EDIT: A mod asked me to tone down some of the language, so I cut it down to only one F-bomb and two S-bombs.

EDIT: Edited again, cuz mods.

EDIT: Had to replace the text after the server crash. Minor changes, but it still complies with mod regulations.

As a guy who loves pony fanfic, I am often asked what I think of My Little Dashie. Fact is, I hate it. On my steam group, I even wrote a lengthy rant on everything that was wrong with it.

For anypony interested, here is said rant, with a minor edit I made to keep it up to date.

Warning: contains spoilers and vitriol.

You may be surprised to hear this, but I do not like My Little Dashie. Yup. I am among the <5% of the brony population that thinks this fic is anything less than God's gift to writing. This is especially odd when you consider the fact that Rainbow Dash is my favorite canonical character, and the magnificent praise I give to other fanfics such as Of War and Friendship or Fallout: Equestria.

In fact, one could even say that I hate My Little Dashie. Considerably. Every last putrid, manipulative, poorly-written word of it. In some ways, this is actually the single worst fanfic I have ever read. Why is this? Surely there must be far worse fanfic out there, right?

Well, take My Immortal, for instance. The infamous Harry Potter fanfic known for its terrible "goffik" writing. During my time with My Immortal, I enjoyed it for the same reason that the Nostalgia Critic enjoyed The Room. It was funnier than hell!

I'm serious. You can't conceivably read a line like "And Lupin was masticating to it" without laughing your balls off. And My Immortal was hilarious like that the whole way through. The same goes for other infamous badfics and shitfics. If you're laughing your ass off, you're having a good time.

When I read My Little Dashie, I did not have a good time. In fact, during the entire experience I could think of nothing more than how every individual sentence failed so miserably at being considered "writing."

But let's not get ahead of ourselves here. For our look at possibly the only instance in history where I can ever justify the use of the word "overrated," I say we begin at the same place that the author did: the premise.

Dear lord, this premise. Hey, have you ever looked at the character Rainbow Dash and thought to yourself "I wish she was an orphan in the human world with a creepy weirdo for an adoptive father"? No? Congratulations, you have just passed Common Sense 101. Collect your diploma at the door.

Oh, but it's worse than it sounds. The whole premise is that the human, who was never actually given a name in the fic, plays daddy with Rainbow Dash for 15 years before her friends arrive to take her back to Equestria, and the audience is somehow expected to cry, for some reason.

There are immediately three core problems with this premise:

1. It's manipulative.

There are ways of making your audience cry. I personally cried my eyes out at the end of Toy Story 3, but I can tell you /why/ I cried. I cried because it depicted a massive, heartwarming change in the lives of characters I had grown to know and love for 15 years. I cried because I saw myself in Andy, and was able to relate to him. I cried because the film, indeed the trilogy, had been building up the themes of moving on and growing up since its inception. I cried for all the right reasons, and I'm not ashamed to admit that. And I firmly believe that a well-written, well-thought-out work of fiction can reduce anyone to tears.

My Little Dashie is not well-written. And it is not well-thought out. It doesn't explore themes of fatherhood or family, it doesn't develop its relationships effectively. It just leaves things at "wouldn't it be sad if..." and rolls along from there. It's impossible to relate to the characters, or to their situation. You never get a sense that you know anyone from the story, and you are never legitimately moved by their actions. Indeed, the big "you must cry now" moment is a bloated exposition dump with loads of plot contrivance and no actual participation from either of the two central characters. There isn't any legitimate reason to cry. You just feel like someone is yelling loudly in your ear "PLEASE CRY! I BEG YOU!" instead of actually moving you with a satisfying story. It's the "brute force with a sledgehammer" equivelant of eliciting emotion.

2. It did not need to be a pony fic.

It takes place in the real world, the main character is human, the only pony character has no actual resemblance to her canonical counterpart (more on that later), and the "adoptive father" story has been done to death by now. Nothing would have changed if instead of "My Little Dashie," it had been titled "Patrick and me," and swapped out RD for Patrick Star from Spongebob Squarepants. The author could have told the exact same story, with the exact same characters (with different names, of course), and had the exact same payoff. Rainbow Dash was only added in, once again, for the purpose of manipulation. Rainbow Dash is a character fresh in the minds of every brony due to her role in the show, and beloved for her characteristics and personality. So, naturally, we've already grown to like her. The author simply took this and said "wouldn't it be sad if..." to create the premise of this story. The story isn't sad on its own merits. The story is sad because it's basically just something bad happening to Rainbow Dash.

