Scoots2

Basically, this. Anyone who says that Lauren Faust INTENDED to make it a "gender-neutral" show has not read her preface to The Elements of Harmony, in which she basically asserts the beauty and magic of the iconography associated with little girls. I'm sorry, but the cupcakes and hearts and unicorn farts are girly, and if they weren't attached to an awesome show, a lot of people wouldn't want anything to do with it because it is girly. Because it is awesome, suddenly it is now "gender neutral." And that is insulting to girls: that anything good associated with them must be "rescued." "But but but! It has relatable plots! It shows things anyone can identify with! The characters' lives don't revolve around makeup and boys! There's even some badass fighting!" Yes? And this means it's NOT for girls? I would like to try an experiment sometime and extract only the design elements--the color palette, the concepts, the shapes, the music--and not tell some bronies "this is from the show." I very much doubt that they'd say, "oo, look how gender neutral this is!" I am very concerned by this attitude, since it often goes along with an exaggerated sense of importance that young adult male audience is to the show and demands that it be changed to suit them (more violence, edgier plots, more male characters.) No. It is what it is. And you don't want to make it "more gender neutral." What you want is to remove its feminine elements for your own comfort. Like it for what it is, but don't try to change it and don't try to call it something it isn't. And it would be nice if you wouldn't lie to yourselves about it, but I can't help that.

I really don't care about being overlooked by the media, but sometimes the fact that I'm assumed to be male gets old. Not so much the "hey, I'm guessing you're male," but the gasps of "YOU'RE A GIRL??!!!?" That DOES get old, especially on FiMFiction. When you consider that lots of women and girls like ponies and always have, and that overall, cutting across fandoms, 80% of fanfic writers are female, FiMFiction is exactly where you'd expect female fans to be. I've been to cons, but I've never, ever been to a meetup, because between my age and my gender, nobody would feel comfortable about my being there, and I don't want to be greeted with "ok, which doofus brought his mom?" So one reason female fans might be "invisible" is because no one knows what gender you are on the internet, and brony gatherings are mostly male, from what I can see. This is actually a really adorkable romance plot in Bronies: the Musical, as it dawns on the very shyest brony, who could barely bring himself to go to a Brony meetup, that that cool dude he's been chatting with online, "Wild Horses," is actually a cute nerdy girl. I think it's slowly getting around campus that "Professor X is a Brony, dude," and I have no idea what it does to my credibility, but if anything, I think it's gone up. ("Does she really have PONIES on her cellphone?" Yup.)

Yes--I went to see it yesterday, and had a great time. The ponies first appear on a puppet stage in the background (which is a sort of TV/computer screen), and on their first appearance, they intentionally punch up the sheer girliness, with all four of the ponies (White Pony, Pink Pony, Yellow Pony, and Blue Pony) singing and giggling. A lot. While three different guys in the same town who have all turned on the TV or cruised over to YouTube or what have you simultaneously see the ponies for the first time and all think "what the hell am I watching?" Easily one of my favorite moments in the whole show: White Pony steps out of the screen and speaks directly to this young artist, promising to inspire him. Each of the ponies seemingly adopts a Best Human, I guess. Anyway, full-sized, the ponies look like this: The plot seemed a little heavy-handed at times, but I enjoyed it a lot anyway. And the good news is that they WILL be taking it on tour. They raised some money via Kickstarter and funded it, so keep your fingers crossed and it may be coming to a theater near you. The chances that it will be videoed and put up online is next to nil, because it's being performed in a 99> seat theatre, and a person holding up a cell phone would be instantly noticeable. And filming actors in a stage production instantly raises issues with Equity, too. But they might create a trailer for when it goes on tour. Plus there will be a cast album. So if you're anywhere near LA, you might enjoy going to see it while you have a chance.