loyalty, nor with her scene in this episode. Applejack’s is the only one that bothers me.

So, without commenting too much on the specifics, we’ve had an episode to establish all kinds of stuff about the world and the basics of the characters, and another episode to establish what kind of friends each of the mane six are.

And this brings us to The Ticket Master, which is an episode about failing like crazy. Before I even say anything about this episode, I MUST bring up the post that was written about it by my friend Misfortune-Dogged. In his post, Dogged questions the authenticity of the show’s moral messages and dissects just how unclean and interesting the characterization of this episode really is. This post was massively influential to the way that I view and write about the characters in this show, and I consider it a must-read. I’ve put a link to the post in the description. It’s not an easy read, but if you really want to start analyzing this show on a deeper level, it’s a magnificent place to start. Seriously. Go read that shit.

So anyways, in this episode, all of Twilight’s friends are kind of shitty and insufferable. Applejack puts herself on a moral high horse, believing that she has the best reason to go to the gala without really stopping to take anything into consideration. Rainbow blatantly cares more about her own goals than anyone else’s. Pinkie Pie doesn’t even consider the idea that she is cutting off someone else by demanding to go. Rarity is somewhere between AJ and Rainbow Dash. Fluttershy is downright manipulative. None of them has a moment of individual realization—it takes Twilight outright telling them that they’re being a bunch of assholes before they shape up their behavior. It’s kind of a dark episode really, wherein Twilight is exhausted by continuous hunger and obnoxious friends who can’t read the clear signs that she’s uncomfortable. It wraps up in a kind of dubious lesson, though I guess the more important lesson is that friends can be forgiving of one-another’s crippling flaws.

So. Having recognized this three-episode stretch as an establishment arc, what does this then tell us about the style of Lauren Faust? To me, it seems to show that the most important thing to Faust was the realization of these characters. These episodes manage to be so focused on their goals that there’s a lot less of the side-stories and gag moments that you might get from other episodes. Some might say that this extra concentration is a good thing, but I actually think it’s part of why these episodes are weaker.

After all, I’m not a big fan of Friendship is Magic Part Two, nor The Ticket Master. Both episodes have a very slow pace that seems to drag along. FiM Part Two did very little to endear me to the characters, and there’s not a lot of cool stuff that makes it worth coming back to for me. Giggle at the Ghosty and the admittedly awesome final scene are the only parts of the episode that I find memorable. The Ticket Master meanwhile is totally forgettable, and is even among the episodes that I’ve seen the fewest references and memes about in the fandom.

Lauren Faust created an amazing show, full of amazing characters and ideas, but I kind of feel that the way she wrote the characters herself was not that engaging. Even though Lauren Faust was integral to their development, I think it was the little touches that each writer added to the characters over the course of the show that really brought them to life. Faust created an excellent springboard in these episodes—she gave the ponies the capacity to fail, and constructed their core essence in a very careful manner to establish them with an exacting vision; but it wasn’t until other writers got their hands on the characters that they began to emerge as fully realized beings.

That’s why I think it’s so important to recognize the creative contributions of everyone in the staff of MLP. The world would never have come to life the way it did without Studio B’s dedication. The characters are not merely the designs and establishing episodes created by Lauren, but are also the expressive animations, energetic voice work, and varied writing of the rest of the team. I wouldn’t want an Applejack or a Twilight Sparkle without the marks that have been left on them by M.A. Larson, Meghan McCarthy, Amy Keating Rogers, Cindy Morrow, Merriwether Williams, Charlotte Fullerton, Dave Polsky, and Corey Powell. I could… probably do without the Chris Savino’s marks though.

QUESTIONS NOW CLOSED!

God damn, what an uneventful month for media. You’d think that leaving my job would mean much more time for stuff, but nooo, ponieponieponieponieponie. (I ended up throwing some pony on the list too, so it would at least be indicative of what actually happened this month.)

Just how serious was this pony takeover? It’s not just a matter of making so many videos—it’s also a matter of constantly reading comments, talking to people on skype and AIM about the show, looking at fanworks, and getting swamped in news and recommendations. I keep thinking I should also do something else, but it’s hard to even bring myself to, because I’m so wrapped up in the excitement of my videos rapidly increasing in popularity. Suffice it to say, I’m not complaining, I’m just overwhelmed. And it doesn’t help that the three-plus score is in seriously short supply this month.

+++ Media

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Season 3 Finale

I’m spotlighting this particular episode because it was kind of a big deal, and because I spotlighted the season premiere back in November. After a couple of weaker episodes and a whole tidal wave of drama that went through the fandom this month, the season finale made it all better for me, and for some others—though far from everyone. It was one of the most controversial episodes of the show, preceded by a shitstorm, and succeeded by equal showers of shit and praise. I was among the first responders with a message of absolute ecstasy.

What will survive all the fandom stuff is an amazing musical episode with some of the coolest visuals and directing flair in the series. This episode brought me the kind of excitement that I used to feel when watching something like the first episode of Fate/Zero, or an Akiyuki Shinbo show, when I was just being blown away by the flair of it all. But this one has the virtue of also being part of my favorite show ever, so yeah, it’s a big deal.

++ Media

Doctor Who Series 1

I’ve been primed for watching Doctor Who by the rampant crossovers it has with the My Little Pony fandom, but nothing actually prepared me for what this show is—ultra fucking cheesy. That’s not a bad thing, though there’s times when it gets hard to care, when the show starts explaining things out of its ass that it doesn’t actually care about making sense of.

Still, it’s a great show. The Doctor is a brilliant character from the conceptual level, and I really enjoyed Christopher Eccleson’s portrayal of him (still getting used to David Tenant). Once the show started hitting all these big emotional moments around episode six, I got a lot more invested, and the sci-fi elements are very cool. I wish there were less episodes that took place in modern London, but whatever. The season finale was such an amazing payoff that it makes the whole series worth recommending for me.

Wonder Woman volume 1

The only comic book I read this month; a holdover from my New 52 marathoning last month. I stopped reading comics for a few reasons: the lack of involvement by Brandon Tolentino, the fact that I can’t afford to buy them flippantly anymore, and of course, ponies.

Wonder Woman is ultra kick-ass as an action story. The characters are cool and likable, and the designs are some of the coolest that I’ve seen out of the New 52. Centering the story around a battle between the Gods was a great idea, and the story does well to give weight to their presence. Plus there’s some badass fights.

Vinyl and Octavia: University Days

Probably effectively my favorite fanfiction. I’ve already made a video about it (see above) and that’s pretty much what I’ve got to say.

Astolat – The Faceless Mask

Interestingly enough, I discovered this band via a song they linked on Reddit, which I happened to click when I was randomly reading musical subreddits months ago. I commented on the video and they put me on their youtube mailing list. When the EP finally came out, I think I was the first to buy it, and am still one of only a few (sadly).

It’s a progressive doom metal album, though it’s probably special in that this title doesn’t immediately tell you what they sound like. There’s an odd kind of clarity to it for a doom album, but it’s definitely got that crushing, sorrowful atmosphere, especially on songs like Atlus’ Burden. It definitely deserves more attention then it seems to be getting so far. If you’re into prog or metal or, you know, music, give it a shot.

SWAG.MOV

The epic conclusion to the Pony.MOV series, which has been a sort of staple of the MLP fandom since close to the beginning. It’s infamous, but at the same time, it really is a good series. and it’s not just some flippant bullshit. Max Giliardi put his heart into it, and there’s a reason he gets panels at so many MLP conventions.

SWAG.MOV seems to reflect the ultimately positive feelings that Giliardy has about the fandom and the series, in that he actually gave it some kind of twisted, badass happy ending. I think it was Omo who said something about how a great ending can make a whole series wortwhile, and I think that kind of applies here.

Ask Jappleack

So, I was aware that there was a side-blog to the Pony.MOV canon and that it was supposedly serious and quite good, but I only got around to reading it after watching SWAG.MOV. The story was more interesting than I expected, and had a lot of heart and real dramatic weight to it (more than just some bullshit sadfic). I enjoyed the hell out of it, and I think it adds a LOT to the .MOV canon (kind of justifies it as a canon in the first place.) Also, Jappleack is adorable, and saves the entire pony multiverse.

Le Soldat Pony

I listened to just enough Le Soldat Pony that I feel like I can list him, whereas I’m skipping over a whole lot of musicians and video makers who I only watched one or two videos of this month. Le Soldat is cool as a shit, and while I don’t like all of his songs, the ones I do like are very worthwhile. He gives me the same kind of vibe as TV On the Radio for some reason, where I feel like he’s just content to experiment a lot and do whatever he feels like.

Space Pony – SoGreatAndPowerful

I’m a giant SGAP fan, and I think I’ve featured him in one of these before, but I’m always looking for an excuse to do so again. This month, he released three short songs which, when put together, form one long song called Space Pony. It’s one of his most imaginative works to date, and I think it’s just THE SHIT, OKAY?

+ Media

Dr. Hooves and the Assistant

I watched/listened to the first four of these I think, which is what launched me into watching Doctor Who itself. I love the voice work in this series, because the actors have a great chemistry together, and they really seem to enjoy doing it. I still have to get around to listening to more, though there’s an extent to which I think it’s only *so* worthwhile. Still, I’m not done.

Destroyer;Preserver – I

I found this on reddit, referring to itself as “like Coheed and Cambria.” This comparison is almost an understatement—the album very much wears its CoCa influence on its sleeve. The titling conventions, the way the music and vocals are, everything pretty much screams CoCa. It actually has more energy than the latest CoCa releases (which we’ll get to in a minute), but ultimately, it’s not that interesting. I’m sure this music is for someone, but it’s not really for me. Giving it a + partly for support.

~ Media

Giana Sisters DS

I still haven’t managed to finish Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams, which I +++’d last month, but I figured I’d give it’s nearly-unknown DS predecessor a shot just for shit’s and giggles. And, well, it’s kinda shit. The controls are stiff, it’s not very tightly put together, and more than anything, it’s just boring and generic as fuck. The music is nice—the art isn’t.

The Afterman: Ascension & Descension – Coheed and Cambria

These albums are just boring. Coheed doesn’t bring anything interesting or exciting to their new releases. They sound like “generic Coheed songs,” which is not something that really existed before these albums came along. The only song on either album that really pops out is Number City, precisely because it DOES sound like a fresh Coheed sound, and is a good one at that. The rest is almost entirely forgettable. I didn’t have high hopes for these albums because I’m not a big fan of Year of the Black Rainbow, but it’s still pretty disappointing to see a band that I really like putting out mediocre music. (NOTE: This whole write-up could very well prove untrue before long. It wouldn’t be the first time that I ended up liking a Coheed album way more than I originally did, down the line.)

No “Others I Tried” section this month.

Not Yet Qualified: These are all the media that I’ve consumed to some degree and am not yet done with. They might fall into any of the lists above on my next journal post. Any media from last month’s post which aren’t in any above category still apply to this list.

Doctor Who Series 2 (5 eps) (Hard to keep my excitement up, honestly)

Links mentioned in the video:

MizuTakishima’s Deviantart: http://mizutakishima.deviantart.com/

My post about Dragonshy and Dragone Baby Gone: http://myswordisunbelievablydull.wordpress.com/2012/11/23/analyzing-dragonshy-and-dragone-baby-gone/

Text version of questions and answers:

Embershard: What are you hoping for in season four?

What I’d really like to see in season four is more changes to the status quo, such as what happened with Twilight becoming an alicorn. I love the mane six, and I think they’ve still got plenty of adventures left in them before the show starts to become stale, but at some point the show is going to run out of new things to do without moving the characters along. Dash can only be out of the wonderbolts for so long—Rarity can only get scouted by fashion experts so many times before she hits it big. But what I want is not just for each character to realize their destiny by the end of the show, I want the show to keep running after they’ve done so. I’m not nearly as interested in the idea of a narrative beginning and end, as I am in a narrative that keeps going after the supposed end is already over. As long as MLP keeps going with the same amount of energy that it’s always had, I think it can go to all kinds of awesome places.

Techranamon: So how did you get into My Little Pony, you just come across it one day, a friend suggest it or did you see a fan made video(s) like Friendship is Witchcraft?
TheRkmonk1: How did you get into the MLP fandom?

The answer to both of these questions can be found in my video, Celebrating One Year Of Bronydom.

Berkeleian Lion: – What is your favorite location in the show and why?

I’ve always loved the designs of the big playset locations, like Carousel Boutique and the Library, because I love the gigantic architectural wonder of them. I’m very fond of buildings in general, especially cool ones like these.

- What are other non-pony things you’d recommend to fans of the show during the drought?

This would have to be addressed on a case-by-case basis. I take recommendations very seriously, and I like to personalize them a lot, even though I’m totally jaded after years of people not watching the stuff they ask me to recommend. So anyways, if you’re off of school for the summer and you don’t have too much work, I might tell you to go read Homestuck, since that’s the only way you’re gonna have time to do it. If you have work, but you still want to take on something really rad, read House of Leaves or Akira, or watch The Venture Brothers or Steins;Gate. If you need something shorter and lighter, check out Hourou Musuko.

- What are your thoughts on the combination age-gender gap between bronies and the show’s target audience?

I think it’s awesome, and not really as surprising to me as it is to a lot of others. I think internet culture has started to bring a certain air of authenticity, and I realize how absolutely insane that sounds when there are so many inauthentic dipshits on the internet, but hear me out. I think that the internet has desensitized us so much that things which used to seem crazy seem less so. After all, when some insane new fad starts up, you can’t exactly be surprised all over again by the next insane fad, can you? At least for me, that’s why I’m impossible to surprise anymore.

But more than that, I already had out-there tastes, so I kinda like the companionship of other people who are standing up for their rather obscure taste. A lot of people even within the brony fandom would probably attack me for a lot of what I’m interested in, but there is an ever-growing number of people who would be there to back me up.

- What is your favorite face in the show?

Oh god that’s difficult. There are so many. I don’t really keep track of these things, sorry. I will say that I think Rarity has the best expressions, the animators but a ton of work into making her face very animated in subtle ways.

Boisterious: Is there a character that you would have liked a little more insight or some kind of backstory on?

Pretty much every one-off character could stand to be explored a little more. I’d like to know things like, what are Gilda’s real passions? What is Trixie’s real talent? But I guess the one I want to know about the most right now is Starswirl the Bearded, just because he’s so mysterious. We’ve never even seen him, yet he’s been mentioned so many times in passing.

Tf2Brony: What got you into making reviews/videos?

Well, this is going to be a LONG story.

When I was about eight years old, I got really into Pokemon. I was big into the games, the cards, and everything, and if my memory serves me right, this is how the story went. My mom had gotten really into the game Pokemon Snap, because she’s a big fan of photography, which she later majored in in college. She picked up a Nintendo Power magazine one time which had tricks for beating the game, and I believe it was in this magazine that she found out there was a free Pokemon Trading Card Game cartridge for Game Boy that came with buying a subscription. So, in the interest of my brother and I, she bought it.

Now, growing up, I almost never read anything, so I didn’t really “read” Nintendo Power per say. However, I was fascinated with the reviews section, and with the list of community-voted favorite games in the front of the magazine. If I had to guess, this was something to do with an obsession with listing and putting things in order which I’ve had since I was a baby, when I used to organize sets of toy cars by size.

So anyways, in my late elementary school years, I got really into the idea of making a magazine. I would draw covers in colored pencil, usually featuring Bomberman because he’s easy to draw, and I would fill the magazine with info mostly copied straight out of Nintendo Power because that was all I knew. I was a big Nintendo fanboy just because of NP’s programming, too, so there was some inflammatory anti-Playstation and Xbox shit in there, even though the console generation hadn’t arrived yet.

When I was eleven, I actually hand-wrote a ninety-five page magazine on lined paper, with pictures traced out of Nintendo Power issues and everything. And of course, the biggest sections were the reviews and list sections, since they were my favorites.

This obsession with magazines and listing continued into my early teens, with focus shifting over to anime, since I was into that now. And of course, once I got onto the internet, I started sharing these kinds of opinions on there, though I was mostly active on forums where it wasn’t really convenient to write reviews. I still read assloads of reviews on sites like GameFAQs, Gamespot, and RPGamer, though.

My first review site was called Digital Boy Reviews, which I started in 2007, and it was meant to cover all kinds of mediums, though I mostly ended up talking about music, which I was into at the time. After that, I opened my anime blog, which went through a lot of names over the years and now is known as My Sword Is Unbelievably Dull. I started writing anime reviews here.

Over the course of 2007 and 2008, I started to grow really tired of the kind of reviews in which people shared their opinions about something, because they always ended up being the same kind of things. I liked it because blah blah, it sucked because blah blah, and people never really got into the bones of the matter. I started to become frustrated when people would say that a show had “bad writing,” but would never clarify what their basis was for what writing had to do to be considered good. Moreover, I became increasingly obsessed with understanding myself, and trying to clarify why I felt the way I did about things.

Over the years of running my anime blog, I met a lot of other people who wrote analytical posts a lot better than I did, and I befriended and learned from them. My writing style and personality continued to change for the better, until I became what I am today.

Anonymous: Is season four the last season?

I have no idea. We will have to wait and see!

Celebrinborn: Can you do an analyses of Friendship is Witchcraft?

Actually, yes! When I started doing episodic analysis in text form on my blog, I intended to talk about each Friendship Is Witchcraft episode in the same post as the episode it was parodying. I wrote a post about Dragonshy and Dragone Baby Gone, which you can find linked in the description, but that was the last episode I covered before I switched to video, and I haven’t yet covered Dragonshy in video form. I’m still not sure if I’m going to talk about FiW on its own, or in my videos for the episodes, but I will most likely talk about it eventually because it was the first MLP fan work that I got really interested in.

FaintLlama: Are you going to write/ perform new songs/ponified songs? I was impressed how well Without Luna turned out.

I would definitely like to do more of them. I actually wrote about eight pony songs around the same time as Without Luna last year. Most of them were parodies, but I couldn’t find instrumental versions of the original songs. A couple of them were totally original, and there was one that Forest Rain was actually working on turning into a full song, but as far as I know he only ever made a thirty second clip of it which he never released, and then scrapped the project.

TuniPeace: Can you read my fan fic and tell me how you liked it?

Sorry to disappoint, everyone, but I will not read anyone’s fanfic. I just am not interested and don’t have time.

angusrangers8: Do you think their should be an episode in season 4 that revolves around princess luna and princess celestia, and how do you think they can portray the princesses relationship with each other?

Well, it would certainly be interesting. I don’t think there’s a high likelihood of it though. There’s yet to be any episodes of MLP which aren’t centered around either one of the mane six or Spike, and I don’t think there ever will be. As for the relationship between the princesses, I like how they’re often portrayed in the fandom, with Luna being sort of clumsy and Celestia being sort of mean. Probably because it reminds me of my brother and I.

Anonymous: How do you think Cadence became an alicorn? Is Sombra is her father?

I really highly doubt that Cadence wouldn’t have said something if Sombra was her father. As for how she became an alicorn, no idea.

Do you think that if a unicorn and a pegasus had a baby that it would be an alicorn baby?

Magical pony genetics are pretty complex. It could be anything.

Prince Blueblood who is Celestia’s nephew is also a unicorn. Is Celestia and/or Luna married or is he just adopted?

Maybe there’s a third sibling to Celestia and Luna that we just don’t know about. Someone must be raising and lowering the stars…

FaintLlama: There are a lot of questions about you analyzing FiW, which leads me to another two questions. Will you be doing those analysis and/or can you reflect over the PONY.MOV series.

Yes, I actually have the .MOV series on my shortlist of things to talk about. I will probably only do one video about the series, but I do like it, and I think Max Giliardi is one cool dude.

Andreas: What do you think of the undertones of the show, would these seem intentional something the writers have put in for the audience to figure out themselves? thanks!

Undertone is something that happens naturally in writing. After all, writing relies on the audience to come in with an amount of experience and social cues to understand what’s happening. MLP has more subtlety than you might expect out of kids show because the writing is handled very naturally, and isn’t dumbed down. When a show seems to have no subtlety, it means that the subtlety was deliberately removed, which is why it feels so jarring.

Jared Cameron: Who is best pony?

Haha! Here we are! THE most frequently asked question in the AMA, so congrats to Jared for being the first to ask it. After grappling with the decision between AJ and Twilight for a long time, I’m gonna put my hoof down here and now, and say that Applejack is my favorite pony. I love everything about Applejack and I could just watch her all day, even if she’s in some stupid episode like Apple Family Reunion. I don’t care. Feed me AJ.

Fanfic suggestions?

Vinyl and Octavia University Days, The Day My Beard Turned Into Pinkie Pie, and The GAPT Falls In Love With A Pine Cone. This doubles as a list of my favorite fanfics, by the way.

What is your favorite episode of each season?

Applebuck Season, Sweet And Elite, and Magical Mystery Cure

Ped O Bear: If you could ship yourself with another pony/creature in Equestria who would they be and why?

Applejack. She’s dependable, she’s lovely, and she’s blonde. Double points for the voice. Best of all, even though she has high moral standards and I totally don’t, she’s respectful and usually not too judgemental, so I think we’d get along really well. Also if I hook up with her, I get an adorable little sister, and a total BRO, plus I could probably share stories with Granny Smith all day. I don’t think I’d ever get bored with AJ.

Touching Everything: If you were to change a character, who and how would you change them, and how far would you go with it?

I’m really not a fan of the idea of altering canon. I like to take what I’m dealt and run with it, instead of trying to change what’s there, since the possibilities of where to go are always endless.

kyderra: Are you sure you will make it trough this Q&A? there’s going to be a lot of questions from people that love your videos.

Better than having a lot of questions from people who hate my videos!

MrOMGaHotpocket: Was the DigibronyAfterDark channel created solely for the pony hypnosis, or what else do you plan to post there?

Okay, so the whole idea with DigibronyAfterDark is that I wanted to be able to post whatever I wanted without having to worry about if it was meeting the same quality standard as the rest of my videos. Obviously I’m not going to release a bunch of shoddy stuff on there, but I wanted to be able to cut loose and do stuff that wasn’t really deep or analytical, without ticking off the people who just came for the analysis.

I got the idea to do this after my Suited For Success video, because there were a lot of people who were bothered by the singing in the video, but a lot of people who also asked me if I could do MORE singing. So, I thought I’d compromise, because I definitely wanted to do more singing, but I didn’t think it would be fair to force that on the subscribers who came expecting analysis.

So, the ultimate goal of DigibronyAfterDark, is that I can do whatever I want. I can sing, I can do readings, I can talk about dark, weird shit, et cetera, and whoever is subbed will know that it’s coming.

WriterPon3: I notice in the show that aside from Sherrif Silverstsar in Over A Barrel and Celestia’s Royal Guards like Shining Armor, we don’t really see many law enforcement ponies. I’ve read fics where the Royal Guard handles most Law Enforcement, and one where the separate cities have their own. I don’t remember the name but it was about Family Day in Ponyville and Applejack wanting all her friends to have a good time with their parents. Fluttershy’s dad turned out to be a brutish, abusive police officer in Cloudsdale. Since we rarely see L.E., could that mean crime is generally low in Equestria? What are your thoughts?

I think it’s likely that crime is just very low, but there probably are law enforcement officials here and there. We saw a security guard in Read It And Weep, for instance, so there’s probably people like that around just to take care of the occasional rough houser.

Zachary.W: How did you create your pony “avatar”? I have been wondering about it for a while now and I think yours seems very unique.

My pony avatar was drawn by Mizu Takishima, whose Deviantart page is linked in the description. I told her that I liked purple, pink, white, and grey, that I had blue eyes, that I wanted to be a unicorn, that my favorite pony design was Sweetie Belle, and that I wanted an analysis cutie mark. What you see is the result. By coincidence, Mizu also managed to make the eyes look vaguely intense, which is why I feel the pony reflects my real presence very well.

artsyrosey: If you were to magically wake up in Ponyville, what would be the first thing you would do?

Um, probably freak the fuck out. Then terrify everyone around with my encyclopaedic knowledge of the last few years of their lives. Then start analyzing them and telling them how to help get their lives on track. Then ask if there’s some kind of job I can do and idk, probably start flirting with Applejack.

Zoren: In your winter wrap up vid I saw that you had some touhou figures. While i am not a fan of touhou my best friend is and he recently became a brony. My question is “Do you think that the brony fandom and the Touhou fandom are similar?”. My friend said that he asked this question at a touhou panel and had the whole room get into an argument.

I think that the culture surrounding the background ponies in MLP is very similar to that of Touhou. In both cases, the fandom took characters with only the faintest hints of who they are, and turned them into fully fleshed out beings, with shitloads of fanart and stories and different interpretations.

Anonymous: ~Season three finale review?

I already sorta did a review, but as for an analysis, I’ll get to it… soonish?

~I also would love to hear more of your thoughts on the Pony-verse, especially your fascinating ideas on destiny! I know we’ll get some of that with the video I requested above, but would you be willing or interested in doing a longer series on it?

I don’t know about a longer series. I definitely intend to do another video to clarify my thoughts on the matter, and to tie in Magical Mystery Cure. I’ll probably just make a stupidly long video and try and say everything in one go. That said, I think it’s cool how much discussion was sparked by my ideas on the subject.

~How would you feel about joining a site like ThatGuyWithTheGlasses or similar dedicated to reviews? Not just of Pony material, I’d love to hear about some of your other passions as well! Your grasp of character and staging is second to none and makes for fascinating listening!

If a site like that offers to take me, and they pay decently, I’ll happily oblige. Hell even if they pay poorly, it’s probably better than having youtube deny me for monetization all the time. Plus it would be really cool if I got to know some of those people and sorta join those cliques.

~Branching off of that, do you have other reviews? Where would be the best place to find them?

The very site you asked this question on! My main blog, called My Sword Is Unbelievably Dull, contains most of all the analytical writing I’ve done in the past six years. Anything from the last two years or so, I can vouch for the quality of. Anything older than that, and it’s a matter of luck.

~Where should I go/ who should I talk to if I want to get more involved in the fandom? I can sing, but I have little talent for arranging or producing music… where would I go to offer my abilities to someone who can make use of them?

I wish I knew. If I did, I’d be shoving my own vocal tracks down their throats. That said, if I ever meet someone who’s looking for singers, I’ll let you all know. Alternatively, if you’re looking for singers, let me know! I’ll spread the word, and also send you my vocal tracks!

Phantom02: What is your best advice for dealing with people that hate the show, yet have never seen it? Some of my IRL friends laugh at me when I say that MLP:FiM has good animation and writing, and they chastise me for simply liking the show, saying it’s creepy for me to watch a show for “little girls.”

I say, if you can’t reason with these people, ignore them. I would probably explain to them how ridiculous it is of them to criticize something they have no knowledge of, but if I can’t get through to them, then I’d just give up on them. If it was a friend of mine, I’d probably also tell them that I know what I’m talking about and they don’t, so fuck off.

Gedarliz Pena: Who is your favorite OC? (It can not be yours).

I’m gonna go with Cat Milly’s OC. She’s got this awesome frizzy mane, glasses, and sometimes seen with a cigarette. Out of all the ponies that are made to look like the person they represent, her’s is easily tops, and also just generally great.

Touching Everything: Odd question: If you could choose an existing pony to be, Who would it be and what’s the main reason why?

I think that if I suddenly became one of the ponies, it wouldn’t matter to me any more which one I was, because I would be them and not me anymore, so I wouldn’t be thinking of it as me being them, I’d be thinking of me as me, as them. So yeah I’d pick Applejack, she seems to have her shit together.

8bitpheonix: What villain would you want to see in the future?

I would love to see some kind of horrible world-crushing Lovecraftian hell-beast. There wouldn’t be a fight or anything, it would just sort of appear, maybe devour a small town and move on or something.

rainbowdashiefan: Have you played luna game?

No, but I watched some youtube videos of it way back. I like the concept of it, but the execution wasn’t very impressive.

Kay: – Favorite Cutie Mark?

I’m gonna have to go with Rarity. It’s very clean and pretty, and whenever I see fanmade stuff that uses cutie marks, hers looks really great. I’ve seen a PC and an Xbox with glowing plates shaped like her cutie mark, and I was full of want.

-Whose destiny do you think is the most interesting to watch for development in?

Probably Rainbow Dash, if only because her destiny is the most visible. Like Twilight, I had no idea she was going to become a princess and all that, and I’m just waiting to see where the show goes with it. But with Rainbow, we’ve had the expectation right from the start that she’s going to become a Wonderbolt, and she wants it SO badly, it’s always cool to watch her progress.

-If you were to make an episode, what would it be about?

I’d probably adapt my own fanfiction, which is about Pinkie Pie having really atrocious teeth, and having to go on an adventure to find a mysterious element which Dr. Colgate can use to repair them. Basically I never brushed my teeth growing up so I have pretty bad teeth, and I think if there’s one lesson I want to teach to little kids, it’s that they should brush their teeth. It’s kinda fucked up to show Pinkie snacking constantly and never brushing, so I’d like to bring that hammer down.

-What do you use to record?

I use an Audio-Technica AT2035 Large Diaphragm Studio Condenser Microphone, which ran me abot 130 bucks on Amazon. It’s hooked into a very basic preamp which was about fifty bucks, and that preamp has a USB converter. This, for me, is about the minimum setup for having good quality audio.

-How many seasons would you think to be a good ending point for MLP, since shows do go stale after awhile, you got to admit that, and it can’t go on forever.

