Azure23 said:
Can I ask a question of any Bronies (or just fans of the show) here?
And I'd like to preface this with the firm statement that I am absolutely NOT coming from a place of malice, insincerity, or any of that garbage, I'm genuinely interested and curious.
What do you enjoy about the show? I've seen a couple episodes of Adventure Time and personally thought that there was an edge of subversive humor and visual jokes that only older viewers would get (the numerous DnD references and the Title Logo being a spoof of Conan's are good examples of this). I also caught one episode of friendship is magic when babysitting my younger cousin. It seemed (and I don't doubt that there are story lines and continuity and all that) like a simple, boilerplate children's cartoon with a good message and well designed appeal to very young girls and boys (because people who say a show is unilaterally for one sex or the other are stupid).
So I guess to focus my question more; I did not understand the appeal of it to an older audience and I'd be genuinely interested to hear more about it. Does it have thematic material that an adult could appreciate isn't so much my question (because it obviously does, given the phenomenon surrounding it), but more "what is that material?" My younger cousin looks up to me and I'd like to have more to talk about with her, so if this is a show that I can watch and enjoy then I'll definitely give it a shot. Looking forward to responses.
I can't speak to your specific experience because you didn't specify what episode you watched, but one of the first and most important things to note about FiM is that it is a highly varied show. Not only does the content vary widely (having done everything from your completely bog-standard sleepover catastrophe type story right up to doing full-force parodies of Mad Men and Dragonball Z), meaning there are some episodes that inherently won't interest everyone, but the quality does also, to such an extent that even those within the fandom itself rarely universally agree how good one given episode actually is. FiM is a show of higher highs and lower lows than the typical TV show, which owes to the fact that FiM generally takes more risks than its contemporaries. As such, I feel you need to watch several different episodes (I suggest looking up the episode listings and picking a few that, based on their descriptions, seem like interesting stories to you) to have a fuller picture of how the show actually works and thus whether or not you like it. This is quite different to a formulaic show like Phineas and Ferb, where any one episode is generally interchangeable with another, or Gravity Falls, which generally maintains a consistent standard throughout its run, hitting neither the highest highs of FiM 'nor it's lowest lows. There are certainly a few episodes that drop the ball and wind up telling a generic, boilerplate story any children's show would tell, such as Look Before You Sleep and it's entirely possible you caught one of these. They are, thankfully, the exception. The majority of the content is far more interesting.
Beyond that, though, as others have said, there is a wide variety (varied show, varied reasons to like it) of reasons why people like the show specfically. Let me address some of the bigger ones:
Voice acting and sound direction:
The voice acting is first class, which is no surprise when it is being headlined by industry juggernaughts such as Tara Strong (Raven from the Teen Titans), being guided by directors that don't breathe through their noses. Every character has a unique sound and every character is a pleasure to listen to... even the young ones. There are so, so, SO many cartoons whose characters are nothing short of torturous to listen to, especially when trying to make child characters sound like children. FiM is quite possibly the only show in existence to make a squeaky-voiced child adorable rather than annoying. The rest of the show's sound design is of high quality as well, with background music that is thematic and never distracting and actual songs (as in, songs sung by the characters) that were written with care and attention to ensure that they actually work as music in their own right and are more than just noise intended to fill space. Indeed, fair warning now, this theme of actually caring about what they were doing is going to repeat itself pretty much ad-nauseum throughout this dissertation...
Art direction:
This is heavily debated point, but none-the-less worth addressing. Some people find the flash animated art style lacklustre, but I personally happen to believe that what we are given in FiM is slick, stylish and polished, especially in the amount of effort and detail that goes into the background objects and movement. What other show is going to give you two young ladies randomly flirting in the background of a shot before they are interrupted by the town idiot suddenly popping out of the well all while the actual episode continues to occur in the foreground? The broad, bright colour palette does a fine job of bringing across the cheerful tone of life and adventures in Equestria (compared with Gravity Falls' darker, more subdued palette that does an excellent show of lending events in that show an appropriate air of mystery. By the way, Gravity falls is also awesome and you should check that out too) and is just eye-catching in its own right. When the big "event" moments happen (in the beginning and end of season two-parters) and even just at other semi-arbitrary moments (again, the show is variable in almost all its aspects), the general pleasant-too-look-at standard of animation crosses over into being truly gorgeous. You'll know these moments when you see them.
Characters:
This is a point several others have already addressed, but it bears worth expanding upon. The original creator of the series, Lauren Faust, brought to the show a number of ideas from her own personal project that never got the green light. This project, named Galaxy Girls, specified as its highest priority that it would show the audience that there was more than just one way to "be a girl", wherein each of the main cast members (six girls in all, as you might imagine) would be a unique character with a personality highly distinguishable from the rest of the cast. This requirement has been retained in FiM, and the result is one of the most diverse and relateable casts in a cartoon in recent memory. Compare this to the MLP specials of the early to mid noughties, where it is essentially impossible to tell many of the characters apart. Each character can be broadly placed within a given archetype, but each has their ambitions, strengths, shortcomings and limits that have been gradually expanded upon over time . Rainbow Dash in particular has undergone some of the most impressive character development I've ever seen in a cartoon (yes, the characters actually grow and change. They are not static like in many cartoons). Not only that, but several of the supporting characters too have had their characters filled in and expanded upon, including one who manages to be dynamic and interesting whilst having spoken fewer words throughout the entire series than are contained in this paragraph.
