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victorluvsalice · 5 years

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AU Thursday: Londerland Bloodlines -- Pre-Game Timeline!

So, I believe I've mentioned I'm replaying Bloodlines currently to determine what the timeline of the game is for my "Londerland Bloodlines" AU (now having been upgraded to an official story!). But when I started working on the opening chapter, I realized something -- I also needed to shore up the timeline for what happened before the events of the game! After all, even if I'm starting with Alice getting Embraced, knowing just how events in her and everyone else's lives happened is important -- if only because my characters are going to be telling each other their histories at some point. :p

So! Under the readmore is my current pre-game timeline for these versions of Alice, Victor, Victoria, Emily, Lizzie, and Bonejangles. I focused mainly on figuring out how Corpse Bride and American McGee's Alice/Alice: Madness Returns would go down, though I added some other notes explaining Alice's relationship to Wonderland in this world (since, obviously, she's not the Alice from the books!), and setting up how Emily, Lizzie, and Bonejangles ended up in the Giovanni Crypts. I may be tweaking things here and there as time and the story goes on, but this serves as a good first draft, anyway. Enjoy!

May 4th, 1984: Alice Pleasance Liddell is born to Arthur and Lorina Liddell – their second daughter after ten-year-old Lizzie (November 22nd, 1974).

June 9th, 1984: Victor Fitzwilliam Van Dort is born to William and Nell Van Dort, their only child. He grows up privileged but rather neglected, and becomes a rather shy young man.

November 5th, 1992: Angus Bumby, one of Arthur's psychology undergraduates at Oxford University who'd developed an obsession with Lizzie, breaks into the Liddell house, rapes and kills Lizzie, then sets the house on fire to cover his tracks. Arthur and Lorina die in the blaze, but a badly-burned Alice is able to escape through her bedroom window and is taken to hospital. She remains in the burn unit for a year, recovering – her body heals remarkably well, according to the doctors, but her mind doesn't. Unknown to anyone, a furious Lizzie's spirit refuses to go to the Underworld as a result of her horrific death, and remains at the site of the Liddell house, haunting it with vigor (namely throwing things at any male visitor).

November 11th, 1993: Alice is then taken to Rutledge Psychiatric Institute, as she's gone catatonic from survivor's guilt and won't respond to any stimuli. It's not as horrific an experience as her Victorian counterpart experienced, but Rutledge is still underfunded and contains Pris Witless and the Monroe twins, so it's not great either. During this time, Bumby manages to deflect all suspicion off himself for starting the fire by setting it up so it looks like the family cat, Dinah, knocked some still-burning kindling out of the fireplace, and sets up his Houndsditch Home for Wayward Youth – an orphanage for disadvantaged children looking for new homes and mental health.

September 7th, 2002: Alice shows her first sign of conscious life in years by drawing a picture of a rather more twisted Cheshire Cat than normal, as her subconscious gets tired of her laying around and plunges her into a mental fight for her life and sanity in a ruined Wonderland. Alice proceeds to battle her way across the various domains over the next year, and successfully wrests her sanity back from her corrupted counterpart, the Queen of Hearts.

November 1st, 2003: Having recovered enough to warrant living outside a care facility like Rutledge, Alice is released into the custody of one Angus Bumby, whose methods of memory management are applauded and derided in equal measure. Alice is only too eager to submit to his decree to forget the fire, but her subconscious doesn't make it easy – especially since she keeps thinking he looks familiar. . .

January 27th, 2004: Victor, taking a gap year between high school and college (to delay having to major in business like his father wants) is "strongly encouraged" to start dating his across-the-square neighbor, Victoria Everglot, daughter of viscounts Maudeline and Finis Everglot. Victor's parents think it'll be an excellent way to earn some more social status (they're millionaires many times over from the Van Dort canned fish empire, but their nouveau riche manners haven't earned them many actual friends among the elite), while the Everglots are only allowing this because they've been running on the ragged edge of "broke" for a while now and William is hinting some loans might be a side effect of letting their children date. Neither Victor nor Victoria is thrilled to be pushed into dating a near-stranger. . .but once they properly meet, they find their personalities mesh nicely, and they decide to keep seeing each other on their own terms.

