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Blog / Reading Rainbowverse

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A collection of blogs that focus on ponies reading various webcomics and the interactions between them. The following blogs are all a part of the same 'continuity', despite being run by different people:

Rainbow Dash Reads Homestuck currently has a separate page. All examples pertaining to blogs that do not have an individual page should be contained below.

Tropes:

  • Accidental Proposal: Vinyl Scratch (from Trixie's blog) made one to Octavia after an emotional video caused her to worry about their friendship. However, the matter caused Octavia to have a Love Epiphany, and after discovering what Vinyl actually meant, she decided to make an authentic proposal back to Vinyl.
  • Aesop Amnesia: Various people point out to Gilda and Trixie the benefits of friendship. Trixie sees it as an unnecessary luxury, while Gilda just claims it's a weakness.
    • Lightning Dust did have a small case of this, believing she was in the right during her actions at the Wonderbolt Academy. She's wised up, though.
  • Alien Geometries: Big Mac tends to react to photos of the human world by citing this trope.
  • Alternate Timeline: Although the Verse as a whole is clearly different from the source material, special mention goes to "Sweetie Belle Plays", which involves an alternate future of the Reading Rainbowverse.
  • And Now for Someone Completely Different: Bonbon goes into the multiverse, and Lyra picks up her blog while trying to find her.
    • Almost every single blog has at least one or two instances of someone else taking over the blog for a day, some of them very frequently. A few were eventually just acknowledged in-universe to be shared and gave the former guest equal billing.
  • Art Shift: Bonbon's blog varies as time goes on.
  • Ascended Fanboy: Scorched Flame, in a way.
  • Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: Bonbon builds a rock candy golem for her duel with Pinkie. It wasn't meant to be used when it was, but the Cutie Mark Crusaders got their hooves on it and lost control...
    • Big Macintosh attempted to invoke this trope under the belief that creating a golem to attack the town would somehow help everyone deal with their romantic issues. Thankfully, he was convinced that this probably wasn't the best idea.
  • Author Avatar: In-universe example. Bonbon runs another blog in which she tells a Show Within a Show story. In it two characters are blatantly supposed to resemble Lyra and a self-insert of Bonbon herself.
  • Be Careful What You Wish For: Bonbon wishes Lyra would take their relationship just a tad more seriously. Then Lyra finds out how Bonbon really feels and, thinking she can't return the affections, breaks up with her.
  • Bigger on the Inside: Octavia and Vinyl's mansion has mysterious extra-dimensional qualities, as revealed when Lyra and Bonbon visited for a few days.
  • Blind Date: Vinyl organized one between Dash and Dust, which ended horribly. Fluttershy organized one between Gilda and Galaxy while drunk, with much better results.
  • Breaking the Fourth Wall: While all the blogs talk directly with their audience as part of their premise, the real kicker is when somebody pointed out to Gilda that her blog had been hijacked by some strange "Mod" person. Leading to them briefly bickering.
  • Breakout Character: Lightning Dust. Goes from a one-episode foil in canon to a horribly insecure teenager with a bad home life.
  • Brick Joke: Early on Fluttershy mentions Spitfire has a daughter named "Lightning something or other." Then Vinyl sets Rainbow up on a blind date...
  • Call-Back: A number of times.
  • Cast Herd: Usually characters stick to their blogs, or the blogs they were introduced in.
  • Cerebus Rollercoaster: Oh so very, very, very much.
  • Changeling Tale: Caramel eventually revealed the reason behind his gender changes and spontaneous combustion is that he's a changeling. Given he didn't know what he was until relatively recently, this is the most likely explanation.
  • Chekhov's Gun: Carapace's super-sugary jam, and the comment that it probably isn't safe for ponies to drink, suddenly becomes a major plot point some weeks later.
  • Childhood Friend Romance: While most of the romances in the Rainbowverse began as friendships, Octavia has known Vinyl since they were both young fillies.
  • Cool Old Lady: Granny Smith.
  • Comically Missing the Point: See Accidental Proposal above, and Oblivious to Love below.
  • Companion Cube: Smarty Pants for Big Mac, apparently.
  • Confessing Under The Influence: Fluttershy finally managed to confess her love to Big Mac...while drunk, and made him swear to get her to confess while she was sober.
