It didn't hit mainstream full swing until they made that one My Little Pony series that added some less than child friendly stuff that drastically accelerated it into the mainstream. But it definitely drastically predates the bronies.
It's because, for the first time, the cartoon was genuinely GREAT. Seriously, I started watching it out of spite because I was so pissed that disgusting, joke-free shows like Family Guy and Brickleberry were so damn popular--and I was stunned that I wound up LOVING it. So different from the older, vapid, substance-free MLP shows--and I'm old enough to remember the original.
And there are sickos in every fandom. Randy Stairkilled people in the name of Ember, a character from Danny Phantom.
EDIT: Okay, Friendship Is Magic was great for nine seasons...and then season 10 went woke. Then the show ended. But I admit that happened.
It wasn't because of any jokes only adults would get. A lot of shows have that.
Ah yes, because pushing agendas in shows by attracting an older audience was not being done in all those older shows too!
But enjoying the series doesn't really make you a "brony" and I also don't believe that it was exclusively the My Little Pony stuff that brought it mainstream but more that it coincided with it. I only believe it accelerated it.
It didn't help that Friendship is Magic also had a fantastic cast of voices that was essentially headlined by the extremely prolific (if a bit not my favorite person due to her politics) Tara Strong, a voice that basically every kid of the surrounding era had heard everywhere growing up.
As I said in another post, it predates Friendship is Magic by at least 21 years when pointing at the ConFurence being founded in 1989.
It definitely started long before bronies.
It didn't hit mainstream full swing until they made that one My Little Pony series that added some less than child friendly stuff that drastically accelerated it into the mainstream. But it definitely drastically predates the bronies.
Former brony here. Yes, really.
It wasn't because of any jokes only adults would get. A lot of shows have that.
It's because, for the first time, the cartoon was genuinely GREAT. Seriously, I started watching it out of spite because I was so pissed that disgusting, joke-free shows like Family Guy and Brickleberry were so damn popular--and I was stunned that I wound up LOVING it. So different from the older, vapid, substance-free MLP shows--and I'm old enough to remember the original.
And there are sickos in every fandom. Randy Stair killed people in the name of Ember, a character from Danny Phantom.
EDIT: Okay, Friendship Is Magic was great for nine seasons...and then season 10 went woke. Then the show ended. But I admit that happened.
Ah yes, because pushing agendas in shows by attracting an older audience was not being done in all those older shows too!
But enjoying the series doesn't really make you a "brony" and I also don't believe that it was exclusively the My Little Pony stuff that brought it mainstream but more that it coincided with it. I only believe it accelerated it.
It didn't help that Friendship is Magic also had a fantastic cast of voices that was essentially headlined by the extremely prolific (if a bit not my favorite person due to her politics) Tara Strong, a voice that basically every kid of the surrounding era had heard everywhere growing up.
As I said in another post, it predates Friendship is Magic by at least 21 years when pointing at the ConFurence being founded in 1989.