Summary and analysis of a "My Little Pony" episode

November 5, 2014

If you've spent any amount of time on the internet in the past year or three, you've probably seen at least one reference to "bronies" -- adult male fans of the cartoon series "My Little Pony" ("bro" + "ponies"). Most likely the reference was made in a disparaging manner -- after all, it's an easy punch line when you hear the phrases "adult male fan" and "My Little Pony" in the same sentence.

But I'm an open-minded guy, and I figured, if this fandom is commonplace enough that a sizable online subculture has formed, maybe there's something I'm missing. At the very least, I should give the show a chance before passing judgment.

After all, I myself am an adult male who, culturally, is way beyond the age where I should know as much about children's cartoons as I do. For example, I'm not ashamed to say that the current incarnation of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" is compelling (and better crafted than its '80s counterpart). I'll happily tell you that "Phineas and Ferb" is more smartly written than a lot of comedies created for adult audiences. "Adventure Time," "Gravity Falls," "Avatar: The Last Airbender"... cartoons aren't just for kids anymore.

I had never sampled an episode of "My Little Pony" because, as most people do, I figured that its reputation as a cutesy, saccharine-sweet show for girls meant that I would have no interest in it (after all, I don't need to watch an episode of "Jake and the Never Land Pirates" to know that the show has no intention of appealing to any of the demographics that I fall into). But after hearing the term "brony" enough, I wanted to see if this series was something other than the brightly-colored pabulum I assumed it would be.

So I watched an episode, and the results challenged my expectations enough that I thought I'd take you along while I share my first impressions of the show. So let's take a look at an episode of "My Little Pony," keep an open mind, and see what it is that all of these guys are obsessing over. I'll summarize the episode, provide my thoughts, and we'll see how much sense it makes that a show about cartoon ponies has a loyal male fanbase.

(If you want to skip the episode summary and jump ahead to my analysis of the show as a whole, click here.)

The episode we'll be looking at (the first episode I saw, randomly selected by being the one that happened to air on the day I decided to see what this show was about) begins, as all of the episodes do, with a cold open that provides a relatively quick joke and sets up the plot of the episode to come.

We begin with some ponies admiring an enormous cake that is going to be entered in a dessert competition. The pony on the left has agreed to transport it. So far, it's a plot you'd expect to see in a cartoon called "My Little Pony."

Comedic set piece #1: The characters need to get the heavy cake to the train by transporting it on the back of another pony. When he nearly crumples under the weight of the dessert (almost causing it to topple to the ground), the pink pony (named, appropriately, "Pinkie") enlists the help of more and more ponies to keep the cake steady.

First, some winged ponies (each generically called a pegasus, although to get technical, Pegasus was a specific figure in Greek mythology) tether the cake to keep it upright. Then a unicorn surrounds the cake with a magic bubble. Finally, two more ponies carry a trampoline because the rule of three dictates that we need another safety precaution and a trampoline sounds reasonable if you don't think about it too much.

Finally, all of the characters reach both the train and the punch line, which is that there's no way they're all going to fit through that small door. Again, it's the kind of joke you'd expect to see.

Though if nothing else, my low expectations were challenged when I saw the pegasi and unicorns. I was expecting the main characters to just be a bunch of horses, so I was pleasantly surprised by the inclusion of horse-based mythological creatures to spice things up. (Looking it up now, even the '80s version of "My Little Pony" featured normal ponies, winged ponies, and unicorns. So I guess I'm the naïve one. Apparently any horse-based animal is fair game -- though we won't see it in this episode, there's also a zebra in this universe. No centaurs, though.)

With that, it's time for the theme song. It starts with a female voice sweetly singing "My Little Pony, My Little Pony," just like you'd expect to hear in a cartoon for little girls. But within about six seconds, the tempo picks up and the remainder of the song takes on the style of... well, "rock" is a little too strong of a word. "Kids' rock." The point of the song is to demonstrate that this show intends to be more interesting than your preconceived notions of what a "My Little Pony" cartoon is. Even though the lyrics are about friendship and magic.

The theme song's sequence ends with this credit, which, if you're familiar with animated series of the past ten years, is a promising sign. I'll go into more detail after this episode recap is complete, but Lauren Faust's name has been attached to other animated shows that have been entertaining for kids and adults alike. As it turns out, this is a second-season episode and Faust left the show after the first season, but since she helped create this take on the franchise, maybe it's worth a chance, after all.