Even if MLP gets stale, I won’t mind if it runs for a really long time. Even if there gets to be a point where there’s a lot of bad episodes, they can’t all be bad, and for me personally, I don’t feel that having weak later episodes cheapens the appeal of the earlier episodes. I’ve seen long-running shows that had shitty mid-sections only to come back and have strong final seasons such as the case with Ranma ½, so even if MLP goes downhill, I’ll still hold out hope.

- Earth Pony vs Unicorn vs Pegasus, which do you prefer?

Space Unicorn

-If you heard any of the foreign dubs (actual episode, or just some songs it doesnt matter) of MLP which are your favorite/least favorite?

I’ve actually watched a ton of videos that compile all the different dubs, and I’ve watched a few episodes dubbed in French and Polish. The Polish dub is easily the strongest non-English one, although take that with a grain of salt because I don’t actually understand Polish, but I’ve seen it praised by Polish viewers as well. I’m currently really looking forward to the Japanese dub because they’ve got a pretty cool cast lined up for it, and I’ll probably be able to understand most of it wihtout subs.

matthewcon965887973: What is your favourite part of the community?

Obviously I’m gonna say the analysis part of the fandom since that’s the part of it I’m a member of! The thing about MLP fandom is that it’s kind of really scattered. There’s an illusion of everyone really knowing what’s going on, because of the fact that the information is really centralized. For instance, everyone in the fandom is obviously watching the show, so we can reasonably count on everyone we talk to in the fandom to have seen each episode. This is very different from something like anime fandom, in which you can’t expect other people to be into the same shows that you are.

So we have a lot of connectivity in what we know and care about, but in terms of where we get our information, and who we talk to, it’s a lot more scattered than people think. Like for instance, I mostly keep up with the fandom through Reddit. On reddit, most people seemed to really enjoy the season three finale. I was under the impression that it was well-liked, but I’ve gotten a lot of comments on my video from people saying that they’d seen nothing but negative opinions and bitching about the finale. It was a weird moment of dissonance because I’d comparatively seen a more positive take, but on the same token, reddit usually celebrates each new episode with lots of content production and screencaps, so it’s kind of just a reddit thing.

So, basically what I’m saying is that the fandom seems strangely broken up into sections, and it’s hard for me to really say what each section is like, and know how they are. I really enjoy the r/mylittlepony subreddit and I really enjoy this little section of the youtube community that I’m a member of, so my vote goes to each of those.

Links mentioned in video:

Luna (Lucid Mode): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G49bLZ2nAmE

r/mylittlealcoholic: http://www.reddit.com/r/mylittlealcoholic/

Text version of questions and answers:

Who is your favourite background character?

Alright! We’ve reached the second most-asked question in the AMA! Grats on being the first to ask it.

I like a lot of the background ponies, so it’s hard to pick a favorite. Berry Punch is one I identify with a lot because she’s supposed to be a drunk, and I really like to drink. Spend a little time on r/mylittlealcoholic, and you’ll really see how magnetic she is. I also like Colgate because she’s cute and had this whole dentist thing going on, which I like. But honestly, my favorite has to be Lyra. Her portrayal as this wacky, human-obsessed, semi-insane pony cracks me up to no end. I’ve probably laughed the most at and favorited the most Lyra fan comics out of any pony, just because I find her hilarious.

What is your favourite part of writing, producing and uploading videos?

Out of those three, the writing. I really enjoy the conceptualizing process as well, and then when I get to flesh that stuff out in writing, that’s the really fun part. I love it even when I’m having difficulty with it, when I really have to think shit through and determine what I’m trying to say. The recording process is pretty fun too, because I really love using my voice, though I think I’m ultimately somewhat lazy about pacing it well. I record these things in one take most of the time and then edit out the mistakes.

The nightmare part is always turning it into a video. Doing the Digibrony expressions isn’t so bad, though it can be really tedious at times. It’s when I have to add in pictures and video that it starts to become a chore. Especially if I jump around a lot in talking about the episode, and have to go hunting for the right clips and moments to use. Part of me would rather just do this whole thing as either a written project, or as an audio only thing, but I don’t think I’d be able to maintain the level of popularity that I have that way, and I do strongly value the visual element when it comes to talking about an animated show. The whole reason I wanted to do this as a video series after all, was so I could show off the show’s brilliant animation and moments without having to dryly talk about them.

Sauvison: Do you think that Scootaloo’s or Fluttershy’s family will ever be revealed?

I think it would be nice if they were. I’m very curious about what kind of ponies Fluttershy has, so it would be nice to get a whole scene with them like we did with Rarity’s parents.

Do you have any concerns for Twilight now that she’s an alicorn?

I don’t know about concerns, but I’m definitely interested in seeing how she’s going to handle all of this. I don’t really want to see her having trouble with the pressure, I’d rather see something a little more complex, like she actually holds up really well, but has this niggling feeling like she’s fucking up or is going to fuck up soon. That might be me projecting, too.

Zoren: Do you believe that there are currently very old unicorns that are better at Twilight in magic? In the episode where Trixie returns, Twilight stated that age spells are only able to be performed by the top level of unicorn, and Twilight could not perform the spell. Also, do you think that shining armor can cast better shield spells than twilight even with her being an alicorn.

The whole concept of some unicorns being stronger than others sits awkwardly with me, which is the one thing I didn’t like about Magic Duel. If unicorn powers are supposed to be unique to each unicorn on some level, then how can we quantify their power levels? It’s possible that this is a ranking among unicorns whose talent is magic, and it’s also possible that Twilight really means that it takes a particularly huge amount of training to learn the spell. It’s hard to tell. I like to think that if there are more powerful unicorns, they are either very few, or dead. If there are any wise old powerful unicorns left, I DEFINITELY want to see them make an appearance in the show.

As for Shining Armor, I do think that barriers are probably his forte, given that he is a guard pony. With Twilight’s talent being magic, I think it’s probably possible for her to learn any spell that she wanted to, but she probably would avoid spells that were uninteresting or not useful to her.

Ze brony: Have you ever read/listened to “my little dashie”? If so what are your thoughts about it?

Back when I first got into the fandom, I guess My Little Dashie was still a pretty big deal. I remember my first real experience with it was that someone had adapted the first chapter into this little sim game based on a Tomagotchi interface. So basically, it would tell you part of the story, and then go into a sort of “raising Dashie” minigame.

I think I saw bits and pieces of the story in other places too, and also a lot of references to it. Basically, I didn’t like it at all. The main character was basically just like the protagonist of a visual novel, in that he generally wasn’t happy with his life or society, and I can’t relate to that. I’m not a misanthrope, and I’m very optimistic, so characters like that just tend to get on my nerves. I also generally hate sadfics, so there wasn’t a lot of strong reason for me to want to read it. I still have no intention of ever reading it all the way through in any form.

Anonyous: Best fanmade YouTube thing?

I think my favorite fanmade video is still going to have to be Luna (Lucis Mode) by Cats Millionaire. It’s a song and video, and it’s basically a mashup to end all mashups. The song takes parts from Luna (Dream Mode) by Eurobeat Brony and a verse from Pony Swag by Swagberg, and combines them with this awesome and really emotional song by Cat Milly and Circuitfry. The video is mixed media, using drawn stills and also parts that appear to be hand-drawn cutouts moved around on popsicle sticks. The video itself tells a story of Luna having an existential crisis which is clearly meant to extensively mirror End of Evangelion. But around that, there’s also a framing device of Cat Milly and Circuitfry playing the song in a bar, and generally fucking up a whole bunch, while the drunken crowd debates on whether not they suck. So yeah, it’s dense and meta as fuck, which I love, and the song is amazing, and I’m a huge fan of End of Evangelion, so it’s like a perfect storm for me.

Best Voice actress?

That’s a hard one. They all have their on and off moments. I think Andre Libman as Pinkie Pie has the most amazing lines, but I’m also really partial to Ashleigh Ball both as Rainbow and AJ. It’s funny too because her voice as the singer of Hey Ocean is so sexy, but so different from how she sounds in the show… which is probably a good thing because honestly, I don’t need that kind of sexual tension while I’m watching MLP.

Best crystal pony?

I guess the Hermes pony?

Best stallion?

Fancy Pants. That dude is a fucking BRO. If anyone wants me to voice fancy pants in anything ever, I will do it. I might even read your fancy pants fanfic.

Best filly?

Gotta be Sweetie Belle. She’s so god damn adorable!

Derpy Whooves: Would you rather be a pegasus, unicorn or a earth pony?

I would rather be a unicorn, because I can move shit with my mind, and that’s just insanely convenient. I’d get a kick out of using all those powers, too.

George Motherfrekin’ Goldsmith: You’re stranded on a desert island with the mane six and there’s a major Earthquake leaving a very large crack in the ground. You can only save one pony and the rest of them will indefinitely die. Who do you save?

Everyone in the world will indefinitely die. If they’re not definitely going to die then I’m not that worried about it. And honestly, how am I going to save one of them? I’m pretty weak, I can’t even do a pull-up, I don’t know how I’m going to lift an entire horse. Um but that said, Applejack.

Flydie: What is your opinion on equestria girls? I’m sure you will have heard of it by now.

Am I just now getting to the first Equestria Girls question? This AMA is going to be SO LONG. Anyways, my thoughts on Equestria Girls are simply, we’ll find out when we find out. I’m really not one to pass judgement on things before I’ve seen them with my own eyes, so I’m going to be keeping quiet about this one until it’s actually upon us.

Daniel Wiecek: What pony would you bring into the real world, and what specifically would you do with him or her?

I don’t want to be too careless about this answer, because the way I see it, I’m basically uprooting one of these ponies from their life and everything they care about. If I have to chose one, it has to be one who would most want to take the journey, or best be able to handle it. I’d either choose Lyra, so she can learn about humans, or Berry Punch, so she and I can sit around and get wasted all day.

Anonymous: What did you think of the baby pony form? Do you like it how it is or would you change the form in any way?

I think it’s insanely adorable and I wouldn’t change it in any way.

What did you think when they gave Mr. and Mrs. Cake a baby pegasus and a baby unicorn for kids?

I thought it was funny and proved that ponies can mate across type.

Who is your favorite twin Pound or Pumpkin?

Based on the webcomic Slice of Life by Egophiliac, I choose Pumpkin.

Do you think Pound and Pumpkin will still have their powers of flying and magic or do you think they will lose their powers at some point and they have to relearn flying and magic?

Again, based on Slice of Life, I’m going to say that they probably have to train still.

Do you think flying is something that can be taught or is more of an instinct that they have?

Could be both. It’s a thing which could come naturally to some pegasi, whereas others have trouble with it.

What do you think of the comics? Both regular and the mini one.

The main line of comics is excellent. The dialog is entertaining and the artwork is fantastic. The mini comics, I haven’t read, because I flipped through and the artwork is atrocious. It’s like a joke compared to the main comic.

Archimedes Pegasus: Can I pet your luxurious mane?

If you catch me at Bronycon, you can give it a try.

ema: Would you rather lose your sense of taste or never be allowed to look at anything pony related, that includes watching the show, and talking with bronys about ponys.

I would not choose either option. And don’t say, “you can’t choose neither,” because I just did.

Anonymous: what sondash

Okay I googled “sondash” and it apparently refers to putting Sonic and Rainbow Dash together. Since I generally don’t like Sonic the Hedgehog, I do not approve.

Anonymous: What motivates you to make videos?

The feedback. I started doing videos because I thought it would be a better way of getting my points across, and getting to reach a larger audience. When I got positive feedback for doing it, I was inspired to do it more.

thepunksclub21: What’s your favorite mlp song?

My favorite is At the Gala. It’s my favorite to sing, and I’ve been extensively practicing a gender-reversed version of it for a long time.

If you were one of the staff members for my little pony, what would you improve?

Probably the continuity. I’d just tighten it up a bit, make sure I threw out lines that contradict the information presented in other episodes. Other than that the staff does a great job and I can’t even pretend to be as good as any of them at anything.

UnstableBrony: I’ve always loved writing and reading poetry, as well as songs! Since I’ve discovered the Brony community I’ve wanted to start publishing my work online, but I have no real idea about how to properly get started and promote my work. Ideas?

I don’t know how to promote your work, but I think a good way to get started it to start a tumblr where you’ll post your work, and then follow other tumblrs who talk about ponies and do similar stuff. Share your work with people, and post it on places like reddit and hope for the best. I wish I could offer more help here, but if I knew more, I’d be doing it myself, too!

Sussermus: – Do you think King Sombra should get more exposure in season 4 to develop his character more? Like, maybe he comes back and they have to defeat him again, or something?

I wouldn’t mind seeing more Sombra, especially if they can expand on the story of what happened with him and the crystal empire. I’m always up for gaining a better understanding of the history and inner workings of Equestria and its characters.

Tugglewugs: What hell hath you unleashed?

I DON’T KNOOOOW~

Are you expecting any other fandoms similar to this one to pop up anytime in the future? Explain.

I think it would be great to see more fandoms like this. I’ve seen other big, expressive fandoms, but it’s rare to see one that does so much to adopt the spirit of what they’re a fan of. Seeing that kind of wide-spread self-modification is definitely fascinating. I read somewhere before that one of the reasons for brony culture being what it is is probably a backlash against the sarcasm and disingenuousness that pervades the internet, and as someone who’s always hated those things, I have to agree with that sentiment.

Bobby Waldman: Do you think any idea, with enough time and effort, can be a great fan-fic?

I don’t see why not. Anything can be good if it’s done well. See: MLP.

Monarilla: This is a long shot but I’ll ask it anyways since I have nothing to lose.
I create worlds and stories in my spare time as a hobby. not on paper but in my head since I’m surprisingly good at keeping track of all of the lore I add to my worlds. But what I have always wanted to do was to write a story based inside one of the worlds I created (one of them is actually a completely non cannon mlp branch off but that’s not important). My question is if you would like to write a story, any story based in one my worlds. I wanted to ask you personally because I think you’re an excellent writer and as a fan, would love it if I could actually have a story and it was written by you. If you’re not interested or just don’t have the time, I would still consider it an honor if you would look at some of the work I have done on one of them and give me some creative criticism. If you don’t feel like doing that then I might as well have an extra question just in case and that is do you have any headcannons on princess Luna’s lifestyle?

With regards to the whole writing thing, the truth is that I’m kind of an atrocious fiction author. Just like you, I’m really great at creating worlds and lore, but I’m awful at actually coming up with stories and things to do there. Most of what I write outside of analysis is non-fictional or meta-fictional flash fiction. As for looking at your work, send it to me in a PM, and I’ll give it a look.

As for Princess Luna, I don’t have any solid headcanons for her. I like a lot of the things the fandom has come up with, but I don’t consider any of them the best.

Kar-gath: What do you think about the idea of season 4 and other seasons after focusing on new ponies, rather than the original six?

Well, season four is definitely going to be focus on the mane six, and it’s hard for me to imagine that the show would ever really break from that. If they made a spinoff or a special starring different characters though, it could be interesting.

What do you think about the theory that alicorn twilight isn’t real, that she’s still looking into Sombra’s door, and that shooting it with love or whatever type of magic that was) didn’t open the way, but instead made her see what she wanted the most. I know this would never happen, but I saw it floating around, and wanted to know what you think of it.

I’m not a fan of these kinds of theories, where everything’s a dream or whatever. They don’t add anything to the story or change the way that I the story can be analyzed, so I see them as pointless.

zargy: -Best Ship Evar?

I have to go with Vinyl and Octavia, just because of University Days.

-Favorite Youtube Brony?

I’m going to go ahead and cut out musicians and animators, and focus on people who make their video explicitly to be watched on youtube. I like my fellow youtube reviewers, such as AnY Pony, who really deserves more attention, and Bronycurious, whom I’ve become good friends with since starting my channel. Shout outs to Strebiskunk and Golden Fox as well. Out of all the people who do youtube poop and PMVs and stuff like that, I’ve always been a fan of JHaller the most. I still remember hanging out in one of his streams for like five hours watching him mask shit. I also think it’s great that he’s taken over the monthly Top Ten videos, and kept them running.

Swiftnotes: Digibrony will you marry me?? and will you put up a video of you singing and rapping just for the fun of it? XD

As I said earlier, I will require a picture, two forms of ID, and also we should get to know each other first. As for singing and rapping for fun, I want to do a bunch of videos like that. I just get too self-conscious about not doing a perfect performance.

Anonymous: Why did you name your channel Digibrony?

Okay, so this is going to involve a lengthy explanation of my username history.

In late 2006, I decided to change my online identity. I had been listening to the song 21st Century Digital Boy by Bad Religion a lot, so I chose that as my username. However, because that name is too long, and because the name Digital Boy was taken on most sites, my name was 2006digitalboy across most websites. Every year, I would update my username on all the sites I use to reflect the current year.

I ended up clinging to this name, because I’ve always been more into stuff that’s current than I am into older stuff, and I spent all my time around digital media, plus I saw myself as being younger than other people and very immature and childish. So I held onto that name for years, and it stuck. However, 2011, I started to feel uncomfortable with the name, because I didn’t feel like I should still consider myself a “boy.” Partly because I was a grown-ass man, and partly because I was way less immature, and at this point older than a lot of people I know.

I had thought about changing my name to SchizoidMan, after the King Crimson song that the Bad Religion song is based on, but this didn’t sit well with me because I’m not a schizoid, and I don’t identify with conventional meanings of manliness. Instead, I went with Digibro, which I’d been called as a nickname a number of times, and dropped the entire rest of the name. Digibro was surprisingly available on a lot of sites, so I haven’t had to do the year by year thing anywhere except for twitter.

It just so happened that a month after I started using the name Digibro, I became a brony, and it just seemed obvious to tack on those extra two letters. I initially did it on twitter as a joke about how I was so into ponies now, but I ended up using it as a username every time I became a member of a pony site. So, my overall online identity is still Digibro, but Digibrony is the pony version of that username.

S’ree: Hi! What’s your opinion on the cutie marks representing the moment in which a pony discovers his/her destiny rather than a literal representation of what that character is meant to do. The former seems to make a wee bit more sense when you look at some of the mane6′s cutie marks, such a Rarity. I’ve heard fans say time and time again that Rarity’s special talent is finding jewels/gems due to the fact that her cutie mark is three diamonds (or so it seems). But… that would make it a pretty mediocre talent due to the fact that we learn in A Dog and a Pony Show that all it takes to find said gems is a simple spell, which Rarity taught Twilight how to perform. I’ve aways believed that Rarity’s special talent has always been the ability to bring out beauty. Whether she is making a bird’s nest or a dress; And gems are just the cherry on top (she doesn’t even use them that often). I like to believe that Rarity’s cutie mark represents not gems, but sparkles, the very same sparkle that were present on the eyes of Rarity’s teacher when she looked upon Rarity’s beautiful dresses (As seen in The Cutie Mark Chronicles); thus validating Rarity’s talent to bring out beauty.

I agree with the idea that Rarity’s talent isn’t finding gems. The gem cutie mark simply represents the same thing as her name—Rarity. Everything she does is like a diamond in the rough. I think cutie marks are meant to be metaphorical representations of the talent. After all, Pinkie Pie’s talent isn’t balloons.

Anonymous: What does your cutie mark mean?

My cutie mark is a magnifying glass analyzing a pie chart, and it’s meant to represent analysis.

Brony of Galifrey9: Well I am a closet Brony, and I wanted to know how to deal with those who are in real life. I have friends who I know who are Bronies/Pegasisters. I have kept it quiet my year and a half of being a brony, my sister however knows. Should I tell my Brony friends that I am a Brony or should I protect identity?

That depends on your circumstances and the type of person you are. For me, self-identity is a really big deal. I like people to know what I’m all about. Suffice it to say, EVERYONE knows I’m a brony. Everyone knows that I make videos based on the show, and everyone has had to listen to me talk about it at length. I wouldn’t even know how to keep a secret like this anyways.

Steel Shimmer: So, in your video about Starswirl the Bearded you argued that Celestia had been grooming Twilight to be her successor. You said that this is the result of SW not being able to grasp the magic of friendship in the past. Do you think that it’s possible that Celestia artificially extended her own lifespan (and maybe Luna’s) after SW’s failure in order to find the right successor to the throne? Sorry, I know I’m probably reading too deep into this.

I don’t really know how a lifespan can be “artificially” extended. If she extended her lifespan then it’s officially extended right? Sorry, wordplay, I’ve been drinking. Anyways, I think Celestia just lives forever.

cobalthailstorm: Do you find it weird that Canada is starting Season 3 of mlp this Saturday?

That is pretty weird. Also weird is that Canada apparently airs a censored version of the show where they cut out certain words.

Dream: Seeing as Pinkie Pie is my favorite pony, I would love to know how you think her history went down. How did she find ponyville, do you think?

This is actually one of the show’s mysteries that I’m the most curious about. When did she leave home? Why is she with the cakes? What exactly is her job? Pinkie is a weird character. I haven’t made any headcanons about this myself, I’m just intensely curious.

Anonymous: Do you have a least favorite episode of MLP, if so which one and why?

I can’t say for sure until I’ve rewatched the whole show, but for now I’m gonna go with A Bird In the Hoof. It’s just really hard for me to look at that gross-ass bird the whole time.

Levi Price: So what would be your take on the Equastian military force if there were ever approached by a threat from a another race. Like when the changelings attacked in the season two finale. How do they think it would function.

I imagine they’d react like any other military, with a cautious guard, ready to defend themselves. I don’t really know anything about how a military functions so I can’t add to that.

cinderautum: What is your opinion on Derpy?

I think she’s adorable.

WeepingPegasus: Have you ever written pony fanfiction?

Yes! I wrote two chapters of a fanfiction called Pinkie Pie’s Toothache of Destiny, which you can find on FiMFiction. I stopped writing it because I very quickly ran out of ideas. It’s way too fast-paced and consists mostly of alliteration, puns, and constant dialog. Still, it had a lot of watchers, so it’s probably worth a look?

What, exactly, is your ponysona’s special talent? Do you think he would fit well into the established society of Equestria?

Digibrony’s talent is analysis! I’m sure he’d get along great with smart ponies like Twilight and Princess Celestia.

If it’s not too sensitive, what are your religious views and do you think they’ve affected how you see MLP? You don’t have to answer if you don’t want.

I don’t have any religious views, so they haven’t affected how I see MLP at all!

High Fidelity: MLP FIM is one of the most well animated cartoon I ever seen (The firs time I watch it i drop a tear of joy and emotion. I mean even now watching top animes like evangelion 1.0,2.0, I’m surprised by the quality and effort animators put in each episode. Just amazing!). The question is. Are you really into mlp because of it’s quality animation or by other aspects like story telling, plot, etc? Thanks

It’s a lot of everything. I talked a lot about what got me into the show in my Celebratign One Year of Bronydom video, but the animation definitely has a lot to do with why I’m into the show. It’s easily the most impressive-looking cartoon on TV right now.

UnovaBrony: How would you start to become a reviewer in your footsteps if you only can show your face, no media and try to do it in 5 to 10 minutes?

Um well, I’d just do that. I’d cut out the media, and try to do it in 5 to 10 minutes.

What would your reaction be if you met a brony who watched My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic from the very beginning?

I would say, awesome!

What would your reaction be if you met a brony who calls himself a Brony yet his only reason be a Death Battle (Rainbow Dash v Starscream) and not even know the ELEMENTS OF HARMONY?

Well, brony is a self-identity thing, I don’t really want to go around telling people they are or aren’t bronies.

Do you believe this would be a wonderful idea for a fanfic? (cut the description for time)

I think anything can be a good fanfic if you present it well enough.

What would be your future career on Earth/Equestria (if your OC has a job there)?

Hopefully, making youtube videos.

What would the solution be for a brony’s OC who has so many talents (an ever-changing cutie mark, blank flank, or a multiple talents cutie mark)?

Pick a cutie mark that represents their jack of all trades nature.

If there was another battle with the Changelings, what would a lesson be for the audience if aired as an episode?

I have no idea. But there is another battle with changelings happening in the comics right now.

If you dreamt of the concept of changelings while being a brony in Season 2 before the finale and seen the finale, did you predict the future, mere coincedence, or you have a deeper connection to pony than you thought?

I dunno but I’d be pretty stoked if I managed to predict that one.

If you put writers with the Mane 6 pony they work well with characterization, who would go with each Mane 6 and how good are they in each role?

I would have to put a loooot of work and thought into that one. If you remind me about this question six months from now after I’ve done a lot more rewatching and analyzing, I might have an answer for you.

Weeping Pegasus: Do you think cutie marks are, as Magical Mystery Cure seemed to indicate, just marks that don’t give talent, or do they actually bring some sort of ability to the pony like Cutie Pox indicated? I know that case was a little different, but the entire cutie mark plot (pun not intended) of the show seemed to point to the second one until the most recent finale.

I think the former.

Anonymous: Do you think Stephen Magnet will get a reappearance?

Actually I wouldn’t be surprised if he did. The writers have shown by now that they like bringing back minor characters, and I’m sure that Lee Tockar would be ecstatic to get to play that role again.

Simon: If you were to give Digibrony a personality separate from your own, what would it be and describe why you chose those characteristics. Thanks!

The biggest difference between me and Digibrony would be that he’d have pony tendencies. He’d also be aware that he’s a pony version of me, and have all of my knowledge, even though he’s in the pony world, allowing himself to experience his reality as a meta-reality. Because, fun.

schoolruler: Who is your favorite princess, and second and third and fourth, with a good reason for each?

My favorite princess is Twilgiht Sparkle, because she was already my second-favorite character anyways, so she kind of wins by default.

Number two goes to Luna because she’s adorable and fun to watch and has one of the best episodes of the show.

Hard to choose between Celestia and Cadence, cause I like them both and they both have great moments, but I’m also altogether indifferent to them both.

Anonymous: Ever see Turnabout Storm?

No, though I think I’ve seen fifteen minutes or so at random in streams. I’ve never played any of the Phoenix Wright games, but more than that I just find it hard to watch something quite so long.

Anonymous: What are your major ideas, thoughts, or feelings on the Fallout Equestria universe? Also, do you have a favorite Fallout Equestria story, beyond the original and Project: Horizons?

I haven’t read any of Fallout Equestria, for similar reasons to Turnabout Storm. I haven’t played Fallout, and also the story is extremely long.

Anonymous: Do you think season 4 will have something to do with the games that “Games Ponies Play” mentioned?

It would be nice if we got an episode or two showing those games, since the staff could dream up all kinds of imaginative ways for the ponies to compete. You know what would be really epic? If they brought in a bunch of recurring characters like Trixie and Iron Will to compete in the events.

Will you ever fix your OC’s leg? Also, what’s his name?

I didn’t draw my OC so I can’t fix him personally, and I also am not sure he’s broken. His legs are positioned the same way as the legs on my old Sweetie Belle avatar, which was a show vector as far as I know. It’s ultimately up to MizuTakishima if she wants to change anything. His name, of course, is Digibrony!

What do you consider your special talent?

Analysis! It really comes more naturally to me than any other kind of writing, and is far more natural. When I try to write fiction, it’s a struggle. When I write analysis, it’s fun.

If you were to make an MLP episode, how would it be?

I know I answered this question already, but I thought of a great episode concept earlier when I saw a picture on reddit. The picture was called guy’s night out, and had Spike and Shing Armor leaving the treehouse together. I think it would be pretty awesome to have an episode about Spike, Shining Armor, and Big Macintosh, possibly in which Spike finds himself really looking up to the older guys and how cool they seem to be. Shining would play a sort of dudely mentor to Spike. I think it would be really charming and fun to see.

Did you know that hooves are actually the nails of a horse’s middle finger?

I do now.

Ok, that was gross. Will you forgive me?

Forgiven!

What do you think the CMC’s cutie marks will be? How will they be acquired?

It’s funny, because in The Show Stoppers, it was heavily hinted at what each of the CMC’s cutie marks would be, but then it’s never really been brought up again. Nevertheless, I think those are probably the marks we can expect.

If Celestia rules Equestria, and Cadence rules the Crystal Empire, what does Twilight will rule?

I think this will probably be explained in the season four premiere.

Do I have such a bad grammar?

Based on this sentence, yes.

Anonymous: Favorite SoGreatandPowerful song?

Oh man, this is a really difficult question! Altogether, I think my favorite song is still A Sorceress Girl, but it’s hard to say. For a while, I was considering Indelible Ink to be my favorite song, but I really burned myself out on it. Dashy’s Hearth’s Warming Eve is also pretty up there for me. A Beautiful Heart is top tier as well, and the part in the middle where it hits that emotional high is one of my favorite moments in music, period. In History, Maybe, is I think the best use of pony dialog in any of his songs and the “whoa” moment is another alltime great moment in musical history. On My Own is the song that got me into SGAP, but I don’t know about a favorite. Episode Thirty (Love and Admiration) is my favorite of the S2 songs, followed very closely by Episode Thirty-Eight. Sofas and Quills is also up there. The Space Pony song, when taken as one eight-minute track, is also definitely among my favorites.

So yeah basically everything SGAP does is gold.

Archimedes Pegasus: Can I scratch you behind your pony ears?

If you track me down at Bronycon, you may do so.

doctor_whooves127: why did you choose this method for interacting with the community?

Because this method works. I started with a pony tumblr, in which I made a bunch of analytical posts, and had started to cover the show episodically, but only a couple of people were reading it. I realized pretty quickly that if you want to reach the brony community, you have to do it in a visual medium. I knew that I’d be able to do a better job of covering the episodes if I had video to go with them anyways, so I got to kill two birds with one stone.