May 28th, 2004: Victor and Victoria have been dating for a few months by this point, enjoying themselves and growing closer. The Everglots are growing less-thrilled with the arrangement by the minute and are constantly pushing potential alternate suitors onto Victoria – Victor assures her that he won't mind if she goes out with a couple just to shut them up, but Victoria is doing her best not to give in just so they won't believe they can run her life. On the Van Dort side, though, Nell's grown impatient with the two just dating, and manages to get Pastor Galswells to crash their date at the local coffee shop to (very reluctantly) extol the virtues of marriage. Victor is mortified and bolts – Victoria follows him, and assures him that she's willing to wait for a commitment. They manage to recover the date, even getting a prize from a little arcade game outside the laundromat – a cheap plastic ring. Victor goes on a walk afterwards in the local woods to clear his head, and ponders if he's ready to get more serious with Victoria or not. In the process, he ends up doing a mock proposal to what he thinks is a bunch of hand-like roots by an old oak, reciting the town's founder's vows and slipping the ring onto a finger.

Turns out it's actually a root-like skeletal hand, which promptly seizes Victor's wrist and tries to pull him into the dirt. Victor fights free, only for a half-rotted corpse bride to rise from the earth. He flees for the bridge – she follows and catches up before he can make it back to town. Victor faints as she goes to kiss him, and wakes in a strange and colorful world that he is informed is the Land of the Dead. Apparently everyone thinks he and the corpse – Emily – are married thanks to him speaking the vows. Victor blurts out that it was a joke – then, seeing Emily well up, clarifies he had no idea she was even there. He asks who she is and how she even came to rise – her friend Bonejangles steps in, explaining through song that she's a murdered bride, killed by the man who promised to elope with her, who vowed to wait under that tree for her true love to set her free. Victor feels awful for giving her false hope, and asks if they can talk more privately. Emily leads him to one of her favorite lookout spots, where they run into Victor's old dog Scraps (now just a skeleton). Victor apologizes for the misunderstanding, and Emily apologizes for frightening him – she was just so excited about finally being married. They talk a bit about Upstairs versus Downstairs, and Emily admits that she misses the living world and would love to see it again. Victor decides that maybe this is the least he can do for her and asks if he can take her up on a pseudo-date (after clearing it with Victoria first). Emily is all for this, and they head over to Elder Gutknecht's, the local magician, who provides them with a spell to return to the Land of the Living after sunset and stay there all night – once dawn breaks, Victor will remain, and Emily return Downstairs. They spend the time until nightfall touring the Land of the Dead – Victor finds he quite likes it and Emily, and tells her that, even if the circumstances aren't the best, he's glad he met her. She is too.

Finally, night comes, and the two return to the Living world. Emily pulls Victor into an impromptu dance in the moonlight, then Victor asks her to wait in the woods while he gets Victoria and brings her around to explain. He heads over to the Everglots. . .only to find the police there, and the Lord and Lady in a tizzy. Turns out, while he was in the woods, the elder Everglots finally talked Victoria into meeting one of their chosen men – one Lord Barkis Bittern, a newcomer to town who's been sweet-talking them. Victoria went to meet him at the coffee shop – and now they've gotten a note from Barkis saying that they'll never see her alive again unless they pony up fifty thousand pounds – a sum of money they just don't have. A horrified Victor checks in with his parents to let them know he's all right (there was some worry that he'd gotten kidnapped too), then sprints back to Emily to give her the news. Emily is equally horrified – and a little concerned, as the man who murdered her was named Edward Barkis. Victor gives her the description he got from the Everglots, in case he spotted the guy – yup, that's the bastard who killed her! Emily's certain that, even if Barkis does get the money, he'll probably kill Victoria anyway, so time is of the essence in finding her. They use the "emergency escape clause" in the spell to head back Downstairs, and explain things to Gutknecht, who agrees to help. Victor gives Gutknecht a flower Victoria gave him earlier in the day to help him track down her location, while Emily rounds up a bunch of her dead friends to storm the place and rescue her. Gutknecht finds Victoria in, of all places, the church – the gang descends on it, and finds both Galswells and Victoria tied up, with Barkis standing guard. He's – naturally a little shocked to see a bunch of walking corpses demanding he free his captives, but manages to regain his wits in time to steal General Bonesaparte's sword and duel Victor (who gets a barbecue fork from Ms. Plum that he uses rather well). Emily saves Victor from a fatal stabbing after Barkis disarms him, and a sneaky call to the police from Bonejangles summons them to save Victoria and Galswells. Barkis is brought in, Victor and Victoria are reunited, and the dead prepare to head back down Below. Victor introduces Victoria to Emily, and they thank her for her part in saving her. Emily thanks them in return, saying she was happy to spare Victoria a variation on her own fate and that she's thrilled to see her murderer finally brought to justice. She says that she'll probably be moving on for real to whatever's next soon, now that that's no longer hanging over her head, but that she'll keep them close in her heart. They say a heartfelt goodbye, and Victor and Victoria head home.

