My Little Pony

[Dachs]

Just because something is marketed towards prepubescent girls doesn't make it immoral to watch, nor does it mean that it can't transcend those artificial boundaries. For the record, I've never once had the urge to buy a toy from the show and probably never will.

I don't think noncon is talking about immorality.

 

[nonconformist]

The boundaries aren't artificial it's the target market, it's the USP. I mean, if watching stuff marketed to 12 year old girls gets you off, then fine, but don't start denying it, and trying to paint yourselves as some sort of intellectuals because you watcha cartoon about magical toy ponies.

 

[NovaKart]

It's a bit weird but most people do things that are weird sometimes, like use photos of geeky Indian guys as an avatar.

 

[nonconformist]

Oh, did you not see it the first time?

Spoiler :

Yeah, I'm pretty sure CS Lewis would be on my side in this one.

The fact that someone had to make an image macro of that (who is probably a 32 year old basement dweller) hardly helps the cause.

 

[NovaKart]

When I'm back in the US I tend to watch a lot of stuff where the target is middle-aged women, like the View and the Lifetime TV channel.

 

[Dachs]

When I'm back in the US I tend to watch a lot of stuff where the target is middle-aged women, like the View and the Lifetime TV channel.

Doesn't that just prove my point?

 

[NovaKart]

No idea, is there a big gay following for this show? I'll watch some things oriented to adult women but not kids stuff.

 

[cardgame]

No idea, is there a big gay following for this show? I'll watch some things oriented to adult women but not kids stuff.

Not as far as I'm aware, but it does feature Steve Magnet in episode... 2, I believe.

 

[NovaKart]

So are a lot of straight guys into the pony phenomenon? Who's Steve Magnet?

 

[cardgame]

I'm honestly not sure, but he has a fabulously gay voice.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

Is it weird to watch this pony show as an adult? I sure think it is. This whole phenomena is incredible weird. Is this a problem by itself? I sure think not, but what is a problem is when someone thinks it would.
To like cuteness and a positive message when done well is weird because it does not conform with certain expectations,. But as long as I don't see an convincing argumentation why those expectations are essential and have to be upheld (as some seem to assume as a given), I wouldn't know why I should ever look down on an adult fan of this pony show.

The cynic- and Michael-Jackson-explanations are IMO hopelessly simplified and biased.

But I have to repeat, this is a weird phenomena in deed I may have to watch an episode just out of interest in this weirdness.

 

[NovaKart]

Well the jury is still out if the adult audience for My Little Pony is more of a gay phenomenon. I was just saying that people don't always watch what their demographic would suggest. I mean I hate most of the stuff on Logo TV, except for Ru Paul's Drag Race. I've never really been into fashion and lots of gay movies just suck.

If we could just find some sophisticated people that watch Smackdown then that would really prove my point. If only.....

 

[Dachs]

Well the jury is still out if the adult audience for My Little Pony is more of a gay phenomenon.

What adult audience? These are teenagers and twentysomethings.

 

[cardgame]

I know a married 30-something who loves the show and uses pony avatars.

 

[asbestos]

I don't think noncon is talking about immorality.

"prepubescent girls" and "something deeply wrong with you" in the same post. Forgive me for being a little defensive.

The boundaries aren't artificial it's the target market, it's the USP. I mean, if watching stuff marketed to 12 year old girls gets you off, then fine, but don't start denying it, and trying to paint yourselves as some sort of intellectuals because you watcha cartoon about magical toy ponies.

I don't think I'm any kind of intellectual. But if others do on the basis of watching a kid's show (and I haven't met anyone yet who does), then I would agree that it's going too far.

 

[civ_king]

Would a girl get hated on if she suggested Transformers was awesome?

Also MLP is intended to have a side audience of adults, mostly parents

 

[cardgame]

Indeed, it has numerous references kids won't understand, much like Disney films. Off the top of my head it references The Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy in the episode Fall Weather Friends.

What I really like about MLP is that the humor isn't separated out into "adult level" and "children's level". It's not like they throw in a bunch of pop references or inneundo that kids won't get but that adults will laugh at*. Instead they craft episodes that are simultaneously hilarious to adults AND kids on the same level. I don't usually use the word wholesome (because I associate it with whole wheat bread commercials), but I think that's a good way to describe MLP FIM. Wholesome, but without being prissy, stodgy, or preachy.

* There are some references kids wouldn't get, like Benny Hill music, but most of the time the humor is pretty universal.

 

[Formaldehyde]

Here is an interesting Wired article about the phenomena known as "bronies".

My Little Pony Corrals Unlikely Fanboys Known as ‘Bronies’

The 32-year-old, who lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, loves his daily fix of My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic, and he’s not alone. He’s part of a growing group of “bronies” (“bro ponies&#8221 — men who are fans of a TV show largely intended for a much younger audience.

“First we can’t believe this show is so good, then we can’t believe we’ve become fans for life, then we can’t believe we’re walking down the pink aisle at Toys R Us or asking for the girl’s toy in our Happy Meal,” Allen said in an e-mail to Wired.com. “Then we can’t believe our friends haven’t seen it yet, then we can’t believe they’re becoming bronies too.”