Sean Dillon: -Thoughts on Conversion Bureau?

I haven’t read any of it.

-Why do bronies keep making Princess Celestia evil?

Probably because we’ve been brought up to fear the idea of a totalitarian government, which she seems to represent.

-Am I the only one who wanted Discord to have a mariachi band when he came out of the statue in “Keep Calm, and Flutter On”?

Um, probably. Not that I wouldn’t want it, but the thought had not previously occurred to me.

-With five minutes to prepare, come up with a pitch for a Doctor Whooves spin off series.

How about five seconds? It’s Doctor Who, but in ponyville instead of London. done, print it.

-What is the worst episode of MLP?

The worst episode is probably Boast Busters. Look forward to when I make another video about it to clarify why.

-Do androids dream of electric sheep?

Sweetie Belle dreams of electric dragon 80,000 volts.

-Who is your least favourite of the Main 6 and Why?

Probably Fluttershy, not for anything being wrong with her, just because I like the other five more.

Pkelton: In your opinion, who is the best villain thematically and in execution in retrospect with main cast? also what do you think about the whole Derpy thing?

Thematically, Discord was the best villain. He was literally the antithesis of harmony, which the mane six represent. It doesn’t get much better than that, which is why so many people feel an opportunity was missed in turning Discord around.

As for the Derpy thing, I have no opinion. I didn’t think it was a big deal, and I didn’t understand why everyone was losing their shit about it.

Luzoledad: how expensive do you think are the gems in MLP? I mean, looks like are not so big thing the most of time, but sometimes looks like are even a pay form.

The gems are definitely a confusing aspect of the show after Just For Sidekicks. I’d love to get some kind of clarification about it. I don’t have a headcanon about it though.

can you put lyrics in your song without Luna? just if you can, not an order, only a request

If you mean, putting lyrics on the video, it’s more work than I’m willing to do, because if I were to do it, I’d want to make sure I did it right, probably in sing-along form. If someone else decides they want to make a lyrics video for it, they can go right ahead.

Plainlake: (Had a very long question about Fluttershy, which I’ve cut for time.)

The answer to all of your Fluttershy questions will be covered when I eventually make a video examining Fluttershy as a character. This will probably be a really long time in the making, but I hope that you’ll look forward to it.

AquaticFlareon: QUICK!!! Who would win? Flareon with a Portal gun, or Pinkie Pie with a flame sword?!

How can either of them hold their weapons?

Sketch: ARE YOU SWEETIE BELLES REAL FATHER
ALSO HOW DO WE SEND YOU FAN PICS

I like to think of myself as Sweetie’s secret older brother. You can send fan pics to me either by sendign me a private message on youtube, or by commenting on my blog.

ryko89: What’s the situation on dramatic readings from you, as in:
Will you be doing dramatic readings?
Will you be doing any more fimfic reviews? (fckin loved ur university days review)
and last, there’s a new chapter of university days (shit is getting real) you said you might reconsider a reading or whatnot whenever the next chapter was released. That’s the power of jinxing…sorta

I still am thinking about reading University Days. If I decide to do it, you can still expect it to take a while for me to put out a video. I’m going to be a perfectionist about this, so it’s going to take me a bit of time to nail down the voices, the pace of the reading, and the editing. I also am thinking about where I might change things to suit an audio recording, like do I need to specify “Vinyl said” when I just read something in Vinyl’s voice? I also might add sound effects. There’s a lot to think about.

As for fanfic reviews, it will depend on me reading fanfics. After I finished Uni Days, I promised I’d read Anthropology next, and I’ve read about five paragraphs of that so far, so it’s gonna be a slow burn.

Anonymous: Who are your favorite pony designs?

I think Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle have the best, most aesthetically pleasing designs, and incidentally this is also my theory as to why Twidash is such a hugely popular ship. I think Rarity’s design is a stroke of genius as well, as it communicates her character in a brilliant way. And then there’s Sweetie Belle, SO GOD DAMN ADORABLE.

How do you feel about the older gens?

I haven’t watched any of them yet, though I’ve been primed on what to expect. I’m actually pretty curious about the original show, because I’ve heard it’s not bad, and it seems to have this magical charm to it.

Do you own any pony merch? If so, what do you have?

I’ve got the first three issues of the comic book, with alt covers for issues one and two. I’ve got the Friendship Express DVD as well, and those are all the merch that I bought myself. My aunt bought my brother and I these MLP bag things which came with a handful of blind-bag ponies, as well as two MLP-themes shower gels, and an entirely-too-small-for-an-adult-man soap thingy which I’ve had to use once and felt really wrong doing so. I’ve also ended up using most of the Applejack and Princess Celestia shower gel when I ran out of my own and kept forgetting to buy more. I have one brushable Applejack toy, which I think my aunt bought for me as well at a thrift store. She also bought me the Brony t-shirt with Rainbow Dash on it. (My aunt has been an MLP fan since the 80s, so she was pretty excited about my brother and I getting into it.)

Besides that, I’ve got the MLP shirt with the entire cast on it, and the 20% cooler throw blanket, which my mom bought me. My little brother also has the Derpy Is Best Pony shirt and the Keep Calm And Brony On jacket.

The other day I finally managed to order the Pinkie Hard shirt from Andrew WK, which is several layers of awesome for me. I really want to get the Twilicorn and Sweet Apple Acres shirts from We Love Fine that were designed by Sofas and Quills, but they’re expensive, and youtube isn’t making me very much money yet.

Just to clarify, are you going to Bronycon in Maryland this year?

Yes! I will be putting out an announcement video about Bronycon very soon. I will be doing something special there, and I will also be cosplaying.

Bright Sky: Fave CMC?

Sweetie Belle!

Luna or Woona?

Can’t I have both?

Celestia, Trollestia, or Molestia?

Can’t I have all three??

Benji234: sooo why does your OC’s mane and tail look like sweetie belle was that a personal thing or did you just really like her….um mane?

I told MizuTakishima that I was a fan of Sweetie Belle’s design, and before she made Digibrony, I was using an inverted-color version of Sweetie as my avatar, so Digibrony was deliberately based on Sweetie Belle.

David Barragan: When was it that you realized that Bronies seriously started to pay attention to your videos and that you were growing a fanbase?

About just now. No but really, it was a very sudden and surprising process. I think that most bronies who become popular have a more steady integration into the fandom. Like, if I’d become friends with JHaller and SaberSpark, and they’d started promoting my channel or something, it would totally make sense. Or if I was getting regularly featured on Equestria Daily or Everfree Network or something, I would understand. However, I’ve already passed all the bronies that I talk to by a massive amount of subscribers, and I’ve only been featured on EQD a couple of times in nightly roundups, with the one major feature being my Good Morning Ponyville video, which doesn’t represent what I usually do at all.

So yeah, it’s strange, and it doesn’t seem to be stopping Youtube analytics tells me that the biggest source of hits and subs is coming over from related and recommended videos, so I guess I have to thank youtube itself, and everyone who puts out pony videos around the same time that I do.

When I got nearly one thousand comments on my Magical Mystery Cure video was when I really knew that this thing had taken off, but it wasn’t until this AMA that the sheer gravity of the situation became clear to me.

Links mentioned in video:

AliceMaple’s Deviantart page: http://alicemaple.deviantart.com/

Notes on channel success: https://docs.google.com/document/d/152Hmp0oFinxGPjwueGwsLKSYjmQafOxExEvtdoOmziw/edit?usp=sharing

Misfortune-Dogged on Boast Busters: http://thingsinthefridge.com/2013/02/27/pony-ep-quips-boast-busters/

Text version of questions and answers:

Anonymous: can you do a Thoroughly Analyzing on rainbow dash presents?

The Dawn Somewhere guys already do their own analysis videos on Rainbow Dash Presents in the form of commentaries, and I don’t really have anything to add to those, so I recommend checking them out!

Musicbrony642: How did you get your channel to be so successful and do you have any hints for up and coming mlp YouTube channels.

Back when I was around 3000 subs, I wrote a really extensive google doc analyzing the possible reasons for my channel’s rapidly expanding popularity, which I gave to AnY Pony and Bronycurious. I’ve gone ahead and linked it in the description for anyone curious. However, I still don’t know how to account for the sheer number of subs that I’m getting at the insane rate I’m currently getting them.

Derring Do: My question is simple: What are your thoughts on this interpretation of S3? (I’ve cut the full explanation for time, but basically Derring was saying that season three was an intermediary step on each pony’s road to realizing their destiny.)

I totally agree.

JetH7: What gave you the idea to do this “Ask me anything”… thing?

Well, there are several reasons. The first one is simply that I love to be interviewed, and it’s something I fantasize about all the time. There’s a whole reddit board called Ask Me Anything, which I based the name off of, and I thought about doing this as an actual Reddit AMA, but I figured it wouldn’t be fair to make all of my viewers create Reddit accounts just to ask me questions (even though reddit is one of the easiest sites in existence to make an account on).

What actually drove me to do this though is that I get a LOT of the same questions again and again in the comments on my videos. I answer them a lot of the time, but not everyone can easily find these answers, since they get buried in the comments. That’s why it’s so important to me that I do this QnA in video form, so that everyone will be able to see it, and easily find the answers to their questions. After this, I’ll feel comfortable either ignoring questions that I’ve already answered, or directing people to this video.

What are your thoughts on fan fiction?

In general, I think fan fiction is a very cool idea. I strongly support the idea of the death of the author, and the idea that every person interprets the same story differently. When people take their interpretation and use it to tell a story, it can lead to all kinds of exciting avenues, especially when someone else’s idea of the story aligns well with mine. That said, it’s pretty rare for that alignment to happen, so a lot of fanfiction doesn’t appeal to me, even if I think it’s well done.

Rudy: I’m a brony (obviously) but i dont wanna tell my friends about being one, in case they tell their friends, who tell the populars who will call me things like “gay” or “baby”. What should i do?

Why do you care about what others call you? If they want to think you’re gay or a baby, what does it matter to you? You know you aren’t gay or a baby, fuck what they think. That’s my way of thinking, anyways. If people want to think I’m gay and a baby, I don’t mind. I don’t care about those people, and they don’t effect me.

Benjamin: Hi Digibrony, would you make a movie about the educational system in Equestria? I mean Earth ponies go to regular school like the one Cherrilee teaches, but for pegasus they have their own flying school and in the case of unicorns they go to a totally different school where they learn magic spells and stuff like Twilight, right? So would you do a review about that please?

Yes, at some point I would very much like to do a video about Equestria’s educational system. I don’t have plans to do it any time soon, but it will happen eventually.

Anonymous: Who is your favorite writer and are you open to more writers being brought on to the show in the future?

My favorite writer is probably M.A. Larson, both as a writer on the show, and as a person in real life, because he’s a total badass. Amy Keating Rogers and Meghan McCarthy are tied for second place. I’m definitely comfortable with bringing in new writers, to keep giving new perspectives. For instance, Corey Powell was a new writer in season three, and I thought he brought something really new to the table with Sleepless in Ponyville.

Ness682: Would you want the CMC to get their cutie marks during the show, at the end of the series, or completely ignore the idea of ever getting their cutie marks?

I would love to see the CMC get their cutie marks in the show, and I’d love to see how they handle starting their careers. This would be one of the coolest things the show could do, actually.

Sam Mutch: How emotionally attached to the mane 6 are you?

Very. My attachment to the mane six is a gigantic part of why I’m so into the show, and what holds me watching it.

As Twilight has now had her development arc, do you think there should be smaller arcs for the other mane 6?

I definitely want to see a strong focus on developing each of the mane six in season four. We’re going to have a full season this time, so there should be time to give everyone a really big moment or two.

What do you think to the headcanon that Scootaloo is actually Fluttershy’s sister?

I think this would be pretty out there. She’d have to be a long-lost sister that Fluttershy didn’t know about, and that kind of far-flung dramatic situation just isn’t the kind of thing I can see coming out of MLP.

OlimpicZeuss: Digibrony, is there any reason why your OC is a unicorn? Mine is too and that’s because I tend to do a lot of “information and writing” in the south american part of the fandom. My actual question is: Does your OC have a background or story (this includes your Cutie Mark :D)? Greetings from Argentina.

My decision to be a unicorn is based both on their strengths and weaknesses. Obviously, unicorns tend to be the more academically-minded ponies in the series, and with a cutie mark of analysis, I’d say I pretty firmly fall in line with that. Earth ponies, to me, represent a deeper connection with the Earth itself, with living things, and with their own bodied. I feel very disconnected from those things, and even envious of people with those connections, so I can’t be an Earth Pony. Pegasi are a bit harder to define, but if nothing else I’d say they’re pretty emotionally driven, which I’m really not.

Luck Bites: What do you think the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ cutie marks should be/look like?

I don’t know, I’m a terrible designer, which is why I left my cutie mark in the hands of the artist!

How many times do you visit my little pony related websites each day and which ones?

I visit the main mylittlepony reddit page about twenty times a day, often just for a couple of seconds to see if there’s something new. This does a pretty effective job of keeping me up to date with all the comics, videos, news, and images that come out of the fandom. I also resubscribed to EQD recently, though I don’t read most of it. I mostly like to check to see if anything by me gets posted there.

Would you rather have more Rarity or more Scootaloo episodes in season 4?

Rarity, no fucking contest.

Anonymous: What is your opinion on fanponies- yea or “neigh”. And did you like my pun?

I always like puns. As for fanponies, I like them when they look nice. I think it would be weird if I had one made if I didn’t like them, for that matter.

zeusassassin: Have you seen My Little Investigations? What are your thoughts on it and what do you hope to see from the game?

I don’t know much about mylittleinvestigations. I remember seeing stuff about it when it was first announced, but I haven’t kept up with it. That said, I’ll probably play it when it comes out.

Who would you personally love to see ponified that hasn’t been yet?

Actually there’s a lot of stuff I want to see ponified. One thing that I want to do myself, is Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares: Equestria. I will write it one day.

GummiTheAlligator: I saw you had homestuck in a part of your video, so what was your reaction when you saw that dirk was a brony.

I enjoyed that a lot. It made sense because Dirk is the kind of character who wouldn’t give a fuck what others thought, and he clearly was into horses and stuff, so why not.

certainly: Favorite tiarawhy animation?

I thought this was going to be in the Digibrony After Dark section, but then I realized that tiarawhy made the animation Trixie: Alone, which is what made me a Trixie fan, so I chose that one. Bullet safely dodged!

Kyle: What is your favorite fan made Brony song?

My alltime favorite brony song is Born Cross-Eyed by Tarby. For that matter, it is also one of my top five favorite songs of all time

Who is your favorite Brony besides yourself?

I’m not going to count my brothers or any of my friends since that’s kind of obvious. Sticking solely to bronies who are visibly active in the community, Bronycurious is the one I’m closest friends with so far. In terms of which brony I’m the biggest fan of, that award goes easily to SoGreatAndPoweful, whom I’m an obsessive fanboy of, and I’m actually slightly upset that I have more subs than him now.

Anonymous: what are you thoughts are on the theory about discord being starswirl

I really don’t get the logic behind this theory. It’s too much of a stretch to catch my interest.

desjin: What are thoughts on how the economy works in Equestria?

For the time being, I’ve thrown my hands up regarding this topic. There’s too little information, and the available information is too all over the place. I barely understand real-world economics in the first place, so I’m not even gonna bother headcanonizing this.

Anonymous: I like to have an O.C. Pony but I am terrible at drawing. How do I get one?

Try and find someone who will draw one for you. Some artists will take commissions to draw OCs if you can afford it. I found an artist just by suggesting that I’d take an OC drawing in one of my videos, so unless you make videos, I can’t help much with advice.

Daniel: First of all, I love your YouTube channel and blog, I think they’re very insightful and interesting. Here’s my question: I know some people have asked how you got into the mlp fandom but what I want to know is if you had anything happen to you socially when you came out with it, were all of your friends bronies too or were you the odd man out, if other people were negative towards you about it how did you deal with it? Do you have any advice for those of us who want to be open about it but are too afraid of what others might think?

Glad to hear that someone reads my blog! Anyways, the thing about me, is that I’m an extremely eccentric person to begin with. I have never been considered socially normal by anyone, and I was ostracized through most of my childhood, so things like this were not new to me. Through force of self-obsession, I happen to like myself a lot, so it doens’t bother me much if other people don’t like me or talk shit about me. I have confidence and love for myself, much more so than anyone has those things in me.

To give a picture of what I’m like, I used to have hair that reached down to my knees, until I finally cut it short last year because I realized having long hair is a nuisance. My wardrobe has consisted almost entirely of t-shirts and pajama pants since 2008, and while I’ve thought about changing that so that I’d look nicer, I just haven’t felt much drive to do so. I was an anime fan for a long time, and everyone knew this, because I never stop talking, and that was what I most enjoyed talking about.

For a while, I had a room that was covered in posters of scantily clad anime girls, because I wanted to have an “otaku room,” though I eventually realized that this was kind of inauthentic since I didn’t like a lot of the posters, and I took most of them down. I have a pretty large collection of figures, and everyone has stumbled onto my doujin stash at least once.

My point is, I have a strong sense of self-identity, and I don’t try to hide this. When my little brother and I got into MLP, I did exactly what I would’ve done if I got into any other show. I talked about it in Twitter and facebook. I pretty quickly changed my facebook avatar to a pony and started spamming PMVs on my timeline, so everyone was very aware of it. I made most of my friends watch episodes of the show with me, and got a number of them to continue watching on their own.

Inauthenticity does not survive around me. I don’t like people who can’t admit what they like, and I hate people who won’t accept other people for who they are and what they’re into. When someone says something like, “you’re a faggot for watching MLP,” I say, “I’d much rather be a faggot than a hater.” I look down on haters.

Cro-Magnon Man: Any good rock brony musicians you know of?

I heavily recommend Tarby. He remains the best rock musician I know of in the fandom. I don’t know a lot of MandoPony songs, but I think he mostly plays rock music to and is quite popular. Another good rock song is For Luna by Vafruous Coyote, though I haven’t listened to any of his other stuff. Just the other day I was introduced to Caine the Destroyer, who plays some wicked cool rock songs, though I haven’t had a chance to listen to much of it yet.

aipom93: Do you have a game console? Which one? What is your XBox Live/PSN/Steam Name?

I have had all of the major consoles at one point or another. I had about four red-ringed Xbox 360s before I finally stopped buying the damn console, so I’m out that one. I have a PS3, but I don’t play it much, and I definitely don’t play online games, so I don’t have a name worth sharing.

Luck Bites: If there was a my little pony episode where one of the ponies dies (mane 6, CMC, apple family, Twilight’s parents, a princess, etc) what would you think?

I would think, “huh, this alternate reality that could never possibly exist sure is strange”

Paleo: How are you catching up with me so fast? <.<

I probably already know the answer though. :P Probably has to do with the fact that I haven’t been active lately and you’ve been very consistent with posting videos, and I commend you for that. You’ve done a great job of it! :D

Thanks Paleo. By the time this video comes out, I’ve probably overtaken you. It’s all quite exhilarating!

Sleipnir: What character would you like to see developed the most? Mane 6 and other. And what character needs to be developed more?

I wouldn’t mind seeing more TRIXIE! In fact, if Trixie could become some kind of mainstay character, I would be quite okay with that. A character who needs to be developed more is Cadence. If she’s going to keep being important, I’d like to know more about her in general.

NickyV917: I became a fan of you after Hasbro shut down your video on “Boast Busters”. You mentioned that you’ll redo that video at some point. When will this be, and can you give a quick summary of what you think of it right here.

I will probably do my Boast Busters video relatively soon, because so many people are curious about it, and I think it’s been long enough for me to formulate my thoughts. If you want to see basically what I’m going to say about it, but written by a friend of mine, check the description for a link to a great post about the episode.

solidmatthew: to me it seems that Luna gets a lot more attention from the fandom then Celestia. I think the reason is the fact that Luna got an episode developing her character were Celestia is around a lot, but its always because of an important event. We’ve only really seen Celestia in a casual setting twice (that i can think of), and during those time it was very brief. We see Celestia but i feel we don’t know her as well as Luna. Do you think an episode focusing on Celestia or both princesses is likely and how could they pull it off

I think it would be nice to get an episode about Celestia, but I don’t know how it can work. With Luna, she was able to have a very personal problem that the mane six could solve. For Celestia to have a problem like this, it might start to raise questions. I’m not imaginative enough to think of a way it could work.

Onlyinthislight: (asked an extremely long question about Rarity, and basically answered it with their own analysis of the situation, so I’m not sure how to respond to it.) Also asked: What are your theories as to why some fans like AND dislike each of the mane 6?

Thing about this is that it’s an intensely person by person thing, and the generalization that people do or don’t like one pony or another are not well-based. I’ve seen polls where Fluttershy came out on top, and polls where Fluttershy came out on bottom. I’ve seen people who think AJ is boring, yet I’ve seen Applejack-centric songs and fan videos dominate in popularity. Because the fandom is so decentralized, people often get it in their heads that popular opinion is one thing, when it really isn’t, and it becomes confusing when they talk to people from another part of the fandom. Altogether, I think it’s better for each individual to analyze their own reasons for liking and disliking each pony.

AndyManX: There’s a rise in rumors on the new toy set that features a unicorn by the name of Sunset Shimmer. People are saying that she’s going to be the next Twilight Sparkle, replacing her as a mane 6 character. Thoughts?

I do not think that anyone is going to REPLACE Twilight Sparkle, but if Sunset was a new member of the group, I think that could be pretty cool. Adding in a proverbial “sixth ranger” can sometimes be a lot of fun, though it can turn out poorly if the character takes away too much screen time and attention from the established cast. Since this can go either way, and it’s only a far-flung rumor that Sunset even might be a new cast member, I’m going to hold off on saying much until I see where things go.

Anonymous: Suddenly your favorite pony is right next to you, what do?

Calm her down, explain where she is, ask her what she was doing just before she ended up here, try my best to calm and comfort her, assure her she’s safe here until she figures this all out, try my hardest not to hug her and/or play with her hair while working her through this disorienting experience.

Anonymous: Hey, I was just wondering. What’s your theory on exactly how Princesses become Princesses?

I really don’t have a theory, I’m hoping it gets touched on in the season four premiere.

Supergrub: What is your favorite MLP fanfic in each of the following genres: comedy, horror, and adventure.

Given that I’ve read so few fanfics, I have only one for one genre, which is The Day My Beard Turned Into Pinkie Pie, for comedy.

What are your opinions on the following fanfics: My Little Dashie, Anthropology, Cupcakes, and Know Your Mare? (You know, if you’ve read them.)

I haven’t read any of them! I do plan to read Anthropology, though.

Anon: Who or what inspired you to write and do these analysis videos?

My biggest inspiration to go to video format as opposed to text was Egoraptor’s sequelitis videos. They are some of my favorite videos ever made, and I’ve watched them countless times. However, I do not have Egoraptor’s sense of humor nor passion for animation, so doing my video exactly like his was out of the question. Then I discovered Campster, who writes with a voice that’s much more similar to mine, and I decided that I could make videos.

Savannah: What is your list of mane 6 ponies from least liked to most liked?

Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Twilight Sparkle, Applejack

Do you like Friendship is Witchcraft or The mentally Advanced series more?

Friendship Is Witchcraft. I’ve never really gotten into the Mentally Advanced Series, I think FimFlam’s concepts of the characters came to life a lot more when he started doing Rainbow Dash Presents.

TAB: Who is your favorite male background character and why?

I don’t know any male background characters.

Anonymous: Do you think Discord’s powers are magic based or something else entirely?

I don’t know what the limitations are on what is considered magic, so I can’ really say.

Pegasister named Gwyn C: You sounded WAY to upbeat on the ASK ME ANYTHING video – are you on the glitter?

What the actual fuck?

If you are on glitter – Don’t tell Pinkie …. this isn’t a question. THIS IS A ORDER

Holy shit I already told her what DO?!

You don’t happen to know the name of Fancy Pant’s wife/girlfriend/fiance do you?

Her name was Fleur de Lis, and I like to think that she was just some model he was hanging out with, not actually in a relationship.

What are your feelings on the Discord and Celestia shipping?

I’m okay with it, vaguely.

alchemgirl13: Should Discord, King Sombra, the Flim Flam Brothers, and/or Queen Chrysalis come back in Season 4?

I wouldn’t mind if all of them came back.

Links mentioned in video:

ask-artila’s deviantart: http://ask-artila.deviantart.com/

Brony Media Overview: http://myswordisunbelievablydull.wordpress.com/2012/04/24/brony-media-overview-tons-of-embeds/

Tufts of Cotton Candy: http://thirtyminuteponies.tumblr.com/post/44107657806/prompt-272-tufts-of-cotton-candy-by-digibrony

Theories about Starswirl’s spell: by Urishima: http://urishima.tumblr.com/post/43435753421/about-starswirls-spell-and-alicorns

by thewriterkid: http://thewriterkid.tumblr.com/post/43508082366/super-fun-theory-time-with-tim-mlp-s3-spoilers-below

Fuck Shit Stack: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NglaU_dZzDI

Pony Cordero’s Dr. Whooves video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1OxlP99QNc

Thor pony: http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2013/049/f/9/greatest_cutiemark_ever_by_davionx-d5veine.jpg

Text version of questions and answers:

Jonathan: Do you think if the main characters were transferred to our world and saw our movies and video games, that they’d think fans of violent entertainment were desensitized to real violence, due to the wholesome nature of Equestria? How would each of them react to gory media? And would your answer to this question just be a reflection of your own opinion on the matter and liking to think the characters would agree with you?

I think that if the mane six were teleported into our world, there would be way the hell more culture shock than just violent media for them to get over. If we’re going to talk about this hypothetical with any seriousness, we have to remember that we’re teleporting a talking marshmallow pony into reality. The implications of this are pretty far-reaching.

What sort of fiction do you think Applejack would enjoy?

I think AJ would probably have a surprisingly classy taste in literature. I can see her appreciating action lit and stuff, but probably not the same way Rainbow Dash does. AJ would read deep and thoughtful stuff that expands her knowledge and empathy for other ponies.

Anonymous: You wake up aboard a spaceship set to arrive at Equestria, what do you do?

I immediately seek out someone who can explain to me where I am in great detail, and marvel at the shock of learning that there are alien races beyond my comprehension with some purpose to send me to a planet of talking ponies. My horizons are so thoroughly broadened that by the time I land in Equestria, I’m just enthralled, not even really shocked by it all.

Oh wait, there was a list of options attached to this question. I ignore them.

Patrick Salisbury: Will you ever do more “Eminem/MLP crossover songs”

I’ve thought about doing it, but I have to find the right combination of song and character. I spontaneously ponified an entire verse of The Real Slim Shady in the comments of Without Luna, so I might possibly do that one in the future.

Favorite Villain from the whole series

If Trixie counts, I answer TRIXIE!

How can you go about getting a picture of your OC such as you are sporting on your channel

If you’re looking for a picture of my OC, check out MizuTakishima’s Deviantart page, or if you want the full-body one, check out ask-artila’s Deviantart. Both are linked in the description.

uolbu: Why does twilight have to earn her wings when Cadence is shown to be an alicorn as a kid already? D:

I don’t know!

In your Mane Six Ages Videos you said that we never got to see a teenager pony. But is the Cadence in Twilights flashbacks not the very stereotype of a teenager – a baby/foalsitter?

Could be! But remember my theory is that the mane six ARE teenagers, not that teenagers don’t exist. My point was simply that there weren’t any ponies with a smaller body than the mane six without being fillies.

Can we expect Twilight to grow as tall as the other princesses now that she got promoted? Maybe not in canon. But else she kinda lacks in presentation.

Cadence and Luna are both shorter than Celestia, right? I’m not sure what governs the whole height thing.

Is she going to live longer than her friends now?

I don’t knoooow!!

Why the f*** did I decide to research alicorns a day after episode 13 got released and spoiled the episode D:?

I’m seriously impressed that you managed to go that long without being spoiled for that episode.

Was there a plan or story for Peewee that got canceled? Cause those few photos in Just for Sidekicks sure where disappointing.

From what I’ve heard, Peewee’s pictures weren’t actually in the script. The animators put that in as an explanation for why Peewee wasn’t in the episode.

Jordan: Any chance you’ll be or are you currently partnered with YouTube?

I am currently a youtube partner, though that doesn’t mean much. Literally anyone can become a youtube partner as soon as they activate their account. Mostly youtube has continually fucked me over by demanding I have permission to use footage before monetization can happen, even though my videos fall under fair use.

If you can make your own MLP video game, what do you think it should be called and what game company do you think would be a great match to develop the game?

It would be called Fighting Is Magic and made by Mane6! Fuck I made myself sad.

If the MLP writers were to make a movie, do you think it would land in theaters or just be an average TV movie on the Hub?

Actually, there is supposedly an MLP TV movie in the works right now!

Tyler: Will you do a series of reading videos on fallout equestria?

No way. Even if I finally get around to reading it, it’s entirely too long for something like that.

ruolbu: Isn’t the spell Cadance casts at around 10:00 in Canterlot Wedding Part 1 to stop the argument of two ponies kinda creepy? I mean, arguing is not inherently bad, she just brainwashed them into believing everything is okay. How is that good behaviour worthy of a princess? D:

It is a pretty weird scene, but MLP has a lot of weird shit like that. Remember the REFORMING SPELL?!?

cj: First I love the videos. Second my question is if you were transported to equestria for life and could bring one person and one thing with you but never return and forget everything about being a human would you do so and why?

