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Kind: captions
Language: en

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So, if you’re a fan of My Little Pony:
Friendship is Magic,

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there is a chance you are aware
of the many pieces of early concept art,

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character designs, or story elements
which are a bit different

00:00:14.440 --> 00:00:18.220
from what we actually ended up getting
in the show.

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I made an entire video going over
a bunch of these unused things

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made during the show’s
very early days of production from 2008 to 2010.

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The thing about this, however,
is that MLP G4 continued on

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for almost a whole decade
with 9 seasons worth of episodes.

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As it turns out,

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there is a ton of behind the scenes stuff
from the production of the show as a whole

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that I simply did not mention.

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This includes more concept art,
more early designs, more thematic changes,

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and even dozens of canceled episodes

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which were left on the cutting room floor forever.

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So today, I’m going to fix that.

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I am going to take a look at everything
I just mentioned, and more,

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which was made for season 1, all the way to season 9 of MLP: Friendship is Magic.

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So without further ado, here is even MORE
of the My Little Pony we never got.

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To properly kick things off,

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I'll be separating the first section of this video
into two categories,

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the first of which will be dedicated
to a bunch of concept art

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or sketches from the show.

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To start off,

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in 2013, Robin Mitchell,
an artist who worked on seasons 1 and 2 of MLP,

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decided to release
well over 100 different images

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he drew during his time on the show.

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This includes miscellaneous sketches of animals,
creatures the ponies encountered,

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and articles of clothing
like dresses or other accessories to name a few.

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I went through every single image
he made available,

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so here are the most interesting.

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There are several sketches which show off designs
for characters like the Mane Six,

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with notably some dresses
we seemingly never saw in the show.

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There are a few images showing off
this Giant Squid creature,

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which was likely the same one
who was intended to show up

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in the cancelled episode titled
“Nothing More to Sea”,

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where the Mane Six encounter a giant squid
called the Kraken.

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There’s this... Weird... sketch of an apple creature
who has a mouth,

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an early design of Pinkie Pie’s pet alligator,
Gummy,

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which shows he would’ve walked
on two legs at one point,

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And a few sketches of Twilight Sparkle’s pet,
Owlowiscious.

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There are several other
downright bizarre sketches here,

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like ponies having been turned
into bowling ball pins,

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a butterfly with slices of bread for wings,
and these slightly off putting balloons.

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If I had to guess, these were maybe all intended
for a scrapped Discord gag or something.

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There are sketches showing off
early designs of the Diamond Dogs

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we see in the episode "A Dog and Pony Show",

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there’s a few different sketches of Spike,
including a baby version of him,

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and this large version of him
that was probably intended

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for the "Secret of my Excess" episode,

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this sketch of Pinkie Pie
wearing an unused confetti contraption,

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and lastly this rendition of the MLP:
Friendship is Magic logo drawn by Robin Mitchell,

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which obviously ended up going unused.

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I actually kinda like it, as it’s quite unique
from all other My Little Pony logos,

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Especially with how the P in "pony"
is quite literally the head of a pony.

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Moving on, there are a few more pieces
of early material for specifically season 1.

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As shown in the official MLP guidebook,

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Nightmare Moon originally went through
several quite different designs

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before we got the one we know.

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She had different styles of wings, mane and tail,
she had a tiara instead of a helmet at one point,

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her helmet used to be shaped like a crescent moon,
and she even had a few different cutie mark designs.

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Some of these are okay, but it feels like
she doesn’t look like a villain in some of them.

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The one in the bottom right
had a vector made for it though,

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and it’s pretty close
when compared to the final Nightmare Moon design.

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Several years ago back in the late 2010s,

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there were several big leaks
of behind the scenes material

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made during the production of MLP:FiM.

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Included in these leaks is a lot of stuff
I will be talking about later on in this video,

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but it also had many animatics for the show,
including this one for the opening theme sequence

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which visually doesn’t have any big differences…

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...other than this obscure version
of the My Little Pony G4 logo that appears at the end.

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This was seemingly made sometime in early 2010

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as likely a placeholder logo
used during production,

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and it never saw any actual use outside of that
before getting replaced.

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Stylistically, it’s the same as the G4 logo we know,

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but the Friendship is Magic subtitle 
s emphasized more,

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and Twilight,
and for some reason Applejack without her hat,

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are also front and center here.

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Moving on to concept art for seasons 2 and beyond,

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here are a few pieces of art by Robin Mitchell,
which show off a quite early version of Discord.

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These seemingly were
the first ever sketches of him,

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dating back to mid 2010,

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and you could tell they had
a general idea of what he should look like,

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but still quite hadn’t figured it out yet.

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A few days later though,
Lauren Faust and her husband Craig McCracken,

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had a drawing session where they came up
with the Discord design we eventually got.

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His color palette
wasn’t fully decided on yet though,

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so according to this image, he could’ve potentially
ended up being colored orange,

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brown, or even white,
which is pretty interesting to see.

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According to the official
Art of Equestria book MLP book,

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Queen Chrysalis
originally had a few different designs

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where she looked more distinctly bug-like,
as if she crawled out from under a log.

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Rebecca Dart, a character designer for the show,

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apparently got a note from Hasbro
saying that those designs "weren’t scary enough",

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so she went back and redesigned her
to look more upright and commanding.

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A few incarnations of this redesign, as shown here,

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were drawn up
before the one we’re familiar with was chosen.

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Speaking of the The Art of Equestria book,

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there are a few other 
interesting pieces of concept art to look at here

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for the next few seasons.

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For the season 3 premiere,

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there’s some art here
which shows King Sombra in different forms

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where he looks more skinny and weak.

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And later on in the book for season 5,

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some early designs of Starlight Glimmer
are also shown.

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She had slightly different colored hair,

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several other manestyles
were drawn and considered,

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and she even seemingly had
a different cutie mark at one point.

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On a related note, according to Jim Miller,
a storyboard artist and director for the show,

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Starlight Glimmer as a character
was initially conceptualized as ‘Aurora Glimmer’.

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However, this was later changed

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apparently due to Disney
having filed a trademark for the name ‘Aurora’,

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and Hasbro not wanting any legal problems.

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That being said,
let’s now cover the second category I mentioned.

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A few interesting thematic
or overarching ideas for the show that got cut.

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At one point when developing season 1,

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Lauren Faust
had originally envisioned Twilight Sparkle

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as eventually graduating
from learning all about friendship in Ponyville.

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This idea seemingly got so far
that even a piece of concept art was made for it,

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showing Twilight
wearing her graduation dress and cap.

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It’s also likely that her graduating

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was intended to play a part
in a season/series finale of the show.

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According to an interview
in the official MLP guidebook,

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another story idea Lauren had considered
for season 1 and 2,

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was to give Twilight a type of insecurity complex

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due to all the pressure
of being Celestia’s student studying in Ponyville.

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They ended up kind of touching upon this concept
in the episode "Lesson Zero",

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but otherwise the idea
never fully came to fruition.

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Additionally,

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here are a few other overarching ideas
revealed in this interview.

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Princess Luna would’ve originally had, quote,
"lingering issues" with Celestia,

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and was going to have more appearances
in season 1 in general,

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with her learning how to feel good about herself
despite living in Celestia’s shadow.

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However, this never happened because of concerns
of a potential pushback from Hasbro

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regarding Luna’s ‘darkness’.

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And, Faust had also at one point considered making
an opposite version to the Elements of Harmony

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called the Elements of Discord,
which judging from their name,

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it can be assumed they were probably at some point
meant to be a part of the season 2 premiere

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where Discord is introduced.

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Aside from this interview, in numerous comments
and anecdotes made by Lauren Faust over the years,

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it’s clear that after she left the show during
the production of season 2 for creative reasons,

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Hasbro decided to make a few changes
to ideas she outlined for the future of MLP G4.

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A good example of this is how initially,

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Princess Cadance was conceptualized
as just a unicorn and not an alicorn.

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However,

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sometime after Faust was no longer involved with the show,

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someone else made the decision
to give her a pair of wings.

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Furthermore,

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Lauren Faust also never intended
for Twilight to become an alicorn

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for Twilight to become an alicorn
during her time on the show.

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The plans she made seemingly only included

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Twilight becoming specifically just a princess
at the end of season 3,

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and nothing else.

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The show certainly would’ve been quite different
if these overarching ideas weren’t changed.

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That being said,

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I think now is a good time
for the second portion of this video.

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The many cancelled, scrapped, and rejected episodes
of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic,

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the ones which were never meant
to see the light of day.

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For context, most of what I’ll talk about here
was either leaked online years ago,

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or revealed by people who worked on the show.

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And for the sake of clarity,

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something you will quickly notice
about these cancelled episodes

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is how short and kinda vague they seem.

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This is because almost all of them were rejected

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long before any type of actual full scripts
could be written.

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What I’ll be looking at
was only ever meant to pitch and convey

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the general ideas and themes of the episodes,
so don’t expect anything super in depth.

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To start off,

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the first of many cancelled,
or in this case, early versions of episodes

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was this one from season 1 titled “A Date to Dance”.

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It would’ve been about Big Mac,
who for context used to be named Big Apple,

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somehow getting two tickets
to attend the Grand Galloping Gala in Canterlot.

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Despite Applejack telling them not to,

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all 5 of the rest of the Mane Six
attempt to ask out her brother on a date

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so they can go to the gala.

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Applejack then gets into a bunch of hijinks
trying to stop them from getting close to Big Mac.

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As far as I can tell, this was the predecessor
to the episode “Ticket Master”

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And I can understand why
the whole "Big Mac" aspect of it was scrapped,

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as it feels kind of out of place
for the characters here.

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Next, here is an episode titled “Label Pains”,

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which would’ve followed Princess Celestia
telling the Mane Six

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to take over the construction of a dam
used for Canterlot’s water supply.

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The original team assigned to it, consisting of
half beaver, half ogre creatures called ‘Beavorcs’,

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are doing a quote “crappy job”.

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The Beavorcs don’t really like the ponies
telling them what to do,

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and effectively try to sabotage
the efforts of the Mane Six,

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putting the city of Canterlot
in danger of being flooded.

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The Mane Six prove themselves and save the day,
and the Beavorcs learn to not judge others.

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It seems like this episode
would’ve leaned into Lauren Faust’s vision

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of having more adventure themed episodes

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where the main characters went out
and encountered new creatures

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while learning lessons.

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This aspect of the show was largely cut out though,

00:13:51.630 --> 00:13:55.790
mostly because of the tight production schedule
and budget.

00:13:56.320 --> 00:13:59.870
In my original My Little Pony We Never Got video,

00:13:59.870 --> 00:14:05.040
I briefly mentioned a cancelled episode
titled “Fancy Meeting You Deer”,

00:14:05.040 --> 00:14:07.280
which only had a vague description

00:14:07.280 --> 00:14:12.260
about the Mane Six finding a pony in the forest
who thinks he’s a deer.

00:14:12.260 --> 00:14:12.980
Well,

00:14:12.980 --> 00:14:18.960
I found the actual full outline for the episode
which goes into a lot more detail.

00:14:18.960 --> 00:14:24.670
It would’ve followed a few of the main characters
finding a tribe of deer in a forest

00:14:24.670 --> 00:14:28.600
while trying to find a cure
to an illness Spike has.

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Among the tribe, however,

00:14:30.270 --> 00:14:37.440
is a deer called Shambi, who isn’t actually a deer,
but rather a pony who doesn’t have a cutie mark

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and was adopted by the tribe at a young age.

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The ponies notice his antlers
are actually just sticks tied to his head,

00:14:45.600 --> 00:14:52.900
and it becomes evident that all the deer in the tribe
are actively lying to Shambi about him being a deer,

00:14:52.900 --> 00:14:56.050
as he truly believes he legit is one.

00:14:56.050 --> 00:15:01.640
He eventually discovers the truth, and feels like
he doesn’t belong with the tribe anymore,

00:15:01.640 --> 00:15:04.520
so he goes to Ponyville with the ponies.

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While in town,

00:15:05.660 --> 00:15:11.390
Shambi notices they are treating Spike’s sickness
in the wrong way and corrects them,

00:15:11.390 --> 00:15:13.540
instantly making him feel better.

00:15:13.540 --> 00:15:18.280
The tribe of deer come into Ponyville
to try to convince Shambi to come back,

00:15:18.280 --> 00:15:24.800
and he initially refuses,
but then he suddenly earns his cutie mark, a feather,

00:15:24.800 --> 00:15:30.120
which in the tribe apparently symbolizes
a young deer finding their purpose.

00:15:30.120 --> 00:15:33.800
He has a special talent
in identifying poisonous things,

00:15:33.800 --> 00:15:37.120
so he takes this as a sign the tribe needs him.

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He returns with the deer,

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and the episode ends with the lesson that
wherever you can find friendship and community

00:15:43.730 --> 00:15:45.680
is where you belong.

00:15:45.680 --> 00:15:48.480
What I find most interesting about this

00:15:48.480 --> 00:15:55.830
is how we eventually did get actual deer designs
in MLP G4 years later in 2018,

00:15:55.830 --> 00:16:02.080
but it feels like the original vision for them
as outlined here was quite different.

00:16:02.080 --> 00:16:03.760
If you didn’t know,

00:16:03.760 --> 00:16:09.820
it’s a somewhat commonly known piece of trivia
that who would later become the character Trixie

00:16:09.820 --> 00:16:13.520
was actually conceptualized as a male pony.

00:16:13.520 --> 00:16:18.760
This is a fact which has been confirmed
by people like Lauren Faust herself.

00:16:18.760 --> 00:16:24.860
Well, I managed to find the original premise
for the episode Trixie is introduced in,

00:16:24.860 --> 00:16:28.360
"Boast Busters", where she was a stallion.

00:16:28.360 --> 00:16:33.200
One day, a boy unicorn from a neighboring village
visits Ponyville.