Every nerd has a favorite TV show they watch religiously and know inside and out. But My Little Pony seems like an unlikely object of fanboy love. Since the show debuted last fall on cable channel Hub TV, it’s attracted a growing number of male fanatics. Their love of the show is internet neo-sincerity at its best: In addition to watching the show, these teenage, twenty- and thirtysomething guys are creating pony art, posting fan videos on YouTube and feeding threads on (and their own chan, Ponychan).

They also risk life, limb and being trolled to death on the /co/ board to fawn over a small gaggle of ponies with names like Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash.

My Little Pony creations have taken off in other areas as well. On Equestria Daily, a fan blog that on first blush could be mistaken for a fifth-grade girl’s locker door, site curator Shaun (he asked that his last name be withheld) struggled to find a half-dozen pieces of art to post in a given day back in January. He now claims he can easily fill a post with 30 images.

Shaun isn’t just impressed with the amount of new content bronies are submitting to his site, he’s also amazed by his own fascination with the show.

“Honestly, if someone were to have told me I’d be writing a pony blog seven months ago, I would have called them insane,” the 23-year-old from Arizona said in an e-mail to Wired.com.

So, why the breathless adoration? Some fans say the show’s appeal lies in good illustration, excellent characters or, as Allen put it, a “perfect storm of ’80s nostalgia and cultural irony.” But nearly every fan Wired.com contacted can be far more specific about the source of the show’s genius: Lauren Faust.

Faust, a 36-year-old who manned the latest reboot of the My Little Pony franchise for Hub TV at the request of Hasbro Studios, has a bit of a history handling shows with crossover appeal. Prior to her tenure on My Little Pony, Faust was a writer and storyboard artist on The Powerpuff Girls, another show that had appeal way beyond its intended demographic.

While Faust acknowledges that her work on The Powerpuff Girls influenced her creative process and that she intentionally looked to create a show that could be enjoyed by adults, she said she’s genuinely surprised about the large number of dedicated bronies, whom she clearly adores.

“This might be a little short-sighted on my part, but I just assumed that any adult man who didn’t have a little girl wouldn’t even give it a try,” Faust said in a phone interview. “The fact that they did and that they were open-minded and cool enough and secure in their masculinity enough to embrace it and love it and go online and talk about how much they love it — I’m kind of proud.”

Faust brings up a good point. Aside from a few brony-haters, blessedly very little (negative) hay seems to get made over dudes liking something that’s “supposed to be for girls” (like, for example, the way girls would be side-eyed for liking Transformers in years past).

Despite a tacit understanding that some people might be surprised by their choice of entertainment, most bronies show little to no compunction about their fandom. They shouldn’t have to. And, intentionally or not, they might be bucking the gender socialization of things considered to be “for girls” or “for boys.”

“I had a Google Alert for the show and I kept getting alerts to comments that people were making that were like, ‘I’m a guy and I’m 22 and I love this, why do I love this!?’” said Jayson Thiessen, the show’s supervising director. “I did see what they liked about it because I liked it.”

And the Hub is making more overt attempts to embrace the brony audience. In an extended promo video for the show released recently — a take on Katy Perry’s “California Gurls” called “Equestria Girls” — the ponies lead by Pinkie Pie sing the praises of “our bronies.”

Link to video.

Embracing the brony audience could be a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow for Hasbro because, as Shaun notes, some bronies would like better merch, adding “the current toys are good for the originally intended target audience of 7-year-old girls … but Lauren Faust and the team behind the actual cartoon did an amazing job of accidentally targeting us instead.”

Faust, however, left the show after the first season aired its final episode early last month. Discussing her departure on her deviantArt journal, she said of her colleagues: “Together I think we helped prove that ‘for girls’ does not have to automatically equal ‘lame.’” She also thanked “the kids, the parents and all you bronies” for supporting the show, adding: “The array of people this show has touched has completely exceeded my wildest expectations!”

If that sounds like hyperbole, it’s not.

“This weird alchemy that Lauren Faust tapped into when she set out to make the show accessible to kids and their parents hooks into the male geek’s reptilian hindbrain and removes a lifetime’s behavioral indoctrination against pink,” said New Mexico brony Allen. “As a person with Asperger syndrome, I learned more about theory of mind, friendships and social interactions from this season than I had in the previous 31 years of life.”

What I find fascinating is the negative reaction to all this. It is so familiar to other negative reactions to various sub-cultures...

 

[Catharsis]

You can ask for a specific toy in your Happy Meal?

Man that goes against what Happy Meals are about. It's supposed to be burger with free toy, not toy with free burger.

 

[NovaKart]

Twentysomethings are adults and teenagers are practically adults. I know people will respond with, no they're not they're so immature but the fact is you can be immature and still an adult.

This actually reminds me of the beanie babies craze of the 90s. Except this was mostly adult women. I wonder if any of that crap actually turned out to be worth something.