I would probably do it, but I’d have to put serious consideration into who to take, and discuss it with each of the candidates at length. It would be a really tough decision to leave our families and lives behind to do something that we could ultimately regret. I don’t know what I’d take, probably a video camera.

DarkAgumonRants: Do you think that Doctor Whooves, Lyra, Derpy, and any other popular background character get their own episode in season 4? My other question is, do you think that Twilight will still live in Ponyville (even thought that she is an alicorn)?

I highly doubt that any background characters will get their own episode. The writers are focused on writing about the mane six, and a lot of them seem to be relatively unaware of background characters other than Derpy. The background ponies are the creation of Studio B after all, and the writers aren’t involved with them at all. As for Twilight living in Ponyville, we have to wait and see!

Anonymous: How deep into analyses can you go?

Pretty damn deep.

Something has been bothering me about Lesson Zero. I believe that in a movie/show/book, they don’t focus on anything unless it has some significance, so why did the camera(?) focus on Big Mac putting down the bucket? Does it have any relevance? If not, why would they focus on it the way they did? Why was he carrying it? What happened to it? Am I crazy?

I will have to see the moment in question again, but yes, you’re probably crazy. Every shot has a purpose, but that purpose isn’t necessarily significant to the plot. It can be as simple as a convenient screen composition.

harphoof: What do you think of the Arabian horses that appeared in Magic Duel?

I really like her… mane? No really I’m indifferent.

Legofane: How do you feel about the NSFW artists? -Do you feel like some of the dislike they get for what they do is justified?

If you are asking, is the hate that people give them justified, then no. It is never okay to hate on someone for what they like, period.

Mooglegirl: What do you think about all the spells such as want-it need-it, reforming, etc. that seem to be perfectly legal and okay in Equestria but are actually pretty morally dubious? And am I the only one who had a bit of a fridge horror moment about how Twilight is a PRINCESS now, giving her room to abuse her power?

Those spells in particular are quite weird. I feel like they get thrown into the story as jokes without much thought, but the minute you think about them they raise a lot of questions. Stuff like this is normal under cartoon logic, but it’s only when you’re trying to construct Equestria as a realized world that these things really come under question.

Lundana: I find that you are very fluid in your speaking skills. I’ve had a speech impediment all of my life and I still struggle with it on a daily basis, even at the age of 21. Do you have any advice in terms of speaking clearly and fluently with confidence?

Practice. Talk as much as possible. The reason that I’m so good at speaking is that I talk constantly, so I speak with a lot of confidence. I trip over words and slur my speech all the time, but I just keep talking and don’t pay any attention to it. Mind you that I make plenty of errors when I record my videos, but I edit them out. In live conversation, I have a habit of starting the same word several times, but again, I just keep talking through it.

ItWasUnderE: Give me your top three brony musicians

SoGreatAndPowerful, Cats Millionaire, and Tarby.

How well did the content of S1 and S2 fit into the Grand Old Arc of FiM? (i.e. Twilight becoming a princess)?

I think they fit pretty damn well, looking back. When I watched the pilot episodes again, I felt they gelled really well with where the series would eventually go.

Which upcoming cons will you be in?

I will definitely be at Bronycon, but I’m not really aware of other cons on the east coast. I definitely have time to go to cons, but it’s a matter of where they are and how much they cost beyond that. If I ever get an offer to go to a con with cost covered, I’ll do it in a haartbeat.

Two elephants and a manta ray are trapped inside a box. The walls are painted bright orange and the ceiling is yellow. Three taps knock on the door, followed by a doorbell. What is your favorite catchphrase in the show?

BUY SOME APPLES! I mean uh, shit, I don’t know.

Nash Tei: Which fan music do you listen to?

If you look in the description, I’ve put a link to a post that I wrote last April in which I listed all of my favorite brony musicians and songs up until that point. The list is missing some artists that I’ve gotten into since then, such as Cats Millionaire and Le Soldat Pony, but other than that it’s got plenty.

pearse mccan: Do you believe there will be more seasons than 4?

Yes. Unless season four somehow does very poorly, I think there will easily be five seasons of this show.

What do you think celestia’s use is for discords magic?

I don’t know but I hope the show goes into it.

When do you thinks (in estimate) season 4 will air?

September would be nice, October is likely.

Do you think sombra is gone? what about chrysalis?

I don’t think they’re gone. Chrysalis is already back in the official comic.

Alex Elliot: I would really like to hear your opinion on Celestia’s leadership. In 3 seasons we’ve had the return of discord, return of nightmare moon, Canterlot was over run with changelings, pony ville was conquered by a lone crazed mare with an magic pendent, pony ville was nearly destroyed by para-sprites, 5 ponies nearly fell to their death in the sonic rain boom episode, and the CMC are bullied in school. If I were living in Equestria I would be writing letters demanding change and accountability!

Well, if a ruler’s job is really good management of their subjects, then Celestia has done a great job of engendering a populace who can take care of these problems. After all, Equestria’s big problems are almost always thwarted in a matter of days.

Nash Tei: actually i had more questions, like: What’s your opinion on all the parasprites that absolutely refuse to watch the show because they claim its a girls show?

If people don’t want to watch it, that’s their business. I won’t force it on them. They’re missing out, but that’s their problem, not mine.

Which pony species is best, unicorn, pegasi, earth, or alicorn?

I don’t prefer any species over the others.

Which is best pony from NOT mane six?

This might sound like a repeat question, but it’s actually the first time someone asked who my favorite non mane pony is without using the phrase “background pony.” Therefore my answer is TRIXIE!

Do you view the pony fandom as the parasprites make it look?

Of course not! Why would I be a member of it if I did?

ral365: If you had to make a top (insert number here) best and worst MLP episodes so far (obviously MMC being #1), which ones would you choose?

At some point, I’m going to make a ranked list of the episodes. I haven’t rewatched season two in a long time, so I can’t feel comfortable doing one right now. However, going on memory, and in no order, here are a list of what I’d currently consider my top ten favorite episodes:

1. Magical Mystery Cure
2. Applebuck Season
3. Sweet and Elite
4. The Cutie Mark Chronicles
5. Lesson Zero
6. Luna Ecliped
7. Sisterhooves Social
8. May the Best Pet Win
9. A Friend In Deed
10. Too Many Pinkie Pies

My bottom five episodes, again from the top of my head, would be: Boast Busters, A Bird In the Hoof, Owl’s Well That Ends Well, The Mysterious Mare Do Well, and possibly Games Ponies Play or Dragon Quest

Do you have any feelings about all the Doctor Whooves spin offs, fan made AND official? (Doctor and Ditzy have their own official MLP comic book at Hot Topic!)

To clarify, Doctor and Ditzy don’t have an official comic, just an alternative cover on the official MLP comic. Besides that, I’ve listened to the first four episodes of Doctor Whooves and the Assistant and watched the animations of the first three, and I think it’s good stuff. That was what finally got me to watch Doctor Who, after all.

Dana Ford: How did you feel when you first realized you loved MLP? Who did you tell first? Did they judge you?

I felt awesome, and I told my brother, and he wasn’t really surprised.

Anonymous: How big do you think the fandom will get?

That depends on how much we keep expanding it. It’s hard to tell how big it is at any given time, but I’m pretty sure it’s not shrinking yet, and probably won’t be shrinking for a while to come. It would be nice to see it enter the public consciousness.

Have you watched anything from PWaaMLPfim,PierceSmoulder or SqueakAnon?

Only Pierce Smoulder, as detailed a moment ago.

How many of your friends like the show?

Well, not counting my brothers, my best friend likes the show a lot, though he hasn’t watched most of season three yet because he hasn’t watched any shows in a long while. I have other friends who’ve watched bits and pieces and liked it, though none of them are dedicated to the show or identify as bronies.

smiley: Who is your favorite guest star on mlp?

How many guest stars even are there? John De Lancie is the only one right?

Trigonometrize: The scene in Magical Mystery Cure where all of Twilight’s friends bow down to her. I personally hated this scene as it made it look as if Twilight had trascended her friends. After all, bowing is meant to say “I am lower than you and respect you”. How do you justify this scene? And I say justify because “in [your] eyes this episode was utterly perfect.”

Bowing does not suggest being lower, it merely suggests respect of the utmost caliber. I saw this moment as being a reflection of the scene in The Lord of the Rings, in which the entire kingdom of man bows to the Hobbits to show their respect for the Hobbits courage in saving their lives. Both are intensely powerful scenes.

princessluna91: Where do you compile all of your information and knowledge for your rant videos.

In my brain. These videos are usually written in a stream of consciousness fashion over the course of about an hour, based on general stuff I’ve been thinking about. Occasionally I will grab a  pen and paper and take notes while I’m watching an episode to account for all the little stuff.

Caitlynn: (asked a long question basically asking for details about Digibrony as a character)

The way I see Digibrony is as a meta-fictional representation of myself. Even if he existed in the MLP universe, he would still be me, with all of my knowledge, experiencing the world of Equestria while understanding that he was in a fictional universe and the laws of that universe. I’ve actually written a short fiction from the perspective of Digibrony the character, which I’m linking to in the description. It’s called Tufts of Cotton Candy, and was written for the tumblr thirtyminuteponies.

ruolbu: In S3E13 Celestia says that Twilight did something extraordinary by creating new magic. But isn’t that what every Unicorn does, since their respective talents lead to them having a unique approach to magic?

This is actually a great question. The principles behind unicorn magic are very interesting to me, and I might actually try and do a really in-depth headcanon about all of this at some point.

What exactly did the spell she wrote in that book? Was the spell what unleashed her princessness and Celestia just zapped her into that twilight dimension (no pun intended) before the spell could take effect? Or did the spell transport her there and Celestia bestowed the wings upon her?

I haven’t given much thought or interest to the actual mechanics of Starswirl or Twilight’s spell, but I’ve put links to some interesting theories in the description.

What is your take on how MLP is being marketed? Is Hasbro pushing it into the “girls stuff” corner by using too many stereotypically girly tropes, like color schemes, princesses themes, and girls only in the commercials?

Well it’s uh a show made for little girls. It would be weird to call it “too girly.” What’s important is that the show isn’t concerned about being girly, it’s concerned about telling a good story about girls.

Is Hasbro doing the fandom a disservice that way?

Nope!

Or do you feel like MLP is at heart still a “girls thing” that just happens to have become more popular with another demographic. I mean, the creators, actors, writes etc. of the show embrace the entire fandom, yet none of that is being reproduced with the toys imo. Or am I just not seeing the entire picture?

Hasbro and really everyone in the show, is under the assumption that if fans liked what they saw from the beginning, then they will continue to like it, and this is true. Hasbro hasn’t capitalized on the fandom yet because they don’t need to. It might be a good idea to do so and it’s almost strange they haven’t tried yet, but altogether, it’s not a necessity.

JakefourLeaf: What program(s) did you have access to and what do you use now?

I do my recording in Audacity, which is a free program, and I do my video editing in Sony Vegas, which is an extremely NOT free program. I personally consider it the best and most intuitive video editing software, and if you want to try and find a way to get it, you have my blessing, but I won’t help you.

ShyGaladriel: How long did each pony take to go back to their normal cutie marks in “Magical Mystery Cure”? (We saw how fast Fluttershy was, but it seems like Applejack might have been much longer, and how long?)
Also, how long did they have switched Cutie Marks?

I… have no idea?

sammyruntz: Do you think that other one-episode supporting characters (like Gilda) will show up sometime in Season 4?

Absolutely.

delta: In episode 1 season 1 when nightmare moon first appears the camera points straight at the CMC all huddled under a table. What is your reaction to that? as the CMC were not formally introduced to each other until much later in the series.

I think it’s interesting, especially because the CMC weren’t supposed to have met one-another. It’s most likely just the animators throwing them in because they knew they’d be major characters later.

Anonymous: What’s your least favorite fan-made thing?

I don’t really have a least favorite?

Shadow of the Dead: If you could live anywhere in Equestria where would you live, what would your house look like, what would your job be, and could i be your neigh-bor? ^w^

I don’t think I’ve seen enough of Equestria to pick the right place to live. I’d have to know more about what goes on in each place, where there’d be the stuff that I want to do most. That said, Ponyville seems the most like my kind of place. Lots of cool friendly people, big enough that stuff happens there, but not so big that it’s overwhelming, a lot like Virginia Beach really. Mind, I’m one of the handful of people my age who actually likes living in Virginia Beach, which most of my friends don’t. My job would be analysis of course! And sure, you can be my neighbor!

Devixicus: What do you think lurks outside Equestria? The map confirmed it’s a land, not an entire world.

Well, we know that there’s some kind of Griffin continent and some kind of Dragon continent based on the map. It would be very interesting to know if there are a lot of other species with their own kingdoms in this world, and whether or not there are other pony kingdoms, or even colonies to Equestria. This is the kind of speculation that has probably driven a lot of fanfics, and I’d have to write one to get deep into exploring it.

Which subspecies of ponies intrigues you the most, and why?

Earth ponies intrigue me the most, because they remind me of the kind of humans that intrigue me the most. People who have a really strong relationship with their bodies and with the way their bodies interact with the world. A lot of my friends are very health and body conscious, and I think they’d make great earth ponies.

If you were to build a spaceship to fly to the other side of horsehead nebula and reach Ponyville, what would you do next?

I have no idea what I’d come up with to do, but I’m sure I’d have planned it all out very carefully over the thirty years that I spent going to college, learning everything about building spacecraft, and then somehow starting a career that brought me the insane wealth to fund a batshit passion project.

Do you celebrate any other MLP:FiM holidays?

I celebrated Derpy Day in 2012, and you can find a post I did about it linked in the description. I would’ve celebrated it this year, but I slept all day and forgot about it until my friends were alerady over and we were all drunk.

snaketooth640: are you a boy or girl… just joking I know your a grown colt and all, but if you were change into a mare for a day what will you do what will you eat, who you be eyeing ;D

Well I assume that if I’m a mare, I’m going to be eating grass and shit just like any other mare, and I’ll probably still be eyeing Applejack.

teschke: If Applejack’s close family members all represent a color of an apple, then why is Applejack orange?

I don’t know where it was, but I know I saw an informational piece recently, possibly a comic, about how there are several kinds of apple that are orange.

Brandon: Where do you get your information from in your videos?

Mostly from my brain. If you’re specifically referring to quotes from the creators and stuff like that, it mostly floats down the news stream on sites like Reddit and Equestria Daily. I really should keep better track of my sources, but it’s hard because I never know what will be useful.

Why are you so amazing?

Lots of training.

Will you ever collab with any other youtubers?

Yes! Well I’ve already collaborated extensively with AnY Pony on his Crepuscular Bronies podcast. I also have plans to do a headcanon video with ToonKritik, depending on when he finished his script and part. I will be doing a very special kind of collaboration with Bronycurious as well, which will have its own announcement video in the near future. I’m also collaborating with RedCordPony on the best episodes of season three video, which I just remembered I’m supposed to have done this weekend so I better finish these questions quick!

Who is worst pone?

I don’t really think about having a worst pony, it seems rather mean don’cha think?

Robert Morgan: Is “Love and Tolerate” is a bad motto for Bronies, some people think Tolerance is important while others think many people are intolerable and the show doesn’t promote tolerance. What do you think?

I do not believe that any human being is intolerable. I very much believe in the ideals of reform and change, and the idea that in a perfect society, we would work to turn everyone around. That said, this would mean having a strongly established moral foundation, which is something that I won’t fight for, because my personal morals are probably at ends with what society would agree on to be okay. I don’t want to live in a strict society because I wasn’t born or raised in a way that would conform to it. So basically, my ideas of what is socially ideal are opposed to my own happiness. All of that said, if we’re approaching this on a simple, visceral level, I think we should tolerate one another as much as possible. That’s the best place to start.

galkife: How much do you think Celestia really knew/knows about everything that went on throughout everyone season of mlp? Also, how much of the events do you think were orchestrated by her?

I think that Celestia had a lot to do with what happened. She didn’t orchestrate everything, or even most things, but I think that she may have placed pieces here and there, such as leaving Twilight the elements of harmony in Keep Calm and Flutter On, knowing that she’d also be sending her Starswirl’s spell a little while later. I think she made use of big situations like Sombra’s return, in which she probably could’ve taken care of it herself, to see if Twilight could handle it. And I think she probably had a close watch on everything that was happening.

snivy17: How do you make the slides with words on them, like the ones at the beginning of the video that announced this questions video?

The HAY HAY EVERY PO-NAY slides were done in Photoshop, I just sorta typed stuff onto the plain background. Most of the text on my videos is done in Sony Vegas though. Incidentally, if anyone was curious, the font I use is Blue Highway.

PonyCordero: What do you think of my Dr. Whooves video?

Putting a link to this video in the description. I like the energy of the reading and the quality is good. Having a hard time with the fake British accent though.

Austin Grubbs: How do you go about your Thorough Analyses? By this, I mean, how do you pick apart the episodes, and make these, surprisingly accurate, predictions?

I just sort of think about the episode, and then I write about it. A lot of the time, I’m pulling in stuff that I’ve given a lot of thought to, like in my Observations on MLP videos. Other times, it’s mostly fresh observations, like in my Winter Wrap Up video. As for the predictions, it’s a mixture of luck, and my eagle eye for creative intent. I used to call myself a bloodhound for creative intent, and lately I feel like I’ve done a good job keeping those skills honed in MLP.

Brendan: What are your opinions on the season one episode “Bridle Gossip?”

I have somehow only seen Bridle Gossip once, when I first watched the show, so I actually don’t remember it very well. I will say that the Flutterguy scene remixed to Fuck Shit Stack by Reggie Watts was the first MLP thing I ever saw though, long before I started watching the show.

StarBloodZero: If a human was going to be integrated into the show, how do you feel would be the most successful way DHX would go about it? Villan, ally, one time appearance, recounting character? Overpowered or wimpy bitch? Should they get any special powers being in a world of magic?

Not only do I never want to see a human in the show, I think I remember Meghan McCarthy promising it would never happen, so let’s go with it should never ever happen.

Anonymous: I was thinking if you ever wanted to make a contest where one of you lucky followers could get to discuss the season 4 opening with you, and if you would like to do a blind commentary when new episodes are out and then analyse them,or would that be too must work?

I’m guessing a blind commentary would mean talking while I watch the ep the first time, which I’m definitely not interested in doing. When I watch a new episode, I like to be totally engaged and not talk over it. I wouldn’t even be able to get the video out any quicker than usual, since I usually have my analysis videos of new episodes finished on the day the episode comes out, if not the day after. As for the contest thing, same applies—I’d rather not talk to someone over the episode.

How do you think the mythology goes in the pony world, could they have other old legends then nighmare moon?

I think there have been other legends in the show, right? There are probably a lot of legends in their world, just as there are in ours.

Staticpanda: If you were magically transported to Equestria, what would the three most important things on your “to do list” be?

1. Figure out what’s going on
2. Get settled in
3. Marry Applejack

levshu: Have you herd “proud to be a brony”, “this is war; by 30seconds to Mars”, “join the herd”, “fluttershy’s lalment”, “awoken” “rainbow factory”, “discord”, or anything else by wooden toaster, living toumbstone, h8_seed, black Griffin, Forrest rain, or 30 seconds to mars?

I’m just curious how the hell 30 Seconds to Mars got in there (which by the way, I don’t listen to). I like Wooden Toaster, particularly the songs Rainbow Factory and Love Me Cheerilee. My favorite Living Tombstone track is probably still Discord, though I much prefer the original song by Eurobeat Brony. The only h8_seed song I know well is Neverending Strife, which is a good song. I’m familiar with Forest Rain though not really a fan. I was in the massive smile song, albeit inaudibly, and for some reason my OC got left out of the video entirely. He was also working on making a song out of some lyrics I wrote at one point, but he never finished it and scrapped it. These reasons have nothing to do with why I don’t like his music though.

Have you ever seen “non-brony commentary”?

Never heard of it.

Do you know any famous/semi-famous bronies?

If Bronycurious counts, then yes.

How good are.you at brony trivia?

You’d have to test me to find out.

PonyLOVER: How does this success on youtube and in your life make you feel?

I feel fucking. Amazing. Besides the fact that I’m not making as much money as I need to be making, I feel absolutely liberated that I’m getting to do what I love full time and see such a huge response to it. I have literally always dreamed of doing a gigantic interview, and now I’m doing the biggest interview that I’ve ever seen. I am totally living the dream.

lavshu: Have you ever heard of saber spark?

I’ve seen a couple of his videos, which were pretty funny. Haven’t watched much though.

Do you have any hater friends?

I don’t suffer haters. If someone I want to be friends with is a hater, I either convert them into a better person, or stop talking to them.

Anonymous: What is your opinion on the Anti-Brony Brotherhood? I personally feel they have accomplished nothing.

I’m not aware of them, but I can tell by the name that they are shit.

eduardo pedrero: Well I was wondering if you could please analyze Luna, why was she so out of date in “Luna Eclipsed”? Didn’t Celestia taught her how to behave after a 1000 years?

Well Celestia is pretty busy, and old habits die hard. Luna didn’t realize she had a problem until she showed up in Ponyville and stuff was weird. It’s also possible that Celestia wanted Luna to learn from Twilight and her friends.

Philip: Have you seen the pony thread simulators on YouTube?

I have not.

levshu: What’s the next topic of.your explanatory “rant”/examination thingy where you explain obscure ideas about the show?

I don’t know yet! If I haven’t made it obvious by now, I kinda tend to write these videos all at once when the inspiration comes to me, and I don’t plan ahead much. I only seriously plan ahead when there’s a specific artistic direction I want to video to take.

Black Puma: Considering how wildly popular Friendship is Magic has become with our mature fandom, do you think it’s plausible that we’ll see a high quality adventure game set in Equestria? Either for console or PC?

It would be really nice. It’s not likely at all, but it would be nice.

Anonymous: Is lauren faust dead because i hear she is and i hope it’s not true

She’s alive, and I’m pretty damn sure we’d all find out really quickly if she wasn’t.

spikey nah: how would you like it have there was more dragons in the show?

Actually I’m not a fan of the dragons in MLP, so I’d prefer if they stayed on the downlow. That said it might be cool if Spike met an older dragon who was totally against type, or was also raised by ponies.

RaibowDash: What do you think about flutterdash?

Flutterdash is okay. It’s not my favorite, but I like it, and I can see it, but then again I can make pretty much any pairing between the mane six work with enough logic power.

Sam Terry: Will you ever do a vid on any pre-G4 mlp?

That depends both on if I ever watch any of them, and if I find I have anything to say about them. I probably will never watch MLP Tales or anything related to G3, because I’ve heard they’re awful, and I make a point NOT to watch awful shit. That said I am interested in trying the G1 cartoon.

Alex: Where does your analyses come from? (I hope I worded that right) In high-school I had to study Freudian and Marxist criticism, which was actually really fun. I’m curious if you follow anything like that or if you’re just a deep-thinker in general.

I have read very surprisingly little critical text (i.e. none whatsoever). Everything I learned about analysis was through other anime bloggers, video game reviewers, Roger Ebert, and my own intuition. I also read most of Oscar Wilde’s thing about reviews as art, which was a pretty boss idea.

Soulless: What is your favorite my little pony fan fiction with 200 likes or less?

Of the fanfics I’ve read and enjoyed, the only one with less than 200 likes is On the Docks, so I pick that one.

TheAndrovax: Are you the kind of brony which buys the toys, or do you just watch the show?

Back when I was working at Target, one of the big reasons I wanted to work there was because I knew they had a lot of pony toys there, and I figured I could get an employee discount. However, I never once ended up going to Target after work, and never bought anything. There was even a time when my boss was going to give me a free DVD for participating in singing Christmas carols over the intercom, and I was going to get the Royal Wedding DVD, but I never ended up meeting the boss to pick up anything. I’m not sure if I was embarrassed, or if embarrassment was combined with the overall excuse that I was always tired as shit and forgetful.

Anyways, I will probably buy one of those vynil figures they sell at Hot Topic if they make one for Applejack or Twilight.

truezangetsu: What do you think of my O.C. name: Shadespark Ironhooves (considering his special talent is blacksmithing)?

Sounds like a fine name, though I’m not sure why the “shade” part is in there.

jokermort: Have you seen rainbow dash presents my little dashie?

Yes, and I enjoyed it a lot.

Zanoscar: Do you have a very special somepony?

Not yet!

Maddie8972: If you could switch bodies with anyone in Equestria, who would you switch with and what would you do and how long would you go before you switched back?

I would switch with Twilight Sparkle. I’d probably spend a lot of time being existential, and feel all kinds of changes as our minds melded together, until I was at once all that she is and all that I am. I would become part of a metaphysical existence, and spend a lot of time wondering what is the definition of myself. Then I guess I’d become princess of Equestria!

TK: who is your favourite scootaloo

The one with the scoot and the loo at the end

Dave: (wrote a paragraph detailing his discovery of a background pony in The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000 with Thor’s hammer for a cutie mark. Link in description.)

That is the most adorable Thor I’ve ever seen.

Anonymous: Would you quit youtubing and gain about 3 thousand dollars every month or keep making videos and gain 1 thousand a month?

Dude if I was making 1 thousand a month for doing this I’d be pretty fucking happy. So far I’ve made like a hundred forty bucks.

Alexander S: If you were to go live in Equestria for the rest of your life, would you rather stay as a human or become a pony.

I would prefer to be a pony. I think it would be way easier to connect with others that way.

Roi Almagor: Is Pinkie Pie a genius?

That depends on your definition of genius. If nothing else, I think that Pinkie Pie has a ridiculously enormous memory.

aidanofvt: Ponies and mechs: good combination?

As Hot Blooded Pinkie Pie has proven, ponies and mechs go together extremely well.

Jay: Growing up did you watch other girl shows like the G1 MLP or She-ra?

Growing up, I hated/feared all things girly, so no.

Anonymous: do you know want the A True, True Friend song in the last ep of season 3 sounds like it sounds like a old song but i cant place it

I wish I could help but I have no idea

Razznack: Vinyl Scratch is best pony. Defend or attack this statement.

I am indifferent towards this statement.

Stewie Pie: I’d like to see your thoughts on the Spike and Rarity thing that went on throughout the show. (rest of the question cut for time).

Well, the thing is I don’t have a headcanon for this, as I haven’t given it much thought. I agree with the idea that it’s probably meant to be young love and won’t come to fruition.

Onmipotent-entity GaviN: -So what is your opinion on people who are leaving the fandom because of Princess twilight,the loss of Lauren,or some other reason?

I can’t help but feel sorry for people who don’t like the finale. It’s sad in a way, that it could ruin some people’s time with the show, whereas for me it made me love it more than ever.

-Is AJ a support character or Lead character?

A lead character inasmuch as any of the mane six are besides Twilight Sparkle.

Oak: I haven’t seen any comments/analysis of Fall Weather Friends from Season 1 (probably my favourite season 1 ep). Any reason why? Planning on doing a video on it? If not, can you give me a brief rundown of what you thought

I am planning to do videos for every episode of the show at some point, so yes I will do a video on it. I won’t know how soon that will be until I rewatch the episode and decide if I’ve got something I want to say about it.

Stjonal: In S4 would you like nicole oliver to sing more?

I’m always up for more singing!

In a world run by oppressing pony overlords, would you, when given the chance, sacrifice you favorite mane six pony for the freedom of mankind?

I don’t put too much stock in freedom, so it would really depend on how shitty my own situation was.

Miyasaki: How much do you earn, money wise, on your yt channel?

I was averaging three bucks a day for a while, and now I’m averaging between eight and ten. I would be making easily double this amount, if not three times this amount, if youtube didn’t deny monetization on most of my videos. Whether or not a video gets monetized is almost a case of pure luck, and I’ve come to that conclusion after a ton of experimentation within the videos. So far I’ve made around one-fifty between the start of January and now.

Alex Da Silva: How fucking awesome would it be if the pillows could do the music for an episode of the show?

That would be incredibly strange, but I can’t say I’d complain.

TheArtFlower: would you like fan art of you?

Sure!

kellypony: What do you think of the MLP:FiM official toys? Also, can you pleeaaase review Luna’s relationship with other ponies?

I don’t have anything to say about Luna’s relationships, sorry. As for official pony toys, the main reason I haven’t bought any is that they don’t look like the designs in the show, which, as I think Hasbro and related companies are beginning to realize, matters a lot to older fans of the show. I like the vinyl figures they sell at Hot Topic, but those things are expensive, so I’m holding out until they make one of my favorite characters.

Murraybot: Can I have a PO box number so I can send you things?

I don’t have a PO box, but if I ever decide to set one up, I’ll be sure and announce it.

Text version:

I recently participated in a podcast discussing the relationship between MLP fans and masculinity, during which an interesting point was brought to attention about the girliness that exists in MLP. I’ve started noticing that a lot of MLP fans claim to like the show “in spite” of its girliness. It seems like girliness in the show is treated as a hurdle, or something that has to be “seen through” to reach the real meat of the show, and I think that this mode of thinking is antithetical what the show is trying to accomplish, and in some ways is cruel to the characters and what they stand for.

In the podcast, BronyDebates stated that he didn’t see the characters as being male or female, but saw them as characters on an equal level. I understand his sentiment, and it’s a noble one, but to get an idea of why it’s wrong-headed, imagine what an important woman in your life would think if you told them that you “don’t see them as a woman.” Think about what that would suggest.