00:16:33.200 --> 00:16:38.860
He annoyingly hypes himself up
as the most magical unicorn in all of Equestria

00:16:38.860 --> 00:16:41.420
and challenges the townsponies,

00:16:41.420 --> 00:16:45.100
but Twilight, being humble,
doesn’t want to get involved.

00:16:45.100 --> 00:16:49.500
Applejack and Rainbow Dash
are beaten by the unicorn in a challenge,

00:16:49.500 --> 00:16:55.180
and in contrast to what happens in Boast Busters,
the unicorn is so full of himself

00:16:55.180 --> 00:16:59.590
that he starts antagonizing ponies
who never wanted to compete.

00:16:59.590 --> 00:17:05.920
He out parties Pinkie Pie, out sparkles Rarity,
and even out cares Fluttershy.

00:17:05.920 --> 00:17:09.770
This causes Twilight
to reluctantly accept his magic challenge,

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where she puts him in his place by defeating him.

00:17:12.930 --> 00:17:14.810
It’s quite interesting to see

00:17:14.810 --> 00:17:20.600
that an alternate version of Boast Busters
with this iteration of Trixie exists.

00:17:20.600 --> 00:17:27.110
Fun fact, one of the show’s writers, Chris Savino,
was apparently the one who saw this premise,

00:17:27.110 --> 00:17:32.800
and suggested to Lauren Faust
that Trixie be turned into a female character.

00:17:34.490 --> 00:17:41.600
To start off with the season 2 episodes,
here’s a premise for one titled “Jewel Thieves”.

00:17:41.600 --> 00:17:47.480
Twilight Sparkle needs to get an important text
in the library archives in Canterlot

00:17:47.480 --> 00:17:52.580
so she uses teleportation Jewels Princess Celestia gave her

00:17:52.580 --> 00:17:54.480
to instantly travel there,

00:17:54.480 --> 00:17:59.460
reluctantly letting Rarity, Fluttershy
and Applejack tag along.

00:17:59.460 --> 00:18:03.160
The latter 3 have a good time
doing things in Canterlot,

00:18:03.160 --> 00:18:06.260
and they all later teleport back to Ponyville.

00:18:06.260 --> 00:18:09.240
Everything seems fine, until it becomes apparent

00:18:09.240 --> 00:18:14.760
that Twilight’s friends are purposely
taking advantage of her access to the jewels

00:18:14.760 --> 00:18:20.440
by making up excuses to go back to Canterlot
so they can buy and do more stuff there.

00:18:20.440 --> 00:18:25.410
This culminates in all 4 of them
using up Twilight’s supply of jewels

00:18:25.410 --> 00:18:27.890
and getting stuck in Canterlot.

00:18:27.890 --> 00:18:33.790
Princess Celestia sees them and unexpectedly
confronts Twilight about Pinkie Pie

00:18:33.790 --> 00:18:38.890
who has apparently been sending Celestia
quote “Twitterlike messages”,

00:18:38.890 --> 00:18:44.640
such as “Am eating spaghetti and throwing confetti.
Hey that rhymes! LOL!!!”.

00:18:44.640 --> 00:18:49.690
Applejack, Rarity, and Fluttershy
admit they were taking advantage of Twilight

00:18:49.690 --> 00:18:51.070
and apologize,

00:18:51.070 --> 00:18:55.500
ot before the episode ends
with Celestia casually pointing out

00:18:55.500 --> 00:19:00.520
the free teleportation jewel dispenser
right behind them.

00:19:00.520 --> 00:19:04.960
According to Lauren Faust,
in the episode ‘Luna Eclipsed’,

00:19:04.960 --> 00:19:10.010
there was originally a scene
with Luna inside Rarity’s boutique,

00:19:10.010 --> 00:19:13.900
however, it got cut out of the script
for time reasons.

00:19:13.900 --> 00:19:19.220
I managed to find the outline of this scene,
which goes as follows.

00:19:19.220 --> 00:19:25.220
Rarity is still busy inside her Carousel boutique
making her costume for Nightmare Night,

00:19:25.220 --> 00:19:27.600
when Luna and Twilight enter.

00:19:27.600 --> 00:19:31.680
Luna wants to have a new look
that comes off as less intimidating

00:19:31.680 --> 00:19:34.520
and more approachable to the average pony.

00:19:34.520 --> 00:19:39.280
Rarity gets super excited
over the opportunity to dress up a princess,

00:19:39.280 --> 00:19:43.440
and briefly mentions
she’s a fan of Luna’s "Goth" look.

00:19:43.440 --> 00:19:46.430
She evidently goes a bit overboard though,

00:19:46.430 --> 00:19:51.630
as she dresses up Luna
in a stereotypical pink princess costume.

00:19:51.630 --> 00:19:55.420
Luna doesn’t like it
and begins to take it off with her teeth,

00:19:55.420 --> 00:20:02.080
when Pinkie Pie suddenly barges in and assumes
Luna had just finished gobbling up a princess.

00:20:02.080 --> 00:20:06.940
Pinkie screams and runs out the door,
as the scene ends.

00:20:06.940 --> 00:20:10.350
The next episode was called “Put a Stork in It”.

00:20:10.350 --> 00:20:16.140
Pinkie Pie loves her unofficial position
as a taste tester at the Sweet Shoppe,

00:20:16.140 --> 00:20:20.570
which for context,
was just an early name for Sugarcube Corner.

00:20:20.570 --> 00:20:24.110
She loves it
not only because she gets to eat sweets,

00:20:24.110 --> 00:20:28.380
but also because she gets to spend a lot of time
with Mrs. Cake

00:20:28.380 --> 00:20:31.000
who she sees as a mother figure.

00:20:31.000 --> 00:20:34.960
Gradually, however,
Mrs. Cake spends less time with her,

00:20:34.960 --> 00:20:37.750
because she’s going to have a baby soon.

00:20:37.750 --> 00:20:41.380
Pinkie seems to be completely oblivious to this
though,

00:20:41.380 --> 00:20:45.200
as she believes
Mrs. Cake is purposely ignoring her.

00:20:45.200 --> 00:20:50.710
So, she runs away for a bit,
not before returning with a mail delivery pony

00:20:50.710 --> 00:20:54.700
because she doesn’t understand
how babies get delivered.

00:20:54.700 --> 00:20:59.820
Quote: “Big sisters Rarity and Applejack
take her aside to explain”,

00:20:59.820 --> 00:21:01.600
and everything turns out fine,

00:21:01.600 --> 00:21:07.000
with the friendship lesson being
to not immediately jump to big conclusions.

00:21:07.000 --> 00:21:12.450
This premise was essentially
an early version of the season 2 episode ‘Baby Cakes’,

00:21:12.450 --> 00:21:17.890
just with no actual babies
and Pinkie seems weirdly naive here.

00:21:18.910 --> 00:21:25.750
For pretty much the entirety of Lauren Faust’s time
developing and working on MLP:FiM,

00:21:25.750 --> 00:21:28.480
she made an effort to purposely avoid

00:21:28.480 --> 00:21:34.080
writing any actual serious romance
or love story plotlines for the show,

00:21:34.080 --> 00:21:37.500
especially any involving
the Mane Six characters,

00:21:37.500 --> 00:21:43.440
as she believed they were largely overdone
and reductive in cartoons for girls.

00:21:43.440 --> 00:21:46.110
During the production of season 2, however,

00:21:46.110 --> 00:21:48.820
she wrote a short premise for an episode

00:21:48.820 --> 00:21:52.270
which would later be turned
into ‘Hearts and Hooves Day”.

00:21:52.270 --> 00:21:55.360
It was titled simply ‘Valentines Day’,

00:21:55.360 --> 00:22:00.130
and was about a Sadie-Hawkins type dance
being held in Ponyville

00:22:00.130 --> 00:22:04.350
and everybody has dates for it,
except for Twilight Sparkle.

00:22:04.350 --> 00:22:07.510
That is until she meets Storm Cloud,

00:22:07.510 --> 00:22:11.290
an old friend of Rainbow Dash
who’s cool and street wise,

00:22:11.290 --> 00:22:14.190
and she quickly forms a crush on him.

00:22:14.190 --> 00:22:19.890
Twilight tries and fails to impress Storm Cloud
by faking acting all tough,

00:22:19.890 --> 00:22:23.020
and she thinks
she’s messed up her chances with him,

00:22:23.020 --> 00:22:27.380
until it’s revealed that he’s also a bookworm
just like her.

00:22:27.380 --> 00:22:32.700
The main lesson here being that
she should’ve just been herself the whole time.

00:22:32.700 --> 00:22:37.240
This Valentines Day episode
was never actually worked on

00:22:37.240 --> 00:22:39.090
beyond this tiny premise,

00:22:39.090 --> 00:22:42.690
but it’s still fascinating to know
that ideas like these

00:22:42.690 --> 00:22:45.090
were indeed thought up and considered,

00:22:45.090 --> 00:22:47.710
even by people like Lauren Faust.

00:22:47.710 --> 00:22:53.010
I just know for a fact that an episode of the show
where Twilight has a big crush

00:22:53.010 --> 00:22:58.080
on just some... random guy
that’s introduced in the episode itself,

00:22:58.080 --> 00:23:03.010
would’ve permanently damaged the psyche
of the 2010s brony fandom.

00:23:03.010 --> 00:23:06.280
There would’ve been like
Twilight becoming an alicorn

00:23:06.280 --> 00:23:10.820
levels of backlash and drama
in the MLP fandom over this.

00:23:10.820 --> 00:23:14.250
So, I think we sorta dodged a bullet here.

00:23:14.870 --> 00:23:19.240
The story arc in the season 2 finale,
A Canterlot Wedding,

00:23:19.240 --> 00:23:24.480
was at one point originally focused
on an evil queen, Queen Chrysalis,

00:23:24.480 --> 00:23:31.030
having invaded and taken over the Crystal Kingdom
with her army of changeling minions.

00:23:31.030 --> 00:23:35.730
It would’ve followed Princess Celestia
putting Twilight and her friends

00:23:35.730 --> 00:23:38.760
up to the task of defeating Queen Chrysalis,

00:23:38.760 --> 00:23:43.680
and freeing the crystal ponies
from her dark and tyrannical rule.

00:23:43.680 --> 00:23:47.250
Most of you can probably tell
this sounds an awful lot

00:23:47.250 --> 00:23:50.790
like what sorta happens in the season 3 premiere

00:23:50.790 --> 00:23:55.010
with King Sombra
trying to take over the Crystal Empire,

00:23:55.010 --> 00:24:00.920
and that’s because King Sombra did not exist
when this plotline was written.

00:24:00.920 --> 00:24:02.090
Later on though,

00:24:02.090 --> 00:24:09.050
the wedding story arc for A Canterlot Wedding
was what replaced this as the season 2 finale,

00:24:09.050 --> 00:24:10.860
and instead of scrapping it,

00:24:10.860 --> 00:24:16.510
 the crystal ponies concept
was just turned into the season 3 premiere instead.

00:24:16.510 --> 00:24:21.960
King Sombra essentially just took
Chrysalis’s spot as the villain here,

00:24:21.960 --> 00:24:24.800
along with a few other changes being made

00:24:24.800 --> 00:24:29.990
like the Crystal Kingdom
getting renamed to the Crystal Empire.

00:24:31.960 --> 00:24:32.910
Moving on,

00:24:32.910 --> 00:24:40.180
there is a predecessor to the season 3 premiere,
which was also made before King Sombra existed.

00:24:40.180 --> 00:24:42.810
Shortly after the season 2 finale,

00:24:42.810 --> 00:24:48.790
the Mane Six go visit Princess Cadance
and Shining Armor in the Crystal Kingdom.

00:24:48.790 --> 00:24:54.920
After Queen Chrysalis was defeated,
they were appointed the new rulers of the kingdom

00:24:54.920 --> 00:24:59.950
and a magical force field was created
to keep out the frozen tundra.

00:24:59.950 --> 00:25:06.300
Cadance and the Mane Six are all having fun together,
until an emissary from Canterlot arrives,

00:25:06.300 --> 00:25:08.940
and tells Twilight and her friends

00:25:08.940 --> 00:25:12.960
they aren't following
the Proper Pony Princess Protocol.

00:25:12.960 --> 00:25:16.400
The emissary puts them through
some rigorous training

00:25:16.400 --> 00:25:20.680
to learn how to "properly" act
in Princess Cadance’s presence,

00:25:20.680 --> 00:25:24.950
and tea party
where everybody is now acting all proper happens,

00:25:24.950 --> 00:25:28.530
all while the magical force field
around the kingdom

00:25:28.530 --> 00:25:31.070
begins to inexplicably shrink,

00:25:31.070 --> 00:25:35.510
causing the dangerous frozen tundra
to start moving in.

00:25:35.510 --> 00:25:40.250
Believing they are to blame,
the emissary tells the Mane Six to go home

00:25:40.250 --> 00:25:45.480
and they reluctantly start to do so,
which only causes the magical force field

00:25:45.480 --> 00:25:47.420
to shrink even faster.

00:25:47.420 --> 00:25:53.420
Twilight realizes that it must be because Cadance
is feeling like she’s being put on a pedestal,

00:25:53.420 --> 00:25:56.890
so they all rush back and have fun with Cadance,

00:25:56.890 --> 00:26:01.770
which actually works,
and the Crystal Kingdom is safe once again.

00:26:01.770 --> 00:26:07.500
It’s kind of funny how the big conflict here
is essentially just Cadance feeling bad.

00:26:08.360 --> 00:26:12.910
The next episode was titled
“Rainbowshy and Flutterdash”,

00:26:12.910 --> 00:26:15.200
and was intended to take place

00:26:15.200 --> 00:26:19.330
shortly after the events
of Proper Pony Princess Protocol.

