*SPECULATION/SPOILERS* Discord's Future & Character Direction Discussion

[NavelColt 22,880]

Art by Sirmaril on DeviantART

 

To my knowledge the so-called released episode about Discord's return has not been confirmed for its' synopsis, but only its' title so far. So, I'm putting spoilers only because it's not confirmed one way or the other yet.

 

I feel like I, as the self-proclaimed leading Discord fan of the board, have yet to contribute anything significant to the recent events about his apparent future episode this season. So I figured I'd take a look at the synopsis, take a look at some of the reactions to it, and make a ranty thread about it. The episode synopsis in question was posted in a slightly older rumor topic, which actually began it's life as a topic discussing a completely different unconfirmed rumor, so I feel an altogether new thread seems appropriate.

 

Let's start from the source. This is the released 'synopsis' for episode eleven, 'Stay Calm and Flutter On':

 

Princess Celestia tasks the ponies with reforming Discord, a mischievous spirit of disharmony, but Fluttershy is the only one who is willing to give him a chance.

 

"Discord". "Reform". These two words in the same sentence are leaving quite a few people with an unsure taste in their mouth. I'm here to offer my perspective on the idea of Discord making his return as something other than the chaotic, fun-loving tyrant who wants to take back his throne from Celestia, of whom we saw in his duo of debut episodes.

 

First and foremost, 'reform' and 'redemption' do not, by definition, mean 'to turn something bad into something good'. Their definition is more about eliminating the negative aspect from something, and that's it. So to all those worried that Discord could become a good guy, even an ally to the ponies, don't start over-thinking things just yet. For all we know, Discord might fail to be reformed, or, he'll be reformed, but he'll decide to remain a neutral character who marches under his own flag, on neither a good or bad side *much like his Star Trek counterpart, Q, who went from full-blown antagonist to a neutral prankster who retained his sadistic pranking personality, but was no longer a true threat to the protagonists*.

 

Now, as for this idea in general. 'Why reform Discord? Discord cannot be reformed. He is the spirit of chaos.'

 

I'll state right out that I love Discord as a villain. He's a terrific villain. His personality and design are fantastic for the role of an antagonist against the protagonist characters.

 

That said, let's look at this from a larger perspective.

 

What would happen if Discord remained an antagonist? What would happen if he remained the way he was shown in the Return of Harmony? He'd eventually come back (maybe) after some thought out reason for how he once again escaped from his stone prison. He then causes more problems, maybe teams up with someone in the process, but ultimately, he's going to taste the painbow again and turn back into a statue.

 

Wreak chaos & havoc --> Stoned --> Break out of stone --> Repeat proccess

 

Discord's fate as a villain is disturbingly predictable. He'll be stoned, again, every time. Why? The thing about using a character who is omnipotent is that their involvement, removal and reintroduction to a storyline filled with characters who are all flexible in both useage/appearances, is that there is a finite number of ways they can be used in a specific role, since they can walk in and fuck the world's shit up without even trying. As a villain, Discord's pretty much doomed to repeat the same process over and over again, since being a powerful spirit causes him to only have one kryptonite: The Elements of Harmony.

 

He can't just be put into hiding like a 'mortal' being like Chrysalis, who can just be *quite litterally* flicked out of town and 'forgotten' by the characters in the show for a while, until the show writers decide to just reintroduce her with minimal effort. Discord isn't the same. You need a pretty good reason for him to break out of stone, and there's less than a handful of 'okay' explanations I can think of for Discord breaking out of his stone prison. Some of them feel like a bit of a stretch as it is. Thus, remaining as an antagonist, Discord is foreseeably doomed to repetition and therefore disuse as a character.

 

Unless of course the show invited some contrived new way of defeating and or imprisoning him, which doesn't seem likely.

 

Now, let's look at the potential behind this synopsis, given these things.

 

If Discord were to be brought back as anything other than a gigantic threat to Equestria as an antagonist, then that cycle of 'muwahaha' --> 'stoned' --> 'repeat' is broken. I can only imagine why Celestia is interested in letting her hated enemy go free, be it that she needs him for something, feels remorseful, or perhaps she finally realizes that sealing enemies away and hoping they don't get out doesn't seem to work very well 8P

 

Whatever the situation, Discord's character would have the opportunity to evolve into something more than that omnipotent villain. He could have the chance to use his apparent vast intellect and make the decision that 'attempting to conquer fate and rule Equestria, only to ultimately get stoned again by cute ponies' is a less wise decision than playing along with the ponies' redemption idea, and toning down his chaos from a global take over to consistent pranks in exchange for indefinite freedom.