The idea that we should treat one-another as equals is beautiful, but treating other people with equal amounts of respect isn’t the same as ignoring what makes them different. Rather, it’s about recognizing them as different, and respecting those differences.

The problem with ignoring the feminity of MLP’s characters is that the characters are, in fact, female, and men and women are not the same. When Lauren Faust made these characters, she purposefully wanted them to be recognizably female. She didn’t want them to be characters you could slap a masculine jawline on and call them a man, she wanted them to be strong, respectable WOMEN.

What makes so many girls shows terrible isn’t the inclusion of girliness, but the hyper-emphasis on certain social notions of what girliness is, and ignoring other aspects of being a woman. When a show depicts girls as nothing but obsessed with fashion and constantly writing in their diaries about cute boys, it ignores that there are other aspects of feminity. However, discounting those things would be equally misrepresentative of what it means to be a girl.

THIS WAS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT TO LAUREN FAUST. She did NOT want My Little Pony to be good in SPITE of its girlness, she wanted to EMBRACE girliness as something that could BE good, and that deserved respect. She wanted to show intelligent, interesting characters who still wanted to have slumber parties and wear cute dresses and maybe even feel lucky when they became a damn princess.

Faust never ignored or avoided feminity. She could have written Applejack, for instance, as one of those tomboy characters who openly rejects everything feminine, but instead she wrote her as a character who, while being a hard worker that isn’t afraid to get dirty, and can hold her own in a rodeo, still likes to dress nice for the Grand Galloping Gala (note: in Look Before you Sleep she doesn’t reject Rarity’s dress and stuff because it’s girly, but because it’s impractical), still is comfortable talking about friendship and togetherness, etc. In fact, in a scene that might be called emblematic of what Lauren brought to the series, Applejack gets mad at Spike, saying, “that’s just like a boy. Can’t handle the least bit of sentiment!” This is the least traditionally girly character in the show openly defending something girly.

Rainbow Dash has a hard time getting sentimental, but it has nothing to do with her rejecting femininity. It’s more about her difficulty with authenticity and desire to look cool. Rainbow Dash still likes to wear a dress, and is still a girl, no matter what those weird gender-reversed dubs may suggest. (Note: I don’t mean to suggest that being a girl means liking dresses. It was just an easy go-to)

The reason I’m pointing all of this out is that it’s kind of a big deal. One of the worst things about most female characters is that authors think the only way to avoid writing stereotypical females is to ignore feminity.

MLP is refreshing because it never brings all this bullshit into the picture. Feminity is neither forced nor avoided, it is simply allowed to BE. That’s what makes these characters so damn believable. They were built from the ground up as women, but without all of the social bullshit clouding their characterization.

Links mentioned in video:

Jowybean’s deviantart: http://jowybean.deviantart.com/

My deviantart: http://digibro.deviantart.com/

My reddit: http://www.reddit.com/user/Digibro/

My fanfic about Pinkie’s mental state: http://digibrony.tumblr.com/post/17948356048/smile-smile-smile-from-the-diary-of-pinkie-pie

Analysis of Ponyville’s population: http://dziadek1990.deviantart.com/art/Ponyville-Statistical-Trivia-Population-293863525

Text version of questions and answers (significantly different from vid):

Doodlenugget: What are you looking for in something like a fan comic?

I’m not really looking for anything specific, I’m just enjoying what I find. I guess the real answer is great art.

Xentomi: I would like to ask why YOU think Fluttershy’s Character is heavily popular in the Brony Fandom as a whole

Beause she’s god damn adorable!

Welsh_Pony: You’ve talked about headcanons that you believe in, Is there any popular headcanons in the fandom that you really hate?

Not in particular. There are a lot of them that I think are weird or senseless, but none that I particularly hate or take offense to. I guess if there’s a headcanon I’m kinda sick of, it’s anything involving Scootaloo. I don’t find Scootaloo that interesting, but bronies just love to speculate about her.

anonymous_Brony: Why do you feel that so many people freaked out the whole Alicorn thing in the first place? I’ve never understood that, how one change affects so many people like that. It kinda reminds of the whole Derpy situation back in season 2.

I think it’s sort of a mass hysteria effect. When a few people latched onto the idea that Hasbro was destroying MLP and that Twilicorn was a big deal, it spread like wildfire through the fandom. It was the simple matter that this change seemed like something that could be blamed on a business decision and made to look disingenuous on the part of the writers. It’s strange particularly because with the exception of that Derpy thing, people never used to blame Hasbro for their problems with the series. They always blamed the writers. It was only when something happened that they didn’t like, that they saw as executive meddling, that Hasbro’s name started getting thrown around all the time.

This totally ignores that Hasbro has always injected toy stuff into the show, that every script is passed under their eyes for approval, that they have final say on everything going into the show, and that the writers were aware that this was coming way ahead of time, and planned the season around it, taking care to do what they felt was the best job that they could in presenting it. No one on the staff probably ever viewed this as the evil executive hand meddling in their show.

Gummie1404: What is your favourite Non Pony?

Surprised this took so long to come up. I think I’m gonna go with Chrysalis, mostly because she’s been been giving me doe eyes on my desktop background for a few weeks and I find it strangely alluring.

Will you marry me?

Okay, I’m going to need to ask all marriage proposals to form a line.

Arta_Shrike: What are your thoughts on Spike as a character?

I think I pretty much summed up my thoughts on Spike in my Spike At Your Service video. He’s a good support character, I just don’t give a shit about him and his problems.

Anonymous: If you could make any other 2 ponies into alicorns, who would it be? (one from mane six, another from the public)

From the mane six I would pick Pinkie Pie, just to wreck utter havoc on everything, and from the public, I would pick Vinyl Scratch, just to see how it would effect her relationship with Octavia, vis a vis University Days.

Skloosh: Favorite mlp quote?

Off the top of my head, “I sure do look funny.” I’ll get back to you on this after rewatching the show and keeping a log of all the best lines.

True or false? Gypsy Pinkie is best pony.

Aiyyo, true

Anonymous: How long do you plan on continuing to make DigiBrony videos?Cause if you can keep up the same quality, I could watch them forever :)

I will keep making them until they run their course. Once I’ve covered every existing episode of the show, episodically covered season four as it comes out, written everything about the show that I have to say, and done all kinds of big cool projects, I will eventually move on. So, rough estimate, I’d say I’ll be doing this for another year and a half to two years.

John T: Who does your title cards?

Jowybean, linked in the description of all the videos that feature them.

Do you think the episodes are being shown in chronological order?

I think that after season one, the episodes have a reliable chronology. Season one’s is questionable, but I think it’s possibly the result of the production order, or some kind of shuffling of the episodes that happened after they were written.

nathan: would you play a pony oriented game that was war-hammer type table top game with custom made models?

Yes, that sounds cool as shit, and a good way to finally get me into tabletop figurine games.

TheArchiviest: 1. have you heard of the Doubble rain boom on, if so what are your thoughts

I actually had somehow never heard of Double Rainboom until the release date video came out, and now I’m really looking forward to it. I don’t know if I’ll do a video about it, will depend on what I have to say.

Emily: What advice would you give to a youtube noob who sucks at making videos?

Practice a lot, buy decent equipment, and worry a lot about your presentation. A whole lot of people send me videos and responses, and I usually don’t finish them because they’re unscripted, or unedited, or there’s a loud hum in the background or a really shitty microphone, or something along these lines. If you’re going to bother doing stuff in video form, it needs to actually be more worthwhile than it would be in text form. If the delivery and presentation are flat, then I’d rather just read it.

The brony from Denmark: If you could make a character that would appear in the show, how would you like it to be like? Look like? What should the cutiemark and name be?

I am extremely unimaginative and have no design sense whatsoever, so if I were going to make a pony for the show, I’d get someone else to design it. Also I pick Digibrony.

Anonymous: How long do you think the crystal empire has been around? Do the windigoes have anything to do with Sombra?

I have no ideas about either of these.

Edgewhisper: What is your opinion of changlings?

I think they’re a cool idea, and I’m glad that the comic brought them back, because they were too big and cool of concept to be in just one episode. I don’t have any deeper thoughts about them, though.

Spite: Digibrony if a Dragon could get to the Crystal Empire do you think it will eat every crystal building and object there? Also are you a changeling?

The dragon thing sounds probable, and no I’m not a changeling.

Anonymous: Do you like Pony Swag?

Yes. As a matter of fact, I wrote and test-recorded my own pony swag verses last year, and had like a six minute version of my pony swag, but in retrospect the verses aren’t very solid and I probably won’t record it again.

megaguy31: can i animate your OC?

Be my guest!

Too many pieces: While it would never happen, which pony would you be least angry about if they WEREN’T in Season 4 at all? It has to be one of the Mane 6.

I’d be angry no matter what. I could totally go a whole season without Spike, though.

watermelonoverlord: Why do you sound significantly younger than you look?

Watch the video where I’ve got a shaved face, and if you still think I sound younger than I look, it’s mostly because I’m speaking in a high pitched, energetic voice for these videos. When I talk to strangers, I usually default to a low, southern drawl that sounds nothing like my speaking voice, and I have no idea why.

What pony or combination of ponies do you resonate with the most?

I think I resonate most with Pinkie Pie, especially in A Friend In Deed. I have her raw energy and desire to make people smile and be happy, which I hope is reflected in my videos. I am also just about as maddeningly eccentric around my friends.

What are some of the “so many ways they can go with this” that you were talking about in relation to Twilight’s being an alicorn?

They could go the classic route, wherein Twilight has to deal with the tough consequences of being a princess
They could go the route where Twilight totally owns as a princess, and also keeps having adventures
They could go the route where Twilight’s friends become her royal court and protect the world as the nights of the round
Twilight could be trained to fly by her friends
Twilight could join Celestia and Luna in doing some kind of epic princess shit

All kinds of stuff can happen. This is just off the top of my head at ten AM after typing 42,000 words.

Nerdweigian: Any favourite pieces of heartwarming, tearjerking, funny or otherwise awesome fanart you’d like to share?

I have seen entirely too many awesome pieces of fanart to single them out here, so instead I’m gonna link to my Deviantart profile and my reddit profile in the description. There, you can see a list of my favorites and stuff that I upvoted, all of which should be worthwhile.

Miguel C: Do you think they’ll make an episode committed to exploring Saddle Arabia?

It would certainly be a cool thing to see.

isisausername: (Asked an extremely long question about the mental state of Pinkie Pie that I cut for time.)

Back around the time that A Friend In Deed aired, I wrote a strange metafictional fanfic about Pinkie Pie, theorizing about her mental state by way of my own. It might be worth a read for you. Link is in the description.

Jake Hughes: What do you REALLY wish the show would explore, but most likely will never due to the medium (a kids show)?

Cosmic horror. Pretty much my go-to for cool stories.

Orion Delta: What do you think of the griffon statues outside the library in the crystal empire, what purpose do you think they serve?

Actually I never noticed them.

Who was your 8000th sub?

I wish I knew. Unfortunately, the page where youtube lists subscribers is disorganized beyond even the faintest ability to make sense. I’ve long given up on even trying to know who’s subscribed to me.

If Gilda made a return in season 4, do you think she would be redeemed in the same way as Discord, Trixie, Babs, ect.?

It would be really cool to see Gilda reformed, especially if they address her inauthenticity as her weakness and strive to make her act authentically. This would be one of the cooler plot points the show could explore for me.

Who are your top 10 ponies, not just #1?

Top ten, okay:

Applejack, Twilight, Pinkie, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Trixie, Sweetie Belle, Applebloom, and, let’s go with, Fancy Pants. Cause he’s the man.

Orcan: There’s certainly a lot of passion from a huge Audience for this show but as a new found Brony I’m wondering is there such a thing as too far? If so where do you think that line is?

I don’t think there’s such a thing as too far. I’m all for pushing the boundaries and going as far as I possibly can.

My first thought when realizing that Twilight will probably replace Celestia is that Celestia might die soon after. She and Luna are 1000 + years old, and looking pretty good too, but you’d think that their time is almost up. My instincts tell me that Celestia simply wouldn’t go off somewhere and retire.
Do you think MLP would ever do such a thing?
Do you think that they could and or should?

I can’t see them having Celestia die, but I can see them having her retire. In fact, this could be the way that season four will start.

If you could dedicate an entire episode to tell the complete life story of a single character who would it be?

Either Pinkie Pie or Applejack, though in AJ’s case I think that would get into some pretty heavy shit with her dead parents and all. Pinkie’s would help to solve a lot of her mysteries.

iH8W8ING: If you could remake any episode, which one would you remake and what would be the plot?

I would remake Boast Busters in a way that thematically makes sense and doesn’t fuck up so hard.

Did you ever expect to be successful on YouTube?

I expected to eventually achieve success doing video game analysis, and that’s the reason I bought all of my equipment for video making. I never expected the MLP videos to take off in anywhere near the capacity that they did.

Kevin T: Do you like ska?

Not in particular.

Do you know Jesse Carlson(aka jcarlson04)?

Okay, I do like SOME ska, specifically that ska.

Have you checked out JanAnimations’ Ask The Crusaders tumblr yet and what did you think?

I have not looked at the tumblr, though I’ve watched the animation that Jan did for it.

If you had to pick between giving up anime or giving up ponies, which do you choose?

I would not chose either one, because that is entirely too difficult, and I don’t have to do it.

Did you also enjoy watching JoshScorcher’s change from non-brony to reluctant admirer of the show to a full blown brony?

I don’t know who that is.

Who would win in a fight? Both members of Acousticbrony and MandoPony Vs dustycatt and Saberspark.

I think Dustycatt and Saber have a bit more weight to throw around between them.

Do you watch Phoe-Kun’s videos? What is your favorite of her series?

Looks like a let’s play channel, not interested.

Do you like Koroshi-Ya or does he rub you the wrong way?

I DON’T KNOW WHO THAT IIIIIS

What is the hardest part about putting together your vids?

By far the hardest part is when I have to compile clips from the episode and images to fill in the blank space on the screen. That part of the process accounts for the most time I spend dicking around and putting it off.

How do you feel about the pony meat found in burgers?

What in the even hell?

Have you played Ponymon yet? What did you think?

I tried to play it once, and I think it was still kinda buggy at the time. I was also really annoyed because in FireRed you don’t get the damn running shoes at the start so you have to walk slow as FUCK. That said it was adorable and I totally want to play it again.

Would anything make you leave the fandom?

Not likely. Maybe disinterest, years down the line.

Do you hate me for asking so many questions?

Yes.

When have you failed? Describe what happened and what you learned from it. Letter to Celestia style!

Dear Princess Celestia, I learned that if you shit around in class all year, you’ll fail classes. Naw joshin, I knew that already, mostly I learned that I’m a shitty person. Your student, Digibrony, circa age 17.

Okay seriously, I’m gonna cut out like a shitload of Kevin T’s questions because I don’t have answers for them and also I am tired as shit.

Reforestka: Why do you think there are four princesses? What could be the purpose of having four rulers?

It’s hard to say, since the royal duties of a princess are unclear. However, I like to imagine princesses are kind of like watchers/protectors over the populace of Equestria more than anything, so having more eyes could only be a good thing.

Anonymous: What would your opinion be on seeing PHYSICALLY disabled Ponies within the show, or at least the fandom too. A wheelchair and orthotic user myself, I think it would be nice to see one IN the show.

From what I understand, Lauren Faust originally intended for Scootaloo to be disabled and incapable of flying. Whether or not the show intends to keep her this way remains to be seen, but I think it would be a really interesting route to take. It’s nice to see a disabled character who isn’t defined by their disability.

Kimmi B: (Asked a long question about the origin of Applebloom, given her lack of appearance in The Cutie Mark Chronicles.)

I don’t have a headcanon about this, but it is a strange moment. My best guess is that she was, in fact, a baby, and that her parents were already dead. Maybe Applejack’s desire to get out of Ponyville was partially fueled by the recent loss of her parents. Sounds like great fanfic material.

(Another long question about whether Equestria is a planet or a country.)

Equestria is a country, as evidenced by the official map that you can find through a google search. I think it’s not a full continent either, as the Dragon kingdom seems to be South on the same continent.

XXXUlt1ma5XXX: If you could go back and reanalyze any episode of any season of MLP, what would it be?

Actually, I intend to go back to a lot of these episodes eventually. I don’t consider an analysis to ever really be good, and if I find that I’ve changed or expanded my opinion about an episode then I’ll come back to tackle it again. There are some episodes that I probably won’t ever have to revisit, like Applebuck Season or Winter Wrap Up, but there are others like Boast Busters and Magical Mystery Cure that I’ll keep coming back to.

Persona: If MLP was to do a parody of another show, movie, or something else from pop culture, what would you want it to be?

I want to see MLP do The Picture of Dorian Gray, with Fancy Pants corrupting Pinkie Pie.

Out of the supposed 26 episodes in season 4, how many would you want to see dedicated to Twilight mastering her new powers / flight?

One. We don’t need a whole lot of it. Gotta leave room for ALL THOSE RARITY EPISODES.

Would you want to see any of the characters develop ‘personal relationships’ with other ponies, tackling the whole boyfriend / girlfriend issue in season 4 or any season after that?

I’m pretty fine with the ponies never having relationships in the actual series. The ponies can worry about that shit later. Mostly because I just am not interested in watching a kids’ show romance.

Do you like Bananas?

I’m a bitch who likes bananas.

Do you think that the writers should adapt a MLP Fanfiction into a fully fledged episode, like Adventure Time did? And if so, which Fanfiction would you want to see as an episode?

I’d rather they didn’t do that, and also I can’t see it happening since the writers aren’t even allowed to read any fanfiction.

Would you want to see Derpy come back? More Importantly, SHOULD Derpy come back, even as just a silent comedic character?

Derpy’s presence is no big deal for me, so I don’t care either way.

Do you think it’s possible, and would you want to see an episode involving Elements of Disharmony, or perhaps 6 new ponies wielding the elements, like some of the fan favourite characters such as Lyra, Bon Bon, Octavia and Vinyl Scratch?

I feel like this would be cheap and obvious. We already had the spirit of disharmony as a villain, we don’t need to keep rehashing it.

Fluttershy as a Dragon. Yay or Neigh?

NEIGH.

What is your opinion on the recently cancelled MLP: Fighting is Magic game?

I’m very saddened by the cease and desist. I love good, tight, 2D fighting games, and Fighting Is Magic looked like it was going to be on the level of an Arc System Works game. The project is being continued now with Lauren Faust doing the new character designs, and I’ll still be excited to play it, and even pay for it if they decide to sell it this time, but it will always be sad to know we didn’t get the pony fighter. I hope they sneak out a skin mod like immediately for the new game.

Could it be possible for a small time fan made show, whether it be based on someone else’s IP or not, to make it to television? And if so, what would they have to do in order to get it broadcast?

Based on IP content, there’s no way, unless the company was somehow in on it. If it’s not based on someone else’s IP, then it’s not fan-made anymore, it’s original content.

JFluffy: Can you see the creative team of FiM using Twilight as a vessel to tell us a bit more about the Princess Alicorn Master Race?

I can see it happening, and I would like to see it happen. In fact, that’s what I hope the season four premiere is going to be about.

britishbronys: What trait from a Character do you wish would be fleshed out more for the purpose of being able to analyze that trait to come to a conclusion on psychological patterns within the individual. (E.G Twilight’s anxiety problems)

I think I’d like to see Applejack’s ethics examined a little. I think it’s kind of taken as a matter of fact that Applejack is the most level-headed and ethical pony, but I’d like to see some kind of examination of this, maybe a situation in which her ethics are questionable, or in which she realizes that her ethics aren’t necessarily more correct than others.

Dude: If you could decide upon one aspect of the world of FiM that would become reality, what would it be (creatures, social structures, rules of physics, etc.) also why would it be that and how do you think it would change the way we currently live?

I would copy over the pony societal structure. A system in as I described in my pony ages video, in which children are given space to realize their talents, and then given the time and drive to hone those talents constantly. Raising a populace of specialists where everyone has a definitive place in society. The problematic thing would be that humans don’t necessarily find something a nice every time, so I’d also copy the magical pony ability to have a specific destiny.

You stated before that you believe in the concept of destiny, does that imply free will doesn’t exist or is inconsequential?

Yes. I don’t believe in the idea of free will. I think the idea is mostly wishful thinking on the part of people who want to believe in accountability.

Do you think there is an implicit correlation between being a princess and being an Allicorn?

Yes, most likely.

What are your thoughts on the format of the show? Do you think the show should have multi-part-episodes for more than just the beginning and end of a given season?

I think it would be nice if they did two-parters wherever appropriate. I wouldn’t want to force them into the show, but in a case like Keep Calm and Flutter On, where the concept easily could have filled up two episodes, I’d like to see them give the concept breathing room.

What are your impressions of Hasbro’s impressions of Bronies? Do you think Hasbro will capitalize on the market of adult fans with disposable income interested in their IP or do you rather think it will disregard the market as not viable enough in the long run?

I don’t know, Hasbro’s handling of bronies is weird so far. All of the major stuff that’s been marketed to bronies is stuff from outside Hasbro that they allow to be released, like We Love Fine shirts, and the vinyl figures at Hot Topic. I definitely get the sense that Hasbro doesn’t know what to do, and is letting others who do know do it for them. I think we’ll continue to see a steady trickle of brony-oriented products hit the market, but for the time being, I don’t think Hasbro has any big plan to charge at our market yet.

Hey There Everyone: What episode got you hooked on mlp?

The first episode to make me realize I was watching a great show was Applebuck Season. The moment when I realized that shit was getting real, though, was Return of Harmony. That, followed by the next few amazing episodes of season 2, was when I started to feel the bronydom.

Anonymous: In your season 3 overview you said that you thought “Look Before You Sleep” was a good episode. How? Twilight is so out of character in that episode, Applejack and Rarity act incredibly immature, and there’s nothing but fighting all the way through.

Acting immature is something we all do when we’re being petty assholes. I get into confrontations like that with my little brothers all the time. And I don’t think Twilight was really out of character, there’s actually a slight deception to the ignorance she displays at first, which is revealed in the bed scene. I’ve been meaning to write about this episode for months now and just haven’t found the right angle to come at it, but rest assured that it’s on my priority list.

Spiral Eyed Maniac: Do you follow CR, and if you do, what are your feelings on his hostility towards the show and the fanbase as of late?

I’ve never followed CR, but I’ve heard a few times that he was pretty upset with season three. Wish I could help him, but I just love S3 so damn much. Anyways go ahead and send him my videos if you think it might spark a discussion.

australianfries: What do you think the population of Equestria is? Of Ponyville? Canterlot? (Not really looking for something specific, just a generalization.)

I’ve actually seen a brilliant study someone did in trying to figure out the population of Ponyville. Will link to it in the description. Other than that though I have no personal speculations about it.

tyler schlarm: Do you hope for discord to become a major character in season 4, or because of your keep calm and flutter on review, do you want him to die off when the season starts?

I want him to make an appearance for sure, but why on earth would I want him to die off? What good would that do?

TBB: Is DustyKatt really the manliest brony in the world in your opinion?

I don’t know, maybe? Manliness is hard to define, and kind of seems more like a gut reaction than anything. Possibly just to facial hair.

Zoe Morgan: So, in the Sonic Rainboom episode, there are those 3 stallion pegasi who bully Rainbow Dash, and each of them has an athletic-ish cutie mark, but they either A) work in the weather factory, where nothing pertains to their supposed destinies, or B) play sports in the sky, which maybe they can do, but it seems weird. Are all of the sports held in the Cloudeseum? Anyways, maybe in one of your analysis videos, you could mention how ponies sometimes have jobs or play roles that have nothing to do with what they’ve discovered about themselves?

Those guys have been pointed out to me before for that reason, and it’s definitely something I’m interested in figuring out. Exploring this whole destiny thing is quickly becoming one of the things I’m posed to do a lot of, so I will probably talk about this in a video at some point.

Jfluffy: Do you believe that the Changelings and their motives are genuinely evil or more on the morally bigamous side?

Everything is morally ambiguous. I mean, no one is gonna argue that Sombra is like the Hitler of the ponyverse, but someone like Discord, evil? Changelings, evil? From their own perspectives, they probably don’t feel that they are evil. Evil is something we have to define for ourselves, whether or not we want to feel sympathy for the morals of those who are opposed to us.

thisisausername2004: Any ideas how to write a fanfic that doesn’t suck?

Yes. Step one is to be a good writer. Step two is to have a good idea. And that’s it.

Anonymous: What is your opinion of Sethisto?

I don’t know the guy, and haven’t seen enough of him, to really know what he’s like, so I have no opinion.

Are you okay with the fact that Sethisto has become more or less the spokesman of the brony community? What is your opinion over the fact that there is no major brony website that rivals Equestria Daily?

I think it sucks. It sucks because EQD is essentially a blog, and it’s governed by the whims of the bloggers. They are going to highlight the stuff that appeals to them the most personally, which means that the stuff which gets the most audience is just the stuff that a couple of bloggers happen to like. This is why I prefer reddit, though reddit comes with its own biases in that on the main pony sub, they mostly share images and comics.

What I’d like most is to have another EQD, with the same level of influence, run by someone else, just to have that split interest.

Anonymous: Do you believe that bronies are annoying at times by constantly pointing themselves out.

I think it’s fine to be proud of being a brony and to share that you are one, but I also think that social awareness is a good thing. Having a brony avatar on youtube and leaving comments on other videos? Cool. Bringing up MLP in the comments if it’s relevant to discussion? Cool. Running in to proclaim that MLP is amazing and start crying about haters? Not cool. Telling people that MLP is a cool show that they should give a chance? Cool. Jamming the show down a disinterested person’s throat, or criticizing them for not giving it a chance? Not cool. Not everyone needs to watch MLP, and it’s perfectly fine to be totally disinterested. And even if there’s a hater, you don’t have to start a shit storm somewhere that it isn’t critical to discussion.

Tdawg: most attractive voice actress in your opinion?

I’m not particularly attracted to any of the voice actresses, but Tara Strong is definitely hot. I can appreciate that without even being attracted.

jacob: Will you be applying for a position in BronyCurious’s “Recovery” project ?

I thought about it, but I don’t know if I’m going to be dedicated enough to do it consistently for a year. I’d rather play one of the minor characters in the coming chapters than the narrator.

The animation on the characters in the show has improved so much and the expressions have become more varied as time has gone on. There are now certain extreme expressions that are exclusive to certain characters. Have you ever thought about adding some of these extreme expressions to your own pony in your videos?

That’s entirely up to MizuTakishima. I can’t draw and don’t, but Mizu periodically sends me new expressions when she finds time to work on them. I don’t know how many she intends to do, but I haven’t asked for any specifically, I just use what she sends me. There’s only one specific still I’ve asked for which you’ll be seeing in a special video on Digibrony After Dark soon.

Anonymous: Do you like Sorin?

He seems like a cool bro.

Have you seen Ponyinabox?

Yes.

Do you think the female Bronies or Pegasisters are under spoken for?

Yes, actually. It seems like most of the big-name bronies are guys, with the exception of voice actress bronies, and I find it kind of disheartening. I’d love to have more women doing things like what I do, or even like what Saber and AC do.

How old do you think you have to be to like the show the way Bronies do?

0 years old.

DavidDorum: Hey Digi, a bit of a personal question. Did you ever receive any crap from people for chasing a career in writing and the arts? You know what I mean the typical,” get a job hippy” bullshit.

Yeah, no one has much faith in the idea that I’m going to succeed at this. It doesn’t help that I spent most of the last five years dicking around while saying that I was going to be a great writer, but yeah, it’s hard to make others feel as sure about what I’m doing as I am. Thankfully if nothing else, my dad thinks that I’m legitimately talented, and is willing to give me the space to work towards my ambition.

Vaster: You seem to know a lot about MLP, and your feed is filled with videos I haven’t even seen! Where and how do you find them?

I seek them out! Equestria Daily, reddit, and just exploring related videos on youtube, are all great ways to navigate the pony sphere.

Links mentioned in video:

Channels:

Game Grumps: http://www.youtube.com/user/GameGrumps

Pogo: http://www.youtube.com/user/Fagottron

Shane Koyczan: http://www.youtube.com/user/ShaneKoyczan

Tales of Mere Existence: http://www.youtube.com/user/AgentXPQ

The Gaming Brit: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheGamingBritShow

JonTron: http://www.youtube.com/user/JonTronShow

Matthewmatosis: http://www.youtube.com/user/Matthewmatosis

egoraptor: http://www.youtube.com/user/egoraptor

redminus: http://www.youtube.com/user/redminus

CGP Grey: http://www.youtube.com/user/CGPGrey

Campster: http://www.youtube.com/user/Campster

HyperBitHero: http://www.youtube.com/user/HyperBitHero

SmallButera: http://www.youtube.com/user/SmallButera

My Drunk Kitchen: http://www.youtube.com/user/MyHarto

Not channels:

My canon: http://myswordisunbelievablydull.wordpress.com/digibros-canon/

Astolat’s bandcamp: http://astolat.bandcamp.com/album/the-faceless-mask

Text version of questions and answers (significantly different from video version):

SECTION TWO: NON-MLP AND PERSONAL QUESTIONS

Yehuda: Do you like the Walking Dead?

I haven’t seen nor read The Walking Dead so for now I have no opinion. I’ve kinda been burned out on zombies for years, though.

Rainbow Smash: Digibrony, will you be my waifu?

I need to see a picture of you and at least two forms of photo ID confirming that you are over 18, also we should probably get to know each other?

skybomb: do you like pokémon? If so, which is your favourite pokémon/type?