Writing:
FiM, in the first place, is not a show that talks down to its audience. This is an extremely important point. As has been stated, this is a show that has tackled the subject of disability more than once and passed this particular test with flying colours. But even in a more general sense, the show trusts its audience to recall plot details (The world-building that goes on is, as someone else pointed out, truly impressive at times, painting a colourful picture of a living, breathing world rather than just having everything revolve around one static, unchanging town sitting in a cartoon void), understand subtleties and to stay invested without having to jingle the proverbial keys for attention every five seconds. This philosophy that kids are NOT idiots allows the writers to pace themselves and tell the stories they want to tell, which is why they were able to get away with having an episode that investigates learning styles theory. This lack of limitations has its downsides as well, of course, but overall I'd say the diversity of content and quality is a net positive, both because there are far more good episodes than bad ones and because it means there's something for everyone (how about an episode that serves as a better 4th Indiana Jones film than Kingdom of the Crystal Skull? Yup, there's an ep. for that... AND a follow-up ep. for that...).
A positive alternative:
Through my own investigations, I have come to suspect that no small portion of the FiM fanbase (myself included) consists of disenfranchised science fiction fans who haven't had anything good to watch since Stargate: Atlantis went off the air. Television these days is absolutely steeped in what is known as "grimdark" (grim characters that are utterly irredeemable and a dark setting that is utterly beyond help), even in its cartoons and its polar opposite, known as "noblebright" (think Star Trek, particularly The Next Generation, as perhaps the Most Triumphant Example), has been marginalised on TV to the point where a show like FiM coming along and saying, "Hey, you know what? We actually CAN have nice things" is a breath of fresh air. Indeed, contrary to what others have said about the presence of douchebags within the fandom keeping then away from the show (EVERY fandom has douchebags, and remember that it's always the biggest idiots that carry the loudest megaphones. The Silent Majority, whilst a cliche concept, does exist and they are almost invariably good people), I would aruge that the show has had a positive effect. Sad though it might seem, there are many individuals well into their formative years and beyond who never were really taught the right ways to behave in a way that was digestible to them, and I have seen first-hand the positive impact the show's messages of friendship and tolerance have had on some of these individuals. In particular, I remember when a talk-back radio host in America accused Bronies of being paedophiles, the response on the primary FiM fansite was overwhelmingly a call NOT to attack the radio show's forums or otherwise backlash angrily against them because, and I am quoting here, "That's not what Twilight would want us to do".
Fan works:
If the show itself is diverse and varied in its content and quality, the works of the fanbase are even moreso. A great many Bronies got their start with fanmade content and whilst there is, as with anything on the internet, plenty of garbage, the remaining 1% really, truly is worth dying for. Whether you love art, music (I particularly recommend Eurobeat Brony's remix of "Discord"), written stories or just wish there was more FiM cartoon to watch (not even joking about that last part. There are show-quality fan-made episodes of the show), there is some truly great stuff to suit every taste to be had if only you're willing to look for it (or you just look at the famous stuff that has the most critical acclaim from the community).
They did it for themselves:
If there's one piece of my mother's wisdom I've completely internalised, it's that the truly talented children's production studios and individuals (such as Don Bleuth or Pixar in their prime) can be said to have (quite apparently) done what they did for themselves first and for the target audience second. With only the minimum amount of corporate meddling on the part of Hasbro (seriously, the degree to which they've taken a hands-off approach to this production is truly commendable), Lauren Faust and the extremely talented crew she assembled were able to make the show they wanted to make... what they wanted to see appear on the screen... So in one way of looking at it, the show was made by adults (individuals who love the animation industry, love cartoons and love to tell stories) for adults. It might seem a little pompous for a Brony to place FiM on the same "fun for all the family" pedestal as the works of Bleuth and Pixar, but taking into account the inherent differences between a televised cartoon and an animated film, I do think the comparison is a valid one because they came about in much the same way... by letting the cartoonists do what they do best without trying to pander to what some suit thinks will sell the most toys... And I do honestly believe that a similar amount of heart and soul (if not budget) has gone into FiM as goes into a Pixar film and that it shows in the final work, lending a certain endearing quality that something that was made purely for a pay-check could never have.
I hope that helps contextualise things a little. As I said somewhere above, I'd recommend going to the episode list (feel free to include all four seasons. The show can be watched out of order for the most part), picking out a handful episodes with intriguing looking synopses and having a go. If you still don't like it then, that's fair enough (despite my own insistence that the show has something for everyone, which it does, not everyone is going to like enough of it to want to stay for the full course).
