UK PonyCon 2016 -- official feedback is open!

If you attended UK PonyCon 2016, the staff there would like to hear from you! The online form is only a few pages long, and the questions are pretty clearly laid out. Also, anyone even thinking of mentioning custard in the course of their feedback answers: I will find you and I will show you Newborn Cuties cartoons. You have been warned.

Here's the link to the feedback form.

I've filled it in myself now. I didn't say anything that would be any great surprise to people who know me and were there. I did say I thought that overall UKPC16 was a fantastic convention. Because it was. :)

Ponyfic Roundup 132: Rainbow Dash Edition

Read it Later story count: 494 (-1)

I'm not sure whether I've ever posted a PR concentrating on a specific character before – and I'm too lazy to go back and check – but that's what you're getting this week. All the stories reviewed today feature Rainbow in a starring role. I've quite enjoyed doing this, so I think there'll probably be a few more character spotlights in PR over the coming months.

Icarus by Tamar
Left Behind by Shrink Laureate
Rainbow Dash and her love by jbond
Colors by superpony55
Kaleidoscope by Winston
A Dusty Jail by Derpator

★: 1 | ★★: 1 | ★★★: 3 | ★★★★: 1 | ★★★★★: 0

Comic mini-review: Friends Forever #33: Applejack and Cherry Jubilee

That can't be comfortable, AJ

The Friends Forever series seems to be playing it a little safe with its pairings at the moment: after this issue, the next three will be Pinkie/Cheese, Twilight/Starlight and Rainbow/Soarin. Come on, IDW, let's have some unusual team-ups again, like we did with Luna/Spike, Rarity/Gilda and most recently Fluttershy/Daring Do.

Anyway, that little quibble aside, the Applejack/Cherry comic is a pretty nice one. Tony Fleecs's art and Heather Breckel's colouring fit together to give us a surprisingly varied palette considering that the story is set in the desert. There's still the odd weird AJ face, but they're rare these days. The cutie marks are a tad basic, though. Christina Rice's writing is a bit more uneven: the storyline itself is fine, if not all that original, but the flashback-filled plot does get a little confusing occasionally. Still, AJ herself does pretty well out of it, the guest mare is nicely designed and it's good to see Cherry Jubilee get a starring role. I know I've given a lot of comics three stars recently, but that's because plenty have been what this is: nothing spectacular, just a generally pretty enjoyable story. ★★★

I'm just curious...

...how many of you out there are old-gen fans, either because you were My Little Pony fans before 2010 or because you've learned about G1-G3 ponies since joining the G4 fandom? This isn't being asked for any sort of proper survey or study; as I say, I'm just curious.

Pony Music Library 30: "Smell the Roses"

Time for another song. Now, usually I've used the PML to showcase songs I've loved from the past, but I've never ruled out featuring newer tracks occasionally. Here is one such piece, released just a few days ago but already an instant favourite.

( Text link )

What? "Smell the Roses"

Who? 4everfreebrony

Which? Original song

When? November 2016

Why? This is a lovely, relaxing pop song of the sort I like anyway, so 4everfreebrony had an advantage from the start. It also helps that he's better than many musicians at mixing his tracks so that you can clearly make out the lyrics, rather than having them buried under a heap of other stuff. Although there's a religious background to the song (he based it on a church talk he heard), it's certainly not necessary to share that faith to enjoy this. Especially at a time when so many people are tense and angry, a calming piece of pop like this is just what the doctor ordered. Also, the background graphics, by DragonwolfRooke, are beautiful.

UK of Equestria's overall S6 ranking list

Over on UK of Equestria, we've been supplying our personal league tables of how all the Season Six episodes compare. I did this last year, and the format is very similar. Once again, we asked people to rank them from 1 to 24, with the premiere and the finale counting as one episode each. We had 18 respondents, one more than we got for the S5 poll. What you see here is based on the overall mean score.

I did the tier boundaries nearly the same way as last year, with a mean score of below five giving a five-star rating, then up to ten giving a four-star rating, and so on. An interesting contrast with S5 is that no S6 episode had a mean worse than 20; there were three last year. However, there was a big gap to the bottom two, so I decided it would be reasonable to give them one-star ratings. The two five-star episodes had no serious challengers at the top.

★★★★★

1. To Where and Back Again
2. The Saddle Row Review

★★★★

3. Top Bolt
4. Stranger Than Fan Fiction
5. A Hearth's Warming Tail
6. Every Little Thing She Does

★★★

7. The Times They Are a Changeling
8. Gauntlet of Fire
9. Newbie Dash
10. Buckball Season
11. No Second Prances
12. The Gift of the Maud Pie
13. The Fault in Our Cutie Marks
14. On Your Marks
15. Where the Apple Lies
16. Spice Up Your Life
17. Dungeons & Discords

★★

18. 28 Pranks Later
19. P.P.O.V. (Pony Point of View)
20. Flutter Brutter
21. Viva Las Pegasus
22. The Crystalling

★

23. Applejack's "Day" Off
24. The Cart Before the Ponies

Number of times each episode placed first
7: The Saddle Row Review
3: A Hearth's Warming Tail
3: To Where and Back Again
1: Applejack's "Day" Off
1: Gauntlet of Fire
1: Newbie Dash
1: Stranger Than Fan Fiction
1: Top Bolt

Number of times each episode placed last
3: 28 Pranks Later
3: Applejack's "Day" Off
3: A Hearth's Warming Tail
2: No Second Prances
2: Spice Up Your Life
2: The Cart Before the Ponies
1: Dungeons & Discords
1: The Gift of the Maud Pie
1: Newbie Dash

Most controversial (highest standard deviation)
1. A Hearth's Warming Tail
2. Flutter Brutter
3. The Times They Are a Changeling

Least controversial
1. To Where and Back Again
2. The Saddle Row Review
3. The Crystalling

A special mention here has to go to "A Hearth's Warming Tail", which produced a result like nothing I've ever seen before. Apart from one person who placed it 12th, every single voter had it either in their top eight or in their bottom five. Generally speaking, the people who hated it were the same people who didn't like A Christmas Carol itself for one reason or another; not one person liked Dickens' original but hated the ponified version.

The only thing all our voters agreed on was that they enjoyed "To Where and Back Again" – the season finale wasn't placed lower than eighth by a single voter, something which I'll admit surprised me a little given the controversy about the changeling reformation. Every other episode had at least one person who deviated substantially from the consensus: even "Applejack's 'Day' Off" and "The Cart Before the Ponies" had their fans.

Ponyfic Roundup 131: I want Freedom, I want Goodness, I want Sin

Read it Later story count: 495 (+2)

It's Wednesday, which means it's time for me to take yet another look at the horsewords that people on Fimfiction have decided other people on Fimfiction (and elsewhere) might want to look at. There's a small hoof-ful of stories under the microscope today, including a couple of really weird ones. I'm all for weirdness, but it does need to be entertaining or at least satisfying. Hopefully it will be. Here's what's on the list:

Twilight's Strange New Illness by keulan742
Discord Finds Jesus. Literally. by ocalhoun
Celestia Orders a Funko Pop by Aqua Drops
Estrus by Friendly Uncle
Eternal by Pastel Pony
My Mask by Vimbert the Unimpressive

★: 1 | ★★: 1 | ★★★: 3 | ★★★★: 1 | ★★★★★: 0