  • Crossover: Before the creation of Derpy's own Reading blog, Ask Facebook Derpy was the Derpy connected to the Reading Rainbowverse. However, Facebook Derpy is also connected to the Ask Cyberbully Fluttershy universe despite it being mutually exclusive, with no better explanation than Derpy being...Derpy. Separating these two universes also allowed the existence of Powder Fluff Reads Ctrl+Alt+Del.
    • A ton of other blogs came to a party meant to comfort Bonbon after her breakup, with Ask Brainy Twilight hanging around and unable to return home until the Rainbowverse's Princess Celestia helped her. Since then, she has reappeared in the Rainbowverse under more controllable circumstances
    • Priddy Pinkie has gone from merely sending messages to actually interacting with some ponies, most often Octavia & Vinyl.
    • In addition to Brainy Twilight and Priddy Pinkie (and "Erishy", Priddy's wife), Pirate Rainbow Dash also made a brief appearance at Octavia and Vinyl's wedding.
  • Cuteness Overload: Fluttershy's reaction to a picture of a Joltick eating a kernel of popcorn.
  • Cyborg: Carapace, Carrot Top, Spotty Record, Cloudchaser, and Star Swirl, thanks to Brainy Twilight and her mad science.
  • Delivery Stork: Derpy, in response to the constant pressure to reveal Dinky's identity, eventually concocts the entire mythos of Stork Mountain with magical words that little ponies shouldn't hear because it will make them tired.
    • Interestingly enough, it is revealed that ancient pegasi actually used storks to deliver foals that weren't pegasi to the other two tribes.
  • Disaster Dominoes: Carrot Top sets one off, though it began with good intentions. She tells Bon Bon that Lyra tried to drink a Love Poison, but didn't mention Lyra's reasons for doing so. This causes Bon Bon to hate Lyra, kicking her out of the house, and a bunch of anons to get really angry at Carrot Top. Due to the combined pressure of both, Carrot Top falls Off the Wagon and disappears. Octavia breaks down sobbing, feeling guilty over keeping Lyra's secret as well as unintentionally hurting other friends recently. When Octavia grows so depressed that she worries about Lyra hurting herself over the matter, Vinyl Scratch tries to help by conducting a search party (including some extra-dimensional guests), but it was unsuccessful. Lyra turned up at Octoscratch Mansion before Octavia completely breaks down, but Carrot Top was still not able to be found. This causes Vinyl Scratch to go into depression and get really drunk, and Pinkie Pie and Rarity choose to take care of her overnight.
  • Dysfunction Junction: Take the canon Friendship is Magic Ponyville, add romantic drama, spice with reactions to human-made webcomics.
  • Edible Ammunition: In the Battle of the Pans, Bonbon and Pinkie engaged in anime-style food fights. Fluttershy lampshades it by saying that duels of this nature are common, since it would not be honorable to die off the battlefield.
  • Failed a Spot Check: Due to the way time works in...wherever Bonbon ended up after the Battle of the Pans, she kept missing important parts of the discussions that occurred right after she left despite standing right next to a portal showing the blog posts of her friends.
  • Fate Drives Us Together: Back when Lyra broke up with Bonbon, she did tell the confectioner that fate may one day bring them back together.
  • Fidelity Test: Vinyl was dared to kiss Applejack by a tipsy Octavia, and was asked to kiss "Philly" by Philly herself. The DJ apparently went through with it both times, but her heart belongs only to Octavia.
  • Freudian Excuse: Even the most HORRIBLE thing to happen in this series is, apparently, the result of childhood trauma.
  • Fun with Acronyms: Lyra (and Carapace, though she's not officially in yet) are members of the Committee On United Chairs and Headrests, or COUCH.
  • Gone Horribly Right: Rainbow Dash's reaction when she finds out that everyone, including fictional characters, are creating their own blogs, and that it has even been recommended for therapy.
  • Heroic BSoD: Usually happens when one character discovers that somepony they love doesn't love them back...or decided to traipse across the multiverse...or attempts to drink a Love Poison.
  • Hilarity Ensues: Usually when Shy gets drunk. Or the characters come across disturbing parts of their comics. Or questions toward their romantic lives ensue.
  • Homosexual Reproduction: Married couple Octavia and Vinyl Scratch are now expecting children, apparently.
