| A Brony's Blue | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Writer/artist | escagorouge |
| Date published | December 24, 2011 |
| Pages | 15 |
| Type/genre | Ponies on Earth |
A Brony's Blue is a comic by escagorouge telling the story of a man who magically receives a cartoon pony into his life. There are superficial similarities to My Little Dashie, but the overall tone is bleaker, and the writer/artist has stated that he hadn't read the fan fic until after he created the comic.[1] The author has teased future stories featuring the pony as a main character[2], but as of March 22, 2012, they have not yet materialized.
Style[]
The comic consists of 15 pages, including two title pages. They all have the same dimensions and the ratio of the ISO 216 A standard. They are, however, presented not as 15 distinct pages, but in a single, extremely tall image, requiring a large amount of scrolling to read the story.
On the second title page, the author recommends two musical tracks that should be listened to while reading the comic.
The drawing style is sketchy, yet clear, and uses a somewhat limited color palette per panel. The dominant color is blue, particularly at the beginning and the ending.
The comic does not feature word balloons, or, indeed, any spoken dialogue. It is told entirely through the eyes of its human protagonist, who narrates the story via hand-written captions. These captions are predominantly, but inconsistently, written in the past tense.
Summary[]
A human named George is the story's protagonist. He lives in the United Kingdom and operates an antiques store which has been the family business for generations. He is not a brony[3]; while the show and its fandom do exist in this world, they are only mentioned in passing.
One night, George notices a strange glimmer on the surface of an old mirror. The sparkle stays on the mirror no matter what he does, and on the twentieth day, while he is walking past, there is a flash of light and something hurtles towards him. The mirror has briefly opened a portal to another world, and George comes face to face with a cartoon pony. Her name is Neon, but George soon comes to call her Nena. She is trapped on Earth far away from her friends, and George has no friends to begin with, so the two bond.
Some time passes. George prohibits Nena from leaving his house lest she be spotted, but eventually, curiosity overcomes her. She does venture outside, and she is spotted. Far from rejecting or fearing her, however, Earth embraces the pony. Over George's objections, she lets herself become fully exposed to the human world. She becomes famous and wealthy, but she also, as George puts it, becomes "more human". For the first time, she experiences negative emotions such as annoyance, disgust, stress and grief. Eventually, it is too much for her, and she has a breakdown from which she is uncertain to recover.
Desperate, George tries to figure out a way to undo the damage. He finds one when he notices that the old mirror has once again started to glimmer. He slips Nena a drink containing memory-erasing drugs and spends the next few weeks "brainwashing" the comatose pony to turn her personality back to the innocent pony she once was. On the twentieth day, she wakes up and does not remember any of her life on Earth; her name, she says, is Neon. That night, the portal opens again, and George quickly pushes her through. As soon as he has done so, he shatters the mirror and sets fire to his house.
When we see him again, he is in a hospital bed with an oxygen mask over his face. It is not explained how he got there, but either a suicide attempt or some kind of terminal illness is implied. George imagines that Neon has found her way home and been reunited with her friends and family, and closes his eyes.
Alternate version[]
Original version of one of the affected panels
The summary above reflects the version of the comic online on March 22, 2012. It differs from the original version in only two panels, on page 9 and 10, respectively. They were altered on December 29, 2011, to address criticism regarding one particular plot element. In the original version, the narrator hits Neon/Nena up the head with a baseball bat, certain that this will cause the memory loss that is a part of his plan. The altered version removes this panel entirely, as well as the comment that the act of violence "will hurt me more than it hurts her". This causes a minor continuity error for the pages that follow, because Neon's bandage was not changed, but with the new version, there is no reason for her head to be bandaged in the first place.
Motion comic[]
| A Brony's Blue (video) | |
|---|---|
| |
| Creator(s) | Loopuleasa |
| Date added | January 1, 2012 |
| Duration | 11:46 |
A very simple motion comic version has been created by Loopuleasa. It slowly pans down the image and occasionally applies minor blur and fade effects. There is no spoken dialogue, but there is background music throughout, as well as some sound effects. The chosen background music only partly matches the tracks recommended by the author of the original comic. The video originally used the comic's original version as a basis, but switched out the affected panels to accommodate the author's wishes.