After a commercial break, we begin the episode proper. The cake is now inside of the train, where Pinkie has invited five of her friends (these six are the main characters of the series) to join her on the trip to the competition. The ponies salivate as Pinkie describes the dessert, which is called Marzipan Mascarpone Meringue Madness, or "MMMM" for short. (Yes, this means that the title is logically short one "M.")

Soon they are joined by other competitors: A French griffin who has made some delectable éclairs, a unicorn with some kind of East Coast accent who has created "Donutopia," and a mule named Mulia Mild (groan) who has sculpted a mousse moose. So not only is this universe populated with talking equines, griffins also exist (watching further episodes reveals the existence of dragons, too). And at least some ruminants, I suppose.

The four competitors angrily stare each other down until one of the other ponies suggests that everybody get some sleep. After the non-main characters retire to their cabins, Pinkie tells the others that they need to protect MMMM -- she's so convinced it's the best dessert, she assumes that one of the other chefs will sabotage it in the middle of the night. Her five friends assure her that she's overreacting and go to bed while she stands guard to watch over the cake.

As Pinkie begins to fall asleep, she's distracted by a shadowy (though distinctly pony-shaped) figure running through the cars. As she runs back and forth across the train to chase it, the only other living being she can find is a silhouetted pony shoveling coal into the engine. She returns to the cake, at which point the shades all simultaneously draw shut (there's no electric power in this universe, so the moon was the only source of light) and we hear (but don't see) some footsteps, a slurp, and a crash.

Pinkie opens the window shades to find herself still alone with the desserts. She straightens an askew portrait decorating the car, reaffirms her vow to protect the cake, and promptly falls asleep.

Morning rises. Pinkie wakes up, sees a perfectly intact cake, and is proud that she protected it all night. When one of her friends joins her, though, she sees the side of the cake that Pinkie wasn't looking at:

One exaggerated cartoon take from Pinkie, and that's our act break. So let's see where the show stands so far. The plot is about a ruined cake, which could be interpreted as a plot that could be written for any half-baked (pun not intended) children's cartoon. But the shadowy figure and mysterious noises at least set up the potential to deliver a satisfying conclusion. And there have been two decent jokes so far: one written during the blackout scene ("Don't go near that cake, thief! [slurp] Stop, thief! [crash] Are you okay, thief?") and a visual joke in which upon waking up, Pinkie scratches her ear with her back hoof like a dog. Nothing in the episode has bowled me over yet, but so far, it's been strong enough to keep my attention.

At the beginning of act two, Pinkie's screams have woken up her friends and the other competitors. She declares that she needs to find out whodunnit ("who did it," her friend helpfully says), grabs a Sherlock Holmes hat and bubble pipe (in a kids' cartoon, a character can't be shown with a pipe in their mouth unless it emits bubbles), and designates her friend Twilight to be her assistant.

(Fans of the show who are reading this are probably getting infuriated that I'm not using the characters' full names or identifying each one at the outset. But I'm presenting this from the point of view of somebody (i.e., me) who has never seen the show before and has started in the middle of season two. These are the only two of the main characters' names that have been used in conversation so far.)

Levelheaded Twilight (named independently of the movie franchise) asks if they should begin by looking for clues. Pinkie responds that there's no need, as she already knows who the culprit is. And accuses Gustave (the griffin) of sabotage.

Transition to Pinkie's account of how he did it, which is presented entirely in silent film format -- complete with film scratches, dialogue title cards, and all of the clichés (including use of the word "cur"). Gustave captures Pinkie, ties her to the railroad tracks, places the cake on a conveyor belt, and cuts it apart with a sawmill blade.

Back in the present, Twilight points out that not only is Pinkie not tied to any railroad tracks, but the cake has been bitten, not cut with a blade. Which is enough to convince Pinkie to acquit Gustave and move on to wildly accuse Donut Joe.

This time in a James Bond motif, we see Pinkie's accusation: Donut Joe receives his mission to destroy the cake via his high-tech watch, cuts a circle in the window into which he throws a sleeping gas grenade toward Pinkie, and uses a mirror to reflect the lasers protecting the cake back onto the cake, thereby reducing it to pieces.