00:26:19.330 --> 00:26:24.820
In order to show the crystal ponies
they’re nothing like the evil Queen Chrysalis,

00:26:24.820 --> 00:26:30.740
Cadance and Shining Armor have decided
to host a Crystal Kingdom Faire in the city,

00:26:30.740 --> 00:26:36.540
with the Mane Six staying to help out
and even participate in some of the festivities.

00:26:36.540 --> 00:26:42.080
Rainbow Dash is taking part in a race
for a chance to get into the Wonderbolts Academy,

00:26:42.080 --> 00:26:46.370
and Fluttershy is participating
in a butterfly demonstration.

00:26:46.370 --> 00:26:51.140
However, things go wrong
when Twilight performs a spell incorrectly,

00:26:51.140 --> 00:26:54.540
and they end up with their bodies
having been switched.

00:26:54.540 --> 00:26:58.600
It’s noted that the crystal ponies
are still quite anxious

00:26:58.600 --> 00:27:01.660
over the changelings' transforming abilities,

00:27:01.660 --> 00:27:08.100
so this means that ‘Rainbow Dash-as-Fluttershy
and Fluttershy-as-Rainbow Dash

00:27:08.100 --> 00:27:13.190
will have to keep up their appearances
to not cause a big scare in the kingdom.

00:27:13.190 --> 00:27:17.900
Rainbow Dash-as-Fluttershy
takes part in the butterfly demonstration

00:27:17.900 --> 00:27:20.350
and eventually impresses the crowd,

00:27:20.350 --> 00:27:25.090
while Fluttershy-as-Rainbow Dash
is just about to start in the race,

00:27:25.090 --> 00:27:30.300
But not before Twilight
reverses the two of them back to normal with a spell,

00:27:30.300 --> 00:27:33.240
and Rainbow Dash wins the competition.

00:27:33.240 --> 00:27:36.360
It ends with the faire being declared a success,

00:27:36.360 --> 00:27:41.740
and Rainbow Dash learning to appreciate
and respect Fluttershy’s interests more.

00:27:41.740 --> 00:27:45.850
This seemingly would’ve been
a fairly typical body switch episode

00:27:45.850 --> 00:27:48.320
you tend to see in a lot of cartoons,

00:27:48.320 --> 00:27:52.740
but it still could’ve been cool
to see more of the crystal ponies.

00:27:53.560 --> 00:27:55.760
According to a few sources,

00:27:55.760 --> 00:28:01.700
the episode “Magic Duel”
was originally intended to be a season 2 episode,

00:28:01.700 --> 00:28:03.990
but its script got shuffled around

00:28:03.990 --> 00:28:08.530
and moved into the production cycle of season 3
instead.

00:28:08.530 --> 00:28:14.610
This season 2 version of Magic Duel
was more or less the same to what we got,

00:28:14.610 --> 00:28:17.760
although it did oddly enough have a subplot

00:28:17.760 --> 00:28:21.640
with Rainbow Dash
challenging Twilight to a magic duel,

00:28:21.640 --> 00:28:24.410
which believe it or not she actually wins,

00:28:24.410 --> 00:28:29.980
to prove a point to Twilight that she needs
to properly practice the magic she’s learning

00:28:29.980 --> 00:28:32.120
 in order to beat Trixie.

00:28:32.520 --> 00:28:38.630
If you thought the Luna Eclipsed scene
with Rarity in it getting cut was disappointing,

00:28:38.630 --> 00:28:44.000
how about an entire cancelled episode
that focused on the two characters

00:28:44.000 --> 00:28:46.160
It was titled ‘Dreamweaver’,

00:28:46.160 --> 00:28:51.130
and was about Rarity getting commissioned
to design a dress for Celestia,

00:28:51.130 --> 00:28:54.540
however, she soon starts having
terrible nightmares

00:28:54.540 --> 00:28:56.770
which affect her ability to work.

00:28:56.770 --> 00:29:02.470
Fortunately, Princess Luna comes to help
by encouraging her to face her fears.

00:29:02.470 --> 00:29:06.430
The next time Rarity dreams, she does just that,

00:29:06.430 --> 00:29:12.600
but Luna then tells her that she also needs
to face the fears in her waking life too,

00:29:12.600 --> 00:29:18.480
which she believes is Rarity’s fear of failure
getting in the way of her success.

00:29:18.480 --> 00:29:21.910
Rarity wakes up and hastily finishes the dress,

00:29:21.910 --> 00:29:26.080
not before Celestia picks it up
and tells her it’s beautiful.

00:29:26.510 --> 00:29:27.920
If you aren’t aware,

00:29:27.920 --> 00:29:36.270
it’s a somewhat commonly known fun fact
that MLP:FiM was at one point going to end at season 3.

00:29:36.270 --> 00:29:40.210
Multiple writers
and other people who worked on the show at the time

00:29:40.210 --> 00:29:45.120
have confirmed that Magical Mystery Cure
was indeed initially intended

00:29:45.120 --> 00:29:48.840
to be the series finale when it was first outlined.

00:29:48.840 --> 00:29:53.480
If it wasn’t for the show becoming
such an unexpectedly popular phenomenon

00:29:53.480 --> 00:29:54.660
in the way it did,

00:29:54.660 --> 00:29:59.510
it almost certainly would’ve not been renewed
for a season 4 and beyond.

00:29:59.510 --> 00:30:03.240
If you have ever wondered
what this original ending was like though,

00:30:03.240 --> 00:30:07.080
here’s a snippet from what was going to be
the last scene.

00:30:07.080 --> 00:30:11.000
There would have been a rendition of the
Morning in Ponyville song,

00:30:11.000 --> 00:30:14.280
all while there’s a big celebration in Ponyville.

00:30:14.280 --> 00:30:17.600
A narrator, most likely Princess Celestia,

00:30:17.600 --> 00:30:21.840
says some stuff about Twilight
learning about the magic of friendship

00:30:21.840 --> 00:30:25.690
and similar to the ending we eventually got
in season 9,

00:30:25.690 --> 00:30:31.110
it then pulls away to reveal the book
from the very first scene of the show,

00:30:31.110 --> 00:30:36.270
right before the book cover closes,
and we fade to black…

00:30:37.420 --> 00:30:41.020
Too bad Hasbro wanted to sell more toys though,
amirite?

00:30:41.320 --> 00:30:43.300
Moving onto season 4…

00:30:43.300 --> 00:30:46.810
...I actually couldn’t find much about season 4.

00:30:46.810 --> 00:30:50.120
There’s this one premise called “What Ponies Want"

00:30:50.120 --> 00:30:55.200
that was essentially just an early version
of the episode Rainbow Falls,

00:30:55.200 --> 00:30:57.400
but it honestly isn’t too notable.

00:30:57.400 --> 00:31:03.000
And in the season’s finale, Twilight's Kingdom,
during the battle sequence with Tirek,

00:31:03.000 --> 00:31:07.930
there was a scene where
Twilight physically punched him with her hoof.

00:31:07.930 --> 00:31:14.120
This stuck around long enough
for it to get storyboarded as shown on screen,

00:31:14.120 --> 00:31:18.670
but it was scrapped,
most likely due to Hasbro objecting to it

00:31:18.670 --> 00:31:21.890
and maybe also because
it just would’ve looked awkward

00:31:21.890 --> 00:31:24.100
compared to the rest of the battle.

00:31:24.100 --> 00:31:28.130
Aside from that,
there isn’t much else to say about season 4,

00:31:28.130 --> 00:31:33.500
Which is okay,
because there is a ton to talk about for season 5.

00:31:36.000 --> 00:31:37.110
To start off,

00:31:37.110 --> 00:31:42.170
there was a scrapped early version
of the episode ‘Rarity Investigates’

00:31:42.170 --> 00:31:45.000
made by the show writer M.A. Larson.

00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:49.140
This early revision
was going to be called “Rainbow Confession”,

00:31:49.140 --> 00:31:53.360
and it’s a bit unique
in the fact that it’s a rare example

00:31:53.360 --> 00:31:57.980
of a scrapped version of an episode
going so far into development

00:31:57.980 --> 00:32:03.910
that it not only had a short premise,
but also only an entire fully written script.

00:32:03.910 --> 00:32:08.230
For this reason,
I won’t go into super detail about everything,

00:32:08.230 --> 00:32:13.800
but all you need to know is that
it’s essentially a courtroom battle drama version

00:32:13.800 --> 00:32:15.840
of Rarity Investigates.

00:32:15.840 --> 00:32:21.870
It follows a relatively similar story
with Rainbow Dash being framed for a crime

00:32:21.870 --> 00:32:24.470
and Rarity proving her innocence.

00:32:24.470 --> 00:32:26.580
Rather than being a detective,

00:32:26.580 --> 00:32:32.080
Rarity would’ve channeled her inner Saul Goodman
by becoming a lawyer instead.

00:32:32.080 --> 00:32:35.120
Some of the other
miscellaneous differences here

00:32:35.120 --> 00:32:39.170
include someone trapping Soarin
inside his hotel room

00:32:39.170 --> 00:32:42.080
so he would miss the Wonderbolts performance

00:32:42.080 --> 00:32:48.440
being what Rainbow Dash was framed for
instead of leaving a fake note for Spitfire,

00:32:48.440 --> 00:32:54.080
Rainbow Dash getting put in an actual jail cell
after she’s accused of the crime,

00:32:54.080 --> 00:32:57.600
Rarity interacting with several unused characters

00:32:57.600 --> 00:33:03.850
like a detective named Flat Foot
and a court prosecutor named Haybe S. Corpus,

00:33:03.850 --> 00:33:05.920
and it was going to be revealed

00:33:05.920 --> 00:33:10.600
that none other than Lightning Dust
was the one behind it all.

00:33:10.600 --> 00:33:16.230
Later on, Lightning Dust was replaced
with an old former Wonderbolt named Wind Shear,

00:33:16.230 --> 00:33:20.120
who then in turn later evolved into Wind Rider.

00:33:20.120 --> 00:33:23.880
As for why this version of Rarity Investigates
was cut,

00:33:23.880 --> 00:33:28.990
I think it’s mostly due to Hasbro
believing most kids watching MLP

00:33:28.990 --> 00:33:34.440
probably wouldn’t find a courtroom drama episode
to be all that interesting.

00:33:34.440 --> 00:33:35.330
As a result,

00:33:35.330 --> 00:33:40.640
the script was rejected
and sent back to be reworked by a different writer,

00:33:40.640 --> 00:33:41.990
Meghan McCarthy,

00:33:41.990 --> 00:33:47.780
and she changed it to lean a lot more
into the Rarity investigating things aspect,

00:33:47.780 --> 00:33:50.140
which I think was for the best.

00:33:50.920 --> 00:33:54.630
In an episode titled “Prism Break”,
believe it or not,

00:33:54.630 --> 00:33:59.140
but the “Rainbow Factory”
actually would’ve been made canon.

00:33:59.140 --> 00:34:00.860
Okay, for clarity’s sake,

00:34:00.860 --> 00:34:07.670
it obviously in no way would’ve been the same
grimdark and gorey version of the Rainbow Factory

00:34:07.670 --> 00:34:10.340
that became popular in the brony fandom.

00:34:10.340 --> 00:34:13.870
But I think it’s likely
the person who came up with this

00:34:13.870 --> 00:34:20.620
was at least somewhat aware
of what the "Rainbow Factory" meant in the MLP fandom.

00:34:20.620 --> 00:34:26.200
The episode was about Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash
getting called by the Cutie Map

00:34:26.200 --> 00:34:29.840
to solve a friendship problem
over in Cloudsdale.

00:34:29.840 --> 00:34:31.010
The problem being

00:34:31.010 --> 00:34:37.130
that the two ponies who head the production
of rainbows at the city’s rainbow factory,

00:34:37.130 --> 00:34:40.960
Vapor Tail and Foal Spectrum,
aren’t getting along.

00:34:40.960 --> 00:34:46.460
As a result of this, the production of new rainbows
later in the episode gets so low

00:34:46.460 --> 00:34:49.850
that the entirety of Cloudsdale begins to sink,

00:34:49.850 --> 00:34:53.700
so Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy
have to save the city.

00:34:53.700 --> 00:34:56.880
It ends with Vapor Tail and Foal Spectrum

00:34:56.880 --> 00:35:01.360
learning how their different personalities
and departments in the factory

00:35:01.360 --> 00:35:04.040
are supposed to work together in tandem.

00:35:04.040 --> 00:35:06.720
I imagine the MLP fandom’s reaction

00:35:06.720 --> 00:35:12.080
to something like Rainbow Factory
seemingly getting referenced in the show itself

00:35:12.080 --> 00:35:14.860
certainly would’ve been funny to see.

00:35:15.160 --> 00:35:20.160
The next episode is actually another one
that takes place in Cloudsdale.

00:35:20.160 --> 00:35:22.410
It was titled ‘Griffon Chore’,

00:35:22.410 --> 00:35:26.800
and the gist of it is that Fluttershy
gets called by the Cutie Map

00:35:26.800 --> 00:35:33.420
to solve a friendship problem in the city,
and Twilight and Rainbow Dash decide to tag along.

00:35:33.420 --> 00:35:35.790
The friendship problem in question

00:35:35.790 --> 00:35:41.580
is actually a bunch of Griffons
infringing upon the city’s airspace borders.

00:35:41.580 --> 00:35:48.130
Their grumpy leader, a griffon named Gregor,
who is also revealed the father of Gilda,

00:35:48.130 --> 00:35:53.790
refuses to move the griffons out of Cloudsdale
when asked nicely by Fluttershy.

00:35:53.790 --> 00:35:59.240
So Rainbow Dash abrasively recommends
that they just call in the Wonderbolts

00:35:59.240 --> 00:36:01.430
to remove them with force.

