My Little Pony Friendship is Magic Wiki
Advertisement
FiM Wiki policies
FW:Help
FW:GL
FW:SG
FW:IU
FW:OM
FW:FL
FW:Speculation
FW:PN
FW:Usernames
See also Wikipedia's Manual of Style section about the topic.

Articles about fiction should be written from the perspective of the audience describing the fictional material and not from the perspective of a character or narrator in the fictional universe. The establishing of canon is an example of giving a description from an in-universe perspective.

Problems associated with an in-universe perspective include:

  • A fictional character article or section written as if it were a biography.
  • Using past tense when discussing the plot or any of its elements.
  • Trying to reconcile contradictions or fill gaps in a fictional continuity, rather than reporting them as such.
  • Disregarding all or most aspects of a work of fiction as a creative endeavor.
  • A plot synopsis written like a historical account.
  • Description of fictional places written like a geographical account.
  • Discussing a fictional topic's appearances in major works and obscure spin-off material in equal detail.
  • Placing spiritual successors in the same continuity as the works that inspired them.
  • Using throwaway comments or jokes as a source of information.
  • Using image captions for film stills and screenshots asserting that what is depicted is the character, rather than a film scene depicting the character.
  • Ordering works by their fictional chronology, rather than the actual order they were published.

How not to write[]

Zebras are from a far away land in Equestria. They use masks as greetings.

This describes how zebras live and what zebras do, instead of how they are depicted in the show.

How to fix it[]

Twilight Sparkle tells her friends in the episode Bridle Gossip that zebras come from "a far away land". Later in the episode, Zecora, the zebra, explains to the ponies that the masks on her wall are used as greeting signs.

Now instead of describing zebras, the passage describes the episode Bridle Gossip.

Advertisement