I have been a big fan of Pokemon since I was about eight, so yes! My favorite Pokemon is Munchlax,  after seeing the Destiny Deoxys movie. I don’t really have a favorite type of Pokemon. If you asked eight year-old me, it would’ve been fire type, and also my favorite Pokemon would have been Charmander.

Bowie-san: Do you like David Bowie?

Take a look at the lawman, beating up the wrong guy, oh man, wonder if he’ll ever know, he’s in the best-selling show. is there life on MARS?!

In all seriousness I’m not that familiar with Bowie, but I love a few songs.

Anonymous: Favourite Youtubers that are not bronies?

Technically I don’t think Egoraptor is a brony, so I’m gonna go with Egoraptor, AKA Arin Hansen. I pretty much am in love with that dude, and I swear to god I’m going to find some way to collaborate/hang out with him is it kills me. Besides him, I’m a big fan of Campster, who runs the video game analysis series Errant Signal, and I like JonTron’s videos too.

Actually here’s a list of channels I’m subbed to on my personal account: CGPGrey, TheGamingBrit, Matthewmatosis, Yahtzee, whose Zero Punctuation videos I’ve been watching on the Escapist since 2008, Nick Bertke also known as Pogo, Hyperbithero, Redminus, Agent XPQ who runs Tales of Mere Existence, SmallButera, and my most recent addition, Shane Koyczyan. I have put links to all of their channels in the description, but I’m too lazy to annotate them.

Jared Cameron: How old are you?

I am 21, and my birthday is August 8.

Siege: Opinion on DBZ’s new movie? Battle of the Gods?
I think it will kick so much ass they will make a new saga.

Never been a big fan of DBZ, though it’s uber-nostalgic for me. Probably won’t watch the new movie unless it’s somehow insanely badass.

Zoren: would you rather fight 50 duck sized horses or 1 horse sized duck?

I’m gonna steal CGPGrey’s answer and pick the big duck because he’s not likely able to walk.

DrawciaWitch: Do you play video games, and if so, what kind/what are your favorites?

The genres that I’m really big into are action-RPGs, platformers, and general action games. I used to be really into RPGs in general back in the day, but these days I lack the patience for turn-based battles and such. If you ask me what is the greatest game ever made, I will say Dark Souls hands down, even though I haven’t played all the way through it myself, and have mostly watched my friends play it again and again. Besides that though, my favorite game is Mass Effect 2. I’m a big fan of Tera Online, which I’m starting to get back into now that it’s gone free to play. My favorite platformer game is Super Meat Boy, and my favorite action-platformer is Super Metroid. I’m in the midst of playing Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams right now, which is also pretty awesome.

8bitpheonix: favorite anime?

It’s hard to say because I haven’t been watching much anime in the past year, but the one thing I rewatched in that time and reaffirmed as one of my favorites is Hourou Musuko.

Kay: -What is your favorite color?

I’ve been changing my mind about this forever, and I think I’m even close to coming full circle. As a kid, I loved blue, mostly because of the Blue ranger. And I loved the blue ranger because Billy wore glasses and was supposed to be smart, and I wore glasses and had been assured that I was very smart. In my early teens I really liked silver and dark slate blue specifically. In my late teens, I became really obsessed with the color red, because I identified a lot both with the connotations of passion, and with the visceral nature of the color. For a couple of years, all of my web pages and stuff were red, and I even dressed in all reda lot of the time.

Then, a couple of years ago, I calmed down a lot, and I started thinking that red was too intense a color for me, so I started using pink a lot. I think pink is probably still my favorite color, though I also really like purple and like to use it a lot. Last year, I basically themed everything on my computer around Twilight Sparkle, so now I’m very used to having purple all over my screen, and as a result, purple is often on the mind.

-What is the meaning of life?

Nothing has inherent meaning. We give it meaning by contextualizing it in our own minds.

-Oreos?

Not a fan!

-Would you like to talk about Homestuck?

The thing about Homestuck, is that there’s so much to say about it, but I think a lot of what excites me about it isn’t the same as what excites others. I really love looking at it analytically, and I adore reading Andrew Hussie’s own analysis of the story. I also appreciate it a lot as a post-modernist clusterfuck, though I think Hussie has something against that phrase.

Abe: Do you like any other folk/black/doom bands besides Allagoch?

Yes! Okay, let’s do a quick run through my media player to see what stuff I’ve got. I’m fairly picky about music, so while I’ve probably heard and like a lot of bands like this, the ones I’m listing here are ones I’m a fan of.

Astolat is a progressive doom band that just released their first EP on Bandcamp, and it’s pretty cool stuff, definitely a unique sound for the doom genre, so they’re worth a listen. Putting a link to their bandcamp in the description.

Electric Wizard is probably my favorite straight-up doom metal band. Dopethrone, Come My Fanatics, and Witchcult Today are all fantastic albums. Listen to this shit while you play Arkham Horror, I promise it will be perfect.

Falkenbach is a classic folk metal band that I love. I tend to listen to them a lot in November to get into that sort of folky late-fall vibe.

I think Goatsnake counts as a doom band. I don’t listen to them as much as these others, but it’s solid shit nonetheless.

Getting into black metal, we’ve got the symphonic black metal band Mirrorthrone, which is some of the most intense music around. It’s just an insane, uber-dense cacophony of shit happening, and I love it.

Sigh is kinda sorta like black metal occasionally, and they’re one of my favorite bands, so I’ll probably say more about them later.

Solstafir is a pretty cool icelandic band that is somewhat like Agalloch, probably closer to Primordial, whom I’ve not listened to as much as I probably should.

Type O Negative is probably not popular to include as a doom metal band, but I don’t care because I like them. Bloody Kisses and World Coming Down are particularly great albums.

My favorite black metal band is probably the short-lived and little-known band called Uvall. Their album, October Turns… Ruined is extremely atmospheric, and has this feeling like sinking into a swamp on a bleak, foggy night. This is definitely worth checking out if you’re into black metal and atmospheric music.

Wolves in the Throne room is another awesome black metal band with a lot of atmosphere that I think is pretty universally liked. And I realize I forgot to mention Krallice, but when I think of one I always think of the other, especially because I saw them live together. Sick stuff.

Zoren: Do you have a steam?

Yes. I’ll probably regret saying this, but my steam name is Digibro. Note that I don’t play any online games, though.

Anonymous: Best car brand? Best car model?

I don’t know jack shit about cars, but I do know this. My dad runs a Volkswagon dealership, and as a result, I drive a 2012 VW Beetle. So, that brand, and that model.

Top five beers?

I’m still really in the early experimental stages when it comes to beers, and I also don’t entirely know what does or doesn’t count as a beer. So here’s a list of stuff I love drinking: Angry Orchard hard cider, Sapporo, most Samuel Adams beers, most Sierra Nevada beers, and most Stone Brewery beers.

Old or new YouTube?

Does anyone like new youtube over old youtube?

Whiskey?

Whiskey is tough for me. It’s good, but it’s fuckin’ hard to drink.

What do you know about Sweden?

jag talar liten Svenska men min Svenska ar inte bra

What is your current studio setup? (Pc screen mic camera etc)

According to what it says on the front of my computer, it’s a Dell studio xps, but I don’t know much besides that. It’s from about 2010, and I really need a new graphic’s card. My monitor is also a Dell, it’s 1080p and 23 inches. I already covered the mic in an earlier question. As for camera, I just bought my brother a Canon Rebel t4i, so that’s what we’ll be using for all future video.

Global warming is a joke?

Dude, no.

Where is 14?

I truly have no idea what you’re asking.

Future plans?

My only plans are to make more youtube videos.

More ponies soon?

Of course

Love you’ videos man, never stop making them… Ok?

Okay.

TheFightForSurvival: Do you know about BFDI? If so, what are your thoughts on it?

I had never heard of it until this question. Also, I wasn’t aware until recently that “object videos” was, like, a thing. I’ve been invited to do a voice in the next season of Inanimate Insanity, but I had no idea there was like a whole culture around this.

Lavosowns: What’s your opinion about high-class dessert vs. snack food? As in for example Game Grumps vs. Sequelitis, or over 9000 episode anime vs regular 13/26/52 episode anime, etc. What do you like more, endless medium quality products as something consistent to look forward to, or high quality products for something to seriously enjoy and flip out about but only have a this experience once and never again (or only in the distant future).

Well the awesome thing about life is that I get to have both. Obviously I’m a die hard fan of sequelitis and I’ve watched each of those videos upwards of twenty times, but I also watch Game Grumps every single day, so I really don’t have to make a decision here. When it comes to anime, I don’t usually have the patience to keep up with a long-running show, and it’s exceedingly rare for me to finish anything longer than 26 episodes, but in the case of anime, length and quality are also not directly related. The highest-quality anime I’ve ever seen was probably FullMetal Alchemist Brotherhood which was over sixty episodes long, so there’s plenty of room for a long series to be great all the way through. I mean, just look at Legend of the Galactic Heroes, which has nearly 150 episodes when you include all the OVAs, and is widely considered to be one of the greatest anime ever made.

I realize this probably isn’t really what you meant, but I guess what I’m saying is that the dichotomy between high-class entertainment and snack food entertainment doesn’t exist or isn’t that important to me.

Jorge Weisson: what is your opinion of the urban art and graffiti? and do you have any favorite one or at least someone in which you´re interested to look about?

I don’t really know anything about urban art or graffiti, but I think it’s pretty cool from what I’ve seen. The thing about art with me is that I don’t tend to come back to it once. I look at a picture a few times, but I don’t tend to give much thought to it, unless I end up using it as a desktop or something. So with urban art, I might see it and think “wow, that’s cool,” but I don’t give much thought to it in the long run.

Littlevince: What are your thoughts on the recent PS4 announcement?

I’m sick of it. I’m pretty ready for the console industry to crash and burn. Honestly, I think the culture of games and consoles being put out to constantly maximize on graphics and flair and expensive games is shallow and starting to look desperate. More exciting games are being made on the PC on smaller budgets by indie developers, and technology is advanced enough now that even relatively cheap games from small developers look nice. More than anything, I just don’t really play any big-name tripple-A console games anyways, and the whole circus of consoles coming out and competing and games trying to push ten million copies at the outset looks bleak to me.

Paul: Have you played any of the Call of duty games?

I played Modern Warfare back when it first came out on my friend’s copy, and at the time, he was ranked in the top 100 in the country on the game. I thought it was fine as far as FPS go. It’s just a game about running around shooting dudes and then getting shot by dudes, I don’t think there’s a lot of thought to be put into it. It’s mostly a test of twitch reflex skills, and I’ve got no interest in building mine up. I haven’t played any of the twenty six clone games they’ve shoveled out since then beyond one or two matches in random places.

Ever thinking about making your own animations?

I would love to make my own animations. The problem is that doing so takes a lot of practice, and is incredibly time consuming. I don’t even have any drawing skills, so I have to build both skills as an artist and as an animator, and I just don’t have the patience for it. I much prefer to do projects where I can churn out piece after piece in short order, like I’m doing on my channel.

Have any pets?

My family owns a cat named Kilala, who is probably a little over eight years old now. She makes a point to piss me off at all times of day, and I take no part in taking care of her, so I wouldn’t say we’re friends.

Jordan Watts: What’s your opinion of Littlest Pet Shop?

Well, I just watched episode one for the sake of answering this question, so here’s my thoughts. I absolutely adore the design of Blythe, and the overall fashion sense of the show. The animation is solid, definitely above other similar Flash shows, though the thin limbs of the characters make movement look kinda awkward. Also the fact that Blythe’s head is nearly half of her mass. All of the voice acting seemed really solid, though obviously the actors hadn’t yet settled into the roles in the first episode. It’s weird to hear Ashleigh Ball play so close to her Rainbow Dash voice as Blythe. Altogether, the thing that is holding me back from getting into the show is the same reason I didn’t jump into watching it when it came out: I really don’t care about pets. I generally don’t like animals, and the ones in this show are kinda on a border between being cute and creepy looking. The dialog in this episode was weird, with parts that were really smart and funny, and other parts that were just bizarre. I’m interested enough to try another ep or two for sure.

Random-Analysis-Brony: You’ve inspired me to start my own line of analysis on the show and other subjects, and i was just looking for some advice from someone who’s been doing this for a while.

My advice about writing analysis is always, just to practice, and to find your voice. Figure out what your goals are in analyzing the work, and then set out to meet those goals. For me, it’s all about getting into the bones of why I like and care about the show so much, so there’s a big element of self-exploration. I’ve also been writing stuff of this nature for years, so I’ve had a lot of time to develop my voice.

Sussermus: How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

ten

How bout….
How much wood would you chuck if you were a woodchuck who could chuck wood?

ten

How old was Clockerbarrel when said Jargon was clocked?

ten

Last but not least, do you read Homestuck?

yes

thepunksclub21: What’s your favorite food?

It’s hard to say, because I really fail at food. Lately, I’ve been sort of addicted to fast food, which I’m starting to think is pretty unhealthy. Luckily my favorite stuff is usually the medium-sized, four dollar menu items at places like Hardees and Arby’s. I could probably name my favorite food at each restaurant I frequent, but instead let’s talk about home meals.

More than anything else, I’m a die hard macaroni fan. Cheese and shells are the best, but I love all kinds of macaroni and cheese. If there’s an ulterior motive behind this question to give me food at Bronycon, I would love it if you brought me baked macaroni.

Do you play any valve games if so what’s your favorite?

Actually, now that I think about it, the only Valve game I’ve played all the way through was the multiplayer mode of Portal 2. I’ve seen Portal played all the way through though. I’ll probably catch some flak for this, but I don’t care for Half Life 2. If you want to know why, check out Campster’s video about the game, which is linked in the description. He pretty much captured my feelings about it.

- Do you like any animators on YouTube/Newgrounds?

Yes, I’m a huge fan of Egoraptor and all of his videos. I also really like SmallButera. As for MLP animations, obviously JAN Animations is pretty king, and HotDiggetyDemon is great as well. I’ve seen a lot more animations that I liked, but these are the ones whose names come to mind.

- When did you first discover YouTube, and how old were you?

I discovered youtube in early 2006, when I was fifteen. Early on, I just used it to listen to music, mostly Coheed and Cambria and The Mars Volta at the time. Back then, songs weren’t nearly as easy to find on youtube. Most songs were attached to AMVs, and other than that there were a lot of random live performances. I get really nostalgic when I go back through my favorite videos.

- Why are your family members so awesome? I wish my family liked MLP

I don’t know why they’re so awesome, it just kind of happened. My brothers like MLP because their tastes are very similar to mine, as a result of us growing up really close to one-another. All three of us watch a lot of anime, and we share a lot of favorites, for instance.

zargy: -Opinions on the global economy?

I don’t know anything about the economy. I just hope it doesn’t crash and burn on me.

-Favorite Movies, TV Shows, Music, and Books?

If you want to see a full list of all the stuff I’m a fan of, check out my canon, which is linked in the description. Also, I’m going to skip over music for now and address it later.

My favorite movie is currently Tangled. I saw it in January and it blew me away. A lot of the movies that I often consider favorites I haven’t seen in a long time, so I’m not confident about them, but a few years ago I was a really big fan of Inception and The Dark Knight, and I’ve always been a die hard fan of everything made my Quentin Tarantino.

My favorite TV Shows, not including anime or MLP, are The Venture Bros., Archer, and uh… man I really don’t watch TV. I guess I’ll sit down to watch anything with Gordon Ramsay in it.

My favorite book is House of Leaves, and I also really enjoyed A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. I really don’t read enough.

-Favorite Word?

I’ve actually been working on a list of my favorite words, after years of saying I was going to. Here’s what I’ve got so far:

labyrinth
tetragrammaton
panopticon
ostensibly
obstinate
and magnanimous

Anonymous: If you could be any other race (besides the one you are now) what would it be and why?

This is a confusing question, I’m not sure if you mean race as in skin color, or race as in species. Either way, I’m fine for now.

TheLionKingSimbaFan: Do you like Harry Potter and The Hunger Games? If yes, what do you like about both series?

I have not read either of these series. I mean I read the first two Harry Potter books when I was like eight, but I don’t remember much of what happens. I’ve seen the first, third, and fifth movies, but I don’t remember them well either. I’m not very interested in either franchise.

Lavosowns: Just out of curiosity, you mentioned the Touhou series in one of your videos. What do you like about Touhou and which would you consider your favorite character in chase you had one?

Touhou is awesome primarily because of the amazing design sense. I’ve played the games plenty and I think they’re awesome, but it’s always been mostly about the character designs for me. My favorites are the Scarlet sisters, because they’re adorable vampire girls and that’s just all kinds of my weakness. Also possibly my favorite picture I’ve ever drawn was of Flandre Scarlet, though don’t get me wrong it’s still not very good.

WeepingPegasus: What’s your favorite pass-time, besides MLP stuff?

I spend a stupidly absorbent amount of time on the internet. Like, it’s all I do for most of every day. I play video games, I watch shows, etc. but all of it is like a blip in the ocean of me shitting around on twitter, tumblr, reddit, and google reader.

Will you marry me?

At this rate, I’m going to become a polygamist, aren’t I?

UnovaBrony: Are you a Pokemon fan? If so, do you believe Pokemon Bronies should be their own group with Keldeo (legendary swordman pony) as their mascot?

Actually I have never seen a Keldeo before. But if you wanna start a group like that, go ahead!

Is Keldeo possibly BETTER than Ponyta/Rapidash as a Pokemon Pony and if putting Vic (Edward Elric’s VA)’s voice in the smallest swordman in the 15th Pokemon Movie a smart decision in Pokemon’s part?

I’m not really sure what you’re asking. Vic Mignona played a Pokemon?

Barricade: If you had a super power or more than one what would they be and what would your costume look like?

I want to be immortal. I don’t know if that counts as what you were hoping for, but the prospect of super powers isn’t all that interesting to me. Living forever, though, is something I’d love.

Play world of warcraft?

I used to play WoW back in 2006. I only ever played Undead, and I never made it past level eighteen or so. I played through the starting country like four times over a few years, but I’d always lose interest shortly thereafter. My friends played the hell out of the game, but they all complain now that Blizzard fucked it up. I haven’t played since probably 2009.

SmilePyrVulpi: Hi! What is your Jung Personality type? How does it relate to INTJ?

I took the test which was linked in this comment, and I got results of pure moderateness.
44% Introvert, 38% Intuitive, 25% Feeling, and 56% Perceiving.

Tonyredgrave666: What are your top 5 games? Also, can you please go into a short, but somewhat in-depth, explanation as to why using your powers of analyzing?

My number one game is Dark Souls. It’s the most deep and engrossing game that I know of, and to me the true definition of what an open-ended game is. It’s the true successor to Mega Man X as defined by Egoraptor, and one of these days I’ll do an hours-long analysis of the game.

Mass Effect 2 is my number two. It’s got the most engaging narrative in a video game, and a big cool universe to explore in fun ways. It’s beautiful and fun and I’ll be doing a gigantic epic analysis of the Mass Effect trilogy as soon as I finally get around to it.

Number three is Tera Online, because it’s addicting and gorgeous. The world is the best-looking that I’ve ever seen, and the character designs are beautiful. The action is satisfying even though it’s pretty one-note, and is enough to carry me through hundreds of hours of game time.

Number four I’m gonna go with Super Meat Boy. It’s the tightest platformer that I know of, with the most thorough exploration of its mechanics. It has a very quick pace and shitloads of content to keep the player busy forever.

And for five, I’m gonna go with Phantasy Star Online. This game is very simple by today’s standards, and when PSO 2 finally comes out it may have a chance to break the list instead, but PSO is kind of a big deal for my brothers and I. We’ve played the game like crazy no shortage of times for nearly ten years now, always offline, always with three or four players. It is, in my opinion, the best in-house multiplayer experience around.

Anonymous: What is your favorite song style?

I’m assuming this is meant to refer to musical genres. I don’t have a favorite, as I like music from all kinds of genres. I do know that I’m biased towards really dense music in which a lot of things are happening at once. Listen to songs by Shinsei Kamattechan and So Great And Powerful to see what I mean by this.

Play any instruments?

Sadly no. My family owns all the instruments to start a rock band, and then some, but I’ve never had the patience or the passion to learn to play anything. I like to consider myself a good vocalist, though, and I enjoy creating ambient noise tracks.

Will you answer this with a negative statement?

Maybe.

The end?

BERFOEHRLN

Since you have a higher level of influence than me, how about spreading the project of a huge pony Harlem Shake, just like BronyDanceParty did with the Smile project?

I’m still bitter about my OC being left out of the Smile project video, so no! Joking, but seriously I don’t know much about the Harmlem Shake. I saw the one ACRacebest did, and I saw the one that Bronyvids did, but that’s about it.

doctor_qhooves127: what is your name?

Digibrony

what is your quest?

To analyze the holy grail of cartoons

What is the air-speed velocity of an un-laden swallow?

W–well I don’t know that o-AHHH!!

why are there so many songs about rainbows?

Must be the rainbow connection

Anonymous: What other fandom’s have you been apart of?

I’ve been a big-time member of the anime community for a very long time. Before it became a video game and pony site, my blog was an anime blog for about five years, and I spent most of my time talking to fellow anime bloggers about all sorts of shows. Anime blogging is pretty much the only active role I’ve had in a fandom before ponies.

Sean Dillon: -What are your favourite non MLP fan fics?

Well that’s a hard question because I can’t even remember the last time I read a non-MLP fanfic that wasn’t some kind of comic or animation. I’m not really that embroiled in fanfic culture.

-Who do you watch on the internet?

I’ve been watching Zero Punctuation every Wednesday since 2008 because I love listening to Yahtzee’s voice. I’ve been watching Game Grumps every day since it started because I’m in love with Egoraptor, and I also watch JonTron ‘cause he’s cool too. Recently I started watching MovieBob’s shows on the escapist as well, which include The Big Picture and Escape to the Movies. I realize I kinda answered this question already when I talked about my favorite youtube channels, but I’m specifying these ones for this question because I watch these shows on a regular daily or weekly basis.

-Thoughts on Adventure Time

I like Adventure Time, but not nearly as much as most people like Adventure Time. My little brother is a die-hard fan, who cosplays Finn, bought the special edition 3DS game, and has bought all of the comics and spin-offs. I can’t get into it like that. I appreciate what it is, but it has this quality of being kinda too right. Like, the characters are a little too wish fulfillment, and the story just does whatever the hell it wants. These are good and bad things at once. If my opinions here seem half-formed, it’s because they are. I’ve been trying to wrap my head around why I don’t care about this show that much for a while now, but I think I need to watch the whole show chronologically before I’ll really figure it out.

I did like the comic book a bit more than the show, which has a lot to do with it being written by Ryan North. I’m a big fan of Dinosaur Comics.

-Do you read comic books, and if so, What are you reading right now?

Back in December, one of my friends and I started up a cultural exchange. He was going to teach me about comics, which he was passionate about, and I would teach him about anime and manga, which I was passionate about. He did a kind of poor job getting me into comics because he’s not as good at recommending things as I am, but it was enough to spark some interest and get me buying a bunch of stuff.

My favorite comic, without competition, is Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, which belongs in the upper echelon of my favorite creative works. After that, I’ve gotten pretty big into Hellboy and B.P.R.D., which pretty much covers all the non-DC stuff I’ve read. Because my friend is big into DC, and because I know those heroes better from my childhood, I’ve been focusing my attention on DC. The problem I have with comics is that I don’t care enough to get into these gigantic, exposition and crossover-laden expanded universes, so I’ve mostly been focusing on the New 52 comics so far.

My favorite New 52 series is probably Batwoman. I’ve read Elegy and the first New 52 volume, and I think it’s just gorgeous and badass in the best ways. I also really enjoyed the first volumes of Wonder Woman and Animal Man. Unfortunately, I can’t really buy comics anymore after leaving my job, but I’ll probably pick up volume two of Batwoman when the paperback finally comes out.

-Is The Simpsons still funny?

I’ve probably seen less than ten full episodes of the Simpsons, and I couldn’t possibly tell you what seasons they came from, so I have no idea.

-Thoughts on Invader Zim

Never watched it. I probably would check it out if someone convinced me I should. I know it’s not the same thing, but I enjoyed Johnny the Homicidal Maniac.

-What is the worst cartoon series you have ever seen and why?

I don’t know about an American cartoon, but the worst animated work I’ve ever seen is a close competition between Loups;Garous, Kai Doh Maru, Ninja Resurrection, Bungaku Shoujo, and every single thing that studio Bee Train has ever produced.

-Why do people hate Johnny Test?

Personally I find Johnny Test obnoxious. It’s not really bad, just not really good. It’s very cheeky and self-aware in a way that kinda says, “we know this could be better, but we don’t care.” The animation is very weak, and the character designs are ugly. But more than anything, I just think it’s hard to follow. The show moves at the most breakneck speed I’ve ever witnessed, with plot and jokes whizzing by constantly. It’s sometimes headache-inducing for me. By the way, if you’re wondering why I’ve seen enough of it to talk about it, it’s because my little brother almost always has cartoon network playing in his room, and about two times out of five that I go in there, Johnny Test is on. They play the shit out of that shoe.

-If SOPA was passed, how bad would it have crippled the internet?

It would have absolutely wrecked everything, and I still fear the idea that something like this will come along again to make my life hell.

We were like, “let’s eat every kind of chicken in the area.” And then I was like, “dude, video.” And this happened.

The lists

Chicken

1. Chick-fil-A
2. Hardee’s
-good ones die here-
3. Sonic
4. KFC
5. McDonald’s nuggets
6. Arby’s
7. Wendy’s nuggets

Honey Mustard

1. Hardee’s
2. McDonald’s
3. Sonic
4. Chick-fil-A
5. KFC
6. Wendy’s
7. Arby’s

Links mentioned in video:

The 100 Characters for 100 Otaku series: http://myswordisunbelievablydull.wordpress.com/?s=100+character+for+100+otaku&submit=Search

My Deviantart: http://digibro.deviantart.com/

My favorite Shinsei Kamattechan song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kau4gncZaAU

Text version of questions and answers (very different from video version):

-If you were stuck on a desert island with only one movie, what would it be and why?

Gonna pick the director’s cut ten-hour version of The Lord of the Rings, because I’ve got a lot of time on my hands, and it takes a lot longer for a ten-hour movie to get old than a regular one.

-Would you like a jelly baby?

As long as you’re referring to the candy and not the sex act.

-Thoughts on Doctor Who.

Actually, I just put up a post on my blog, which I’ve linked in the description, in which I shared my thoughts on the first series, which I watched last month.

SomeRandomGeek: I noticed in one of your videos, you used Virginia Beach as an example as a place not known for fashion. Since that’s not a place specifically known for not being known for fashion, did you pick it cause you live in the area?

Yes. That is where I live.

Anonymous: Do you watch Doctor Who? And if so, who is your favorite Doctor? Favorite companion?

Because I’m really new to Doctor Who, my favorites are still Chrostopher Eccleston and Rose Tyler.

Anonymous: Will it Blend?

I DON’T KNOOOOOOOOOOOO-

dai1313: I just wanted to know if you have been watching Tamako Market, and if so, what you thought of the show – particularly the character Dera Mochimazzi.

I watched the first episode of Tamako Market, and I thought it was really good, and I even thought about doing a thorough analysis of it. However, this was right at the time that I started having trouble with youtube blocking my videos, so I ended up focusing on making the MLP videos work. I didn’t end up continuing Tamako MArket for the same reason that I never end up watching any shows while they’re airing—a mix of laziness and forgetfullness.

ryko89: How is your life these days?

Completely overtaken by ponies. The month of February went by in a complete blur of watching ponies, talking about ponies, making videos about ponies, singing about ponies, etc. You see, the funny thing is that each of my viewers interacts with me individually. You see each of my videos, and you possibly talk to me through an instant messenger client, or through private messages on youtube, etc. But for me, I’m talking to ALL OF YOU, so I’m interacting with dozens of people on a regular basis, not to speak of my hundreds of commenters that I try to keep up with (though it’s quickly getting away from me). And all of this is between constantly consuming fan works and other analysis videos. It’s pretty overwhelming, but a lot of fun, too.

Do you like musical theater?

I’m fine with it conceptually, but I don’t know a lot about it. The only musical I’ve ever seen live (incidentally, the only professional-level play that I’ve ever seen live), was Jesus Christ Superstar, which is pretty damn cool.

What’s your favorite shirt that you own (not necessarily pony related)?

Hard question actually. I think the favorite of my friends is this a plain brown shirt that I sloppily wrote “SHIRT” on in permanent marker. We call it the “shirt shirt.” I also have the Dinosaur Comics “Panel 2” shirt, but it always takes forever for stuff to wash off of it, so I don’t get as much fun out of it as I should. Also I wrote “THOROUGH ANALYSIS” in it in pen, intending to wear it in one of my videos when I was filming myself, but I never got to do so, and now I’m realizing that pen doesn’t really come off.

I have a whole asslaod of band t-shirts and show t-shirts, a lot of which are pretty cool, so any of those would suffice. I’ve also got a shirt that says “You sure do got a purty mouth,” which I get a kick out of.

What’s your shoe size?

I think I wear like an eight and a half or nine. I have tiny feet.

Will you ever shave your hard to describe facial hair (not that it’s bad, just wondering)?

Actually I’ve been clean shaven since early January. In fact, it’s been cracking me up endlessly that people keep telling me they love my facial hair in those videos where I had it, because I put out a video right afterwards in which I was clean shaven. No one seems to watch that video though, so not a lot of people are aware that I shaved.