00:36:01.430 --> 00:36:04.120
Fluttershy comes up with her own plan though,

00:36:04.120 --> 00:36:08.300
which includes
giving Gregor his favorite chocolate dessert,

00:36:08.300 --> 00:36:11.590
which works
in making him more willing to cooperate.

00:36:11.590 --> 00:36:15.880
It then ends with the griffons moving out
of Cloudsdale’s airspace,

00:36:15.880 --> 00:36:19.920
and Rainbow Dash apologizing to Fluttershy
for doubting her.

00:36:19.920 --> 00:36:25.990
This premise was seemingly replaced
by the season 5 griffon related episode we did get,

00:36:25.990 --> 00:36:28.930
The Lost Treasure of Griffonstone.

00:36:29.810 --> 00:36:32.240
The episode Slice of Life,

00:36:32.240 --> 00:36:37.610
the one where all the most iconic background ponies
are now the main focus,

00:36:37.610 --> 00:36:43.170
went through quite a lot of changes,
as in a bit more than the average episode.

00:36:43.170 --> 00:36:47.600
It initially began development
under the name “The Other Mane Six”,

00:36:47.600 --> 00:36:50.990
with a premise written by Amy Keating Rogers.

00:36:50.990 --> 00:36:58.270
It follows the background ponies
Octavia, DJ Pon3, Lyra, Bonbon, and Derpy

00:36:58.270 --> 00:37:01.170
all getting ready for the Grand Galloping Gala,

00:37:01.170 --> 00:37:05.000
so they come to Rarity
to have her make dresses for them.

00:37:05.000 --> 00:37:06.880
A problem arises though

00:37:06.880 --> 00:37:12.060
when all of them repeatedly ask
for the exact same dress as the others.

00:37:12.060 --> 00:37:18.130
Rarity individually urges them
to choose different designs, but they all refuse.

00:37:18.130 --> 00:37:21.850
This culminates in them
noticing they all have the same dress,

00:37:21.850 --> 00:37:24.330
and they get into a big argument.

00:37:24.330 --> 00:37:27.280
Twilight Sparkle then appears out of nowhere

00:37:27.280 --> 00:37:31.480
to remind them that their friendship
is more important than a silly dress,

00:37:31.480 --> 00:37:33.320
so they all make up.

00:37:33.320 --> 00:37:34.760
Throughout all of this,

00:37:34.760 --> 00:37:40.510
Dr. Hooves is also repeatedly trying on
a bunch of suits to wear to the Gala

00:37:40.510 --> 00:37:45.810
which are all just a bunch of references
to the different doctors from Dr. Who.

00:37:45.810 --> 00:37:48.860
He settles on the outfit of the Tenth Doctor,

00:37:48.860 --> 00:37:54.500
and at the end he stumbles into the pony Rose
and introduces himself.

00:37:55.020 --> 00:38:01.800
After this premise was written, a different writer,
M.A. Larson, soon began to work on it instead.

00:38:01.800 --> 00:38:07.850
It picked up the title "Slice of Life",
and was revised into something a lot more familiar,

00:38:07.850 --> 00:38:11.040
albeit it’s still pretty different in a lot of ways.

00:38:11.040 --> 00:38:13.070
It starts off with a scene of Derpy

00:38:13.070 --> 00:38:18.840
picking up Cranky and Matilda’s
custom made wedding ring from the Diamond Dogs

00:38:18.840 --> 00:38:22.250
and the rest of the episode mostly follows Derpy

00:38:22.250 --> 00:38:27.230
as she goes around Ponyville
interacting with other background ponies

00:38:27.230 --> 00:38:30.700
and miscellaneous characters
preparing for the wedding.

00:38:30.700 --> 00:38:35.500
A few highlights include a scene
with Celestia, Luna, and Cadance

00:38:35.500 --> 00:38:39.970
having a day at the spa
while they have a meta conversation

00:38:39.970 --> 00:38:44.120
on how things only ever go wrong
when there’s a big event,

00:38:44.120 --> 00:38:48.280
a short scene
where Twilight suddenly has crossed eyes

00:38:48.280 --> 00:38:52.320
and Derpy fixes them by... whacking her on the head,

00:38:52.320 --> 00:38:55.220
a scene where a bunch of background ponies

00:38:55.220 --> 00:38:59.240
accidentally run
into their recolored pony counterparts

00:38:59.240 --> 00:39:02.000
and awkwardly stare at each other,

00:39:02.000 --> 00:39:03.690
and bizarrely enough,

00:39:03.690 --> 00:39:10.240
a scene where it’s revealed Dr. Hooves and Derpy
were actually going to be siblings.

00:39:10.240 --> 00:39:15.090
Personally, I have a good feeling
this detail was cut out of the episode

00:39:15.090 --> 00:39:20.160
most likely because it was realized
by either Hasbro or the writers,

00:39:20.160 --> 00:39:25.390
that the countless number
of already existing fanart or fanfictions made

00:39:25.390 --> 00:39:30.470
shipping the two characters
would all immediately become super weird.

00:39:30.470 --> 00:39:34.460
This ship was one of the most popular
in the brony fandom at the time,

00:39:34.460 --> 00:39:40.560
so they definitely knew something like this
could’ve caused a big backlash from fans.

00:39:40.560 --> 00:39:41.830
Anyways though,

00:39:41.830 --> 00:39:48.300
according to M.A. Larson in a few interviews,
some other details which were cut from the episode

00:39:48.300 --> 00:39:52.220
include Vinyl Scratch
actually talking at one point,

00:39:52.220 --> 00:39:58.020
but Hasbro noticed and told him
 to specifically make her a mute character,

00:39:58.020 --> 00:40:02.740
Octavia would’ve had a cello duel
with King Sombra,

00:40:02.740 --> 00:40:07.780
there was a scene where Flash Sentry asked Cranky
why nobody liked him,

00:40:07.780 --> 00:40:13.710
and at one point, the episode ended with the Mane Six
hugging outside the wedding,

00:40:13.710 --> 00:40:17.640
before the camera
comically panned over to the sunset

00:40:17.640 --> 00:40:21.940
where an army of Changelings
are seen flying towards Ponyville.

00:40:22.880 --> 00:40:28.940
There was a premise and outline
for a cancelled episode called “How to be a Princess”.

00:40:28.940 --> 00:40:32.840
It would have focused on the Mane Six
going to Canterlot

00:40:32.840 --> 00:40:36.400
to attend a type of Princess themed convention,

00:40:36.400 --> 00:40:39.090
where ponies sell merch and cosplay

00:40:39.090 --> 00:40:43.760
as their favorite past or present princesses
from Equestria.

00:40:43.760 --> 00:40:50.310
It’s through this that it would’ve been revealed
there were potentially dozens of other Princesses

00:40:50.310 --> 00:40:54.700
who ruled over Equestria
prior to Celestia and Luna.

00:40:54.700 --> 00:40:58.310
There is a Princess cosplay pageant at the event

00:40:58.310 --> 00:41:02.380
where ponies compete
to show how their princess is the best.

00:41:02.380 --> 00:41:08.030
Twilight Sparkle notices that
only one pony in the competition chose to be her,

00:41:08.030 --> 00:41:11.280
but the pony in question, named Pretty Sweet,

00:41:11.280 --> 00:41:16.050
seems to have the complete wrong idea
of who Twilight is.

00:41:16.050 --> 00:41:23.000
She portrays her as a stereotypical princess
obsessed with tiaras, tea parties, and ball gowns.

00:41:23.000 --> 00:41:27.600
Twilight fails to convince Pretty Sweet
on what she’s actually like,

00:41:27.600 --> 00:41:31.250
as she doesn’t believe she’s the real Twilight.

00:41:31.250 --> 00:41:33.640
Meanwhile, for the episode’s B plot,

00:41:33.640 --> 00:41:37.750
the rest of the Mane Six
are getting ready for the competition,

00:41:37.750 --> 00:41:41.900
when they discover Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy’s costumes

00:41:41.900 --> 00:41:44.080
have been accidentally swapped.

00:41:44.080 --> 00:41:48.330
Rainbow Dash
is forced to be a more girly and calm princess

00:41:48.330 --> 00:41:50.510
who loves taking care of bunnies,

00:41:50.510 --> 00:41:55.800
and Fluttershy is forced to act
as a tough tomboyish warrior princess.

00:41:55.800 --> 00:41:59.190
They both struggle,
but eventually get the hang of it

00:41:59.190 --> 00:42:02.510
and learn to appreciate each other’s princesses.

00:42:02.510 --> 00:42:05.560
During this, much to the annoyance of Twilight,

00:42:05.560 --> 00:42:12.110
Pretty Sweet scores quite well in the competition
as this weird inaccurate version of her.

00:42:12.110 --> 00:42:17.510
Shortly before the final round,
Twilight finally convinces her that she’s real,

00:42:17.510 --> 00:42:21.980
and explains not every Princess
is all about tea parties.

00:42:21.980 --> 00:42:23.920
Pretty Sweet understands,

00:42:23.920 --> 00:42:27.500
but also says
she’s just going to drop out of the competition

00:42:27.500 --> 00:42:29.020
if that's the case.

00:42:29.020 --> 00:42:30.960
The two of them have a nice moment

00:42:30.960 --> 00:42:32.890
where Pretty Sweet explains

00:42:32.890 --> 00:42:37.900
she now knows Twilight
doesn’t love things like tea parties or tiaras,

00:42:37.900 --> 00:42:42.340
but she does
because it’s a way to spend time with her friends

00:42:42.340 --> 00:42:44.010
and to feel beautiful.

00:42:44.010 --> 00:42:49.030
Twilight sees her point of view,
and tells Pretty Sweet to go out on stage

00:42:49.030 --> 00:42:51.640
and be the princess she wants to be.

00:42:51.640 --> 00:42:55.650
It then ends
with a random filly coming up to Twilight

00:42:55.650 --> 00:42:59.180
and being impressed
with her accepting Pretty’s idea

00:42:59.180 --> 00:43:01.820
of what it means to be a princess.

00:43:02.640 --> 00:43:05.600
In an episode titled “Trend or Foe”,

00:43:05.600 --> 00:43:11.620
the antagonist from the season 4 episode
Rarity Takes Manehattan, Suri Polomare,

00:43:11.620 --> 00:43:13.900
would’ve actually returned.

00:43:13.900 --> 00:43:19.570
Applejack and Rainbow Dash are helping Rarity out
at her Carousel Boutique for the day,

00:43:19.570 --> 00:43:25.650
when they discover that Suri Polomare
has opened a competing boutique in Ponyville.

00:43:25.650 --> 00:43:29.336
Her place is suddenly much
more popular than Rarity’s,

00:43:29.336 --> 00:43:33.049
so Rainbow Dash and
Applejack start doing things

00:43:33.050 --> 00:43:36.560
like hiring DJ Pon3 to play music

00:43:36.560 --> 00:43:41.000
and slashing the prices of dresses
to drive more customers,

00:43:41.000 --> 00:43:47.170
all while Rarity herself is completely unaware
as she’s busy in the other room.

00:43:47.170 --> 00:43:53.140
Rarity finds out and isn't too happy
because Hoity Toity is expected to visit soon,

00:43:53.140 --> 00:43:56.570
but they manage to fix everything just in time.

00:43:56.570 --> 00:44:03.420
It then ends with Suri Polomare being broke
and forced to close down her new boutique,

00:44:03.420 --> 00:44:07.270
not before vowing revenge and galloping away.

00:44:08.130 --> 00:44:11.290
In an early outline for ‘Amending Fences’,

00:44:11.290 --> 00:44:14.200
the episode which Moondancer was introduced in,

00:44:14.200 --> 00:44:17.040
there are a few interesting differences.

00:44:17.040 --> 00:44:18.190
To name a few,

00:44:18.190 --> 00:44:22.480
soon after Twilight
tries talking to Moondancer at her house,

00:44:22.480 --> 00:44:28.170
it’s revealed that she had actually been waiting
for Twilight to show up at her party

00:44:28.170 --> 00:44:33.000
for over 5 years,
with all the decorations still being up,

00:44:33.000 --> 00:44:38.390
and she became such a shut-in
that she still hasn’t even got her cutie mark.

00:44:38.390 --> 00:44:39.160
Additionally,

00:44:39.160 --> 00:44:43.120
there was at one point
also going to be a scene in the episode

00:44:43.120 --> 00:44:48.870
where Twilight goes to Celestia for advice
about what she should do about Moondancer.

00:44:48.870 --> 00:44:53.040
She says
she wants to resign as the Princess of Friendship

00:44:53.040 --> 00:44:56.280
as she clearly failed Moondancer as a friend,

00:44:56.280 --> 00:45:01.060
but Celestia tells her
it’s never too late to repair a friendship.

00:45:01.060 --> 00:45:08.060
According to the writer of Amending Fences,
M.A. Larson, this scene was cut for time reasons.

00:45:08.060 --> 00:45:13.620
Speaking of this guy, M.A. Larson,
also said in a 2020 Q&A session

00:45:13.620 --> 00:45:18.560
that he once wrote a premise
for an episode titled "Mother Country",

00:45:18.560 --> 00:45:22.530
which would’ve revealed
who the apple siblings' parents were,

00:45:22.530 --> 00:45:24.780
or at least who their mom was.

00:45:24.780 --> 00:45:31.050
This being a whole two seasons
before the season 7 episode, The Perfect Pear.

00:45:31.050 --> 00:45:35.120
Apple Bloom starts to wonder
what exactly happened to her mom.

00:45:35.120 --> 00:45:41.480
So, Applejack tells her the sad story of their mom,
a pony named Honeycrisp.

00:45:41.480 --> 00:45:46.640
Back when Applejack was a filly,
Sweet Apple Acres was struggling to get by,

00:45:46.640 --> 00:45:53.700
so Honeycrisp went into the Everfree Forest
to find some new kind of apples for the farm.