  • Humiliation Conga: Let's see. Lightning was kicked out of the Wonderbolts, which ruined her relationship with her mother, set up on a blind date with the mare that she blames for that, accused of getting said mare into prison and getting more disappointment from her mother, went into heat for the first time and became heatlocked on said mare, attracted the attention of an anonymous eldritch abomination, had a "male organ" drawn on her forehead by said eldritch abomination, hospitalized herself trying to do a sonic rainboom, was disowned by her mother shortly thereafter, and forced to wear a frilly dress. More recently, she's been accused of being racist, and she will permanently need glasses due to damages from attempting the rainboom.
  • Incompatible Orientation: Big Mac had a crush on Twilight, who isn't actually into stallions. Leads to Sorry, I'm Gay.
  • I Need to Go Iron My Dog: The characters will frequently deflect asks with "Hey let's read the comic!" comments.
    • Subverted with the Wonderbolts, who have gone on semi-hiatus from reading the comics while Spitfire tries to recover.
    • After Carapace accidentally says something that could incite anger against the changelings, she indulges the next person to ask about her recent date, and then proceeds to move the discussion towards the merits of Jam. Surprisingly, the readers go along with this, and with equal enthusiasm.
  • Innocent Innuendo: When the CMC asked what a concubine was, they were informed it was the name of the quills on a porcupine. Cue Scootaloo indirectly calling one of Fluttershy's animal friends a pimp, much to her consternation.
    • When Vinyl asked if Khepri the Changeling would like to be her pet, it turns out Vinyl meant it more like "house guest".
  • Insistent Terminology: According to Pinkie Pie, there is no "multiverse"; just many alternate dimensions contained within a single universe.
  • Interspecies Romance: As per the norm, Gilda with a pony. Specifically, an eyeless unicorn named Galaxy. She may have also had a one-night stand with Zecora while drunk, but Gilda did not know what actually happened that night. Turns out that nothing happened with Zecora, but Galaxy broke up with Gilda for trying to keep the mere possibility a secret from her.
    • Gilda is also the subject of a one-way crush by Flamefur the Fantastic... a completely non-anthropomorphic cat owned by Trixie.
    • As for the Changelings, Khepri is now in a relationship with Lightning Dust, and Big Mac is in a relationship with Carapace.
  • It's All My Fault: After Bonbon had a falling out with Lyra over the Love Potion incident, Octavia blamed herself for knowing about Lyra's plan but keeping quiet. She also felt guilt for dropping Gilda off at Zecora's house after the Wild Teen Party, and considering all of her friends that were hurt in some way by these two events, she nearly broke down completely.
  • It Makes Sense in Context: Vinyl Scratch often locks herself in a bathroom during her freak-outs.
  • Love Epiphany: Octavia has one after Vinyl's Accidental Proposal, which leads to her actually proposing to Vinyl.
  • Love Potion: Lyra has attempted to recreate the Love Poison (last used by the Crusaders on Hearts and Hooves Day), and tried to vary the recipe so it would not put Bonbon in danger. She never got to use it.
  • Love Triangle: Macintosh, Fluttershy, and Carapace were in a love triangle, mostly because what Macintosh interprets as a breaking up gesture, Fluttershy seemed to interpret as more of an "I'm still nervous but I'm okay with this" gesture.
  • Made Myself Sad: Pokey Pierce, in a rare moment of lucidity, comments that he believes he will inevitably have to seek psychiatric help. He claims that he 'bummed himself out' for a minute.
  • Magitek: The Wonderbolts' "clandestine operations" are rumored to involve this.
  • Major General Song: Octavia wrote a version to celebrate her blog getting 50 followers, and it takes note of how much her fellow ponies can relate to the comics they chose to read.
  • Mind Screw: The relationships of Vinyl and Octavia have gotten so complicated that it drifted into this.
    • For starters, Fiddlesticks is part of the Apple Family and one of Octavia's cousins. Then, Octavia and Carapace did an experiment in order to put a teenage version of the former into the brain of a pony, thus counting her as a daughter. Brainy Twilight created Vinylbot, so she can count as the child of the former and Vinyl, and since Brainy Twilight is genetically the same as the Twilight Sparkle from THIS universe, SHE counts as being reelated to the musicians.
  • Mistaken for Cheating: Several readers and ponies used to accuse Big Macintosh of cheating on Fluttershy with Carapace. But Mac did not consider himself to really be dating Fluttershy in the first place, and had in fact been trying to let her down gently.