Twilight reminds Pinkie that there is no laser security system surrounding the cake, which means that it's time for Pinkie to decide that Mulia Mild is to blame.

And now it's a ninja movie. Mulia stealthily enters the dessert car, conks Pinkie on the head with a frying pan, and uses her sword to slice the cake into multiple pieces.

Twilight doesn't even need to explain the problems with this story, instead pointing out that Pinkie's wrathful accusation has turned the elderly Mulia into a frightened, quivering mess. Her crazy stories having been debunked, Pinkie now assumes that none of the other competitors could be guilty.

Pinkie is confused by this development, pointing out that the other three desserts are also delicious-looking (describing each so appealingly that all of the characters lick their lips), so why was the cake the only one that was attacked?

At which point the train enters a tunnel and the screen goes black again. There are eating noises, a scream, and when light reenters the car, we see that all of the desserts have been destroyed.

With no clear motive behind this new crime, Pinkie is stumped and we go to commercial.

Two acts down, one to go. And while it hasn't risen to the level of "amazing," I must admit that there's more to this cartoon pony show than I had anticipated there would be. Sure, writing scenes that parody various other genres has been done before, and these don't break any new ground, but they were well-animated and show a willingness on the writers' parts to put forth the effort to make this more than a phoned-in stereotypical cartoon for girls. Plus, with every character still a plausible suspect, I don't know how the plot will be resolved. This is better than I thought it would be. Although that may not be saying much, as my expectations were very low.

Act three begins with Twilight sending all of the suspects back to their rooms and switching hats with Pinkie to become the detective of the two. It has no real bearing on the story, but it was at this point that I noticed that the hat-switching and pipe-wiping were all being accomplished by levitation controlled by Twilight's horn. Since none of the main characters have fingers, you (as the viewer) quickly accept that if a pony needs to pick up an object, they just somehow can use their hooves to do so (as seen with the bubble pipe here and in the earlier screen grab). Or if the character doesn't have any lines, they can use their teeth (as seen with the trampoline in the cold open). But since you have unicorns in your series, why not give them the ability to levitate objects? And it's animated in such a way that the audience can immediately discern what's happening. There's a surprising amount of nuance for a show that I thought would just be about cute horses.

Twilight, pointing out that one traditionally looks for clues when trying to solve a mystery, asks Pinkie to retrace her steps the previous night. Pinkie leads Twilight to the caboose, where she first followed the shadowy figure. Offscreen, Twilight finds a clue up near the ceiling, places it in an envelope, and places the envelope in her saddlebag. We don't get to see the clue, but Twilight declares that she already thinks she knows who the culprit was. To be certain, the two continue to look for more evidence.

Pinkie leads Twilight to the engine, where all she saw was the conductor shoveling coal. Twilight telekinetically picks up the conductor's hat and looks inside. "But that doesn't make any sense," she proclaims. So she takes another envelope, picks up the evidence from inside the hat (again, unseen by the audience as well as Pinkie) and continues to look for clues.

(This is also where I noticed an unusual bit of dialogue that's a hallmark of the series: Before looking for the second clue, Pinkie says, "I heard somepony else in the dessert car and chased them up to the engine." You see, in this universe, instead of saying "somebody" or "anyone," the characters are required to instead say "somepony" or "anypony." I'm not sure why -- the word "somebody" doesn't have to refer to humans -- but it's a recurring feature of this show's dialogue. If you ever want to quickly pick out the bronies in a room, just say "Hi, everypony" and see who reacts.)

The two head back to the dessert car, where Pinkie describes the sudden closure of the shades, the sounds she heard, and how the framed portrait was crooked when the light returned. Twilight examines the picture, finds another clue, and with her head blocking the audience's (and Pinkie's) view, places the clue in an envelope.

With no more cars to examine, Pinkie describes how she fell asleep for the remainder of the night. Twilight believes that she's solved the case, and all of the characters are summoned back to the dessert car.

So we reach the part of the train mystery in which the detective slowly explains who indeed dunnit. Twilight reveals the clue that she found in the caboose: a blue feather.

Pinkie announces that that means the griffin must be the culprit. But Twilight points out that Gustave's feathers are white. The only character with blue feathers is one of the ponies -- the pegasus named Rainbow Dash, who must have run to the caboose and then flown out.