00:45:53.700 --> 00:45:59.390
While there, she came across and rescued
a magical creature called a satyr,

00:45:59.390 --> 00:46:01.640
who granted her a wish in return.

00:46:01.640 --> 00:46:05.630
Honeycrisp wished that everything she touched
instantly grew.

00:46:05.630 --> 00:46:10.960
She used this ability for the apple trees,
and the farm was now flourishing.

00:46:10.960 --> 00:46:15.880
However, she realized her mistake
when she tried to give Big Mac a hug,

00:46:15.880 --> 00:46:21.760
and he had a massive growth spurt,
which is and I quote: “why he’s so big now”.

00:46:21.760 --> 00:46:26.860
Tortured over how everything she touched grew,
Honeycrisp ran away from the farm.

00:46:26.860 --> 00:46:29.600
Apple Bloom says she wants to see her mom,

00:46:29.600 --> 00:46:36.040
so the two sisters go into the Everfree Forest
to find her and reverse the curse.

00:46:36.040 --> 00:46:42.730
Larson said that, in hindsight, he was actually glad
this episode was rejected by Hasbro.

00:46:42.730 --> 00:46:44.210
And I don’t blame him,

00:46:44.210 --> 00:46:50.890
it really doesn’t seem anywhere near as good
of a heartfelt backstory for Applejack’s parents

00:46:50.890 --> 00:46:53.300
as The Perfect Pear was.

00:46:54.000 --> 00:46:57.750
There was a version of the season 5 finale,

00:46:57.750 --> 00:47:02.810
which was made back when Starlight Glimmer
was still named “Aurora Glimmer”.

00:47:02.810 --> 00:47:05.290
It would’ve shared some similarities,

00:47:05.290 --> 00:47:09.270
with "Aurora"
trying to permanently mess up the timeline

00:47:09.270 --> 00:47:11.830
still being a key point of contention,

00:47:11.830 --> 00:47:14.070
but everything else was different.

00:47:14.070 --> 00:47:17.760
Firstly,
Starlight would’ve actually been successful

00:47:17.760 --> 00:47:22.060
at preventing Rainbow Dash’s sonic rainboom
pretty early on,

00:47:22.060 --> 00:47:25.320
which starts to show its consequences fast.

00:47:25.320 --> 00:47:30.180
In the main timeline itself,
the Mane Six lose their cutie marks,

00:47:30.180 --> 00:47:32.940
and everything else
they had done up to that point

00:47:32.940 --> 00:47:37.790
starts gradually getting undone and reversed
in front of them.

00:47:37.790 --> 00:47:40.800
This causes the season 4 finale Tirek

00:47:40.800 --> 00:47:44.740
to be successful
in stealing all the magic in Equestria.

00:47:44.740 --> 00:47:48.270
It’s at this point in only part 1 of the finale

00:47:48.270 --> 00:47:52.530
that Starlight actually sees her mistake
in preventing the rainboom,

00:47:52.530 --> 00:47:56.240
and begins to actively help
Twilight and her friends

00:47:56.240 --> 00:47:58.040
defeat Tirek again.

00:47:58.040 --> 00:48:01.320
They fail and he sends them to Tartarus,

00:48:01.320 --> 00:48:06.280
but due to timeline shenanigans,
the world around them breaks apart

00:48:06.280 --> 00:48:09.340
and they find themselves back in Ponyville,

00:48:09.340 --> 00:48:14.190
where the plunderseeds from the season 4 opener
have taken over again

00:48:14.190 --> 00:48:17.210
and Celestia and Luna are both missing.

00:48:17.210 --> 00:48:23.760
Part 2 of the finale is dedicated to Twilight
attempting to recreate the sonic rainboom,

00:48:23.760 --> 00:48:27.520
all while the rest of the Mane Six plus Starlight

00:48:27.520 --> 00:48:32.060
have to deal with villains
like King Sombra and Queen Chrysalis

00:48:32.060 --> 00:48:33.810
suddenly coming back.

00:48:33.810 --> 00:48:36.460
They eventually all get their cutie marks back

00:48:36.460 --> 00:48:40.880
and it ends with Starlight
writing a letter to her new teacher,

00:48:40.880 --> 00:48:42.400
Twilight Sparkle.

00:48:42.400 --> 00:48:47.240
Interestingly enough,
it seems like Sunburst did not exist at this point,

00:48:47.240 --> 00:48:49.240
which is why he’s absent here.

00:48:49.240 --> 00:48:53.780
Starlight’s only motivation for being a villain
was that she, quote,

00:48:53.780 --> 00:48:56.830
“never truly experienced the magic of friendship.”,

00:48:56.830 --> 00:49:00.940
which is lowkey a very funny excuse
for being a villain.

00:49:03.200 --> 00:49:08.960
Moving on to season 6,
according to the season premiere, The Crystalling,

00:49:08.960 --> 00:49:14.940
Flurry Heart was originally going to be named,
get this, “Buckey Sparks”.

00:49:14.940 --> 00:49:20.400
Furthermore, The Crystalling itself
was going to be titled “Off To See the Wizard”

00:49:20.400 --> 00:49:23.190
and Sunburst actually existed now,

00:49:23.190 --> 00:49:27.650
although he’s referred to here
with the name Sunray instead.

00:49:27.650 --> 00:49:29.870
Another interesting thing to highlight

00:49:29.870 --> 00:49:36.100
is also how it’s hinted at here the lore of alicorns
and where exactly they come from

00:49:36.100 --> 00:49:39.810
maybe would’ve been explained in more detail
at one point

00:49:39.810 --> 00:49:44.860
It’s said that Celestia and Luna apparently knew "first hand"

00:49:44.860 --> 00:49:48.390
that alicorns can be born as alicorns,

00:49:48.390 --> 00:49:51.890
which is in heavy contrast to the actual episode

00:49:51.890 --> 00:49:56.810
where they’re both just sort of clueless
why Flurry Heart is an alicorn.

00:49:56.810 --> 00:50:01.970
I imagine this was cut out
most likely because either the writers or Hasbro

00:50:01.970 --> 00:50:05.830
didn’t want a big sudden lore dump
in the middle of the episode.

00:50:07.020 --> 00:50:11.350
There was a premise for an episode titled
“Mayor Discord”.

00:50:11.350 --> 00:50:18.030
As the name suggests, it follows Discord
accidentally being elected mayor of Ponyville

00:50:18.030 --> 00:50:23.020
after beating the usually unopposed Mayor Mare
by one single point

00:50:23.020 --> 00:50:25.510
due to Fluttershy voting for him.

00:50:25.510 --> 00:50:26.760
As you would expect,

00:50:26.760 --> 00:50:30.290
Discord makes a bunch
of chaotic changes in Ponyville

00:50:30.290 --> 00:50:32.790
which Twilight Sparkle has to fix,

00:50:32.790 --> 00:50:36.790
and he refuses to resign
even when things start to fall apart.

00:50:36.790 --> 00:50:39.560
Twilight eventually gets him to quit the job

00:50:39.560 --> 00:50:43.560
by forcing him
to do a bunch of boring stuff like paperwork,

00:50:43.560 --> 00:50:46.440
and Mayor Mare gets elected back.

00:50:46.440 --> 00:50:48.930
This was shortly after rejected

00:50:48.930 --> 00:50:53.260
in favor of another Discord episode idea
for season 6.

00:50:53.260 --> 00:51:00.150
This next one being that idea in question,
this time it was called “Number Fish Fan”.

00:51:00.150 --> 00:51:05.260
It would’ve been about Discord
finding out at a Twilight Sparkle fan club meeting

00:51:05.260 --> 00:51:11.440
that he has a number 1 fan of his very own,
a pony named Sweeper Mess.

00:51:11.440 --> 00:51:14.400
The two of them start to get along pretty well,

00:51:14.400 --> 00:51:21.490
but Sweeper Mess soon makes it clear
that he’s actually a much bigger fan of the OG Discord,

00:51:21.490 --> 00:51:23.470
before he got reformed.

00:51:23.470 --> 00:51:27.510
Sweeper encourages Discord
to take a trip down memory lane

00:51:27.510 --> 00:51:31.360
by revisiting the scenes
of his old chaotic exploits,

00:51:31.360 --> 00:51:34.170
and the Mane Six start to become worried

00:51:34.170 --> 00:51:37.760
when it looks like Discord
imitates his pre-reformed self

00:51:37.760 --> 00:51:39.710
to humor his new friend.

00:51:39.710 --> 00:51:44.960
They get even more worried when they uncover
what appears to be a plan by Discord

00:51:44.960 --> 00:51:49.320
to plunge Equestria into chaos once more
with Sweeper.

00:51:49.320 --> 00:51:49.880
However,

00:51:49.880 --> 00:51:55.950
it’s shortly after revealed it was actually
just a super convoluted plot by Discord

00:51:55.950 --> 00:51:59.560
to teach Sweeper Mess a lesson about friendship.

00:51:59.560 --> 00:52:04.890
Similar to Mayor Discord though,
this episode idea also got rejected,

00:52:04.890 --> 00:52:11.620
and it seems like ‘Dungeons & Discords’
is what eventually took its place in season 6.

00:52:11.940 --> 00:52:17.170
Next up, there was an episode titled
“Gallop’s Book of Pony Records”,

00:52:17.170 --> 00:52:22.050
which would’ve been about the pony equivalent
of the Guinness World Records

00:52:22.050 --> 00:52:23.650
coming into Ponyville,

00:52:23.650 --> 00:52:26.260
and Rainbow Dash getting a bit jealous

00:52:26.260 --> 00:52:32.600
over Pinkie Pie setting a bunch of super specific
and nonsensical world records.

00:52:32.600 --> 00:52:39.080
Rainbow Dash challenges Pinkie to a competition
she knows she will win and get a record for,

00:52:39.080 --> 00:52:43.280
but it inadvertently
leads her into the Everfree Forest

00:52:43.280 --> 00:52:49.520
where she encounters a half elephant,
half anaconda creature called a Grootslang.

00:52:49.520 --> 00:52:53.580
It starts to attack her,
but Pinkie Pie helps Rainbow Dash escape,

00:52:53.580 --> 00:52:56.370
and the two of them return to Ponyville

00:52:56.370 --> 00:53:02.810
only to receive a shared world record
for the fastest time escaping from a Grootslang.

00:53:02.810 --> 00:53:06.980
Interestingly enough,
this Grootslang creature mentioned here

00:53:06.980 --> 00:53:11.610
actually did appear
in one of the official My Little Pony comics,

00:53:11.610 --> 00:53:15.980
which gives a good idea
of what it may have looked like in the show.

00:53:16.890 --> 00:53:21.850
In a scrapped flashback episode titled
“I Know This Much is True”,

00:53:21.850 --> 00:53:26.450
it would’ve been revealed
Rarity and Applejack were already friends

00:53:26.450 --> 00:53:28.790
before they met Twilight Sparkle.

00:53:28.790 --> 00:53:33.630
Shortly after Applejack
returned from her brief stay in Manehattan as a kid,

00:53:33.630 --> 00:53:38.090
she meets Rarity in Ponyville
and they start to become friends.

00:53:38.090 --> 00:53:43.890
To Rarity’s disappointment, Applejack tells her
about how awful she thought Manehattan was

00:53:43.890 --> 00:53:50.560
so to not risk damaging their new friendship,
Applejack just starts making up a bunch of lies

00:53:50.560 --> 00:53:54.690
about the Manehattan fashion scene
and its current trends.

00:53:54.690 --> 00:53:58.880
Her lies catch up to her
when Rarity changes her dress designs

00:53:58.880 --> 00:54:02.390
to reflect the completely made up fashion trends,

00:54:02.390 --> 00:54:07.910
and she goes to show them
to a famous fashion designer in the next town over.

00:54:07.910 --> 00:54:13.050
Applejack tries to stop her
from making a fool of herself, but it’s too late.

00:54:13.050 --> 00:54:17.910
So she confesses she’s responsible
and apologizes to Rarity.

00:54:17.910 --> 00:54:19.540
The two of them make up,

00:54:19.540 --> 00:54:26.260
and it ends with Rarity telling Applejack
she didn’t need to lie because she liked her already.

00:54:27.420 --> 00:54:31.900
This next one
was actually also a flashback episode.

00:54:31.900 --> 00:54:35.900
It was titled "Life of Pie",
and would’ve been about Pinkie Pie,

00:54:35.900 --> 00:54:38.860
shortly after she got her cutie mark as a kid,

00:54:38.860 --> 00:54:41.760
deciding to leave her family’s rock farm

00:54:41.760 --> 00:54:46.590
to go on a mission of throwing a party
for every pony she meets.

00:54:46.590 --> 00:54:51.370
She accidentally stumbles into Fluttershy
in the Everfree Forest,

00:54:51.370 --> 00:54:56.110
who is still chilling with her new animal friends
after she got her cutie mark,

00:54:56.110 --> 00:54:59.200
so Pinkie tries to throw a party for her.

00:54:59.200 --> 00:55:01.110
It doesn’t go well however,

00:55:01.110 --> 00:55:05.460
because it’s too loud and uncomfortable
for Fluttershy’s liking,

00:55:05.460 --> 00:55:08.180
so Pinkie wanders into Ponyville

00:55:08.180 --> 00:55:12.410
where she drowns out her sorrows
in the Sugarcube Corner.

00:55:12.410 --> 00:55:17.940
The Cakes offer her a place to stay,
so she tries to throw a party for them too,

00:55:17.940 --> 00:55:20.000
but it also doesn’t go well.

00:55:20.000 --> 00:55:21.300
Feeling dejected,

00:55:21.300 --> 00:55:25.820
Pinkie runs off back into the forest
where she meets Fluttershy again.

