Discord (My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic)
| Discord | |
|---|---|
| My Little Pony character | |
 Discord as he appears in "What About Discord?" | |
| First appearance | "The Return of Harmony" (2011) |
| Created by | Lauren Faust M.A. Larson |
| Voiced by | John de Lancie Peter New (Pony Life) |
| In-universe information | |
| Species | Draconequus |
| Title | Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony |
| Affiliation |
|
| Significant other | Cosmos (one sided crush)(comics only) |
| My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic |
|---|
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Discord is a fictional character who appears in the fourth incarnation of Hasbro's My Little Pony toyline and media franchise, beginning with My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic (2010–2019). He serves as the main antagonist of the season two premiere before becoming a major recurring character throughout the series. He is voiced by John de Lancie.[1]
Discord is depicted as a powerful and mischievous anthropomorphic draconequus who embodies chaos and disharmony.[2] As the Spirit of Chaos, he possesses reality-warping abilities and delights in creating disorder and confusion. Initially presented as a malevolent force who once ruled Equestria through chaos before being defeated and turned to stone by Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, he is later reformed through the friendship and kindness of Fluttershy, becoming one of her closest friends and an unlikely ally to the Mane Six. His character arc explores themes of redemption, the value of friendship, and the balance between order and chaos.
Appearances
[edit]![[icon]](/wiki/File:Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg){kind=small} | This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (May 2025) |
Fourth My Little Pony incarnation (2010–2021)
[edit]My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
[edit]More than a thousand years before the beginning of the series, Discord once ruled Equestria in a state of unrest and unhappiness until Princess Celestia and Princess Luna used the Elements of Harmony to turn him into stone. Discord first appears in the second season premiere "The Return of Harmony" when he escapes from his stone prison and plunges Equestria into chaos. He corrupts the Mane Six by turning their positive traits into negative ones, causing them to turn against each other. After Twilight Sparkle overcomes his influence and restores the Elements of Harmony, Discord is defeated and turned back into stone.
Discord returns in the episode "Keep Calm and Flutter On" when Princess Celestia releases him from his stone prison and tasks Fluttershy with reforming him. Throughout subsequent seasons, Discord develops a close friendship with Fluttershy while learning to use his chaotic abilities for good rather than evil, and occasionally helps the Mane Six in their adventures.
Development
[edit]He's the one character where we can break all of the rules of the show. He can have a reference to something that's a bit more modern day or contemporary. He has hands—which is a big thing. In Seasons 4 and 5, I ended up with a couple of Discord episodes, and he then became a kind of character where you could just throw him in a different costume and have him do something extra silly—it seems to work really well for him.
In mythology, Discord or Discordia is a trickster and the Roman goddess of chaos.[4] Faust based Discord's character on Q, an omnipotent trickster played by John de Lancie in Star Trek: The Next Generation. The production team considered casting a soundalike of de Lancie to voice the character but decided to try to get de Lancie himself, who was available.[5] The creative team developed Discord as "the one character who could break all of the rules of the show", by making him put more modernized or contemporary pop culture references than usual in the series' "fantasy storybook" setting.[6][7] He was not intended to have a recurring role;[6] according to McCarthy, "'reforming' him allows us to tell new stories with his character. He gets to be the not-always-reliable ally instead of the known enemy".[8] Author of My Little Pony: The Art of Equestria Mary Jane Begin commented on the "chaotic" settings that accompany the character, such as his home dimension called Chaosville, likening them to "dream-inspired Salvador Dalí paintings".[9]
Discord's introduction in the Season 2 premiere was indicative of the show's incorporation of pop culture references to appeal to adult viewers. Media studies professor Venetia Laura Delano Robertson noted that Discord's chaos-inducing abilities, including causing chocolate rain to fall over Ponyville, referenced the viral YouTube video and Internet meme "Chocolate Rain" by Tay Zonday that had been popularized on 4chan. The character's debut was part of what Robertson identified as the show's deliberate "tailoring to the geek demographic"; the series also used references ranging from Star Wars: A New Hope (which the ponies' victory ceremony directly mimicked) to The Big Lebowski (whose characters appeared as background ponies).[10]
Supervising director and executive producer Jayson Thiessen wrote of Discord's reformation:
"What I like is that he started out as a villain and now he's not a villain, but he never really changed. It's really just whether or not he's trying to hurt the ponies or take over their world. He's still the chaos character that we were introduced to; it's just that now he's not doing it for evil purposes. He's essentially the genie from Aladdin in a way, or Loki—really, any sort of trickster. He can be either negative or positive, but it doesn't change his trickster nature."[11]
Reception and analysis
[edit]Academic analysis has examined Discord's character design and mythological significance within the show's lore. According to Priscilla Hobbs in her 2015 essay Everypony Has a Story, when show creator Lauren Faust drew inspiration from Greek mythological creatures like chimeras and manticores when developing Discord, she deliberately made his body parts asymmetrical and from different animals to give the impression of disharmony. Hobbs likened Discord's character to the Greek goddess Eris, the personification of discord and strife, and applied essayist Lewis Hyde's analysis of trickster figures to Discord, describing him as "a boundary-crosser" who "will cross the line and confuse the distinction" between established social and moral categories. The essay also examined the philosophical implications of Discord's reformation, noting that the show presents a doctrine of balance similar to Aristotle's Golden Mean, where Discord and harmony must coexist rather than one annihilating the other (cf. The Nicomachean Ethics). Hobbs argued that Discord's transformation from chaotic villain to reformed ally represents hope and optimism for controlling real-world chaos, especially for "a generation who has spent a significant portion of its life in a state of war and chaos."[12]
In his 2018 study Rebooting Ponies and Men, men's studies professor Samuel Miller used Discord as the namesake for a theoretical framework he termed "discordant masculinity." Miller argued that Discord's physical composition as a draconequus and his character arc from chaotic antagonist to reformed ally through friendship parallels how adult male fans of the show challenge traditional gender norms. According to Miller, Discord's initial appearance as "chaotic, mish-mashed, and an oddity" followed by the revelation of "something within him that is genuine and good" mirrors how the general public perceives male My Little Pony fans (also known as bronies). Miller further argued that Discord's reformation without the need for ironic distancing or strategic identity management is a departure from other forms of alternative masculinity that rely on traditional masculinity for legitimacy.[13]
In his 2018 article My Little Pony, Communalism and Feminist Politics, media scholar Kevin Fletcher wrote that Discord's backstory reflected "a feminist impulse," remarking that Princess Celestia and Luna's dethroning of Discord represented a form of feminist revolution against autocratic kingship, with the sisters fighting against injustice to liberate the oppressed ponies and establish Equestria's matriarchal diarchy. Fletcher argued that Discord's actions during his return—taking control of natural cycles including the sun, moon, weather, and food production, while altering reality in ways reminiscent of M.C. Escher and Salvador Dalí—suggest associations with "male culture" that contrast with the ponies' more nurturing relationship to nature.[14]
Carly Olsen, writing in Screen Rant, ranked Discord as the fourth most powerful magic user in Friendship Is Magic.[15]
See also
[edit]- List of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic characters
- Fluttershy
- Princess Celestia
- Princess Luna
- Twilight Sparkle
- Derpy Hooves
- Zecora
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fandom
References
[edit]- ^ "Discord Voices (My Little Pony)". Behind The Voice Actors. Retrieved 2025-05-27.
- ^ Connelly, S. (2017). Ponyville Confidential: The History and Culture of My Little Pony, 1981-2016. McFarland, Incorporated, Publishers. p. 78. ISBN 9781476662091. LCCN 2016044897.
- ^ Begin (2015), p. 97
- ^ Ruoff, s.v. Eris, p. 329.
- ^ Cereal Velocity (September 24, 2011). "Massive Jayson Thiessen Q&A From Bronycon". Equestria Daily. Retrieved September 23, 2012.
- ^ a b Begin (2015), p. 96
- ^ Begin (2015), p. 9
- ^ Snider (2013), p. 54
- ^ Begin (2015), p. 97
- ^ Robertson, V. L. D. (2013). "Of ponies and men: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and the Brony fandom". International Journal of Cultural Studies. 17 (1): 21–37. doi:10.1177/1367877912464368.
- ^ Begin (2015), p. 99
- ^ Hobbs, Priscilla (2015-04-23). "Everypony Has a Story: Revisions of Greco-Roman Mythology in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic". In Berti, Irene; Carlà-Uhink, Filippo (eds.). Ancient Magic and the Supernatural in the Modern Visual and Performing Arts. Bloomsbury Publishing. pp. 197–209. ISBN 9781472532213.
- ^ Miller, Samuel (2018). "Rebooting Ponies and Men: Discordant Masculinity and the Brony Fandom". Journal of Men's Studies. 26 (3). SAGE Publications: 1–19. doi:10.1177/1060826518773468.
- ^ Fletcher, Kevin (2018). "My Little Pony, Communalism and Feminist Politics". Orienting Feminism. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 25–42.
- ^ Olsen, Carly (2020-04-05). "My Little Pony: The 10 Best Magic Users, Ranked". Screen Rant. Retrieved 2025-05-27.
Bibliography
[edit]- Begin, Mary Jane (2015). My Little Pony: The Art of Equestria. New York: Abrams. ISBN 978-1-4197-1577-8.
- Snider, Brandon T. (2013). The Elements of Harmony: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: The Official Guidebook. New York: Little, Brown and Company. ISBN 978-0-316-24754-2.