May 29th, 2004: The next day, Victoria apologies to Victor, but says the whole experience has badly rattled her and she'd like to take a break from dating while she processes it all. (In fact, she plans to take a break from the whole village, having talked her parents into reopening an abandoned summer home that they were never able to sell for a couple of months.) Victor understands – his parents do not, and he ends up on their shit list for supposedly letting her slip through his fingers. Even worse, Galswells immediately starts accusing Victor of dark sorcery because of the walking dead (never mind that they helped save his life). Few people take Galswells seriously, but even those who don't blame Victor for apparently driving the man out of his mind, and he becomes a figure of mockery and derision in the village.

July 4th, 2004: Alice, having endured about half a year of only semi-effective therapy from Bumby in the Houndsditch Home, suffers another psychotic break while visiting Pris Witless (who took to blackmailing her about a comment she made while not really with it that suggests she might have some responsibility for her family's death) and tumbles back into a freshly-corrupted Wonderland. This time, the source of her troubles isn't the Queen, but some sort of terrible Infernal Train built in the factories of Hatter's Domain, which flies across the landscape spewing a horrible black goo called Ruin everywhere. Alice battles her away across various domains trying to track down who commissioned the Train and how to stop the Ruin, while in reality she wanders in a hallucinatory daze across London over the course of about two months. During her travels, she almost drowns in the Thames after falling in; narrowly escapes a fire at her old nanny's bar (and secret brothel), set by said nanny's ex-pimp; runs afoul of the police by causing a scene at her old family lawyer's house looking for her beloved toy rabbit; and ends up briefly back at Rutledge when the local cops decide she's too much of a danger to herself to roam unsupervised. She goes catatonic again for a bit as she braves the last of her domains, and awakens with the terrible knowledge that Bumby killed her family – and worse, his activities at Houndsditch are a front for child prostitution. He isn't removing the painful memories of the children under his care – he's wiping their minds entirely and selling them to unsavory sorts! She tries to convince the staff of Rutledge of this, but none except Dr. Wilson and Nurse Darling are willing to listen to her – and even they can't do anything without proof. Superintendent Monroe forces her to return with Bumby when he comes to pick her up. . .

September 7th, 2004: So Alice confronts Bumby herself about his wrongdoings shortly afterward, cornering him in the Moorgate Underground during a quiet moment. Bumby smugly admits that she's right, claiming he's giving the children under his care a "new purpose" – and that Lizzie deserved what she got. Alice realizes that the key he uses to hypnotize people is in fact her sister's room key, and reclaims it, furiously telling him she'll go to the police with it. Bumby tells her no one will ever believe her – Alice points out the security camera, but Bumby tells her it hasn't worked for months (he made sure of that, since he uses this station to drop off kids sometimes) and that the key isn't enough to reopen her case. She can either storm off in a huff and return to the asylum, or submit to his care as the "tasty bit" he'd hoped to make her.

Alice takes a third option and pushes him in front of an oncoming train.

Fortunately, she's able to spin the incident as an accident (Bumby falling in front of the train) and – after a search of Houndsditch reveals his private journal, with the ledger for his less-savory activities – no one's much inclined to look too much into his death. Alice still thinks that it might be a good idea to get out of the country, though, just in case. Besides, after all that's happened, she craves a fresh start in a new world. She gets the help of Dr. Wilson (now the director of Houndsditch) to track down her rabbit, and prepares to go as far from London as possible – Los Angeles, California.

September 10th, 2004: Around the same time, Victor finally snaps when he receives a letter from Victoria, telling him her parents have decided not to move back to Burtonsville as they don't want to confront the memory of Barkis – or the Van Dorts. Without the hope that they'll be reunited and possibly resume their relationship, Victor decides to leave Burtonsville himself, concocting a story for his parents about wanting to go to college overseas. He too eventually decides that Los Angeles, California is the perfect place to go and starts making plans.

October 1st, 2004: Emily, having finished up what she wanted in the Underworld and said goodbye to all her friends, prepares to move on to whatever comes next. With Elder Gutknecht's help, she moves Upstairs for one final look at the moonlight before releasing her soul. . .