00:55:25.820 --> 00:55:27.160
She gives her some advice

00:55:27.160 --> 00:55:32.010
by suggesting she make her parties
more personalized for each pony.

00:55:32.010 --> 00:55:35.690
And it ends with Pinkie
putting the suggestion to good use

00:55:35.690 --> 00:55:40.300
by throwing Fluttershy
a much more quiet and peaceful party.

00:55:40.300 --> 00:55:42.700
Both of these flashback episodes

00:55:42.700 --> 00:55:46.950
showing how some of the Mane Six
were friends as kids

00:55:46.950 --> 00:55:48.640
could’ve been fun to see.

00:55:48.640 --> 00:55:55.360
It seems like the first one was reworked
and replaced by the episode ‘Where The Apple Lies’,

00:55:55.360 --> 00:55:57.550
just with Rarity being absent,

00:55:57.550 --> 00:56:01.620
so these ideas didn’t go completely unused.

00:56:03.950 --> 00:56:06.080
Moving onto season 7,

00:56:06.080 --> 00:56:12.280
here is an outline for an early version
of what would become the episode A Royal Problem,

00:56:12.280 --> 00:56:15.500
instead called "A Royal Pain in the Map".

00:56:15.500 --> 00:56:20.980
Instead of Starlight, it was originally going to be
a Twilight focused episode,

00:56:20.980 --> 00:56:25.370
with her being called by the Cutie Map
to solve a friendship problem

00:56:25.370 --> 00:56:28.260
between Princess Celestia and Luna,

00:56:28.260 --> 00:56:31.100
which turns out to be just a petty problem.

00:56:31.100 --> 00:56:34.670
There wouldn’t have been
any cutie mark switching shenanigans here,

00:56:34.670 --> 00:56:38.480
and it also would’ve concluded
with the royal sisters

00:56:38.480 --> 00:56:42.300
unloading all their problems with one another
all at once.

00:56:42.300 --> 00:56:46.650
But they end their argument
by laughing at how ridiculous they’re being,

00:56:46.650 --> 00:56:51.580
and thank Twilight
for helping them air out their grievances and vent.

00:56:52.400 --> 00:56:56.820
In an early revision
for the script of Fame and Misfortune,

00:56:56.820 --> 00:56:59.650
the ending was going to be slightly different,

00:56:59.650 --> 00:57:04.630
with not only Toola Roola and Coconut Cream
talking to the Mane Six,

00:57:04.630 --> 00:57:10.700
but also numerous other ponies
like Cheerilee, Big Mac, and Celestia and Luna.

00:57:10.700 --> 00:57:16.750
The townsponies who acted rude to the Mane Six
also would’ve actually apologized to them,

00:57:16.750 --> 00:57:22.410
right before everybody begins to sing a chorus
of the “We’re Not Flawless” song

00:57:22.410 --> 00:57:24.710
as the episode ends.

00:57:25.260 --> 00:57:28.470
There was an episode titled "Train Tales",

00:57:28.470 --> 00:57:34.060
which was going to be about Twilight
telling Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Rarity

00:57:34.060 --> 00:57:38.970
stories about the Pillars of Equestria
while they’re stuck on a train.

00:57:38.970 --> 00:57:43.190
This was evidently the predecessor
of Campfire Tales,

00:57:43.190 --> 00:57:45.050
just with a different setting

00:57:45.050 --> 00:57:48.640
and the Cutie Mark Crusaders
not being present here.

00:57:48.640 --> 00:57:53.150
They were added in when the story was reworked
into Twilight being removed,

00:57:53.150 --> 00:57:58.480
and their big sisters telling them the stories
about the pillars instead.

00:57:58.480 --> 00:58:03.750
It also seems like when this was written,
one of the Pillars, Flash Magnus,

00:58:03.750 --> 00:58:07.640
originally went by the name "Flash Prance" instead.

00:58:08.530 --> 00:58:14.170
Next, here is a Daring Do episode
titled “What Dash Would Dare to Do”.

00:58:14.170 --> 00:58:18.520
Rainbow Dash visits A.K. Yearling, aka Daring Do,

00:58:18.520 --> 00:58:22.160
but finds her in a confused state
where she can’t remember

00:58:22.160 --> 00:58:24.910
what’s happened to her in the last week.

00:58:24.910 --> 00:58:28.120
Rainbow Dash helps Daring Do retrace her steps

00:58:28.120 --> 00:58:32.880
where it repeatedly looks like
she brought destruction everywhere she went.

00:58:32.880 --> 00:58:35.500
Which makes Daring start to question

00:58:35.500 --> 00:58:39.410
how all her adventures
negatively impact other ponies.

00:58:39.410 --> 00:58:40.960
They eventually find out

00:58:40.960 --> 00:58:46.000
that Daring Do’s memories were actually stolen
by an evil minotaur

00:58:46.000 --> 00:58:50.810
who used an ancient memory stone
to cleanse himself from her memories

00:58:50.810 --> 00:58:52.400
so he could get away.

00:58:52.400 --> 00:58:57.390
It ends with Rainbow Dash and Daring
working together to defeat the minotaur

00:58:57.390 --> 00:58:59.260
and get her memories back,

00:58:59.260 --> 00:59:00.800
with the lesson being

00:59:00.800 --> 00:59:04.320
that sometimes you have to help out
and give reassurance

00:59:04.320 --> 00:59:06.710
to even the people you look up to.

00:59:06.710 --> 00:59:13.610
This was seemingly the spiritual precursor
to the season 7 Daring Do episode Daring Done,

00:59:13.610 --> 00:59:19.060
with it sharing a few similar plot points
and friendship lesson at the end.

00:59:21.380 --> 00:59:28.160
Moving on to the final two seasons of MLP:FiM,
it gets a bit more interesting,

00:59:28.160 --> 00:59:31.030
as we begin to see early ideas

00:59:31.030 --> 00:59:36.950
for what would eventually become
the last few big story arcs of the show.

00:59:36.950 --> 00:59:42.750
According to some pre-production notes
made for the season 8 premiere, School Daze,

00:59:42.750 --> 00:59:46.580
the Cutie Mark Map
would’ve played a more important role

00:59:46.580 --> 00:59:50.650
by telling the Mane Six locations in Equestria

00:59:50.650 --> 00:59:54.820
where they can find new students
or friendship ambassadors

00:59:54.820 --> 00:59:57.520
for Twilight’s School of Friendship.

00:59:57.520 --> 01:00:01.790
A lot of the premiere was likely intended
to have been dedicated

01:00:01.790 --> 01:00:07.140
to convincing all these different creatures
to come with them to the school.

01:00:07.140 --> 01:00:08.510
It’s also mentioned here

01:00:08.510 --> 01:00:14.260
that Cozy Glow was at one point
intended to be introduced in the premiere itself,

01:00:14.260 --> 01:00:18.540
instead of nearly halfway through the season
like she was.

01:00:18.540 --> 01:00:20.260
Speaking of Cozy Glow,

01:00:20.260 --> 01:00:22.750
in numerous other preliminary notes

01:00:22.750 --> 01:00:26.900
made during the early stages of production
for this season,

01:00:26.900 --> 01:00:30.840
Cozy Glow is repeatedly referred to as a he,

01:00:30.840 --> 01:00:35.440
which means it can be inferred
she was initially conceptualized

01:00:35.440 --> 01:00:37.480
as a male character.

01:00:37.480 --> 01:00:38.240
Additionally,

01:00:38.240 --> 01:00:44.170
it was also suggested a few times here
that Cozy Glow should be a non-pony character,

01:00:44.170 --> 01:00:50.130
with creatures we saw in the 2017 MLP movie
being considered the most.

01:00:50.130 --> 01:00:56.600
This in turn would’ve been used as an explanation
for why he was a villain in the first place,

01:00:56.600 --> 01:01:00.880
as he would’ve never been exposed
to the magic of friendship.

01:01:01.350 --> 01:01:04.210
Moving on to the season 8 finale

01:01:04.210 --> 01:01:09.820
rather than Cozy Glow working alone
to sabotage the school of friendship

01:01:09.820 --> 01:01:11.740
like she ended up doing,

01:01:11.740 --> 01:01:15.350
it would’ve been revealed
she was actually working together

01:01:15.350 --> 01:01:18.440
with none other than Queen Chrysalis.

01:01:18.440 --> 01:01:20.760
Their motivations for working together

01:01:20.760 --> 01:01:26.160
were that Cozy wanted to oust Twilight
as the Princess of Friendship,

01:01:26.160 --> 01:01:30.180
so he could become
the powerful Prince of Friendship,

01:01:30.180 --> 01:01:34.360
while Chrysalis wanted revenge
on Twilight and her friends

01:01:34.360 --> 01:01:38.640
by destroying the Cutie Mark Map
and taking over her school

01:01:38.640 --> 01:01:42.900
to use as a nesting ground for a changeling hive.

01:01:42.900 --> 01:01:46.500
How exactly these two characters
would’ve ever met

01:01:46.500 --> 01:01:51.480
and decided to work together
at this much earlier point in the show

01:01:51.480 --> 01:01:53.820
was seemingly not thought of yet,

01:01:53.820 --> 01:01:56.000
but it still could’ve been cool.

01:01:56.360 --> 01:02:01.930
According to some other pre-production notes,
this time for the season 9 premiere,

01:02:01.930 --> 01:02:04.060
quite a few ideas were cut.

01:02:04.060 --> 01:02:10.470
This included the season beginning with a scene
showing a future version of Twilight Sparkle,

01:02:10.470 --> 01:02:13.190
with the rest of the season meant to show

01:02:13.190 --> 01:02:17.080
how she eventually ended up
at that point in the future.

01:02:17.080 --> 01:02:23.500
There was an idea where The Young Six,
who had just saved the day in the season 8 finale,

01:02:23.500 --> 01:02:29.910
start to act all arrogant or overconfident,
believing they are the "new Mane Six".

01:02:29.910 --> 01:02:35.380
This overconfidence results in them
trying to talk to the original tree of harmony

01:02:35.380 --> 01:02:37.300
in the Everfree Forest,

01:02:37.300 --> 01:02:42.100
and the tree itself enveloping and trapping them
inside of it.

01:02:42.100 --> 01:02:44.490
The Mane Six try to get them out,

01:02:44.490 --> 01:02:51.100
but the tree starts to wither
and they fear the Young Six will die with the tree.

01:02:51.400 --> 01:02:56.430
There would’ve been a whole story arc
where Celestia, Luna, and Discord

01:02:56.430 --> 01:02:59.360
are feeling the quote "force",

01:02:59.360 --> 01:03:04.760
and that their quote
"ascension" or "departure" from Equestria is near.

01:03:04.760 --> 01:03:07.490
Discord doesn’t want to leave though,

01:03:07.490 --> 01:03:13.810
so he makes up a plan to unite all the big villains
to prevent his ascension from happening

01:03:13.810 --> 01:03:16.220
by wreaking havoc in Equestria.

01:03:16.220 --> 01:03:20.360
While disguised as Grogar,
he gives what is referred to here

01:03:20.360 --> 01:03:24.850
as the "Elements of Disharmony" to the villains.

01:03:24.850 --> 01:03:26.530
According to these notes,

01:03:26.530 --> 01:03:32.200
Queen Chrysalis would’ve been
the Disharmony element of Betrayal, Tirek Greed,

01:03:32.200 --> 01:03:38.740
Evil Twilight Sparkle Anti-magic,
Grogar/Disguised Discord would be Fear,

01:03:38.740 --> 01:03:43.210
King Sombra Cruelty, and Cozy Glow Deceit.

01:03:43.210 --> 01:03:47.620
If you’re wondering
what this mention of an Evil Twilight Sparkle is,

01:03:47.620 --> 01:03:52.180
the writers considered making Twilight,
through one way or another,

01:03:52.180 --> 01:03:55.500
a temporary antagonist somewhere in season 9,

01:03:55.500 --> 01:03:59.150
either in the premiere
or during the final few episodes.

01:03:59.150 --> 01:04:02.810
But the idea was eventually dropped altogether.

01:04:02.810 --> 01:04:07.290
If I had to guess,
probably because it was too drastic of a change

01:04:07.290 --> 01:04:10.920
to happen to the main protagonist of the show.

01:04:11.320 --> 01:04:16.260
Anyways, later on
the Mane Six confront and defeat King Sombra

01:04:16.260 --> 01:04:18.680
as they do in the season premiere,

01:04:18.680 --> 01:04:22.810
which would’ve caused the tree of harmony
to revert back to normal

01:04:22.810 --> 01:04:25.480
and release the Student Six.

01:04:25.480 --> 01:04:29.400
The whole
villains having the Elements of Disharmony plot

01:04:29.400 --> 01:04:31.700
could’ve been interesting to watch play out,

01:04:31.700 --> 01:04:37.910
especially since MLP fans for years
had been creating their own interpretations

01:04:37.910 --> 01:04:40.570
of what something like this would look like.

01:04:40.570 --> 01:04:44.660
Some early ideas for other episodes
throughout season 9

01:04:44.660 --> 01:04:49.440
also included some of the villains 
using their Elements of Disharmony

01:04:49.440 --> 01:04:52.000
to cause chaos in Equestria.

01:04:52.370 --> 01:04:54.850
Speaking of these villains,

01:04:54.850 --> 01:05:00.460
the season/series finale,
from the battle with the 3 villains,

01:05:00.460 --> 01:05:04.780
to what exactly was going to happen
in the very last episode,

01:05:04.780 --> 01:05:09.160
went through quite a lot of changes
during production as well.

01:05:09.160 --> 01:05:15.360
In addition to having the Legion of Doom
orchestrate an attack on Twilight’s coronation,

01:05:15.360 --> 01:05:20.000
Discord also intended for them
to do various other schemes

01:05:20.000 --> 01:05:22.750
to further weaken harmony in Equestria.