  • Mistaken for Romance: Both various readers and the ponies in the community convinced themselves that Big Mac and Carapace's friendship was more than it seemed, which caused strife when they try to force them together. Though they do end up together later on...
  • The Multiverse: Openly acknowledged to exist, and occasionally crossed over with.
    • Surprise and Blaze of the Wonderbolts both have knowledge of the "Human World," the former having "old friends" there, as well as her pop culture references, and the latter with her love of flight simulators. More recently, "Operation Magic Mirror" is implied to take place there as well.
    • After Pinkie threw a huge multiverse party for Bonbon with over a dozen other blogs making cameos Bonbon is nigh-obsessed with finding a way to travel to other universes/blogs, especially ones starring Lyra. She finally achieves this after combining her powers with Pinkie to summon cakes and candies from another universe and accidentally sending herself... somewhere. After crossing through the world of "Legend of Lyra" and Daring Do's place, she did successfully find her way back home.
  • Mundane Utility: The day after the Wild Teen Party, while it was not her reason for doing so, switching to her Philly personality did help Octavia avoid dealing with hangover pains the next day.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Oh hey look, Lyra's on Bonbon's blog! Let's all send her asks about how Bonbon adores her! That can only improve their relationship and oh my gosh Lyra just broke up with Bonbon. That's right, the readers did this.
    • The readers were also eager to ask Gilda about her love life with ponies and things other than Galaxy, and theorized that she slept with Zecora while drunk after the Wild Teen Party, but that didn't end well either...
  • Noodle Incident: The Cutie Mark Crusaders have, according to Lightning Dust's blog, attempted slaying an Eldritch Abomination before.
  • Not What It Looks Like: Played with; ever since Gilda woke up in Zecora's hut after the Wild Teen Party, she tried to convince herself that she did not accidentally cheat on Galaxy with the Zebra. In the end, Zecora herself reveals that nothing happened, but not before Galaxy breaks up with Gilda over the matter.
  • Odd Friendship: The independent and rash Gilda develops a camaraderie with the Bonbon the level-headed planner during the interactions between their blogs. Gilda is the first one to arrive to comfort Bonbon after her breakup, and Bonbon drew the "awesome" header for Gilda's blog.
    • The outgoing and proud Trixie is friends with with the shy and timid Fluttershy, though Trixie refuses to admit it. Trixie even refers to her friend as "Fluttershy the Graceful".
  • Only Sane Mare: Trixie, if you can believe it. She does her best to avoid the other ponies as much as possible, and especially avoid going into Ponyville, so as to not get drawn into embarrassing and dangerous shenanigans.
  • Painting the Fourth Wall: The asks sent from the Shadowbolts have... odd capitalization.
    • In addition, the virus on Big Macintosh's computer has recently begun to add a Zalgo-like effect to text on the blog.
  • Parody Names: Whinny Leaks, an obvious spoof of Wiki Leaks.
    • Big Mac and Philly have also brought up some movie titles and brands that are the pony equivalents to famous works.
  • Phrase Catcher: 'Thunderlane is an irresponsible x' is starting to spread around.
  • Polyamory: The concept of 'herding' has been brought up a few times on various blogs, mainly as a joke. However, Star Swirl (the current, not the Bearded) is a product of such a relationship, with five different ponies having raised her equally.
    • Lightning Dust may be in a similar situation, depending on whether or not others believe that Forest Melody and Khepri are really completely different characters.
  • Rage Against the Author: Agate from Crystalstuck has some rare moments where she seems to resent the commands tumblr gives Bonbon to write the story with.
  • Replacement Goldfish: Fluttershy believes this was the reason Bonbon wanted to travel the multiverse.
  • Running Gag: To Vinyl's chagrin, all of the Wonderbolts keep saying that she plays nothing but dubstep.
    • Big Mac reacting with confusion whenever Lyra gives him a new nickname.
    • Whenever a new person makes themselves known, they always get asked if they find Trixie attractive.
    • Ponies hiding in Fluttershy's bathroom for some reason.
    • Big Mac's keyboard mashings containing references to the words of Franz Kafka.
    • FLYIN' SURFBOARD!
    • The constant mangling of Caramel's girlfriend's name, Sassaflash.
  • Satchel Switcheroo: Lyra attempted to make a Love Poison in order to provide the affection Bonbon wanted from her, but before she could use it, the concoction ended up switched with Carapace the Changeling's extra-sugary jam.