 

I know I know, this goes back to the 'But he's the spirit of chaos, he shouldn't want anything more than pure anarchy'. But again, Discord is obviously pretty damn intelligent, and I would think he's more than fully aware that being in stone nullifies his purpose, and that anything that allows him to be free *and not have ponies hunting him and trying to ruin his fun* is a far better alternative to that fate. Hell, if you really don't want to let go of his evilness, how's this for a head canon: Discord goes along with the idea of being reformed until the Mane Six eventually die, in which, being an immortal spirit, he could then safely try and take over Equestria again, since the Elements would no longer be an immediate threat.

 

TL;DR, Discord possibly evolving as a character from an antagonist bent on ruling with chaos into something else is not a bad thing. The individual's opinion will differ on this, but overall, it's not in any way a 'bad move'. If anything, Discord could become a more reoccurring character from now on if he's allowed to remain free in exchange for not trying to take over again.

 

--

 

Alllll speculation in the end :3 For all we know, Discord's reaction to this plan of the ponies, Celestia's reasoning for doing it in the first place, etc. Could all put a different twist on these ideas. I have no idea how this episode will play out, and we'll just have to wait and see before we establish official head canons and whatnot.

Edited December 26, 2012 by ~Chaotic Discord~

[Gears of Halo Duty V 394]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TURI6iDdbac

 

I can only hope this is a reality. For better or worse, I've never been this psyched about an episode before.

 

Brace yourselves guys.

[Dusty Soul 2,611]

I hope that rumor that Discord is Starswirl is correct.  I think that would be a great twist.  I honestly don't know what to think about the episode.  I honestly thought by reform, they meant "bring back"

[duidamasterXD 9,627]

While I don't necessarily have a problem with reforming him (even if I would like it if he returned as a villain) I still have a few standing questions about it.

 

Is it safe to even try? Discord has power that dwarfs that of really any character that we've ever seen. How do you guarantee that he won't have a bad day and decide to turn Equestria and its residents into toys for his amusement again? He's the grandfather of all security risks with a track record longer than my arm.

 

Why has this never been tried before? Celestia had the guy in her garden for a thousand years, and must have either failed to improve him or thought that it wasn't worth the effort to try. What prompted this sudden change of heart in either Discord or Celestia?

 

How could one be certain that this whole thing isn't a ruse? Discord is essentially the poster child for being a trickster god and a false reformation to get free seems completely up his alley.

 

I still think that this could be a great episode, especially if it precludes the possibility of Discord making more regular appearances on the show. I think that I'll just wait until the episode comes around because I have no idea how to feel about this.

[Vaporeon 1,168]

he'll be reformed, but he'll decide to remain a neutral character who marches under his own flag, on neither a good or bad side *much like his Star Trek counterpart, Q, who went from full-blown antagonist to a neutral prankster who retained his sadistic pranking personality, but was no longer a true threat to the protagonists*

 

Does that mean in the final episode Discord will show Twilight the creation of Equestria?

 

-------------

 

Now I don't hate the idea of a "reformed" Discord, I hate how it could go. If it was more like Q with Discord being neutral then ok and something to break the cycle would be good for both Discord's character and the plot. It's just I really don't want another good character, I don't know I just always prefer villains I like Eggman more than Sonic, Venom more than Spider-Man, Bowser a lot more than Mario considering Mario has little to no personality and Bowser is a really fun character in some games.

 

The main reason I'm afraid of wait they'll do with Discord is what they did with Trixie in Magic Duel. Liking villains as much as I do, I would have like to see Trixie as a rival for Twilight like maybe she could become Celestia's apprentice as well and outshine Twilight. Eh I don't know what to think of this to be honest. I trust that it'll be a good episode and all but I still can't help but be a little worried.

Edited December 26, 2012 by N-Harmonia

[Nouth 496]

Mhhhm... I would not mind if the episode came out like this. I can smell a Forgive & Forget moral here. Well, I'm surely looking forward this one

 

The only thing I'd fear would be a complete change of his design. I love how he looks now, and if they did something like they did to Nightmare Moon when she changed back into Luna, but on a bigger scale :/... Let's hope they don't mess the best villain up.

[Silverwisp the Bard 2,353]

I hope that rumor that Discord is Starswirl is correct.  I think that would be a great twist. 

I disagree: It would be a lazy move, tagging yet another aspect on Starswirl (along with the library wing, Clover...) instead of coming up with something new.

 

Apart from that, I hate what the idea of Discord being "reformed" or being Starswirl.

Discord is the personification of Chaos, his power dwarfs any other being on the show including the royal sisters (sans Elements). The very idea that he could be influenced by some mortals giving him a prep-talk would be a huge step into Carebear territory.