01:05:22.750 --> 01:05:29.720
This included Queen Chrysalis and Cozy Glow
attacking and sabotaging the main characters.

01:05:29.720 --> 01:05:34.070
A good example of this
is the episode “Sweet and Smoky”,

01:05:34.070 --> 01:05:38.300
which was originally going to be called
“Trial by Fire”,

01:05:38.300 --> 01:05:45.160
and was about Smolder, Spike, and Fluttershy
taking a visit to the Dragonlands.

01:05:45.160 --> 01:05:46.540
When all of the sudden,

01:05:46.540 --> 01:05:52.320
Queen Chrysalis shows up to invade
with the power of her Element of Disharmony

01:05:52.320 --> 01:05:55.750
to make the dragons her new subjects.

01:05:55.750 --> 01:06:01.450
Another example was in an early version
of the episode ‘Growing Up is Hard to do’.

01:06:01.450 --> 01:06:08.230
Cozy Glow was apparently going to mistake
the grown up versions of the Cutie Mark Crusaders

01:06:08.230 --> 01:06:09.900
 for their big sisters,

01:06:09.900 --> 01:06:14.060
and start to attack them
using her Disharmony element.

01:06:14.600 --> 01:06:18.860
Perhaps
the most interesting cut concept for the finale

01:06:18.860 --> 01:06:23.100
tied into the Evil Twilight Sparkle ideas
I mentioned.

01:06:23.100 --> 01:06:27.160
After the Legion of Doom
sabotaged harmony in Equestria

01:06:27.160 --> 01:06:30.920
by making the 3 pony tribes distrust one another,

01:06:30.920 --> 01:06:34.540
Twilight Sparkle,
out of desperation to fix everything,

01:06:34.540 --> 01:06:38.370
would've forced everybody in Equestria
to get along

01:06:38.370 --> 01:06:44.230
by performing some vague spell
and transforming into Midnight Sparkle,

01:06:44.230 --> 01:06:47.980
a powered up, but antagonistic version of herself

01:06:47.980 --> 01:06:54.110
where she is willing to do whatever it takes
to make the ponies in Equestria united again.

01:06:54.110 --> 01:06:57.830
This included using some quite ruthless tactics

01:06:57.830 --> 01:07:02.250
that are described as being similar
to Nightmare Moon.

01:07:02.250 --> 01:07:04.700
Given that they share the same name,

01:07:04.700 --> 01:07:10.640
this pony version of Midnight Sparkle
could have shared some similarities design wise

01:07:10.640 --> 01:07:16.880
with the Midnight Sparkle we see
in the Equestria Girls: Friendship Games movie.

01:07:16.880 --> 01:07:22.140
Meanwhile, in a different
but kinda similar cut idea for the finale,

01:07:22.140 --> 01:07:29.340
Discord was going to turn Twilight evil,
by using one of the Elements of Disharmony on her.

01:07:29.340 --> 01:07:31.960
Personally, as cool as it could’ve been,

01:07:31.960 --> 01:07:38.090
I’m kinda glad they didn’t go with any of these ideas
of turning Twilight into an antagonist,

01:07:38.090 --> 01:07:42.340
as they feel too out of place for the show
in my opinion.

01:07:42.340 --> 01:07:48.250
Aside from that, a few other scrapped ideas
for the events in the second to last episode,

01:07:48.250 --> 01:07:49.840
The Ending of the End,

01:07:49.840 --> 01:07:51.640
included the Mane Six

01:07:51.640 --> 01:07:57.440
discovering they have apparently
always been connected to the essence of harmony

01:07:57.440 --> 01:07:59.910
ever since the very beginning,

01:07:59.910 --> 01:08:05.390
and they subsequently quote "level up"
to become the, and I quote

01:08:05.390 --> 01:08:09.230
‘literal embodiment of the gemstone elements’,

01:08:09.230 --> 01:08:11.270
whatever that means I guess…

01:08:11.270 --> 01:08:17.580
And when they’re in this powered up state,
they defeat the Legion of Doom once and for all.

01:08:17.580 --> 01:08:19.240
It gets even better though,

01:08:19.240 --> 01:08:22.860
(or... maybe worse...
Depends on your perspective...)

01:08:22.860 --> 01:08:29.540
because after that, they would then somehow pass on
their connection to the Elements of Harmony

01:08:29.540 --> 01:08:36.860
over to the Young Six student characters
as a gift for graduating the School of Friendship.

01:08:36.860 --> 01:08:41.000
God, it would’ve been so funny
to see the fandom’s reaction to this.

01:08:41.000 --> 01:08:45.020
Like the Student Six
becoming the new Elements of Harmony

01:08:45.020 --> 01:08:49.180
through the equivalent of...
graduating high school.

01:08:49.180 --> 01:08:53.720
Otherwise, the events of the last episode,
The Last Problem,

01:08:53.720 --> 01:08:56.460
also went through quite a lot of changes,

01:08:56.460 --> 01:09:01.080
with miscellaneous ideas being cut
mostly for time reasons.

01:09:01.080 --> 01:09:04.730
To start,
there apparently would've been a flashback scene

01:09:04.730 --> 01:09:10.220
which actually showed Twilight
waking up one day and getting all freaked out

01:09:10.220 --> 01:09:14.380
when she discovers
her body has magically transformed

01:09:14.380 --> 01:09:18.800
into the Celestia-recolor one we see in the finale.

01:09:18.800 --> 01:09:23.860
The episode itself was also going to be structured
a bit differently at one point,

01:09:23.860 --> 01:09:30.460
with Luster Dawn either not existing yet
or playing less of an important role in the episode.

01:09:30.460 --> 01:09:34.530
This ties into
maybe the most interesting cut concept

01:09:34.530 --> 01:09:36.460
in The Last Problem.

01:09:36.460 --> 01:09:42.220
There was originally going to be a scene
where none other than Sunset Shimmer

01:09:42.220 --> 01:09:45.560
visited Twilight in Canterlot
to give her an update

01:09:45.560 --> 01:09:48.710
on how things are going in the human world.

01:09:48.710 --> 01:09:51.020
It’s here that it was going to be revealed

01:09:51.020 --> 01:09:55.340
sometime during the huge jump of time
seen in the finale

01:09:55.340 --> 01:10:00.290
that Sunset Shimmer
actually became the principal of Canterlot High,

01:10:00.290 --> 01:10:04.280
and she now has a student council
which help her run the school,

01:10:04.280 --> 01:10:08.480
who are implied to be the human versions
of the Mane Six.

01:10:08.480 --> 01:10:10.520
This then inspires Twilight

01:10:10.520 --> 01:10:15.580
to establish the Council of Friendship
in Equestria with her friends,

01:10:15.580 --> 01:10:20.400
so they can all still keep in touch
no matter how busy they may be.

01:10:20.820 --> 01:10:25.470
So yeah,
I guess this scrapped scene with Sunset Shimmer

01:10:25.470 --> 01:10:30.080
is about the closest we will ever get
to an actual canon ending

01:10:30.080 --> 01:10:32.810
for the Equestria Girls universe.

01:10:32.810 --> 01:10:36.960
Too bad it got cut though, as Hasbro/the writers

01:10:36.960 --> 01:10:40.870
believed it would be too lore heavy
for some people watching,

01:10:40.870 --> 01:10:43.940
which is fair enough, but at the same time

01:10:43.941 --> 01:10:48.994
this was the best opportunity they had
to do something like this.

01:10:49.450 --> 01:10:54.120
One more interesting thing in The Last Problem
I want to highlight

01:10:54.120 --> 01:10:57.900
is how in some of the writers notes
made for the episode,

01:10:57.900 --> 01:11:04.340
there is text alluding to the fact the writers
did intentionally try to subtly imply

01:11:04.340 --> 01:11:09.640
that Rainbow Dash and Applejack
were in fact now a couple in the future.

01:11:09.640 --> 01:11:10.500
Additionally,

01:11:10.500 --> 01:11:12.300
they also planned at one point

01:11:12.300 --> 01:11:16.960
to effectively make the FlutterCord ship
officially canon as well,

01:11:16.960 --> 01:11:21.770
by having them kiss
after Fluttershy walks out of the chaos dimension

01:11:21.770 --> 01:11:25.620
when the future Mane Six
are meeting up in Canterlot.

01:11:25.620 --> 01:11:29.720
This detail was cut out of the episode though,
if I had to guess,

01:11:29.720 --> 01:11:34.680
most likely because the writers
didn’t want to outright confirm

01:11:34.680 --> 01:11:39.780
too many ships from the MLP fandom
as being canon in the show.

01:11:39.780 --> 01:11:44.670
But it’s still fun to know
this was indeed considered at one point.

01:11:47.740 --> 01:11:53.500
So, I’m now done talking about
all the cancelled or early versions of episodes.

01:11:53.500 --> 01:11:57.760
Technically, every single episode
went through early revisions,

01:11:57.760 --> 01:12:01.720
but I think I mentioned
all the especially interesting stuff.

01:12:01.720 --> 01:12:06.560
Personally, some of my favorites
I wish actually got to see the light of day

01:12:06.560 --> 01:12:08.640
include “How to be a Princess”,

01:12:08.640 --> 01:12:13.680
for its fun theme, the lore about
introducing all those new princesses,

01:12:13.680 --> 01:12:16.070
and the nice lesson at the end.

01:12:16.070 --> 01:12:17.830
And “Number Fish Fan”

01:12:17.830 --> 01:12:22.880
because it sounds like an overall pretty fun
and memorable Discord episode.

01:12:22.880 --> 01:12:28.890
But with that said, I think it’s worth remembering
that almost everything I mentioned here

01:12:28.890 --> 01:12:32.580
was still either drastically changed
into something else

01:12:32.580 --> 01:12:35.920
or otherwise completely cut for a reason.

01:12:35.920 --> 01:12:39.620
In my opinion,
the majority of cancelled episode ideas

01:12:39.620 --> 01:12:44.610
vary from being just okay,
to feeling a bit boring or repetitive,

01:12:44.610 --> 01:12:50.100
or to being downright bad
with poorly thought out stories or moral lessons

01:12:50.100 --> 01:12:53.500
that don’t really feel
like they fit in with the show.

01:12:53.500 --> 01:12:58.600
This could reasonably be attributed
to the fact these scrapped episodes

01:12:58.600 --> 01:13:03.420
inherently don’t have the same level of polish
that finished ones do,

01:13:03.420 --> 01:13:06.650
but I think some are genuinely just bad.

01:13:06.650 --> 01:13:13.640
A perfect example of this is one I didn’t even bother
to mention earlier, titled Smothered Brother,

01:13:13.640 --> 01:13:16.320
written by Lauren Faust herself.

01:13:16.320 --> 01:13:21.430
It’s about Big Macintosh
constantly being nagged to do things on the farm

01:13:21.430 --> 01:13:23.220
by the rest of his family,

01:13:23.220 --> 01:13:25.930
until he leaves for one single day,

01:13:25.930 --> 01:13:29.700
and now the women on the farm
are unable to do anything without him.

01:13:29.700 --> 01:13:34.930
It has this odd kinda reductive message
about how they should be thankful to Big Mac

01:13:34.930 --> 01:13:39.450
because he’s apparently
the sole provider of the farm or something.

01:13:39.450 --> 01:13:44.000
Which feels like it would’ve spectacularly gone
against a lot of the show’s

01:13:44.000 --> 01:13:48.460
original themes and messages
about female characters.

01:13:48.460 --> 01:13:52.200
The same could also be said
about something like Label Pains,

01:13:52.200 --> 01:13:56.010
where the Mane Six
are trying to prove themselves as capable,

01:13:56.010 --> 01:14:01.070
despite the fact we... already know they are
from as early as, like,

01:14:01.070 --> 01:14:03.400
the very first episode of the show.

01:14:03.400 --> 01:14:04.740
The point I’m trying to make

01:14:04.740 --> 01:14:11.610
is that maybe it was mostly a positive thing
these episodes never came to fruition.

01:14:11.900 --> 01:14:15.430
Anyways though, I’m still not fully done here,

01:14:15.430 --> 01:14:18.190
because in my research for this video

01:14:18.190 --> 01:14:24.940
I found a lot of miscellaneous smaller,
albeit still interesting cut ideas or concepts

01:14:24.940 --> 01:14:27.500
that I can’t really mention anywhere else,

01:14:27.500 --> 01:14:30.290
so I might as well go over them here.

01:14:30.710 --> 01:14:33.280
All the way back in 2009,

01:14:33.280 --> 01:14:40.220
when the voice actors for the Mane Six characters
were getting auditioned and casted into the show,

01:14:40.220 --> 01:14:43.560
some alternative voice actors were considered.

01:14:43.560 --> 01:14:49.640
The most notable were Shannon Chan-Kent
voicing Pinkie Pie instead of Andrea Libman,

01:14:49.640 --> 01:14:55.260
and believe it or not, but Kelly Sheridan,
the voice actor for Starlight Glimmer,

01:14:55.260 --> 01:14:59.500
at one point being seriously considered
for Twilight Sparkle.

01:14:59.500 --> 01:15:06.180
She apparently did two separate auditions,
and for a while was Lauren Faust’s top choice.

01:15:06.180 --> 01:15:10.200
The ‘Generosity’ and ‘Honesty’ Elements of Harmony

01:15:10.200 --> 01:15:15.470
were originally going to be called
‘Inspiration and ‘Trust’ respectively.

01:15:15.470 --> 01:15:17.780
The Elements were also at one point

01:15:17.780 --> 01:15:22.250
going to be called
the "Elements of Friendship" instead.

01:15:22.250 --> 01:15:25.530
The season 2 premiere, The Return of Harmony,

01:15:25.530 --> 01:15:30.180
was at one point going to be titled
“The Seeds of Chaos” instead.