I also get the impression that people thought I’d been growing that bear for a long time. I had that beard for a grand total of two and a half months. I started growing in in October, because I knew No Shave November was coming up, and I wanted to participate. I kept the beard until January because it was cold, and I am always worried about utility before fashion (which is why I almost exclusively wear pajama pants). Once it started getting a little warmer, and the beard had started to get out of hand, I shaved it clean, and have kept it clean since.

Would you want to get married in the future?

The thing about marriage is that from what I understand, there’s a bunch of contracts and shit involved, and I find that highly disturbing. I don’t like to get involved in contracts and stuff, so I’d really rather just have a relationship without the marriage thing, unless we were going to have kids and a family and shit and I was very well-briefed on the benefits of marriage.

Do you have a deviantart? If so, who are your favorite deviants?

Yes, you can find me as Digibro on Deviantart, and see a list of my favorites there, since it would take me a while to list them all here. Link to my profile in the description.

What’s your real life first name?

Conrad.

Favorite band/musician?

My favorite band is Shinsei Kamattechan.

Halie: Do you like lolcats? do you have a favorite?

I hate animals.

JetH7: Do you like Kingdom Hearts?

No. I will probably end up making a video about this game on my video game channel one day, because I consider it my duty to talk about every noteworthy action-RPG, but it may not happen for years. For now, I’ll just say, I don’t like it.

Taylor: Have you ever watched Avatar: the last airbender? What did you think of it?

Yes, I have seen it, and I think it’s fucking awesome. I still haven’t watched past the first ep of Korra though, which I really ought to do.

Baka-Raptor: Since when did so many people love you?

Ponies dude. Ponies. And also, video, seriously. Baka I’m going to tell you seriously, if you turn your Unbiased Reviews series into video form, and did a good job of it, you might see some success. I’ll help promote it, too.

Waldo: You keep mentioning an anime blog that never took off. Why do you think that is, and why do you think your pony analysis videos are more popular?

Anime blogging is an interesting thing, because there is such a broad spectrum of what an anime blog is. There are anime blogs out there which rose to be incredibly popular, but most of them provide regular, fast coverage, often of a lot of random things. The biggest anime blogs very closely resemble Equestria Daily in terms of output, and I never wanted to be like that.

The next level of anime blogs, which are big but probably not enough to make money from it, usually covered a wide variety of shows on an episode-by-episode basis. I never keep up with many shows, and never ever keep up episode by episode, so these kind of blogs never appealed to me, and they had a tendency not to say much of worth about the episodes.

For me, it was always about covering shows on my own terms, with a heavy dose of analysis and observation, mixed in with my gonzo style of blogging. I had a decent following of readers, though mind you that my writing was absolutely awful for the early years of my blogging, and I still don’t like having to read anything that I wrote before 2011.

There are a lot of reasons I was never huge. I was inconsistent, I was obnoxious a lot of the time, I talked about a lot of things that people didn’t care about, I didn’t advertise very well, and I wasn’t trying to appeal to anyone but myself. I had about as many readers as I should have had.

If there’s a series that I’m disappointed hasn’t taken off yet, it’s my video game analysis, both on my blog and on youtube. I know that the problem is that I haven’t talked about any big games yet, which is why I’m focused on trying to make a Mass Effect video, even though I haven’t been working on that because PONIES.

Luck Bites: Did you know that tomatoes were thought to be poisonous a long time ago because everyone ate them off aluminum plates?

I had no idea! I still don’t like tomatoes though.

Were you obsessed with anything as a kid?

Yes. In fact, when I look back on my life, I see it as a chronicle of past obsession. In my early childhood, I was obsessed with Barnie and Whinnie the Pooh. The earliest obsession that I clearly remember was with the Power Rangers. After that, I got into Beast Wars. Next, I was obsessed with dinosaurs, because of Jurassic Park and The Lost World. Then I got big into Godzilla. The first obsession to become a long-lasting part of my life, though, was Pokemon, which I got into when I was about seven, and it kind of took over my life for the next four years. I still consider myself to be a Pokemon lifer, though I don’t keep up with it as well as I should.

After Pokemon, I became obsessed with anime, which I would consider to be altogether the biggest and most pervasive obsession in my life. There was a period in 2004 where I didn’t have cable, and streaming anime wasn’t really a thing yet, so I got really into video games. After that I went through a period where I didn’t have cable or any spending money and got really into music. Then I got obsessed with anime again, and at that point I was at the age where all my obsessions seemed to be staying with me, and balancing out.

And now, I’m obsessed with MLP

Do you like secret agent and sci-fi books and stuff?

Not really. I don’t read much to begin with, and those genres aren’t terribly interesting to me. I did think Skyfall was a fucking awesome movie, though.

How many hours of sleep do you get?

Way too many. I don’t usually set an alarm because I never know when I‘m going to pass out. My sleep schedule is totally erratic, and I probably average ten hours of sleep a day, often going up to twelve. Every month or so there’s at least one day that I sleep for like sixteen to eighteen hours. All that said, I hate sleep. I take forever to get to sleep, I have no concept of how people can make themselves sleep, and I consider it a giant fuckign waste of time. I’m really waiting for science to affordably eradicate the need for it.

What is your favorite school subject and which subject did you get the best grades in at school?

My favorite subject is none. I hated school and everything in it, and I made pretty mediocre grades in everything. My best subject was English, but I made Cs and Ds because I’d ignore all my homework and sleep through class, or write blog posts on the side. In eleventh grade, I failed Algebra 2 with like a 10 percent, because I decided I was going to sleep and read manga through class and blow off absolutely every assignment, but the next year I passed it with an A, so I guess I wasn’t bad at it after all. All in all, school was just a place I went because I was too crippled by depression, anxiety, and laziness to do something else.

Do you like cats?

No.

Are you superstitious?

Not in particular. I like the idea of superstition, the idea that there are things seemingly innocuous things which can be dangerous, but I don’t really know the origins of most of the well-known superstitions, and I’ve seen to much evidence disproving them to buy into them.

Do you own a lava lamp?

Actually there’s quite a few lava lamps in my house, though I don’t think any of them still operate. My mom used to be a manager at Spencer Gifts.

What is your favorite kind of cake?

I’m not a fan of cake. If I have to pick, I pick vanilla.

Would you rather eat pickled bed bugs or swim in a red lake with a zombie?

Swimming in a red lake sounds pretty badass, zombie or not, so that one.

Do you have any fears and have you ever almost died?

I have one crippling phobia I’ve been struggling to get over which I will not share, and I have had a couple of faint brushes with death, but nothing serious.

FiveOFlutter: What shampoo do you use?

I use Head and Shoulders dandruff shampoo, various kinds because I don’t really know what kind of hair I have.

zeusassassin: Have you played any Sonic games? If so, which one is your favorite? Do you have a favorite level?

Okay I’m probably gonna get some hate for this, but I really don’t like Sonic games. Any of them. I grew up with Sonic Adventure 2 Battle and I have a lot of nostalgia for it, but I think it’s a terrible game, and I don’t like the old games either. I’ve linked a post in the description where I talk about one of the big reasons I don’t like the franchise on a conceptual level.

Nate: What is the speed of sound in a vacuum?

Nothing, according to google.

Cro-Magnon Man: Do you like classic rock?

I’m not big into what I understand to be classic rock. Most of the older rock bands I like are prog bands, like Pink Floyd, Rush, King Crimson, and Steely Dan. I do like some of the classic songs like Carry On My Wayward Son, but they aren’t a big part of my listening.

Luck Bites: Do you watch “mystery diagnosis” or anything similar?

Never heard of it until just now, but it doesn’t sound like my thing.

Do you know anyone named Soak, Potato, Cash or Shark? Have you ever played Poptropica?

No to all of those.

AngelicTurtle: What was the first video game you ever played (or the first one you remember playing).

If the Sega Pico counts as a game console, then the first games I remember playing were the Whinnie the Pooh, 101 Dalmations, and Mickey Mouse games on the Pico. Beyond that, in my early childhood, my parents were scared to let me play video games, because I have a cousin who’s around eight years older than me who was incredibly violent and aggressive, and played video games, and this was the 90s and all.

I remember playing Super Mario World and Mega Man X on a friend’s Super Nintendo, but I had no idea what the fuck I was doing and didn’t enjoy myself. The first time a video game caught my attention was when my aforementioned cousin brought over an N64 and Diddy Kong Racing in something like 1996. That Christmas, he gave us his N64 and two semi-functional controllers, and that was how I grew to know video games. They probably didn’t become a big part of my life until Pokemon Red, though.

Supergub: What is your favorite movie in each of the following genres: comedy, horror, and adventure?

My favorite comedy movie is Pineapple Express, no contest.

My favorite horror movie is Gozu, if it counts. By the way, everyone who can handle weird shit should see this movie, and should read as little as humanly possible about it before doing so.

My favorite adventure movie is Tangled, if not The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

What is the most frequent activity that you have done, excluding work, school, and working on YouTube content, over the past month?

Well, I haven’t done any work or school, but outside youtube content, I’ve had a hell of a lot of instant messenger conversations. I’ve also spent a lot of time drinking and/or drunk, smoked more cigarettes than I probably should, and spent as much time dicking around on the internet as ever.

What is your favorite drink?

I have been hideously addicted to Mountain Dew for a very long time. Lately, I’ve mostly been drinking Whiteout, which is the newish Citrus version of Mountain Dew and is stupidly good. No joke, I could easily put together a fifteen to twenty minute video analyzing and instructing on the best ways to drink Mountain Dew. The drink is a kind of big, albeit miserable, part of my identity.

Can you identify where the 10th question is quoted from?

Yes. It is from Somebody to Love by Queen.

Can anybody find me somebody to love?

Idk man, I’d have to find one for myself first.

Anon: I’ve always wondered, have you ever written a novel? if so, what’s it called?

I have never finished a novel, though not for lack of trying. I actually completed 50,000 words during NaNoWriMo in 2010, but the novel was a huge fucking mess, and I gave up on trying to fix it. Since then, I’ve mostly given up on long-form literature, and I much prefer short-form flash fiction and non-fiction.

Dave Eash: You get to have lunch with one person. You can ask them anything during this lunch. They can be from any time, past, present, or future. Who is it and why?

I’d like to have lunch with my good friend ghostlightning. He lives in the Philppines, and I got to stay with him for a month a couple of years ago. I’d like the chance to visit his house and have lunch with him again and say hi to his family.

Mirne23: How many TV series have you watched, anime, cartoon, or otherwise? How many have you analyzed?

According to My Anime List, I’ve watched at least one episode of over one thousand anime series, and completed nearly five hundred of them. Outside of that, I’ve probably seen a normal number of cartoons. I’ve analyzed hundreds of anime, but the only one I ever analyzed every episode from start to finish was FLCL.

What is your day job?

I make youtube videos! For very little money!

Neonz: – Are you currently in school? And (unless you haven’t graduated high school yet), what are you studying?

I am a college dropout right now. When I graduated high school, I went to a community college with my mom for five semesters. I took multimedia classes for the first semester, then switched to online business classes in the second semester which I failed spectacularly (long story for another time), then I did one English class for a summer semester, went back to multimedia for the next semester, took a semester of core classes so I could try and transfer to a university to take more English classes, but then got sick of it all, dropped out, and spent a month in the Philippines. Meanwhile my mom graduated in photography.

Are you really going to answer all of these? Celestia be with you.

I CAN DO ITTT!!!

Mysteriously Handsome Mustache: If I devour your face, do I gain your powers?

Well there’s only one way to find out now isn’t there? But you better come prepared!

derpy: do you have a gf?

Nope!

Mutton Lefay: Do you have any future career plans or hopes?

I hope to make a living doing analysis. One way or another, I want this to become my life.

Esorial: How often do you bring in others opinions to your works, by which I mean analyses?

All the time. There is no such thing as original ideas. I carry a heavy load of ideas into all my my analysis from years of reading and writing stuff like this. I was hugely influenced by my friend and fellow anime blogger ghostlightning, as well as better-known reviewers such as Roger Ebert and Yahtzee. I’ve been sharing a lot of ideas with AnY Pony, Byter, and the guests on the Crepuscular Bronies podcast, as well as with Bronycuriuos, and all of us have made reference to one-another in our videos.

Anonymous: Do you have any professional experience as a reviewer?

Nope! This channel is the closest to pro that I’ve ever been.

ItWasUnderE: Do you have any siblings, if so, do you share interests?

I have two younger brothers, and as I mentioned earlier, we share interests because of the fact that we’re all very close. That said, there are differences in what we care about the most.

My twenty year-old brother is very passionate about giant robots, and has a huge collection of model kits that he built. He likes anime of every genre, but is biased towards robots and uplifting stories, with his favorite being Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. He likes ponies for their uplifting nature as well.

My fifteen year-old brother likes things that are cute, fun, and lighthearted. He prefers comedy anime about girl characters, and getting into MLP was kind of a natural transition for his taste once he got over the kneejerk pony reaction.

Both of them are also much bigger gamers than I am. The older one plays a lot of the new releases and stuff, preferring action and adventure games, whereas the younger plays a lot of free-to-play online games with his friends.

What’s your fastest WPM? (maintaining ~90% accuracy)

I took a few tests just now, and my best score was 67. I probably type a little fast than that on average, because I wouldn’t be reading the thing I’m trying to type most of the time (though I do have to stop to form words every so often).

What timezone are you in?

EST.

Nash Tei: Which bands do you listen to besides bronies? Arcade Fire Perhaps?

I’ve never really listened to The Arcade Fire, but here’s a list of my favorite bands: Shinsei Kamattechan, Agalloch, Coheed and Cambria, Protomen, Silversun Pickups, Boris, Circle Takes the Square, Comus, The Dear Hunter, Electric Wizard, Fozy Shazam, Isis, Mark Lanegan, Manchester Orchestra, The Mars Volta, Mastodon, Maximum the Hormone, Mindless Self Indulgence, Opeth, Portugal the Man, Sigh, and Steely Dan.

Nash Tei: What do you want to be when you grow up?

A professional analyst! See, I’m already grown up.

Who is your favorite american president?

I, uh, don’t have one! I don’t have much knowledge of historical presidents.

Do you plan on making videos forever, or What kind of legacy do you want to be remembered by when you leave youtube?

As long as youtube remains the best, and most viable platform for video making, and as long as videos remain the best means of communication, I will be making videos. As technology and the landscape of the internet changes, I will change to keep up with it.

Dana Ford: Do you think tardigrades are awesome?

What the Fu… AAAAAAAA!!!!!!

Anonymous: Do you know how to fix computers?

Not even slightly. I rely on my computer-savvy friend to handle everything.

Zapple: I love you. Will you Marry me someday? We could have a beautiful honeymoon in Hawaii where we could watch the sunset while laying on the beach together… Doesn’t that sound nice? C’mon. Please? <3

Actually I live at the beach and I kinda hate the beach.

Scorpion_23: Miracle Whip. Yes or no?

Noooo.

Devixicus: Minecraft? Roleplay? Minecraft Roleplay?

I haven’t played much Minecraft. My fifteen year-old brothers has spent literally thousands of hours playing the game, running his own servers and stuff, and I’ve watched way more of him playing than I ever should. I’ve probably spent a good twenty hours in the game when I was building Glasslandia, which was going to be an entire city made of glass, with vast underground passages and a giant, magnificent tower, from which reigned a totalitarian overlord. But yeah I never came close to finishing it.

I’ve never done roleplay in video games, but I used to run forum RPs back when I was in my early teens. I also play Dungeons and Dragons with my friends, but we don’t get into character or anything.

What are some other cartoons that you really like?

Not including anime, I’m a big fan of The Venture Brothers and Archer. I also like The Boondocks, American Dad, Gravity Falls, and Metalocalypse, to cover still-running shows. Others I liked are Avatar: The Last Airbender and 12 Ounce Mouse. I like some of the other Cartoon Network shows like Adventure Time and Regular Show, but I mostly just catch them when they’re on and I happen to be in my brother’s room.

Anonymous: have you watched the anime code geass?

Yes, although I still somehow haven’t finished R2. I watched up to episode ten while it was airing, and then just sort of fell off the bandwagon as I tend to do. I’m very familiar with what happened, though, and I vividly remember being on 4chan’s anime board during the finale and watching it absolutely explode.

Brandon: What are your thoughts on the Battlefield vs CoD controversy?

I could not possibly give less of a fuck since I don’t like either franchise.

Who are your role models?

My biggest role model is my good friend ghostlightning, who has been my mentor for the past four and a half years. I also really look up to Roger Ebert, Egoraptor, and Campster as reviewers. In terms of prose and fiction, I look up to H.P. Lovecraft and Oscar Wilde.

theboredotaku: If you could jump in a jar of Jelly what flavour would it be?

Grape!

M.A.C.: You mentioned in your “Mane six ages” video that you’ve been writing for aprox. 7000 hours, I was simply wondering, what do you write and how did you get into writing?

Well, you may remember way the hell back at the start of this QnA, I mentioned that I’d spent a lot of my childhood writing my own magazines. I probably didn’t think of this as writing per say, but it was a start. I also had a video game I’d been conceptualizing for about a year when I was ten, which was called Puzzling, and I thought that if I drew all the levels, enemies, and items, wrote a gameFAQs style guide to how it’s played, and sent it to Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo would give me two million dollars. Don’t ask me how I reached any of those conclusions.

After spending a very boring summer writing my first magazine and drawing shit for Puzzling, I started working on a written sequel to Puzzling called Puzzling Two: Golden Fantasies, which was meant to be a reference to Golden Sun and Final Fantasy, even though I’d never played any Final Fantasy games and only know about them in legend. It was an incredibly generic adventure story but, again, it was a start.

In eighth grade, I took a creative writing class, which in retrospect I’m amazed they even had, though that was probably the nicest school that I ever went to so that would be why. In this class, I learned some of the fundamentals, and was positively reinforced both by generally being better than my classmates, and by the undeserved praise of my parents. I became especially proud of my poems and wrote a lot of poems that I hope I’m never forced to read again at any point.

In my teens, I spent a lot of time on forums, and I ran some forum RPs, which probably did more to develop my writing skills than the dozens of failed stories I tried to write. It was really rare for me to write more than the first page of a story, and a major victory if I wrote like ten.

This trend continued into the years when I started blogging, and realized it was much easier and more satisfying to write about myself as opposed to fictional stories. When I figured out how to combine writing about myself with writing about things that I liked, I think I’d found my niche, even if I didn’t quite realize it yet.

I spent most of high school writing blog posts constantly. I know I’ve mentioned my anime blog a few times, but I don’t think I’ve mentioned that it was insanely prolific. The highest density of my writing was February 2009 when I published sixty posts in a month. Though seriously, with this QnA alone, I think March is going to be my new most prolific month.

Basically, the realization that I enjoyed and was starting to get good at writing blog posts was what drove me to stop trying to write fiction, and a while later I realized that the kind of writing I like to do was not only a viable career, but possibly even more viable than fiction writing. And uh, here I am!

snivy17: Will we be seeing that epic beard again?

Maybe not for a long while, but when it gets cold again, you can bet I’ll be keeping my god damn face warm.

Kamina, Simon, or Kittan?

WHO DO YOU THINK I AM?! No but for real I can’t chose, partly beacuse it’s been too long since I watched Gurren Lagann.

Who DA F is Hank?

I have no fucking idea.

hexaguin: Metric or imperial?

Imperial is a lot easier for me because I grew up with it, and I have a great sense of what five feet looks like, better than I do 130 centimeters. I wish I was better with metric though because universal standards are a good thing.

Any other hobbies beside videos?

Quite a few. You can see a collection of pretty much everything I work on at my website linked in the description. The thing I would most describe as a hobby is my band, since we mostly do improvisational music, and no one takes it very seriously. I love our music, but I’m the only one who listens to it.

What are these weird things on my back?

Idk dude see a doctor.

Yecki: Did you ever create a backstory for an oc (not needing to be pony) if so, wanna share that?

This is a complicated question, because any character which I’ve created would be an original character, and I’ve created HUNDREDS of characters for my various stories, many of which have fairly detailed backstories. So, I’d rather not get into those.

How would you keep yourself entertained, if power went out for 2 weeks?

Well it’s happened before during hurricane season, though years ago. The most recent time that our power went out for a whole day, we had about eight people come over and we played Arkham Horror by candlelight. I think we could easily sustain that for two weeks.

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Links mentioned in the video:

My Adventure! Action! RPG! series: http://myswordisunbelievablydull.wordpress.com/aarpg/

Text version of questions and answers (different from video version):

Have you ever tried pen and paper? If so, do you have a story from there to share?

My friends and I started playing Dungeons and Dragons a few months ago. I play a Tiefling named Nigga Rafiki, and I started the game with five thousand bottles of ale and nothing else. I use the ale to get through most obstacles, and my character mostly sits around getting drunk and singing the circle of life. He also has a kid that he took in as a disciple named Snoop Lion, who at one point had his dick cut off and thrown into a portal, then had it resurrected by the god of alcohol. Yeah basically everything we do in DnD is a crazy story.

Have you seen ‘gosick’ if so what is your opinion on that?

I actually own the first book of Gosick, which I read some five years ago because it was done by my favorite translator. I liked it, but when I watched the anime, I didn’t like it nearly as much. I watched about 8 episodes, and I found the male lead to be obnoxious as shit, and the mystery wasn’t that interesting to me, so I dropped it.

do you prefer day or night?

I seem to be more productive when I work through long stretched of night time, so I prefer the night. Altogether.

what would YOU want your rl name to be if you were a girl?

Baroness.

if any: which animes managed to give you teary eyes?

I actually have a count of the exact number of tears that I’ve shed while watching anime. The first tear was from Kanon 2006, when Nayuki reacts to her mom being hit by a car. My second tear was during the last episode of Eureka Seven the first time that I watched it. My third and fourth tears were shed during the ending of ef ~a tale of memories~ the first time I watched it. My fifth tear was during the second-to-last episode of Eureka Seven, when I rewatched it. Incidentally, my brother and best friend bawled for like twenty minutes after that one. Tears Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Nose Run One, and Choke Up One all happened at the end of the Fuuko arc in CLANNAD. Later I thoroughly lost my shit at the end of Angel Beats, and beyond that I kinda stopped keeping track.

misssmartypants: if xy=1 what is the value of: 2(x+y)^2/2 (x-y)^2

FUCK-IN, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!

TimeChaser: Are you vegan, vegetarian, or normal?

I am not a vegan or vegetarian. I enjoy meat entirely too much to be either of those.

Staticpanda: Which animes would you recommend to people? (Non-mainstream if possible pls :D)

Since you specifically asked for non-mainstream stuff, I’m going to pick the most obscure shit on my favorites lise. Go watch Alien Nine, Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight, Hourou Musuko, Kamichu!, Kara no Kyoukai, Kure-nai, Kuuchuu Buranko, Kyouran Kazoku Nikki, Mugen no Ryvius, Otaku no Video, Revolutionary Girl Utena, Riding Bean, Seikon no Qwaser, The SoulTaker, Summer Wars, Texhnolyze, and The Sky Crawlers. If you need any of those spelled, check the text version of the post.

Tenranea: You said ask anything, so Homestuck it is. Aranea being my favorite character, followed by Vriska and Mindfang, as well as Rose, in addition to my self analyzed class and aspect to be the Mage of Light, I can definitely say that I have a strong preference for the light aspect. Do you have anything similar? Which characters do you like the most, and for what reasons? I myself spend time thinking about the titles of players, and how a player with a theoretical title would be. Have you done any of this at all?

Actually, I’ve given very little thought to the titles, especially because I’m not sure that their meanings have been fully explored by the story, and also because their meanings are incredibly complex. I mostly have a passive appreciation for Homestuck, not usually diving too deep into it. My favorite characters are, in no order, Karkat because of his constant self-loathing fail inferno, which reminds me way too much of my younger brother, Terezi because she’s just cool and fun, Vriska because she’s a manipulative bitch, Meenah because she’s entirely too cool, Aranea because honestly she’s hot, both Striders because they’re pretty much perfect characters, and both Lalondes for pretty much the same reason.

levshu: Which of any of these questions from all of these people is your favorite question?

All the questions that prompted giant answers out of me are among my favorites. I’ve also been having fun with all the questions about being teleported to Equestria. The question that made me smile the most was BRO, DO YOU EVEN LIFT?

nicklesfox: What web browser do you prefer?

Google Chrome, all the way. It simple, it’s effective, and it’s fast. I switched over as soon as chrome came out and never looked back. As an added fun fact, I have a Twilight Sparkle chrome skin.

Grim Palsson: Why are you so epic?

I ate Odin.

Mattwo: Have you heard of Super Sentai and Kamen Rider?

Yes, I am familiar with both franchises. I watched about 22 episodes of Samurai Sentai Shinkenger around the time that it ended, and I greatly enjoyed it, but did not ever get around to finishing it, which is typical of me. I also saw a few episodes of Kamen Rider Decade, but I’ve never taken the time to get into the Kamen Rider franchise.

UltimateBarn: Have you ever been to the UK, if so, what did you think of it?

I have not been there, but I suspect if I did I would melt because I love British accents to death.

RevanandSamus: Would you rather own a male version of samus’s suit? or a gundam of your choice?

You know, having my own Samus suit would be intensely badass. I mean, I’d get to feel amazing all the time by my feats of strength and speed, I have a gun arm, and I can turn into a ball.

But dude. A. FUCKING. GUNDAM. OF COURSE I’M GONNA PICK THE GUNDAM. Specifically, I want Turn A Gundam, because DAT MUSTACHE.

truezangetsu: Can I be your new bestfriend?

Well, I already have a best friend, but you can be a friend anyway.

Anonymous: How is your brainwashing coming along?

The stains aren’t coming out!

ender: What can change the nature of a man?

This seems to be a reference to something I don’t know. But the question I ask of you, is, WHAT IS A MAN?

TK: how many times did you stop while recording this

I won’t know until I record this but considering the length, probably a lot of times.

whats your favourite muffin flavour

I don’t have one, not a big muffin fan.

what is your opinion on dynamite

Um, it explodes things??

if you could punch a star would you

Fuck yes?

aidanofvt: Will you change the picture at the top of this page?

No way, that’s my adorable Tera Online character, Falario Fa. She is intensely relevant to the title and content of my site.

Pierce Jones: Dear Digbrony Do you Condenser Maryland and Virginia a part of the South Because They are very Different from other “Southern” States (Like Alabama or South Carolina) yet the US cenus make both a part of the south?

I don’t consider them to be in the South. Virginia is historically considered South, probably because of the Civil War, but at this point I think it’s got way more in common with Northern states than Southern states, especially since a lot of our population comes from New York. Maryland is above us so yeah, definitely North.

Maranwe: Recently my sister and I crossed and compared Yu-Gi-Oh and MLP, I stated that Yugioh is just MLP for boys, since the friendship is powerful lesson is prominent in both shows, and then we proceded to make a list of which Yugioh characters lined up with which ponies, like Yugi being Twilight and Joey being Rainbow Dash, it was totally weird XD So my question is, do you like Yugioh? If so, which pony do you think compares best with Yugi? ( And that’s little Yugi, not the pharaoh, some fans don’t see the difference so well) And if not, what anime would you cross MLP with in this way?

I was really into Yugioh when I was about eleven years old, and my yugioh deck still holds up and kicks ass to this day. Twilight is probably a decent enough comparison to Yugi Muto. Does that mean Seto Kaiba is TRIXIE?!

Anonymous: What is your Llama like?

I don’t, even, fucking

Anonymous: Autobots, Decepticons, or Omnicons?

What in the fuck is an omnicon?

Devil Hooves: If you could had anything in the world what would it be?

A check for a billion dollars. That I would be then able to cash. For a billion dollars. And if I can’t have that then the Large Haldron Collider, just to say I have it, or to like sell it, for like a billion dollars.

Razznak: Describe your typical workflow.

My typical workflow is like, I get on the computer, and I dick around for fifteen minutes, then I start thinking about what I want to make a video about, then I dick around for another fifteen minutes, then I spend an hour or two possibly writing the video, then dick around for like an hour, then possibly record myself reading the post in like fifteen minutes, then dick around for another hour, then I throw the track into Vegas and probably go to bed. The next day, I wake up, dick around for fifteen minutes, then I start putting together the Digibrony talking track, which takes about half an hour. Then I dick around some more, and finally spend one to three hours putting in the rest of the video. Depending on how long the video is, I may also dick around considerably during this process. If I’m doing a headcanon video, cut out all the dicking around and cut all the time into a fifth of what I said before. Once the video is put together, I very quickly put together the timetable and gather all the links for the description while the video is rendering and uploading.

Ever try your hand at programming? If so, do tell.

I think if I even looked at a programming language my head would immediately explode.

What do you typically do when not discussing the finer points of everybody’s favourite children’s show?

When I’m not doing that and/or dicking around on the internet, I hang out with my brothers and my friends and drink a lot. I’m also finally getting back to playing video games.

Strepie: Do you speak any languages other than English?
If so, which?

I can’t speak any languages with any degree of fluency, but I do have a pretty good comprehension of Japanese. It’s gotten a little rusty from not watching much anime over the last year, but for a time I had enough comprehension to watch children’s shows in Japanese and understand most of what was going on. When the Japanese MLP dub starts, I intend to watch it RAW.

