Humm…I could be working on the new chapter…or I could waste your time with yet another post that will be quickly invalidated…

Let’s go with the post, then. Time to look at Discord.

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Long ago, sometime between the founding of Equestria and Nightmare Moon, the land was ruled by the evil draconequus Discord. A literal God of Chaos, the monster spread fear and suffering across every corner of Equestria, torturing the poor ponies for eons and infecting the land with his madness. Then one day, he was challenged by two sisters: Celestia and Luna. Using the Elements of Harmony, the one force in existence that could counter his ruinous powers, they turned him to stone, freeing the land of his toxic influence and taking control of Equestria for themselves.

Fast forward to the present. Because Celestia and Luna lost their link to the Elements, Discord was finally able to free himself. After spreading some entry-level chaos to Ponyville, he confronts the new Bearers in the chamber holding the Elements, having already bypassed Celestia’s security measures with ease and stolen them. He then manipulates the ponies into a rigged game, stranding them in a maze and breaking each pony mentally before spreading his chaos to everywhere and everything else in Equestria. Even after they find the Elements, the group is too corrupted to do anything, and Discord is overjoyed at his victory.

What he didn’t know, however, was that Celestia was also a master manipulator. In a desperate move, she sent Twilight back her friendship reports, breaking the corruption and allowing her to save the others. When they returned to finish him off, he was so certain that they could never have broken free that he simply sat there and let them fire a shot. It wasn’t until the rainbow was bearing down on him that he realized his mistake, and was turned to stone once again.

Rumors are that he will appear in Season 3.

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Discord was a major step up in the antagonists department from Season One’s offerings. Outside of Nightmare Moon, the enemies our heroes faced tended to either be straightforward jerks or literal monsters. Discord, however, was far, far more dangerous than anything else the heroes have run into by this point. This isn’t just some egotistical stage magician or foppish prince; Discord is an abomination capable of warping reality on a whim, erasing the personalities of his victims so they can serve as better toys. Even his very body is representative of his chaotic origins; every part belongs to a different species, giving him a disjointed, freakish appearance.

Power-wise, Discord is the most powerful opponent the heroes have yet faced. While he’s not much to look at physically, his abilities rely in his chaotic magic and nature. Discord far surpasses Celestia and Luna, to the point where the only thing the Princess could do was sit back and hope the others could find the Elements and stop him. He can completely change reality with a snap of his fingers, change the positions of the sun and moon, and transmogrify anything into anything else. His most dangerous and terrifying power, however, is his ability to mind rape anypony he touches, infecting them with his own particular brand of insanity. Much like Poison Joke, the madness tends to be ironic in nature, such as making Fluttershy cruel and forcing Granny Smith to tap dance. What the chaos is doesn’t matter to him, however, as much as it simply occurring.

As for his personality, Discord is, to put it simply, pure evil. He wants to spread chaos and misery wherever he goes, not to further some grand plan or to advance his personal agenda, but just because he likes to make ponies suffer. While things like cotton candy clouds of chocolate rain and bunnies with legs like giraffes might seem funny, once you see everything else he does it loses its charm very quickly. When Discord breaks the Mane 6, he uses illusions and psychological tactics to dig at their weaknesses, eventually reducing them to mere shadows of their former selves before digging his way into their brains and erasing their personalities entirely. But the worst thing? None of that is necessary. He could simply brainwash them with a touch, or a hypnotizing glance. But it’s just so much more fun to watch the puppets dance before cutting their strings...

Discord has one major weakness, however: his pride leaves him incapable of understanding anything outside of chaos. After running the game to perfection, defeating the only ponies that could stop him, and taking over Equestria again, he lets his guard slip. This gives Celestia the opening she needs to make her own move, using Twilight to free the others and launch another attack. Discord, however, cannot comprehend the idea that anypony could break free from his corruption, even giving the ponies a free shot. And we all know what happened then…

Popularity-wise, Discord is one of the all-time most beloved villains in the series, going neck-and-neck with Trixie. Unlike her, however, Discord has absolutely nothing redeemable about him shown to us. He mentally rapes nearly all of the primary and secondary characters. He nearly destroys Equestria for laughs. He celebrates Twilight’s breakdown and subsequent corruption. So why do so many people love the guy?

A lot of it, honestly, has to do with the voice actor and character’s inspiration. Lauren Faust dreamed up Discord while watching a bunch of Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes, and figured that a Q-like villain would be really cool. They wanted to get a soundalike for the episode, but then someone suggested getting John de Lancie himself. And so they did. Given the very negative reaction to his general appearance, that simply casting call not only saved the character from the fandom’s trash bin, but made him one of the most endearing figures to ever appear.

Unfortunately, this also has led to a rather large disconnect between the inspiration and the character. Because he sounds like Q and has powers like Q, a lot of fans immediately assume that he has the same personality as Q. Nothing could be further from the truth. At most, Discord is like Q from the first season of TNG, before he was tweaked into the character we know and love. Back then, he was an obnoxious trickster who screwed with the crew for his own amusement and threw fits when he didn’t win. Discord doesn’t want to use chaos to expand everypony’s knowledge of the universe, or to test the limits of their character. He just wants to screw with you, and assuming that he’s just a misunderstood funny guy greatly undermines the rather nightmarish aspects of his character.

Still, a lot of stories also use Discord as a villain, as was intended. Of course, quite a few take the route of Discord coming back and kicking everypony’s flanks but good this time and destroying Equestria. Still others use him as a more subtle force, corrupting ponies even after being turned into stone. And of course, there’s the ones where he teams up with another villain (usually Chrysalis these days) to spread chaos and destruction over all of Equestria.

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Obviously, Discord gets quite a few stories shipping him with the ponies, with these stories also either providing him with a Freudian Excuse for his actions or painting him simply as a dragon-thing who wanted to have fun. And the most popular ship by far is with Celestia. If the story’s in the past, then the two had a forbidden love that went sour, thus causing Discord to turn evil. If it’s in the present, then the two are exes who decide to get back together for whatever reason. And then you have the ones where Discord loved Celestia, but she was cruel to him because he was ugly and she wasn’t perfect and nice like Luna.

Another one that’s built up a lot of steam is with Pinkie. This one is a lot less complex in theory; she loves pranks, and he’s obviously just a big prankster, so they must get along perfectly. Never you mind that Pinkie was very much ready to stone his butt after he had screwed with her and her friends, the two are obviously an item! Oh, and you could also ship him with Chrysalis! After all, she’s a bad guy, too.

When you get right down to it, though, Discord simply doesn’t ship cleanly with anypony. The guy is not a cuddly figure who just needs a good hug. He’s a complete sociopath, and if approached at all about a relationship, he’d probably just use it as a means to earn some cheap laughs at the lover’s expense. He also has no friends or allies, nor does he need them.

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Discord is the most powerful villain in the series so far, and certainly the most twisted. He made a tremendous impact when he came onto the scene, serving as a sign that this series was willing to go into darker territory than many of its contemporaries. That being said, I still don’t think that he should return, outside of a flashback appearance or the like. He’s just so powerful that there’s no way to do a second battle without cheapening or trivializing the threat he represents. Still, we shall always remember him for his soapy roads, exploding chocolate milk, and sexy, sexy voice.

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And that’s another one down.