Only to have said soul snagged and bottled by a mysterious stranger. Trapped and only vaguely aware of what's happening to her, Emily is taken back to the Giovanni mansion, where she becomes part of a strange ritual. To her shock, the ritual restores to her a – well, semi-alive body; she's basically a very well put-together and sentient zombie. The resident Giovanni are impressed with her construction, but displeased she won't follow orders (they were expecting a servant), and lock her in the basement of their mansion for further experiments.

October 7th, 2004: Emily gains a cellmate – Lizzie Liddell! Turns out her soul was snagged by another Giovanni around the same time Emily's was, and she too was subject to the same ritual – with the same result. The two girls quickly bond over their shared backstory of "a rotten man plundered and murdered me" (if in two different ways), and their worries about their living friends (Victor and Victoria) and family (Alice).

October 10th, 2004: Getting frustrated with the failure of their latest necromantic ritual, the Giovanni try just yanking a soul straight out of the Underworld at random. By sheer chance (or perhaps the table still being contaminated with a bit of Emily's hair), they get Bonejangles, who is very surprised at going from a skeleton the Ball & Socket pub to sort-of-living man on a cold slab in a mansion in L.A. He's thrown in the basement too when he won't play ball – Emily is equal parts shocked, thrilled, and horrified to see him. Lizzie takes a little time to warm up to him, but his extremely different demeanor from Bumby and the other Oxford toadies wins her over, and soon the three are planning escape attempts and wondering just what the world outside is like. . .

October 14th, 2004: Alice arrives in Los Angeles, having reclaimed her bunny and said her goodbyes to her family's graves. She manages to snag a room at a rather crappy motel at the edges of the city, and starts looking for work and a better place to live. Unfortunately, her presence is noted by one Fish, a 7th Generation Malkavian, who sees her madness and decides that she must be brought into the clan. And what better way to lure her in than putting an ad in the paper, claiming he has an apartment for rent. . .

October 20th, 2004: Victor arrives in Los Angeles – or, more specifically, Santa Monica. He snags a rather nicer hotel room and starts trying to figure out what exactly he wants to do with himself while he's here.

Three days later, the question is answered when a drunk driver plows into him, and he ends up in the local clinic. . .

#londerland bloodlines #timeline #yeah I started on the story #and then I thought 'you know I really should figure out how exactly CB and AMA and A:MR all went down FIRST'#so here we are #I think it came out pretty well!#I might do a bit of fiddling with dates still #but yeah as a description of events before the game starts #October 21st 2004 btw #...hang on a second OCTOBER 21ST WHY DID THAT NOT REGISTER WITH ME BEFORE??#Holy crap this game was CRYING OUT for a BTTF crossover #not even getting into the fact I recently discovered there a very minor character named MCFLY in it. . .#anyway yes this works and I am happy with it #queued

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marvelandponder · 7 years

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Lost Episodes? Well, You Better Go Find Them!

Ever browse through the internet looking for the lost ideas that never made it air? Have you gone to conventions just to hear the insight on what the show staff left out? Are you already on board thus defeating the purpose of me giving a third example?

As a fan who enjoys the occasional interview, commentary, or behind-the-scenes tid-bit, that describes me pretty well.

I always like hearing the stories we could’ve gotten. To me, there’s an element of intrigue, and the same feeling I get hearing urban legends except with the confirmation that this was in fact true information.

This month we saw the revival of the script for Fame and Misfortune, a story M.A. Larson wrote around the time the staff was writing the 5th season that was then retooled and edited to fit with the current season. In honour of that lost script getting new life, I thought I’d go through and find all the coolest lost content MLP never had to offer!

Of course, to super fans, this may not be new information (I don’t have access to the pony version of the deep web quite yet...), but hopefully there will be some surprises in here for even those who seek out the lost and unknown...

Honourable Mention Section

Debunked Nightmare Moon the Villain for ALL of Season 1: This has since been corrected by Lauren Faust, but the original rumour was that Faust planned for the show to be a serialized, on-going story, and that instead of being defeated in the first two episodes, Nightmare Moon was supposed to reign over Equestria for all 26 episodes. We now know Lauren always planned for the show to be an ensemble comedy, but it was a very cool rumour nonetheless - Source (x)

Lost Pinkie Pie Songs by Amy Keating Rogers: In the Season 1 finale The Best Night Ever, Amy Keating Rogers says Pinkie was meant to sing a few more songs that she wrote for her. These would’ve been the standard early seasons Pinkie songs, one being called the Pinkie Conga - Source: (x)

The Hub Commercials: While not exactly lost (and hence not on the list), new fans of the show might not have been around before the switch from the Hub to Discovery Family, and have no idea about these hidden gems. These relics include, but aren’t limited to an April Fools series trailer for a Cowboy BeBop inspired Spike spinoff called Dragonfire, a dub of the 2014 Maleficent trailer by the official cast with Discord as Maleficent, and a parody of Kay Perry’s California Girls called Equestria Girls that predates the series of the same name!

