One of the hearts of the brony community is the thinkers. The people who behave like scientists and analyze every facet about the show: the characters, atmosphere, episodes, and little references in each episode. Compared to other fandoms (the lone exceptions being possibly Sonic and Harry Potter), this fandom tends to review things from an extremely critical perspective, whether it's positive, neutral, or negative. Sometimes, we do this to a fault where we may occasionally think too much. But knowing us scientists, we like to take the information, break it down, and then reassemble it. It's as if we're taking a physics class 24/7, except it's more fun, and we don't have to take an academic exam for it.

Now, there has some rather loud dissent of the thinking, part of it when some bronies have been rather critical of Rainbow Dash's character as of late. I've seen one loud fan call the (perhaps overly) critical dissent as (in his exact words) "Over-analyzing at it's best here people." Well, it's time to respond back and why thinking this critically is one of the greatest things in this fandom, even to a so-called "nitpick."

Early in the brony fandom, one of the most popular and biggest pieces was a physics presentation, the one that basically exposed the brony community to the Internet and its potential to reflect intelligently and critically. Taking the show, this person then showed a complex presentation of the way the show's physics work with its universe. Here is the video.

It's rich. It's deep. It's smart. It's informative. Even almost two years later, I'm still wowed by it. If you haven't watched it, please do.

Afterwards, the brony fandom has begun looking at the show from an extremely critical view. We take a close look at everything we see and hear from the show, from the episode itself down to its little detail in Rarity's shopping bag. Currently, we have a plethora of rich analyzers here: myself, Chaotic Discord, Kyronea, Scootacool, Alfonzo Dennard, and so on. We review the show inside and out so we can fully comprehend its premise, characters, and whether they make sense. But around the brony fandom, there have been a lot of deep analyses. Several months ago, one user broke down Twilight Sparkle's cutie mark and what it truly stands for. If anyone wants to read it, click here. It's very good and extremely informative.

Sometimes we take such a close look that we tend to overthink or think the wrong stuff. For instance, some of the fanon like Lyra's interest in humans. Sometimes, it results in us getting a bit too far in ourselves. In other words, we tend to analyze to a fault occasionally.

But this flaw is also such a great strength in the community.

For one, these moments of really thinking about the show shows a completely fresh perspective of we watch and hear. My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is the most intelligent family-friendly episodic animation since Avatar: The Last Airbender, and it isn't done by accident. When we view the show from its exterior only, then we just see the animation, characters, beginning/middle/end. End of the episode. Going back to analyze the episode little by little gives the mind such a fresh look on the episode, be it positive or negative. For example, when I watched Magic Duel for the first time, it was great with well-done characterizations, plot, and ending. Then I rewatched it, and I gained a much more thorough, fresh perspective on it.

Here are my consecutive analyses of the episode (either via the links or the "spoilered" em-dashed passages below):

———

———

 ———

I followed this same pattern with "Sleepless in Ponyville" here.

When we deeply review episodes, we can analyze them inside and out instead of just its dress. It makes us appreciate the overall production of the episode and show. Whether it makes you like the episode or not, and whether it determines whether that specific episode is good, average, or bad is up to you.

And to go even further in its intelligence, the staff always adds in some references here or there (say, they may add them anywhere! ). These references play a little game for the viewer to spot, find, smile, laugh, and appreciate.

Secondly, we analyze the episodes this deeply because the staff WANTS this. When we analyze, we create rich communication between the professionals and the bronies. The bronies see all this rich information beyond the dress, and we relay this back to the professionals either intentionally or accidentally. They see it themselves and appreciate how much we like to see the episodes and overall show beyond the veil.

This communication also results in the staff appreciating not just the audience, but their overall product more. When you work on your product, you tend to see this from tunnel vision. In other words, your world, your vision. The animators and storyboards take the ideas and script to give it more life. But the viewers then take what they see and pick it apart. They see what's so great about it, what's not so great, and how they can make the product even better. When they see us reviewing it from a more critical, microscopic perspective, it gives the team a much fresher, prouder, more concrete view on their product.

When the staff notices this fresh viewpoint, then they play some games on how to make themselves appreciate the quality they display on screen for millions of people. These games, normally in the form of newer references (sometimes subtle to only the bronies) give us a bigger and better opportunity to review a more revised and better product and then see the results of this communication. The bronies and professionals have an extremely close relationship. The richness in these analyses are one of the key reasons why.

Finally, these rich analyses show us that we care. The brony community is so invested to the show, that we review the product deeply to prove it. Sometimes our analyses result to the point in disliking the episode. In Sleepless of Ponyville, one person couldn't like it as much as the others mainly because he considered dreams and nightmares to be a very private matter, and he didn't appreciate how Luna got involved in Scootaloo's nightmares. (A rather refreshing point, which I disagree with, but a pretty good point nonetheless.)

We love this product sometimes to a fault, and these analyses show how much we adore it, even if we tend to think too far to the point where we get a splitting migraine. But after leaving and then going back to review what we wrote, all it does is show how much we just love to see the product and want to nurture it. When we analyze this deeply, we want the show to grow beyond its potential. My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is such a great show, but we're not satisfied, and nor we should. Being satisfied means accepting the quality we have. The analyses are an underlying message that we want it to grow in its intelligence, world, characters, atmosphere, and overall production.

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is the most intelligent Flash episodic animation and the smartest episodic animation currently airing altogether. There are many layers that help us appreciate how the staff shapes up the episodes. These rich analyses provide such a brand new, rich perspective on how the staff created and executed My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. But these analyses also give the staff extra appreciation for their own product, creating a multitude of ways to communicate between the intelligent community and the staff. Although we may experience points where we may overthink, dismissing it all as such is a major insult to the show and the brilliance of the staff, bronies, and overall communication between the two. Rather than dismissing it, embrace it. This show is only demonstrating how smart it is, and all of these deep analyses (whether good, bad, concrete, or overthinking) are what help not only strive to create better staff-fandom communication, but a desire to improve the product even further, as well.