01:15:30.180 --> 01:15:30.980
Additionally,

01:15:30.980 --> 01:15:37.420
it also seems that it had initially
started out development as a direct to DVD special

01:15:37.420 --> 01:15:40.660
instead of being a part of the show itself.

01:15:40.660 --> 01:15:46.590
As far as I can tell, this was seemingly
because Lauren Faust didn’t know for a while

01:15:46.590 --> 01:15:52.170
if MLP:FiM would actually get renewed
for a second season or not.

01:15:52.170 --> 01:15:56.660
In the Daring Do parts of the episode
‘Read it and Weep’,

01:15:56.660 --> 01:16:02.210
there was going to be a two-headed
ghost dog creature Daring Do encountered,

01:16:02.210 --> 01:16:06.000
but it was seemingly scrapped
because of time constraints.

01:16:06.000 --> 01:16:10.350
Oddly enough,
an asset showing off the design of this creature

01:16:10.350 --> 01:16:15.810
was for some reason included on the back
of an official MLP trading card binder

01:16:15.810 --> 01:16:17.580
out of all things. 

01:16:17.580 --> 01:16:21.230
According to an early outline
for Wonderbolts Academy,

01:16:21.230 --> 01:16:26.730
Lightning Dust was at one point
actually going to apologize to Rainbow Dash

01:16:26.730 --> 01:16:30.600
for her reckless behavior
at the end of the episode.

01:16:30.600 --> 01:16:34.700
Lightning was also
not dismissed from the academy as well,

01:16:34.700 --> 01:16:40.690
with her originally being part
of the group of ponies who salute Rainbow Dash.

01:16:40.690 --> 01:16:47.560
In Magical Mystery Cure, the dreamlike space
where Celestia and Twilight have a conversation

01:16:47.560 --> 01:16:50.560
before the latter gets turned into an Alicorn

01:16:50.560 --> 01:16:57.340
was initially going to be named the ‘Caelum’,
a quote ‘special place for Princesses’.

01:16:57.340 --> 01:17:01.940
Another change for this episode
and in turn the rest of the show

01:17:01.940 --> 01:17:06.940
was also how it was considered to make Twilight
much physically bigger

01:17:06.940 --> 01:17:08.900
after she became an alicorn.

01:17:08.900 --> 01:17:13.660
But she ultimately ended up
only becoming slightly taller.

01:17:13.660 --> 01:17:14.700
When making this,

01:17:14.700 --> 01:17:20.020
I stumbled across this official guide
made for people working on MLP:FiM

01:17:20.020 --> 01:17:23.050
on how exactly pony hooves should function.

01:17:23.050 --> 01:17:28.780
They had a rule to explicitly
not make the pony’s hooves be like human hands,

01:17:28.780 --> 01:17:32.960
with no quote “sticky hooves” being allowed.

01:17:32.960 --> 01:17:38.420
In the sort of infamous Derpy scene
from the episode The Last Roundup,

01:17:38.420 --> 01:17:43.050
both Rainbow Dash and Derpy
would’ve actually had more lines

01:17:43.050 --> 01:17:46.030
as the scene was intended to be longer,

01:17:46.030 --> 01:17:51.020
but was shortened in the final draft of the script
for time reasons.

01:17:51.020 --> 01:17:53.380
In Crusaders of the Lost Mark,

01:17:53.380 --> 01:18:00.080
the CMC were originally going to all get
the exact same cutie mark at the end of the episode,

01:18:00.080 --> 01:18:02.780
the Cutie Mark Crusaders emblem.

01:18:02.780 --> 01:18:09.200
The line quote “We all got the same cutie mark”
was actually meant to be literal.

01:18:09.200 --> 01:18:11.240
According to Jim Miller,

01:18:11.240 --> 01:18:15.240
 before the concept of the school of friendship
existed,

01:18:15.240 --> 01:18:21.440
season 7 was originally going to focus
on foreshadowing the Pillars of Equestria,

01:18:21.440 --> 01:18:28.010
with season 8 having an entire story arc dedicated
to bringing them back with their artifacts.

01:18:28.010 --> 01:18:32.020
However, Hasbro wanted the show to end at season 9,

01:18:32.020 --> 01:18:38.930
so the entire idea was condensed
into season 7’s finale, Shadow Play, instead.

01:18:38.930 --> 01:18:42.130
At the end of the episode Secrets and Pies,

01:18:42.130 --> 01:18:45.680
there was going to be
what appears to be a subtle reference

01:18:45.680 --> 01:18:50.340
to the infamous grimdark MLP fanfiction,
Cupcakes.

01:18:50.340 --> 01:18:53.420
Pinkie Pie asks what she thinks of cupcakes,

01:18:53.420 --> 01:18:57.710
and Rainbow Dash
has a worried expression on her face.

01:18:57.710 --> 01:19:00.790
According to some early scripts for season 8,

01:19:00.790 --> 01:19:06.130
some of the Young Six student characters
used to have different names.

01:19:06.130 --> 01:19:12.770
This included ones like Gossamer for Ocellus,
and Blaze for Smolder.

01:19:12.770 --> 01:19:17.340
According to some planned storyline ideas
for season 9,

01:19:17.340 --> 01:19:23.960
there was once going to be an episode
where either Sandbar has a crush on Tree Hugger,

01:19:23.960 --> 01:19:28.720
or alternatively,
it’s revealed they are related in some way.

01:19:28.720 --> 01:19:33.520
In some of the pre-production notes
I talked about earlier for season 9,

01:19:33.520 --> 01:19:39.940
there were some ideas to potentially explore
Celestia and Luna’s past more in depth.

01:19:39.940 --> 01:19:44.580
It would’ve been shown that they were the pupils
to the Pillars of Equestria,

01:19:44.580 --> 01:19:47.400
specifically Starswirl the Bearded.

01:19:47.400 --> 01:19:48.910
And speaking of him,

01:19:48.910 --> 01:19:55.180
there was also an idea here to reveal Starswirl,
most likely in some type of flashback scene,

01:19:55.180 --> 01:19:59.100
had at one point in time been an Alicorn.

01:19:59.100 --> 01:20:03.710
For the 200th episode of the show, Sparkle’s Seven,

01:20:03.710 --> 01:20:06.110
the voice actors for the Mane Six

01:20:06.110 --> 01:20:10.100
had the special opportunity
to pitch their own ideas

01:20:10.100 --> 01:20:13.020
for what they wanted to happen in the episode.

01:20:13.020 --> 01:20:17.250
However, not everything they suggested
ended up making it in.

01:20:17.250 --> 01:20:23.150
This includes it being explained
why Rarity has a different accent from her parents,

01:20:23.150 --> 01:20:28.340
Fluttershy going on a mission
to free the pigs on Sweet Apple Acres,

01:20:28.340 --> 01:20:30.870
time capsules, time travel,

01:20:30.870 --> 01:20:35.430
potentially new elements of harmony
like the ‘Element of Victory’,

01:20:35.430 --> 01:20:41.000
Derpy occupying multiple realities,
Spike finding a long lost sibling,

01:20:41.000 --> 01:20:46.750
and the Mane Six going into each other’s dreams,
among many others.

01:20:46.750 --> 01:20:53.160
Oh yeah, and <c.red>TARA STRONG</c><c.white> suggested to the writers
that Twilight Sparkle should be pregnant.</c>

01:20:53.660 --> 01:20:55.070
...

01:20:55.570 --> 01:20:56.730
Enough said.

01:20:56.920 --> 01:21:01.120
Speaking of Twilight,
here are a few pieces of concept art

01:21:01.120 --> 01:21:05.720
which show off unused designs
for her second coronation dress

01:21:05.720 --> 01:21:08.220
seen near the end of the show.

01:21:08.460 --> 01:21:11.520
In some pre-production notes for season 8,

01:21:11.520 --> 01:21:15.720
an idea for an episode
where all of the parents of the Mane Six

01:21:15.720 --> 01:21:19.720
get together to solve a friendship problem
was proposed.

01:21:19.720 --> 01:21:22.930
Which sounds like
it could’ve been really awesome…

01:21:22.930 --> 01:21:26.760
although maybe not as awesome
for specifically Applejack.

01:21:26.760 --> 01:21:30.920
And finally, there’s one last thing
I want to highlight.

01:21:30.920 --> 01:21:33.650
As part of leaks which happened years ago,

01:21:33.650 --> 01:21:37.890
a massive number
of behind the scenes musical material

01:21:37.890 --> 01:21:43.570
created for the songs featured in MLP:
Friendship is Magic and Equestria Girls

01:21:43.570 --> 01:21:45.120
was put online.

01:21:45.120 --> 01:21:49.600
This included demos
for early unfinished versions of songs,

01:21:49.600 --> 01:21:53.950
 the studio instrumentals of songs and much more.

01:21:53.950 --> 01:21:57.820
I purposely chose
not to talk about them here in this video,

01:21:57.820 --> 01:22:00.720
as it would not fit well in this format,

01:22:00.720 --> 01:22:06.280
but I will say that if you’re an especially big fan
of the music of MLP G4,

01:22:06.280 --> 01:22:09.170
then I would recommend checking these out.

01:22:09.170 --> 01:22:14.040
There’s a dedicated channel on Youtube
where most of them have been uploaded,

01:22:14.040 --> 01:22:17.520
and you can listen
to some really fascinating stuff here

01:22:17.520 --> 01:22:19.180
 if you look enough.

01:22:21.080 --> 01:22:23.830
So, I am now done here, for real.

01:22:23.830 --> 01:22:28.580
I covered a lot of different stuff
spanning the decade long production

01:22:28.580 --> 01:22:31.560
of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic

01:22:31.560 --> 01:22:34.200
and do you wanna know what’s kinda funny?

01:22:34.200 --> 01:22:37.780
There’s still a ton of things I didn’t mention.

01:22:37.780 --> 01:22:42.100
If I talked about every little unused idea
or early concept art,

01:22:42.100 --> 01:22:47.320
this video would be at least twice as long
and probably a lot more boring.

01:22:47.320 --> 01:22:53.700
But, I do believe I narrowed everything down
to the most interesting and notable stuff.

01:22:53.700 --> 01:22:58.590
That said, you should all now totally go ahead
and comment down below

01:22:58.590 --> 01:23:03.740
which unused ideas, concept art,
or cancelled episodes I talked about

01:23:03.740 --> 01:23:05.810
were your personal favorites.

01:23:05.810 --> 01:23:08.740
I personally learned a lot when making this video,

01:23:08.740 --> 01:23:12.780
so it would be awesome to see
what you have to say about them too.

01:23:12.780 --> 01:23:16.420
Whether the show would’ve been better or worse
with these ideas,

01:23:16.420 --> 01:23:20.850
or maybe why they have a certain allure to them
in the first place.

01:23:20.850 --> 01:23:24.180
I think the main reason
this is all so captivating,

01:23:24.180 --> 01:23:29.200
is how it effectively shows us a glimpse
into what we could’ve got.

01:23:29.200 --> 01:23:33.840
Like imagine if we ended up
with this Discord design in the show,

01:23:33.840 --> 01:23:39.770
if episodes like ‘Fancy Meeting You Deer’
or ‘A Date to Dance’ actually got made,

01:23:39.770 --> 01:23:43.110
if Starlight was still named Aurora Glimmer,

01:23:43.110 --> 01:23:48.020
or if this version of the My Little Pony logo
was actually used.

01:23:48.020 --> 01:23:54.340
MLP G4 could have been drastically different
throughout many points of its production,

01:23:54.340 --> 01:23:57.830
that looking at these
really is something special.

01:23:57.830 --> 01:24:03.680
But moreover, I think everything here
also highlights just how much creative effort

01:24:03.680 --> 01:24:10.060
must go into not only creating a show,
but also keeping it going for so many years.

01:24:10.060 --> 01:24:14.120
It’s through all this brainstorming
and refining of ideas

01:24:14.120 --> 01:24:19.800
that MLP:FiM was made into the iconic cartoon
it’s known as today.

01:24:19.800 --> 01:24:23.080
And if it wasn’t
for all the incredible talent behind it,

01:24:23.080 --> 01:24:27.610
nothing I featured in this video
would have existed either.

01:24:27.610 --> 01:24:34.780
So, with that being said,
that was more of the My Little Pony we never got.

01:24:34.780 --> 01:24:36.640
Thanks for watching.

01:24:39.860 --> 01:24:44.660
Well, you made it to the outro,
so I hope you enjoyed this video.

01:24:44.660 --> 01:24:47.930
If you did,
then consider doing all the normal stuff.

01:24:47.930 --> 01:24:51.400
Like, comment or share it around,
whatever you prefer.

01:24:51.400 --> 01:24:53.780
This is my longest video yet,

01:24:53.780 --> 01:24:58.710
and I imagine will probably remain as such
for the foreseeable future.

01:24:58.710 --> 01:25:02.340
But regardless,
I definitely still had fun making this.

01:25:02.340 --> 01:25:03.420
Like I said, 

01:25:03.420 --> 01:25:07.630
I myself genuinely learned a lot of new stuff
when making this,

01:25:07.630 --> 01:25:11.100
like uh, did you know
that one pony called Svengallop

01:25:11.100 --> 01:25:14.950
was at one point originally named ‘Pony Baloney’?

01:25:14.950 --> 01:25:16.450
I didn’t know that.

01:25:16.820 --> 01:25:20.210
Anyways though,
thank you for watching until the end.

01:25:20.210 --> 01:25:23.840
I’ve been talking for way too long now,
my- my voice is dead.

01:25:23.840 --> 01:25:26.640
so, that's everything I have left to say.

01:25:27.020 --> 01:25:29.600
And so, like always,

01:25:29.600 --> 01:25:31.020
I’ll see you

01:25:31.020 --> 01:25:32.960
whenever I see you.

01:25:32.960 --> 01:25:36.129
Subtitles by Mister Pino