3 Scootaloo Episodes Dealing with her Disability in the First 2 Seasons: Since we ended up getting an episode that dealt with this topic in the form of Flight to the Finish, this didn’t quite make the list, but it almost did based on the fact that was originally supposed to be an arc. Scootaloo would’ve taken 3 episodes to learn that she would never fly and achieve her dream of being like Rainbow Dash, according to Lauren Faust, but ultimately, the little squirt would learn her real worth didn’t depend on her wings or abilities - Source: (x)

Lightning Dust’s Redemption: Anybody out there holding out for hope for Lightning Dust? What if I told you she could’ve already been redeemed? Well, it’s true. Our good friend Megan McCarthy released two portions of the original ending on her Twitter, including one where Lightning Dust become Rainbow Dash’s wing pony (Source: x):

Derpy’s Deleted Flashback Scene, The Last Roundup: Remember how people got mad about Derpy’s voice and clumsy behaviour? Well that was nothing compared to the destruction they had planned. Originally, there was going to be a flashback to Derpy accidentally destroying the town hall, thus giving the episode an inciting incident. Amy Keating Rogers let us in on the original scene (Source: x x), and well, it wouldn’t have ended pretty:

With those out of the way, let’s get to the real list of unreleased goodness! Remember, all of these have been confirmed, and you can check the sources as they’re provided for proof.

#10. Lauren Faust’s Big Mac Episode

Imagine a timeline where we got a Big Mac episode in season 1. Now imagine that was going to be our timeline.

Lauren Faust originally planned to have an episode starring Big Mac that featured the then monosyllabic stallion going through his daily life with his three outspoken family members. She’s described it on her Deviantart thusly:

“Big Mac is a stallion of little words. He just keeps his opinions to himself. I think he knows he's around three opinionated mares and it's easiest to just go with the flow. We had a Big Mac centered episode idea where he was helping all three of them one day, just going along with what they wanted to keep the peace (the running gag being that his three family members were quite verbose and he spoke only with facial expressions) but finally got fed up and took off. The Apple ladies worried that they had taken his easy going nature for granted and made a big production out of apologizing and promising not to take him for granted ever again, only to find out that he went into town to get another hand- er, hoof- to help. Of course the only words he'd say were to graciously accept their apologies and promises anyway. I thought it was cute and I LOVE non-verbal gags and acting in cartoons, but it was turned down.” - Source: (x)

We clearly never got the episode, but MLP comics issues #9 and 10, Zen and the Art of Gazebo Repair, did end up following Big Mac through a chaotic day and relying mostly on his expression to get across his feelings. Whether this mini-arc was inspired by the lost episode, we may never know, but we got a good story out of it all the same. Eeyup.

#9. Rainbow and Applejack Help a Deer Family Episode

Once again, Lauren Faust provides! Since working on the show, Faust has said that one of the early episode concepts involved Rainbow Dash and Applejack stumbling across a deer family with a young pony who thought he was a deer. Perhaps cut for its similarities to Over a Barrel, the episode’s conflict would’ve centered around RD and AJ taking sides of the issue on whether or not to burst the “deer’s” bubble.

Ironically, Applejack and Rainbow Dash took surprising positions on the issue, given their Elements: Rainbow Dash wanted to break the news to the pony, whereas Applejack wanted to leave well enough alone.

Jokes about their Elements being switched aside, I would imagine this episode would’ve established the depth of their characters outside of their roles as the Elements of Harmony. Rainbow Dash would rather speak her mind and be blunt and deal with the consequences afterward despite her loyalty, and Applejack would rather tell a lie if it meant keeping a family together.

In my opinion, this most likely would’ve set precedent that even the each of the Mane 6′s Elements have areas of exception, and those areas reveal something about each pony.

And, if all that wasn’t cool enough for you, this episode also took place in White Tail Woods, which is where it got the name that stuck with the show despite the episode concept being lost. You can still find White Tail Woods on the official map to this day.