  • Serenade Your Lover: Several readers suggested that Mac serenade Carapace in an attempt to win her over. Mac argued that the only instrument he can play is the banjo, which he considers the least romantic instrument ever.
  • Sibling Rivalry: According to Daring Do, she was once attacked with a knife by her sister Derring for unintentionally stealing the spotlight too often.
    • Carrot Top has major issues with her twin sister Golden Harvest. Golden Harvest is a wealthy and popular member of the Canterlot Social Elite (So she says, anyway), while Carrot Top is a recovering alcoholic who works on the apple farm. On the other hand, Carrot Top has her soft side beneath her Snark Knight exterior, while Golden Harvest badmouths Carrot Top behind her back after logging into Carrot Top's account. She also called Derpy retarded, earning her a black eye from Applejack.
  • Show Within a Show: Inspired by the command-based webcomics her friends were reading, Bonbon gets her gaming group, including Pinkie, Roseluck, and Thunderlane to help her draw another webcomic called Crystalstuck that takes commands from tumblr. Events from her main blog often effect the Crystalstuck blog, and vice-versa.
  • Single-Target Sexuality: Related to 'Replacement Goldfish' above, Bonbon was not interested in ponies like her world's Lyra, but alternate Lyras specifically.
  • Slice of Life: A lot of the plot isn't actually about reading webcomics.
  • Some of My Best Friends Are X: Lightning Dust, in response to non-Ponies in the Equestrian Military:
    Lightning Dust: Look I’m dating a changeling okay I can’t be a racist.
  • Suspiciously Specific Denial: Thunderlane is very insistent that he has no connection to the virus on Big Macintosh's computer, and that Big Mac's flash drive wasn't purchased from a mysterious caravan.
  • Sympathetic P.O.V.: Lyra does eventually get the chance to show Bonbon their relationship issues from her point of view, showing just how careless some of Bonbon's actions have been.
  • Tempting Fate: "But I’m sure that there’s nothing in whatever she has to write that’s so urgent that it can’t wait a few days."
  • 10-Minute Retirement: Trixie had once announced that she ended her blog. With the help of Pinkie Pie, she's back blogging the next day.
  • That Reminds Me of a Song: Fluttershy usually gets a little weirded out when she receives asks from characters who, in universe, should be able to just walk up to her. So her drunkenly typing out her drunkenly singing Rock Lobster is almost completely out of nowhere.
  • Troubled Abuser: It turns out that one of the reasons Lightning Dust has such a rocky relationship with her mother Spitfire is because Spitfire had a equally bad (if not worse) relationship with her own father.
  • Uptight Loves Wild: Octavia is stuffy. Vinyl is untamed. It's true love.
    • Bonbon (who is always planning things) has feelings for Lyra the free spirit, though Lyra's not sure if she loves Bonbon in a romantic sense.
  • "Well Done Daughter" Girl: At one point, Lightning Dust heavily injured herself trying to impress her mother, Spitfire. Spitfire's response was to (figuratively) disown her, though she has since regretted saying such things.
    • Also, to a lesser extent, Bonbon. She often references the way her late parents raised her to explain why she does what she does, including her extremely reverent attitude to the Princesses (including Twilight, to her annoyance), wanting to marry and have a family early, and even her friendly rivalry with Pinkie Pie.
  • What Did I Do Last Night?: On June 18th, 2013, after a Vinyl concert and a huge after party the previous night, various guests ended up scattered across the Ponyville area wondering what happened. Big Mac, whose house the party was thrown in, ended up in a mare's bedroom in an entirely different city.
  • Wham Episode: Fluttershy celebrates two hundred followers by getting drunk... and subsequently drawing all the major blogs at the time into a whirlwind romantic breakdown.
    • In early 2014, Khepri becoming a Changeling Queen impacted every blog connected to the Changelings in some way, and will certainly effect many future developments.
  • Wild Teen Party: Two in one night! The first is just Vinyl's concert, so it's to be expected... but then Gilda drunkenly tells everypony there's an after party at Big Mac's and, well, things get really crazy. Most of the attendees wake up in homes that aren't even their own!
  • Worldbuilding: We're occasionally treated to hints of ancient pony history. The world's called Arcadia, there was some goblin war in the past, and the elves cut off contact after the Nightmare Moon incident...
  • You Mean "Xmas": Aside from the show-based holidays, Fluttershy also mentions the Ceremony of the Painted Eggs.

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