Pinkie declares the case solved. Twilight explains that the case isn't solved, because when she inspected the conductor's hat, she found a strand of pink hair. Pinkie says that it came from Rainbow Dash's rainbow-colored mane, but Rainbow Dash points out that there is no pink in the mane. The only character with that shade of pink hair is the other pegasus: Fluttershy.

(Now that we've gotten to the big accusation scene, I, as a first-time viewer, am finally being introduced to the other main characters. I've spent most of the prior thirty seconds of the episode trying to determine whether Rainbow Dash is male or female. Of the six main ponies, the other five all clearly have female voices. It's obvious that Rainbow Dash is being voiced by a female voice artist, but it's a raspy voice. And since women have been doing the voices of young boys in the cartoons for decades, that's not much to go on. Rainbow Dash is blue... perhaps that's the token boy of the group?)

Pinkie, completely forgetting about the very incriminating feather, yells at Fluttershy that she's going down. Twilight interrupts so she can present the third piece of evidence. In the dessert car, all of the shades mysteriously closed, seemingly on their own. But as we learned earlier in the episode (and the series, if you're a regular viewer), the unicorn characters have the ability to move things using magic. And when the picture was run into, a false eyelash was left behind. Cut to a unicorn named Rarity, whose mane has been covering her right eye. Twilight lifts her mane, and Rarity confesses... that she wears false eyelashes. "Oh, and I took a bite of the cake."

Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash also admit to taking a bite of the cake. Pinkie had made it sound so delicious, they couldn't resist. And once they had one bite, they kept eating (which explains why the cake had multiple bites taken from it).

Pinkie accepts each of the three ponies' apologies, and is glad that the case is solved. At which point Twilight explains that it isn't -- we still don't know who ate the other three desserts when the train entered the tunnel. Pinkie, having learned a lesson about detective work, declares that they must look for clues, so Twilight gives her the Sherlock Holmes hat back and Pinkie climbs over all of the other characters while looking through a magnifying glass.

In no time, Pinkie knows who ate the other desserts -- it was the other three bakers. The griffin has mousse in his moustache, Joe has éclair in his hair, and the mule has sprinkles in her wrinkles. The three bakers admit their fault, each explaining that it was because Pinkie had made the desserts seem irresistible when she described them.

With all of the mysteries solved, the train pulls into the station. The bakers lament that now no one has any dessert to enter into the competition, but Pinkie has a solution.

The episode wraps up with a voiceover by Pinkie, telling a Princess Celestia what she learned today. Specifically, that you should never jump to conclusions, because if you blame somepony for something they didn't do, it will hurt their feelings and make you look foolish.

As we receive the moral of today's story, we see that Pinkie's solution was exactly what we expected it to be: All of the desserts have been combined into one extravagant entry. The judges, without even tasting it, immediately award it the blue ribbon.

The moral voiceover complete, Twilight offers the princess a piece and asks if she would care for a bite. Pinkie interprets the question as being for her, says that she would, and rapidly devours the entire dessert. All of the other characters stand around and laugh, because apparently, that's how every children's cartoon that presents a moral is required to end.

So that's the episode. What did I think? My reaction was... mixed. The main plot didn't break any new ground, and while the resolution wasn't surprising, at least it wasn't predictable (personally, I expected all of the other events to be red herrings, with the big reveal being that Pinkie ate the cake in her sleep). None of the jokes were hilarious, but there were a few chuckles (and honestly, I wouldn't have guessed that I'd even get any chuckles out of a My Little Pony cartoon). I certainly didn't hate it.

And while the episode didn't entirely win me over, it did convince me to give the show another chance (and there are many other cartoons where I know after one episode that the show isn't worth my time). So I watched another episode. And it too was okay -- it didn't convince me to become a fan, but it also didn't convince me to say "never again." So I watched another episode. Same result.

Overall, that's how I feel about this version of "My Little Pony" -- I see the potential in the show (it has interesting characters and well-done animation), but every time I watch it, hoping that they'll do something really entertaining, it nearly, but ultimately doesn't, leave me satisfied. It's the animation equivalent of blue balls.

So why do I feel that way? Why do a surprising number of adults have such a passion for the show? Let's look at the series in general and see if we can't figure out what it is, what it isn't, and what I wish it had.

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