Unlike Q, Discord is not just immensely powerful, he is actually the embodiment of chaos and anarchy, opposed to all established order. To change that to "He's just a jackass, who needed someone being nice to him/show him the error of his ways", just so we can have another episode of him, would be a terrible tradeoff.

Edited December 27, 2012 by Silverwisp the Bard

[Swick (ded) 436]

Discord is my favorite villian in the series, so I definitely like the idea of a reappearence. I can't help but wonder if this could somehow be connected to the Alicorn Twilight rumor, though I doubt it.

[AnonBrony 1,468]

Hmmm... I love the Starswirl rumor for him. I wish that were to be true. But this whole reformin' thing... I'm having mixed feeling on it. I love discords charcter as a whole and if this "change him to be nuetral" things happens i really hope it doesn't affect his overall character. I'm ok with it happening so that hes not constantly sealed away and so he can be reoccuring, but i don't want this "reforming" process to be some simple peptalk or some wave of the elements dealio. No... i have a feeling it would be much more interestin' than that. I mean there has to be SOME kind of reason celestia wants him reformed or just brung back. Perhaps... Celestia is making a "deal with the devil" so to say? Discord gets to stay as long as he doesn't cause any mischief or harm and does whatever celestia needs him for, and discord would probably want something else too. Question is what? Better question is what is Celestia willing to offer him? idk i just specualtin' here. I guess we just have to wait and find out.

[That Colt 42]

It's hard to think how this episode will play out. maybe discord escapes again but is temporarily powerless, other people think that maybe Celestia needs discord as an even bigger threat on the horizon.

 

However i think that if discord becomes like a netrual character, he would most likely treat fluttershy better than most other pony's.

[Veylon 255]

Maybe since he's effectively sealed away, they have to contact him via some sort of dreamscape that Luna could create. And they could always fail to reform him. Maybe the moral that it's important to try to reach out even if you don't succeed. That's the vibe I got from the Gilda episode.

[ComradeUncleJoe 29]

I absolutely love Discord and always wanted him to have another episode, so I'm super stoked for this. I hope for they don't change Discord's character and make him less chaotic. His charm, and the charm of other characters like him, has always been the fact that they don't conform to social norms. I don't necessarily want the ponies to fail in turning him from evil (although I never believed him to be inherently evil), but I don't want them to succeed in making him conform to a more orderly standard. What I'd like to see is Discord becoming a more Chaotic Neutral character, like Q.

[NavelColt 22,880]

I absolutely love Discord and always wanted him to have another episode, so I'm super stoked for this. I hope for they don't change Discord's character and make him less chaotic. His charm, and the charm of other characters like him, has always been the fact that they don't conform to social norms. I don't necessarily want the ponies to fail in turning him from evil (although I never believed him to be inherently evil), but I don't want them to succeed in making him conform to a more orderly standard. What I'd like to see is Discord becoming a more Chaotic Neutral character, like Q.

The neutral character aspect is something most people would love to see. It would be the perfect outcome to this episode in my opinion, far better than failing to reform him. If he became neutral:

-He doesn't need to be re-stoned. Future appearances and cameos: All too possible

-He doesn't need to be a good guy. To be neutral, all he has to do, really, is stop trying to take over Equestria and saturating chaos over the entire land. His personality doesn't need to change one bit. Like Q was when he became neutral, his antics will not cease, he'll simply use them as pranks both big and small to amuse himself.

[Doctor-Whooves 288]

I definitely have mixed feelings for this episode. I can see two possibilities here:

 

• Discord is reformed. This is the bad feeling for this episode. Here, I'm taking about a villain becoming a good guy. I do not want this. I'm assuming that you all remember the Spongebob episode where they reform Man-Ray with the tickle belt. While Spongebob can pull this off with it's several hundred episodes and they don't all relate to each other. But pony couldn't pull this off. All the episodes relate to each other, one war or another. They don't pull off the strange yet comical ending.
• Discord turns neutral. This is what I want. Very badly. First off, Discord outside of stone is much better than Discord inside of stone. Secondly, Discord's inner nature wouldn't change at all. He would simply pull pranks and smaller things, because he wouldn't want to be set in stone again. As Chaotic says, he's much too smart to just try to repeat the same process again.

[Lost Profile 644]

I remember a rumor going around that discord is star swirl the bearded...

 

What if this is true and he comes back to life as star swirl?

 

 

But if discord dose return...

 

IM GOING TO BE SO HAPPY!!!!!

[Circadian 1,273]

I personally hope Discord isn't brought back into the present day (yet), but is instead featured in a flashback episode. I want to see Celestia and Luna turn him to stone the first time.

 

I also want to know exactly what the circumstances were that caused Luna to be consumed by darkness.

 

Interesting times we live in.