Source: (x)

#8. The Curious Case of FlutterDragon

Here’s a famous one, but a fascinating one: Normally during conventions like Comic Con or BronyCon, when a voice actor gives out information on an upcoming season, it’s pretty reliable (unless it’s obviously a joke).

So, the Comic Con before season 3 rolled around, and as usual, we were getting a lot great information on the upcoming season. Trixie would be returning? There would be a Twilight and Spike duet? Score! One piece of information that stood out, however, was from Tabitha St. Germain, who as you most likely know voices Rarity and Luna.

She said that her favourite recording session was for the episode that “Fluttershy turns into a dragon.”

Not the episode where Fluttershy faces a dragon or anything like that that had already aired.

Megan McCarthy eventually had to debunk this theory via Twitter, but I kept this on the list because it came from an official source all the same. A recording session that never made it to air that, to this day, hasn’t been explained? Now that’s mysterious.

I have to wonder if that was a warm-up of some sort, just to get the voice actresses in character. Of all the staff members, Tabitha is one of the least likely to just troll the fandom, so I still have to believe she was truly referencing something. Even Andrea Libman, Fluttershy herself, seemed to know what she was talking about as Tabitha described it being funny hearing Fluttershy’s soft voice coming out of a giant dragon.

The story behind this pick alone is enough to make me wonder...

Source: (x)

#7. Rarity’s Deleted Scene in Luna Eclipsed

Have you ever noticed that there’s one pony missing in Luna Eclipsed?

Well, Rarity originally had a scene that explains her absence. Lauren Faust to the rescue again!:

“...May I ask why Rarity wasn't in it? Lauren: She was in the script. Sounds like she got cut. Kitmit: What was she supposed to do in the script? You think she would of made herself some fabulous nightmare night costume... Lauren: She was still working on her costume, and perfectionist as she is, it wasn't ready. (I forget what it was.) There was a whole sequence where Twilight brought Luna to Rarity's for a makeover, hoping she could give Luna a "softer," less intimidating look. Rarity freaked out about getting to dress up a Princess and over did it, covering her in the pinkiest pink princess get up ever. Luna disliked it and in taking it off, had a piece of the dress in her mouth. Pinkie showed up just at that moment and screamed that Nightmare Moon ate a princess and all the kids screamed and ran. Source - (x)

Rarity’s over-dramatics most likely would’ve made this scene hilarious had it made it to the final cut, and honestly, that’s all I need to say. Tabitha St. Germain might’ve spread the FlutterDragon rumour by accident, but she’s one hell of a comedic voice actress, and her playing off of herself and Tara Strong for a scene could’ve been a stellar performance.

At least we know where Rarity was the whole time now... and judging by Scare Master, she learned her lesson and just went with something less than utter perfection the year after. Does that count as character development?

#6. Zecora’s Mentor Role

This might be common knowledge for hardcore fans as well, but in hindsight it’s such a loss that it deserves it’s own spot.

Zecora has become critically underutilized, especially in later seasons, but that wasn’t always meant to be the case. Zecora was originally meant to fill the mentor role in Twilight’s life while Celestia was busy in Canterlot. Of course, Twilight would still write to Celestia for guidance, but Faust also said:

“If we had penned more adventure stories, the only difference I can think of is that perhaps you would have seen more of Luna and Zecora. Zecora was designed to be a sage and mentor to whom the ponies could go for information about their quests. She was designed to be a second mentor to Twilight, but that didn’t come to pass.” Source: (x)

We can see bits of this throughout the series, though, in episodes like Secret of My Excess, The Cutie Pox, and Magic Duel.

If she were Twilight’s second mentor, it might have even been interesting to have a conflict between Zecora and Celestia about some kind of magic, leaving Twilight in the middle to struggle with the fact that both of the authority figures might not be teaching her the right solution, and it’s up to her to decide. Just some speculation, based on where Twilight’s character would’ve been at the time...

Perhaps Zecora’s role can be reclaimed in the future, as she’s included in more episodes to come. But for now, we can only think of what might’ve been.

#5. Sunset’s Duet, Homesickness Storyline, and Alternate Ending to Friendship Games

Okay, so this is definitely well known, but given just how well-constructed and nearly finalized this story-arc was, I couldn’t leave it off the list! Plus, something something Sunset Shimmer bias.