Can you pronounce this sentence? It’s Dutch :D

I can try: “De Nederlandse bronies zijn geweldig.”

Stjonal: Bacon or oreo’s?

Bacon, no contest.

mika halagah: I happen to know you like PTH after I commented about how you look like a fusion of luke and tim from the band, my question is, what is your favourite PTH album and how do you think their 4th album with turn out?

Well, actually, sorry to disappoint, but I’m not a big Protest the Hero fan. I am mostly familiar with the song that I quoted, and I’ve only really listened to the Scurrilous album. I think it’s good stuff, but I’m rarely in the mood for it, and when I’m in that mood I usually listen to Doppleganger by Fall of Troy instead.

Anonymous: Have you ever eaten fresh flesh?

Of an animal, yes. Of a human, not yet.

The Brazen Pirate: I wonder, can you stare into people’s souls?

Totes yo.

Skloosh: Do you like the Pokémon game series? if so favorite pkmn game?

My favorite Pokemon game would probably be White, though I have only played about half of it. I also think SoulSilver is absolutely boss, and super nostalgic for me since Silver was my favorite game growing up.

Modern gaming or Oldschool gaming?

I agree with the idea that in any media, stuff is always getting better. We always have more history to learn from and better technology to expand on, making games better and better. My choice of greatest game ever made is Dark Souls, and I find it to be in the same tradition of Mega Man X. Mega Man X is a classic and better than many games today, but the existence of a successor that expands on its ideas in so many ways proves that the new generations have powered over the old ones.

When does the Narwhal bacon?

AT MIDNIGHT!

EqualizerlsDeath: Would you be interested in reading the visual novel, Umineko no naku koro ni?

I watched the Umineko anime a few years ago, and I greatly enjoyed it, so I tried to play the game, and it’s really difficult for me to get past the atrocious character art. I also just don’t have patience for visual novels, as evidenced by the fact that I actually bought Higurashi, which I think looks fine, and only played about ten minutes of it.

Anonymous: Do you watch gravity falls?

Yes. I watched the first six episodes or so when it first started, and I thought it was absolutely amazing, but I didn’t keep up with it because I wasn’t sure about the airtimes. I keep saying I’m gonna catch up, but haven’t gotten around to it.

Anonymous: What’s your favorite dinosaur?

Fuckin, Velociraptor. Call me unoriginal but whatever I been watchin raptors since I was six. Clever girl.

Scootaflew: How does Slenderman eat? I mean he’s got like no mouth!

Why do you come to me with these questions?! Maybe Slenderman absorbs shit through his skin!

Lloyd: Do you like mudkipz?

Sure.

Do you like garlic toast?

Yeah.

What’s your favorite game in the n64?

Okay that’s actually a real question. The N64 was the console I grew up on, but I haven’t played a whole lot of it as an adult. The only game I played a lot of recently was Banjo Kazooie, and that was pretty cool. I didn’t end up finishing it, but I enjoyed it for what I did play.

As for childhood games, I would probably pick good ol’ Super Smash Bros. If you’d asked me as a kid, I might have said Ocarina of Time, but the truth is I never played it growing up, at least not past the first three dungeons. I watched my cousin play it, and was so blown away by the game’s narrative presentation that I thought it was the best game ever made. I’m actually playing through the game now on the 3DS, and I mostly find it frustrating. I’ve still never played Majora’s Mask, but I really want to.

One of these days I’ll legit play the fuck out of a bunch of great N64 games.

AgentAbacus01: What are your thoughts on minimalism in storytelling? Or, for that matter, the arts?

I think there’s a lot to be said for the effectiveness of minimalism, and how it can stir up emotions in someone. Subtlety creates a certain kind of density, in that it makes you create a meaning internally instead of having it explained to you. That said, I prefer media to be very dense, which can mean a lot of subtle aspects stacked together, or subtleties sprinkled around something more dense. It’s like the difference between listening to ambient noise, and listening to a doom metal song with an ambient noise track layered over it. I like ambient noise, but I will probably favor the doom metal song.

thezoombie: do you do forum rp’s?

I used to do them and run them back in the day, but I don’t hang out on forums anymore.

Smashmatt202: What is your all-time favorite song?

I’ve actually been working on a list of my top 100 songs recently, but I keep putting it off because of ponies, and because I keep finding songs that I forgot to put on the list. That said, the song I put in the number one slot was A Meeting Place and Time by Woods of Ypres.

When are you going to do another “Thoroughly Analyzing Video Games” video?

I really really want to do more of these, but I haven’t beaten any video games lately because I’ve been so preoccupied with ponies. It doesn’t help that the games I most want to take on are long and will take a long time to make videos for. If you want to see more of my games analysis though, I did a handful of videos called Adventure! Action! RPG! on my old channel, in which I covered Nier, Castlevania Aria of Sorrow, Xenoblade Chronicles, and The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap. I’ll put a link to these in the description. Note that the audio and video quality is not as strong as my newer videos.

Anonymous: What is your favorite number?

My favorite number is eight, because I was born on august eight and weighed eight pounds and eight ounces, and as far as I’m concerned that makes me pretty tied to the number.

Kevin T: Friend or foe?

Foe, and we’re all about to learn why.

Gandalf or Dumbledore?

Gandalf are you even serious?

Mac or PC?

PC. Don’t be fooled by my mac book, it’s been boot camped.

Do you like wrestling? If so, favorite superstar?

Never watched it.

Straight edge?

If you haven’t gathered by now, I drink a lot. I also smoke cigarettes about once a day. None of that is illegal, but I don’t know if it qualifies as straight edge.

Hulk or Fight Club: which is more like the modern Jekyll and Hyde?

I have no idea.

Why is your sword so unbelievably dull?

BECAUSE I’M BEING CHASED BY A REAL ARMY! EVEN DINOSAURS ARE HERE! AND THEY USE BOWS AND ARROWS!

LoL, DOTA, or Newerth?

Haven’t played any of them.

Do you read webcomics? Which would you recommend?

My favorite webcomic, not counting Homestuck, is probably Dinosaur Comics. I also recommend the obvious choice, xkcd, as well as Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, Hark A Vagrant, and probably more shit I haven’t read in a really long time.

If you were a female, what would you like most? Dislike most?

If I were a female, my entire course in life leading up until now would have been completely different. For all I know, female me has no siblings, a step-dad, and no interest in cartoon ponies. The possibilities are pretty much endless.

Twitter or Facebook?

My twitter is linked on the front of my youtube channel.

Okay seriously, I’m gonna cut out like a shitload of Kevin T’s questions because I don’t have answers for them and also I am tired as shit.

rafer4a: Also, did you watch/red Fullmetal Alchemist?

Yes, I have watched both series. I’m not a fan of the original show, but FMA Brotherhood is one of the best series that I’ve ever watched.

XXXUlt1ma5XXX: Are your jimmies rustled?

Nope! I finally got some sleep.

If you could do anything ever mentioned or thought of even once by anybody, what would it be?

Become immortal

Do you hate pears?

No.

Can anything escape a black hole?

Probably

If the Speed of Sound is 1,484 m/s, and The Speed of Light is 299,792,458 m/s (Which is 202016.481132 bigger than the speed of Sound.), what would your theoretical hypothesis be for Breaking the Time Barrier? (So fast you accelerate past the law of time which is 1 second per second, even if for a split second.)

X + 2^5 times twelve, if X=shut the hell up

Anonymous: how many push ups can you do?

With proper form, I can do like 20, and maybe second set of ten.

Anonymous: Nice elin slayer banner. You play Tera? Also,realm?

Yes, I play Tera, actually just got back into the game the other day, but got pulled away by this hugemassive AMA. The character I’m played right now is called Sui.Supernova (spelled in description) and is on Valley of Titans I think. My main is called Falario.Fa and I can’t remember her server name, it’s whichever the biggest PVE sever is.

TBB: Have you played Halo 4?

Nope. I used to be a Halo fan back when Halo 2 was out, and I played the hell out of the first two games. Didn’t care for 3 or Reach though, and I don’t have a 360 anymore to play Halo 4.

Have you played Lost Planet 1 or 2?

I have not. I’ve watched them played though.

TBB: How would you want to die?

Recently, one of my friends and I decided that when we’re old enough to not want to live anymore, we should fight in a sword duel to the death. It’ll be like the sword fight from the end of Rob Roy.

Anonymous: Who is better: Megadeth or Metallica?

I’m going with Megadeth. I’ve never been a fan of either band, but there’s maybe five Metallica songs that I think are pretty cool, whereas I can actually listen to Megadeth albums. But seriously, I’ll take Iron Maiden over both anyday.

Anonymous: Have you seen Fairy Tail?

I haven’t.

Are you a Nerd Fighter?

No idea what that is.

Do you Like Panic! At The Disco?

I CHIME IN~

…that’s the only song I know.

What age and Gender do you want to be?

I want to be the little girl.

Do you like Axolotls?

dude these things are weird as hell

Philip: Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?

Dude, You’ve got to be kidding me. I’ve been further even more decided to use even go need to do look more as anyone can. Can you really be far even as decided half as much to use go wish for that? My guess is that when one really been far even as decided once to use even go want, it is then that he has really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like. It’s just common sense

Anonymous: How do you do your hair?

I touch it constantly. Seriously, I can’t stop touching my hair.

Text version of questions and answers (different from video version):

SECTION THREE: DIGIBRONY AFTER DARK

Gebriel Gattaglia: You’ve mentioned working on a Tulpa in one of your videos in the past. How did you find out about Tulpa? Is your Tulpa still around? Do you believe it was essentially sentient by the time you were “done” with it?

There have been a lot of questions about this Tulpa thing, and I kinda wish I’d never brought it up, because in the long run it has not proven very interesting to me. I don’t know if what I did is really the same as what other people are doing, especially because most accounts of Tulpamancy seem to involve having a strong bond with the Tulpa and doing a lot of activities with it.

Now, as for me, I’ve always been really enamored with the idea of existing half-in, half-out of fantasy. I have a habit of writing this really meta fiction, in which I am a part of the story, and am self-aware of this fact, or the character in the story are aware of what I am in it. So, I basically have this fictional universe that is purposely interwoven with my own reality, and all I really did was pull a character from that universe into mine, define its shape, and start talking to it.

The problem is that this didn’t really do anything for me. I had no desire really to hang out with Holy at all, and she had her own shit to be busy with in the metafictional universe where I pulled her from so, that was pretty much that. It’s not so much a question of whether she’s around and exists, it’s more a matter of if I have any purpose for her, which I don’t. She “exists,” I think, inasmuch as such is possible, but is still mostly just in a metafictional reality.

As for how I found out about Tulpas, I first saw the word in the comments of my first hypnosis video and looked it up on reddit.

zargy: -Do you like clopfic?

My opinion on clop is the exact same as my opinion on every other form of media: I like it if it’s good. I have no moral or personal objection to any kind of story, and I can assure you that I had read and enjoyed far weirder shit than clop before I ever got into MLP. I have read at least one really phenomenal clopfic, so as far as I’m concerned, the genre is worthwhile.

thepegasista: How big is your penis?

*arin’s penis song*

Sean Dillon: -Using evidence solely from what the show has given outside of one off jokes, answer this question: Is Rainbow Dash a lesbian?

Okay, serious answer? If it’s up to me, everyone’s a lesbian. Just everyone. I am massively biased towards lesbians.

-Who would win in a fight to the death: Rainbow Dash or Applejack?

Assuming they can’t use weapons or anything, and following along from their competition in Fall Weather Friends, I’m going to say neither has a particular physical advantage. Therefore, I’m going to pick Applejack, because she has more to fight for, and therefore will never give up, no matter how brutal and lengthy the battle becomes.

-What is the best portrayal of Rape in fiction and why?

Why in the hell would I have an opinion on this? I guess, objectively speaking, the most realistic portrayal of rape and its consequences would be the movie Irreversible. I don’t recommend watching this movie unless you have a really strong stomach.

Nathan: I’ve been following your Pony Hypnosis project videos on digibronyafterdark, and you talked about becoming your Digibrony Pony is your second update video, I think it would be very interesting to become My OC, do you think you could help?

The thing about OC hypnosis is that it would have to be personalized for every person’s OC, and I’m not interested in writing and recording a whole bunch of personalized hypnosis videos (which I’d have to do, because I’ve gotten a number of requests about this. In the discussion on my hypnosis post, some guys have been trying to work out a set of generic pieces that could be put together to form an OC script, so you can get involved in that discussion if you like, but I’m probably not going to do a whole ton of recordings for the hypnosis project, at least not in the near future.

Sketch: has any pony ever sent you any fan pics of ur pony in Hentai if not can I be the first ^_^

No one has sent any yet, but a few people have expressed interest, so yes, you can still be my first. I mean, the first.

How do you feel about grimdark fanfiction/art?

The same way I feel about anything else: if it’s good, it’s good. I really enjoyed the ask blog Pinkamena Diane Pie for instance, which I’ll be doing a video about in the near future.

TimeRight: I have been watching you since you released your too many pinkies video. now my question is: what is your thoughts on the Mare to stallion ratio(i believe 4:1) and how it effects/might effect equestrian society? How would this effect: marriage laws, the sexual orientation of most of the populous (and equestria’s tolerance to it?)

If the mare to stallion ratio is really what it seems to be, then I do think it should suggest same-sex relationships, and the legalness thereof. I’ve been told by people who went to all-girls schools that the rampant lesbianism fantasized to come out of them is very real. Or rather, even if they aren’t lesbians, a lot of girls will hook up just for the sake of companionship. I do think there’s something to be said for the idea that male ponies probably have to play the role of breeder to a number of females, but I also think it’s probably that there’s a lot of mare/mare couples out there. Plus, if I haven’t made it clear yet, I’m totally biased towards lesbians.

Anonymous: what colour underpants are you wearing right now?

Grey.

Anonymous: Which of the mane six do you think would be most likely to smoke marijuana?

The obvious choice is Pinkie, since she’s a party animal, and already seems to be on a different plane of thought. I like to imagine that Pinkie was stoned during One Bad Apple, for instance. It’s really easy for me to imagine both Applejack and Rarity smoking pot, possibly together. In Rarity’s case, I think it’s because most of the people whom I know to smoke weed are older women, and Rarity is closest to that personality type. In AJ’s case, it’s just easy to picture her chilling under a tree smoking a blunt. Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash both seem like they’d probably get really paranoid if they smoked, but Twilight could probably use the stress relief.

I don’t smoke weed, by the way, if you were curious, but I hang out with some really passionate stoners.

Supergrub: Are you a “clopper”, and if so, what is your favorite clopfic?

I haven’t read many clopfics, but the best one I’ve read was hands-down, Getting To Know him by Sleepless Brony. The first chapter is fucking hilarious, and the second chapter is perhaps the most erotic thing I’ve ever read, regardless of ponies. There was also one called Jack/Off, which had an amazing plot twist at the end.

Anon: have you ever fully believed you were twilight or anypony else?

No.

Pegasister named Gwyn C: PLEASE, CAN YOU READ THIS? D”: AND ALSO ANSWER

YES OKAY I’M READING IT.

Now that you are reading this, which is your favorite lesbian (nohate) mane 6 couple- if any?

This is very difficult, because I kinda like all of them. They’ve all got their strengths. If you twist my arm, I’ll probably go with Appledash, to match my favorite with the cutest.

Marry me maybe? <3

Everyone gets a maybe.

Can you ignore question three?

Too late.

uolbu: Are you aware of the sexual context that Pony Hypnosis can have?

Well, at least one person told me they fapped to my Twilight recording, so yes. I didn’t go into the hypnosis topic giving the sexual aspect any consideration, but I think it’s pretty obvious that there were going to be people who take it there.

Do you consider it to be relevant to the general topic of Pony Hypnosis?

Sure. It’s not a part of the topic that I’m particularly interested in addressing, but it’s fit to be a part of the conversation (which you’ve just made it).

Do you like/dislike MLP being sexualized (in the sense of it being a more diverse fandom that way)?

I have the expectation that everything is going to be sexualized, after years spent on the internet. I knew going into the MLP fandom that I was going to see that stuff, and I only avoided it at first while I was mentally preparing myself for it. I’m totally fine with the sexualization as a means of expression.

Do you personally enjoy sexualized content of MLP as porn, art, storytelling?

Yes to all three.

Is plot worshipping cute, silly or just sincere?

I have never heard of it.

Are you a follower of the great plot?

If the question is do I follow ask Princess Molestia, I haven’t followed it, though I’ve some of it and I think it’s solid stuff. The dominatrix aspect doesn’t really appeal to me, but it’s fun to read.

In case you you didn’t guess already, I’m kinda into BDSM and consider myself a sexual deviant in hell-I-don’t-know-quite-a-few ways. Is that something you ever considered for yourself or you have any opinion on? I ask specifically because your comments on how you like stories about insomnia kinda made my kinky sense tingle and I don’t even know why. ^^ So is that related or am I just plain wrong?

I have only a moderate interest in BDSM. I will say that I have a bit of a sadistic streak, but I really can’t say how this applies to sexuality because I haven’t actually participated in it. I have never cared for BDSM porn, but I don’t know if it would be different if I tried it in real life. If I had a girlfriend who was open to that kind of experimentation, I would definitely be interested in trying it, though.

An Ask Tumblr that I like and enjoyed a lot when it was new (less so now) is Little Miss Rarity. It features a Rarity that becomes addicted to pain after an incident with her cat and a little shout out to the pinkamina pie tumblr. Again, do you know it, and is it something you (would) like/dislike? And why?

I haven’t heard of it before now. I looked it up and the art doesn’t really appeal to me, though.

Tyler: Who is your fave pony to clop to?

I don’t really have one.

Anonymous: If you had to fight one of the characters from the show in a fight to the death, who would it be and why? Do you think you would win the fight?

I would pick Tank. He’s slow, he’s weak, and he has a long, thin neck. If he tried to hide in his shell, I’ll drown him in it.

ruolbu: Do you know about Laci Green? http://www.youtube.com/user/lacigreen (proper sex ed is always relevant, in case you were wondering why the shift in topic

Not until just now, gonna check her out.

After watching a few episodes, do you like what she does?

This is fucking awesome, watching all of it.

Erik: Bro, do you even lift?

NIGGA I WILL BENCH YOU BENEATH THE TABLE, no I’m kidding I can’t lift for shit.

Anonymous: What is the password for your Youtube account?

Shitdick_cockass

Anonymous: What’s your favorite porn vid?

Do people keep track of this? I don’t, like, know the names of porn vids, or really rewatch a lot of them. It’s all kind of a skinny Asian blur.

nicklesfoc: Do cloppers have the right to bash furs?

Hell no.

truezangetsu: If you clop which pony/ponies do you clop to and are there scenarios which you think while you clop to said pony/ponies?

I’m not going to get into detail about this, but I’ll admit that I’ve conceptualized fanfics worth of scenarios, and I’d probably write those fanfics if I was a person who ever got around to writing the fanfics I conceptualized.

Luke: What are your favorite character ships? Straight, gay, and lesbian.

Okay, my favorite straight ship is probably Rarity and Fancy Pants, because Fancy Pants is the fuckin’ man. I haven’t thought of any gay ships, but I do think the ones involving Braeburn generally feel the most sense-making. As for lesbian ships I love ALL OF THEM.

truezangetsu: What do you think of cousins along the second degree of blood relations (second cousins or first cousins once removed and soforth) dating and of being in a relationship that has sexual aspects and what would you do in a situation in which your cousin (second or first once removed) who is ten years your junior had a sexual attraction and actual feelings of love for you?

If this theoretical cousin was ten years my junior, then she would be eleven, so I’d definitely pass on that one. As for cousins dating, I have no problem with the idea. I don’t think I want to date any of my cousins, personally, but if you’ve got a really hot cousin who seems to be into you, then go for it.

Someone: How sexually active are you and/or what kind of sexual relationships do you want to have?

I am a total virgin. No idea what I want, since I’ve never been to that stage of a relationship (or in one, for that matter).

Anonymous: Boxers or briefs?

Boxers.

zyber: What is your most Weirdest/Darkest/Secret Fetish

If you ever want to feel like you’re definitely going to hell, regardless of your religion, check out one of my favorite manga, called Tokyo Akazukin.

colonelkusak: What do you do
If you want to do a poo
In an English Country Garden
??

I drop trow. And squeeze out, a Cleveland Steamer, on the grass.

Do you think naughty thoughts when drinking apple juice?

No, but when I drink hard cider I like to imagine I’m on Sweet Apple Acres.

The Dovah Brony: Are You A Virgin? If Yes Can I Have Your Babies? ;)

No one is having my babies. Not for at least another ten years. Also, why do I have to be a virgin? Not interested in spoiled goods?

Twilight Sparkel: If I keep doing the pony hypnosis for Twilight will eventually have some effect on me? If yes if I keep doing this will the effect rise!?

I don’t know, maybe, depends on how you react to it really.

the zoombie: will you do more hypnosis readings on digibronyafterdark?

I intend to read a modified version of the Twilight script that someone put together in the comments of my hypnosis post. After that, I’m not sure what I’ll do. I’ve lost a lot of interest in the project and kind of feel that it can be better handled by other people, but I may become active in it again in the future.

Orion Delta: Are you a furry?

Nope.

BloodSpirit: Have you ever attempted to bite off your toenails, grind them up, and then inject the toenail juice into your veins?

I FUCKIN NEED MY FIX MAN, BACK OFF! SHIT! FUCKING SHIT!

PinkamenaThePuppeteer: Hey, I know this is going to sound kind of gross and disturbing, but I’m actually genuinely curious to know. Theoretically, if you were trapped in an inescapable room with the dismembered body parts of your two favorite ponies for 5 days, and the only way you could stop yourself from dying of dehydration/starvation before escaping was to eat them, would you, and which would you start on first?

Yes I would eat them. I would probably still be horribly malnourished because marshmallows don’t have any water in them, so I’d possibly die. And I’d start with AJ cause idk, orange marshmallows seem strangely alluring.

dirtydan: Hey Digibrony, have you ever played Super Contra and also does your mom have a dick?

NO, my mother does not have a DICK. I believe you knew this before you asked.

Text version:

What does this phrase mean: Alicorn Princess Twilight Sparkle. It means a lot of things to a lot of people. I’ve received countless comments, links to posts and videos, and seen images, opinions—angry, happy, ambivalent, et cetera—about the concept. What I want to do in this video is clarify exactly what Alicorn Princess Twilight Sparkle means to me.

For starters, let’s examine the word “princess.” Traditionally, the word “princess” refers to a woman who marries into nobility, by marrying a prince. It did not originally refer to the daughter of a king or queen, but over time, it eventually came to have that meaning as well, and is probably better understood that way in modern pop culture.

When you think “princess,” you most likely think of Disney movies and fairy tales. You might think of traditional femininity. The idea of the princess who has to be rescued by her prince, is one of the most fought-against images of feminism. Princesses are a contentious concept. They simultaneously remain a great icon of femininity, and the most hated misrepresentation of what femininity is.

When Lauren Faust conceptualized My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, she did not want there to be princesses. In her original concept, the land was ruled over by a Queen, namely Queen Celestia. However, Faust was forced to change Celestia’s title to Princess because of the notion that in pop culture, Queens have a tendency to be evil, whereas princesses are traditionally the heroine.

We can consider this to be a loss. Yes, it would have been meaningful for Celestia to not be a princess just on the basis that “princess” was an easier sell to little girls. It’s sad to think about, but it’s the kind of casualty that is bound to happen when a show is fighting on the front lines of a social battle.

But the loss here was SOLELY over the word, “Princess.” Celestia is still the single most powerful figure in all of Equestria. In fact, every single ruler of Equestria is a woman. In a reversal of the traditional meaning of Prince vs. Princess, Prince Shining Armor actually married into his title by marrying Princess Cadence.

In Equestria, the word “princess,” DOES NOT mean, a girl who married into the royal family. It means, “the highest power in the entire kingdom.”

And as a matter of fact, becoming a princess in Equestria isn’t even the same as becoming queen in our world. A queen is ordinarily born into her position, and then trained to fulfill her role. In Equestria, princesses are trained to fill their role, and then become a princess once they’re earned their title.

It is not clear what would happen if a male did the same thing in Equestria. We have seen two princes in the series. Shining Armor, while named a prince by way of marriage to Princess Cadence, could still be said to have earned his princehood. Prince Blueblood most likely did not earn this title, leading to the speculation that he was either married or born into it at some point.

However, we know that Princess Celestia at one point tried to train a male unicorn to become the new ruler of Equestria, in the form of Starswirl the Bearded. It is unknown if he would have been a prince, king, or, hell, a princess, but it is most likely that he would have become an alicorn, and a ruler of Equestria, had he passed his trials.

Twilight Sparkle became a princess because Princess Celestia guided her on the course to becoming one. She determined that Twilight’s way of life was one that would coincide with the nature of being a princess. This would relate to the element of magic, which is synonymous with friendship.

Starswirl the Bearded tried to master magic, but because he never recognized friendship as the most powerful magic that there is, he was never able to become an alicorn ruler. Twilight Sparkle discovered friendship, the most powerful magic, and was able to become a ruler.

What, exactly, has Twilight Sparkle’s ambition been throughout the show? Twilight has always been interested in exploring the concepts of magic, and exploring her relationship with her friends, which, because friendship is magic, is the same thing as exploring the concept of magic. Magic is her element, magic is her being.

I am going to posit, though it has not YET been explicitly stated, that an alicorn princess is the most magical being in existence. Twilight has always seen Princess Celestia as the highest authority on magic, and the magical powers of Celestia and Luna have appeared to have the greatest consequence on the world. Twilight has been touted as one of the best magic users in Equestria after doing things like teleport blinks, gravity spells, and very brief time travel. Celestia and Luna move Celestial bodies and walk through ponies’ dreams. Princess Cadence was able to trump a villain that Celestia couldn’t handle, and was the vessel for the power that would banish King Sombra.

The most powerful magic that Twilight has been a part of is the magic unleashed by the elements of harmony, which is fueled by the power of friendship, and channeled through Twilight. Each time that Twilight accesses this power, she goes into a mysterious “god mode,” which she goes into one last time in Magical Mystery Cure before transforming into an alicorn.

The elements of harmony were activated each time through friendship, and channeling of its magic. The first time it activated was simply on the first occasion that Twilight and her friends became connected, even before they had ever become friends, signaling their eventual destiny. The second time was when Twilight first realized what friendship is. The third time was when she remembered again how important friendship is. And the fourth time was when she proved to have an understanding of friendship so great, that she didn’t. need. to. learn. anything.

At this point, Twilight had fully grasped the nature of friendship, unlocked the full potential of its magical power, and transcended the need to be reminded or learn about it any further. She had mastered the most powerful magic that exists, and this led her to transcend her unicorn body.

Why did this happen? The answers are not entirely clear. However, again, it is clear that alicorns possess the most powerful magic that there is. Ostensibly, what separates an alicorn from a unicorn is only a set of wings, yet somehow alicorns clearly have more power than any unicorn, suggesting that something about the alicorn form inherently allows for greater magical power. Maybe this will be explored in season four. Only time will tell.

What is clear is this—to reach this form, Twilight had to exhibit this understanding of magic, and from the events in Magical Mystery Cure, we can infer that this understanding qualified her as a princess of Equestria. We don’t yet know if this is the only thing that can qualify someone as a princess. We might surmise that Princess Cadence is a princess because of her understanding of love, rather than friendship. Whatever the case may be, it is clear that Princess Celestia guided Twilight Sparkle’s learning to achieve this understanding and become an alicorn princess.

In retrospect, the idea that Twilight would become Celestia’s successor is kind of obvious. Right from the very beginning, Twilight’s element of harmony takes the form of a tiara just like the one that Princess Celestia wears, even though all of Twilight’s friends receive necklaces. Twilight is considered the Princesses’ immediate apprentice, which would ordinarily mean that Celestia was training her for her position. If Twilight wasn’t being trained specifically to be a princess, then there would be no reason that some other powerful unicorn couldn’t have trained her. However, Princess Celestia specifically chose to train Twilight herself so that she could guide her in this direction.

Twilight Sparkle’s course in life was destined to lead up to her becoming a princess. Her aspiration happened to align with the qualification of princesshood. Everything that she is, is what it means to be the princess of Equestria. The title is less a definitive change, so much as it is an affirmation. It’s like how, after writing for ten years, when you publish your first book, everyone comes to know you as a WRITER. New doors are opened. Your life changes forever. You feel like the luckiest person in the world.

Being a princess and being an alicorn seem to come hand in hand, possibly because both are the result of reaching this state of power. Therefore, Twilight Sparkle became Alicorn Princess Twilight Sparkle.

I understand that some people may disagree with my reading of what Twilicorn is, and others may agree completely with what Twilicorn is, and still dislike the idea on a conceptual level, or in the way it’s presented. And those people are entitled to their opinion. It’s an opinion that I don’t agree with, and one that I don’t really understand. It’s definitely one that I don’t want to argue with. I’ve made my case, and my point, and I don’t find the other visions of the character terribly interesting.

Why? Maybe it’s because I thoroughly enjoyed Magical Mystery Cure. I have no problems with the concept or the execution, and in fact, I am ENAMORED with both of those things. Maybe it’s because I relate to Twilicorn, as someone who’s just recently found my wings, so to speak. I know exactly what it’s like, to be working single-mindedly with the goal of bettering myself, and then to suddenly gain a massive amount of power in an avenue that I never saw coming. It literally just happened to me.

tl:dr: I’m a fucking alicorn princess.