Now, for a counter-example. A fic that actually uses its fanfiction status for full effect: Fallout Equestria. If you haven't read the fic by now, don't fret, I would be damned if I spoiled even a word of this masterpiece. Fallout Equestria doesn't simply look at the Fallout world and say "what if it had ponies?", it merges and blends elements of both universes together to craft a world greater than the sum of its parts. It doesn't try to seperate itself from MLP, it embraces it, and it repurposes the setting to fit the tone of the story. While it does take creative liberties with characters and such, it always respects and admires the source material, and it even stays true to the central themes and messages of the show, albeit in a much more R-rated approach. This is just one of many reasons why I love Fallout Equestria, and just one of many reasons why I despise My Little Dashie.

3. It's creepy!

No extended rant this time. No wall of text. Just a simple statement. Brony culture is already considered... eccentric... by outsiders as is. Imagine their reaction when they discover that the fandom's favorite fanfic is about Rainbow Dash living in a brony's apartment and calling him "Daddy." Oh yeah, and she's only a filly in this story. Thank you for doing wonders to our reputation.

So that's the premise. But we aren't done yet. We've still got to talk about the characters (all both of 'em), and the abject failure that is the writing style. But what is it about these characters that makes them so very loathesome? How is it that a duo of an adoptive father and Best Pony could make my personal shitlist for atrocious writing? Well, here's how:

1. FYYHSOSS Mopy McAngstysue.

Since the human character is never named, I prefer to go with my own name for him: Mopy McAngstysue, the blandest fucking character you will ever meet. Mopy is, unsurprisingly, a brony. More specifically, he's the type of brony that most bronies try to steer clear from during conventions. He's disturbed, he's depressing, and worst of all, he's boring. His backstory includes every tired sad story cliche you could think of, including dead parents, a hatred for cities, lack of friends, and clinging on to a kid's TV show for dear life.

I guess the idea is that we're supposed to pity this loser, but we are never actually given a chance to like him. Mopy is never granted human interaction, and his character is unbearably static. Not only that, but the audience is never shown a different side of him. He never grows to be anything relatable or interesting, and he never grows to become an actual protagonist. He never solves any problems, he never involves himself in the plot in any way, and he really only seems to be there so that he can voyeuristically watch as the filly grows up. To be fair, he and her occasionally share some interactions, but even then the interactions seem to exist only to reinforce the mood, and not actually develop the characters.

2. Little Orphan Blue.

I refuse to use the name "Rainbow Dash" to describe this... thing! You thought Mopy was bad? You ain't seen nothing yet. Little Orphan Blue is an absolute disgrace to her namesake. She is wretchedly out of character the entire time, her backstory consists entirely of "magic, durr hurr," and once again, she simply did not need to be a pony.

Just like Mopy, Little Orphan Blue never actually does anything over the course of the story, apart from going about her life. As such, every major "event" in the plot is simply another milestone in her childhood. Like when she first learns to fly, her first NASCAR race, etc. Except these milestones never serve to alter her character, including the major revelation that she's a cartoon character, and really serve no purpose apart from buildup. But really, that's the least of my qualms with this character. She has absolutely no relation to the character from the show whatsoever. She's frail, pathetic, easily impressed, and loves to call Mopy "daddy."

Yeah, "daddy."

As if this shit wasn't manipulative enough already. You don't know how horribly violated I felt the first time I heard Little Orphan Blue mutter that word. Such a complete betrayal of everything a character stands for, while not unheard of, is something I would at least like to think is rare. How is it that Cupcakes is closer to Pinkie Pie's character than MLD is to Rainbow Dash's character? You can't really sink lower than "psychopathic murderer" without trying pretty damn hard to destroy a character.

And at last, we come to MLD's most greivous insult to literature: its writing style.

There is simply no way to defend this fic's writing style. While we've already established that when your characters never actually do anything, it should come as no surprise that nothing is ever accomplished, the shit still doesn't end there.

None of the major events (with the exception of the last one) actually occur "on-screen." We are simply told of their occurrance long after the fact. You may have heard the Anton Chekhov quote "Don't tell me the moon is shining, show me the glint of moonlight of a pane of broken glass."

My Little Dashie prefers to simply give you a spreadsheet of lunar phases over the last year.

Why is LOB's first flight relegated to no more description than "she flew"? Why does the NASCAR part focus only on the planning, and never let us see the event itself? One might make the argument that it's supposed to be a "journal" or sorts, but then why is the "cry now" scene (which takes up half the damn fic, BTW) written normally? Why isn't that also part of a journal? It really gives you the sense that the author was single-minded, that he just wanted to breeze through all that story stuff to get to the manipulation. That he didn't actually give a damn about having any sort of plot.

In conclusion, I despise everything about this fanfic. But though I loathe its very existence, but I'm still glad I read it. I consider myself something of a writer, and as a writer, I need to understand not only how to make a great story, but also how to make a terrible story.

And My Little Dashie is a terrible story. It is a cautionary tale for all writers, a wake-up call for anyone who would use cliches and manipulation over legitimate storytelling. I just hope my plea has not fallen on deaf ears.