[Mu Nova 66]

As far as reforming him into something different (read: particularly good) goes, I chalk that up to some of the synopses we've had being a bit misleading anyway.

 

I feel rather confident that they're not going to be changing him I to a good character--Studio B has been way too smart and levelheaded about continuity to do something like that, I think. It seems to me that we're getting Discors back, without him trying to take over the world and inevitably getting stoned.

 

WHICH MAKES ME SO DAMN HYPED.

 

PLUS, it sounds like this may at least partially be a Fluttershy episode. And [one of] my favorite pony(/ies) getting another episode is always good.

Edited January 1, 2013 by Mu Nova

[Doctor-Whooves 288]

I personally hope Discord isn't brought back into the present day (yet), but is instead featured in a flashback episode. I want to see Celestia and Luna turn him to stone the first time.

 

I also want to know exactly what the circumstances were that caused Luna to be consumed by darkness.

 

Interesting times we live in.

 

I agree. A flashback to Discord's reign would be glorious, to say the least. One must wonder if his rule was as chaotic as when he returned.

[Tall_But_Short_37 233]

I think it could make for an excellent episode. I really hope they can pull it off right, I believe in them. I'm just not sure if they can do it completely with no major holes in a 22 minute show...

[That Colt 42]

Seeing what kind of show this is the chance of fluttershy failing to redeem discord is basicly nonexistent.

 

Also the fact that he can be redeemed means he has NOT crossed the moral event horizon, and that he is not pure evil.

[That One Techpriest You Used To Know 2,286]

Discord is the spirit of chaos. The best he can be is neutral. Actually, in the show he is chaotic neutral. Did we ever see him do any villain work? The worst thing that he did was prank everyone in Equestria... like this one rouge in D&D...

 

*tangent*

 

Anyways... a reformed Discord would totally ruin the character. While I agree that the mwahaha ---> stoned ---> repeat cycle is depressing... I say that if- IF- he comes back, It'll be in season four.

 

Sorry, ~Chaotic Discord~, I just don't see it happening - unless the show creators want to dissolve all sense of integrity that the show has.

[Bucky McGillyCuddy 956]

So pretty much Discord is being sentenced to rehab, staring Fluttershy as the friendly rehabilitator. They both seem to make for pretty  funny scenes so i can't wait for the episode. 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUeVxnuGo-w

[NavelColt 22,880]

Discord is the spirit of chaos. The best he can be is neutral. Actually, in the show he is chaotic neutral. Did we ever see him do any villain work? The worst thing that he did was prank everyone in Equestria... like this one rouge in D&D...

Chaos is -not- all he did. He changed Twilight's friends against her, effectively trying to split them apart and ultimately ruin their relationships, all while he laughed on the sidelines. He's not pure evil, but he was by no means neutral anything in Return of Harmony.

[Fhaolan 4,483]

The question I have is why? In-universe, why reform Discord? Story-wise, you're right that the omnipotent villain with one weakness is hard to pull off repeatedly because it's far too easy to fall into a rut. Release -> Chaos -> Painbow -> Stone -> Release -> Chaos -> Painbow -> ad nausium. That's an excellent reason for the writers to want to do something different. However, because the cycle is so easy to fall into, and to the characters in the story they're already passing into at least the third pass through this cycle, why would Celestia want to attempt to break it? What is making the risk worth it in her mind?

 

My first thought is that she doesn't think the last pass through the painbow was as good as the previous, so it won't contain him as long. Or there's been prior passes through the cycle we're not aware of, and she thinks each pass through the cycle is getting shorter. He's becoming effectively immune to it, and she wants to take this risk now before he can completely shrug it off.

 

My second thought is that she's discovered that the last pass through the painbow as *better* than the previous, and there is some side-effect of having the incarnation of chaos being forced into stagnation that means they can't keep him in that state as long as she might wish.

[Veylon 255]

I'm also wondering why, but from the worldbuilding and storytelling end.

 

Things get tense and dangerous because the heroes run out of options and are put at risk. It's already bad enough (from a tension/danger standpoint) that Celestia and Luna exist, ready to potentially swoop down and fix everything, thus completely ruining the story. So you have to either make the threat underwhelming (also bad for tension/danger), overwhelming (bad because it puts them at the center of the story, possibly sidelining your mains), or distant (so they can't show up / don't know to show up). Or you hand somepony the idiot ball so they won't ask for help. But that's silly.

 

A friendly Discord is much worse the Princesses. He could pop up anytime anywhere and offer nigh-omnipotent assistance. This would be a terrible thing. If this episode description is legit (I'm holding on to my skepticism with both hands), it'll be very hard to justify any truly dangerous villains from here on out when he could very casually dispose of them and would want to.