Thanks to the Friendship Games DVD extras, you can watch all the deleted scenes, including the duet, over here if you’ve never seen them:

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I always found the parallels drawn so satisfying, even if the alternate ending had Sci-Twi leaving for Crystal Prep.

In hindsight, what’s even more interesting is that they’ve seemed to go in the opposite direction with Sunset: when she finally did return to Equestria, it was rather reluctantly, and only briefly. Despite the fact that she has friends and an ex-mentor on the other side, she seems to be eager to stay in the human world.

Or, maybe she’s avoiding somepony...

Seeing how completely opposite things could’ve turned out is fascinating in and of itself.

#4. Lost Slice of Life Gags

How could that episode get any crazier? Slice of Life is already the epitome of our absolutely wild fandom, what more could there be?

Well, of course, M.A. Larson does not disappoint for this list, providing some insight into missing scenes like a Devil Went Down to Georgia inspired cello battle between Octavia and King Sombra.

In fact, there’s a whole list of cuts:

“In the first draft Vinyl Scratch's talked, but they told him she doesn't talk, so it was removed in phase 2.

The original Vinyl Scratch and Octavia scene involved Vinyl crashing at Octavia's house and destroying her sofa. So she goes to Quills and Sofas to buy a new one. They weren't originally roommates, but The Hub and Hasbro made them roommates.

Flash Sentry was originally in the script. He was following Cranky asking why no one likes him.

Another cut scene was a group of ponies coming in, and a group of their recolor ponies running into them, followed by awkwardness.

His original reason for not wanting to bowl, was because he had trauma as a kid where he couldn't figure out the physics behind it, which lead to his science focused career.

Outside of episode 100, there was originally a cut scene where after Twilight is coronated, Rainbow Dash and her fly around Equestria, eventually ending up in dragonland where they do a musical scene.There was a scene where Derpy is saying "I don't know what to do doc! I don't know what to do!" and the camera pans over to reveal Dr. Caballeron, revealing Derpy at the wrong table with the wrong doctor. Gags like this were throughout the entire original script.

After everyone is gone and in the town hall, the bat ponies and royal guards are outside doing silly impressions of Princess Luna and Celestia. "Every day shall be cake day!".

At one point, Lyra tells Bonbon to "stop using that ridiculous voice!" to make fun of her other voices.

In the script, Gummy had a french accent.

There was a moment where Doctor Whooves is running up to Carousel Boutique, and he sees Opal and Tom.

A scene between Coco Pommel and the pony from season one in Boast Busters with the green mane that Rarity accidently insults was cut. She had a full green wedding ensemble on with Coco's stamp of approval, and said she couldn't wait until Rarity saw it as revenge. Coco Pommel then says she doesn't really like green, and asks for anything in pink.

The original ending had the hugging scene with the mane 6 being their usual end-of-episode corny selves, but the camera pans to the sunset where a changeling army is flying in...”

Source: (x)

This episode went through a lot of research and development to get just right, and even I would’ve loved to see all of that be left in, we ultimately only have so much run-time per episode.

But if that weren’t enough to convince of why I admire M.A. Larson as a writer...

#3. Fillidelphia Ragtime

I suppose you might be wondering how a single undeveloped episode idea can beat out all that Slice of Life goodness.

Well, it comes down to structure, adult (but nowhere near too adult) implications, and a really intriguing idea.

I’ll let Larson make the pitch himself:

youtube

(55:24-57:50)

Larson pretty much immediately sold me on this. I think because there’s a part of me that loves implying the maturity of these characters without going into it for the kids sake, and honestly, it would be so much damn fun.

This episode was never meant to be, it seems, but damn is it ever a good premise.

2.5. Twilight Nearly Resigns From Being a Princess

Note: I stumbled on this one late in the game and instead of bumping something off the list, I decided to cheat and give you all an extra pick. I’m a stinker that way.

We know Twilight wasn’t always so sure about herself as the Princess of Friendship, but did you know she almost gave it up?

“In "Amending Fences," Twilight is at her lowest low and goes to visit Celestia in the middle of the night. She tells her mentor that she has to give up her role as princess of friendship because of how her past actions have affected Moondancer. She says, "How can I tell others about the magic of friendship if I've killed that spirit in somepony else?" Celestia then surprises her by saying that the lesson Twilight is in Canterlot to learn is one that she herself has only recently learned. Twilight is surprised...Celestia knows everything about everything. But Celestia looks out the window at the moon and says, "Some relationships are so broken, so filled with bitterness and anger that they seem impossible to mend. But the lesson you're here to learn now is that it's never too late to repair a broken friendship." So Celestia uses her own experience, her gradual rebuilding of trust and friendship with her own sister, to tell Twilight that everyone goes through it. This gives Twilight the hope that she can fix things with Moondancer. I thought it was a nice scene, but you only have 22 minutes and this was an easy cut.”

Source: (x)

Easy cut my ass! That’s a huge deal! Twilight would’ve come through in the end anyway, but it’s still interesting to know how close she could’ve come to giving it all up...

#2. Seapony Two-Parter

Seaponies? In G4? Don’t be ridiculous....

But it was true. One of Lauren Faust’s ideas at that. She would’ve designed them after the sea ponies of the first generation, with a plot sounding preeetty darn cool:

“Hasbro never asked for seaponies, but other ideas that had nothing to do with them. Lauren was hoping for a two-episode special so that she could have the proper build up and payoff for the seaponies, but the idea never came up. Lauren planned for the style of the seaponies to be the same as G1 with seapony bodies and pony heads. While Lauren didn't have the seaponies in her show bible, she had a plan for incorporating them. The episodes included one of the seaponies washing up on the Equestrian beach and begging for their kingdom to be helped. Their kingdom would be in the Equestrian Ocean, drawing inspiration from Greek and European mythology. She even thought about using the Kraken as a villain.” Source: (x)

Undersea shenanigans and the chance to make a genuinely terrifying sea monster the villain sounds perfect, to be honest. This may not have fit within the schedule for the first two seasons Lauren helped work on, but lo and behold, we’re finally getting around to the fish-horses one way or another! I find it hilarious that in G4, they’re almost majestic and carry with them some sort of epic quest for the girls.

Shoo-be-doo, indeed.

#1. The Series Finale Version of Magical Mystery Cure

After all this time, Magical Mystery Cure holds up in some regards (Celestia’s Ballad is gorgeous no matter what, the animation is beautiful, etc.) but good pacing, it was doomed to never have. Writer M.A. Larson asked the studio execs if they could make it a two-parter, because at the time this was going to be it, they really didn’t know if the show would be renewed. Buut Hasbro said no, so a two-part story had to be crammed into a single episode.

Even with that aside, what was the series finale of MLP going to be like?

Larson recalls that his original script was more a Pandora’s box story than anything else. Celesita sent Twilight a box and, by letter, told her student to wait for her to get there to go over the high level magic inside. Celestia’s mistake was telling Twilight this would lead to a new level of her studies.

Twilight, of course, couldn’t handle waiting to see the amazing magic within, and just like Friendship Games, her curiosity would’ve gotten the better of her. Which, of course, is when she would’ve unleashed the cutie mark swapping spell.

Celestia would then send Twilight a letter that just read My faithful student, what have you done?

To imply that even Celestia herself couldn’t handle this.

In both versions of Magical Mystery Cure, our favourite reader becomes an author of a spell, but in Larson’s story it’s a bit more clear as to what exactly Twilight’s spell does.

Twilight wasn’t just finishing a spell to create new magic (which... only seems to undo what the first part of the spell does), she was rewriting a spell that was already in existence. The words even rearranged on the page for her.

Granted, I like the idea of Twilight standing on the shoulders of giants to earn her wings (finishing Starswirl’s spell) but what a way to end the series: with the book that opened in the first episode closing, implying that Twilight and her friends became legends.

But, in the end, I’m glad we didn’t get that version of Magical Mystery Cure, because what we did get, and what came after, was worth anything that was lost.

More Pony? I’ve got that! I do reviews and editorials! Check out the last three things I’ve done here:

Fame and Misfortune, Triple Threat, and Campfire Tales Reviews

Year of the Pony

Featured Artists of the Post Include:

Derpy’s Accident by GlancoJusticar Apple Siblings Vector by 773her Bramble Vector by CheeseDoodle96 FlutterDragon by Skyfries Rarity’s Nightmare Night by GlancoJusticar Zecora Vector by Stabzor Sunset Vector by KeronianNiroro Sombra Vector by Fercho262 Octavia Vector by WishDream Applejack Vector by Midnite99 Rainbow Dash Seapony Vector by GreenMachine987 Twilight Picture by The Shadow Stone

Go check out these talented artists! They’re nice enough to work really hard to make these vectors available with credit, so go appreciate their talent and hard work!

What Never Was and Might’ve Been

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