History Fanfic / TheTaleOfLordBarleycorn

* KickTheSonOfABitch: Despite their fleeing their homes in Hollow Shades out of fear of Lord Barleycorn killing them for food, the bunnies lose any sympathy from the reader by virtue of the fact that, really, they're rotten little thieves who are stealing food from the mouths of destitute pony farmers and expecting to get away with it scot free. Even InUniverse, Applejack disdains the little monsters and thinks they're just making up lies to "justify" why they went from terrorizing the farmers of Hollow Shades to doing the same thing in Ponyville.

* OddJobGods: The Season Lords, the four spirits who reign over the four seasons and make sure that the year spins over in the proper order. They also double as small gods, because there's really only a need for them in places outside of Equestria, as the ponies do all the work

* OddJobGods: The Season Lords, the four spirits who reign over the four seasons and make sure that the year spins over in the proper order. They also double as SmallGods, because there's really only a need for them in places outside of Equestria, as the ponies do all the work

Hollow Shades is a small farming and lumberjacking community, a tiny bubble of Equestria smack in the middle of the Everfree Forest. Things have been hard-going since the lumber mill was closed down by its aristocratic owner, and the town is slowly dying. The fate of the town weighs heavily even on the town's youth, with young filly Corn Crib of the Harvests being intimately aware of the fact things aren't going well for her family and friends. And then, a ray of hope comes into her life when she encounters a most unusual figure on the road nearby; a talking scarecrow, one that claims to be Lord Barleycorn, the King of Autumn, who promises to help her however he can. Can the two of them succeed in breathing life back into Hollow Shades?

** He tells Corn Crib and Leadfoot a kid-friendly version of ''Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail'' as a story in chapter 14, and admits to having also told her the story of ''Literature/{{Aladdin}}'' and ''Literature/RobinHood'' in chapter 15.

** At one point, he gives one of his titles as "He Who Walks Between The Rows", which sounds awfully similar to [[Franchise/ChildrenOfTheCorn "He Who Walks Behind The Rows"]].

* TheFairFolk: Barleycorn claims to be a king of these. [[spoiler:Later, he meets the real deal in a hidden shrine -- they don't approve of him creating his GodGuise, but nevertheless let it slide because (1) it's still entertaining to watch and (2) he agrees to help restore said shrine to its former glory.]]

* AchievementsInIgnorance: A variation; the Hollow Shades weather crew have literally rewritten the book on handling "wild" weather due to having to cope with Everfree's weather systems without having enough pegasi to [[PaintingTheFrostOnTheWindows brute-force it to ponykind's wills]] like in, say, Ponyville.

* AchievementsInIgnorance: A variation; the Hollow Shades weather crew have literally rewritten the book on handling "wild" weather due to having to cope with Everfree's weather systems without having enough pegasi to brute-force it to pony wills like would happen in, say, Ponyville.

* IdiotBall: [[spoiler: Despite Carrot Top's warnings earlier, Lord Barleycorn drops claims to Applejack about being an old friend of Princess Celestia. Naturally, Twilight immediately contacts the Princess based on this claim when she hears it from Applejack.]]

* {{Irony}}: Daisy and Lily deeply want to meet a real forest spirit -- but, when they meet Lord Barleycorn, they adamantly insist he's "just" a puppet being remote-controlled by a talented and charming unicorn who won't show himself. Carrot Top is dumbstruck by this. As for Lord Barleycorn, well...
-->'''Lord Barleycorn:''' ''"Seriously? The kid thinks I'm the god of autumn, her mom thinks I'm her farm's spiritual guardian, and these two choose to believe I'm just a puppet?"''

** Invoked: [[spoiler: Jack takes up the Lord Barleycorn guise because the first pony to see his naked face flees in terror. Even those ponies who don't believe Lord Barleycorn is an actual spirit still often think of him as creepy from what they can see of his unusual (read: bipedal) anatomy... especially the fact he has the canines of a predator-species.]]
** Subverted: [[spoiler: When Carrot Top finally sees Jack's real face, her reaction can be summed up as "...that's it?" She admits he's ''unusual'' to her, but she hardly thinks he's got any reason to be classified as '''terrifying'''. No horns, no pustules, no tusks, nor any other sorts of protrusions or deformities she can think up. It's subtly implied in other chapter that the shoemaking pony who fled Jack is the town's resident coward.]]
* KickTheSonOfABitch: Despite their fleeing their homes in Hollow Shades out of fear of Lord Barleycorn, the bunnies lose any sympathy from the reader by virtue of the fact that, really, they're rotten little thieves who're stealing food from the mouths of destitute pony farmers and expecting to get away with it scotfree. Even InUniverse, Applejack disdains the little monsters and thinks they're just making up lies to "justify" why they went from terrorizing the farmers of Hollow Shades to doing the same thing in Ponyville.
* LateArrivalSpoiler: [[spoiler: Lord Barleycorn is actually a human, a failed actor named Jack, teleported into Equestria by some unknown WildMagic surge. This is actually revealed in the very second chapter, which is the first time he appears.]]

** He plays "Binks Sake" on the violin to convince Daisy and Lily to stay in Hollow Shades in chapter 16.

** At one point, he gives one of his titles as "He Who Walks Between The Rows", which sounds awfully similar to [[Film/ChildrenOfTheCorn "He Who Walks Behind The Rows"]].

* He plays "Roundtable Rival" in chapter 29.
* He performs "Scherezade" and "Grim Grinning Ghosts", a Disney Halloween Special song, in chapter 31.

** In chapter 24, he refers to "Trick or Treat", a 1957 Disney ''WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck'' cartoon featuring Donald, the Triplets and Witch Hazel. In chapter , he reveals he plans to have the foals put on a play version of that very story as part of the Halloween celebration.

* AristocratsAreEvil: The ultimate source of Hollow Shades' woes; the lumber mill was originally owned by a lazy and disinterested noble, who then passed it on to his equally bad SpoiledBrat son. The pair regarded the lumbermill as just a turn-key operation[[note]]simply showing up in the morning to open the doors and collect the profits[[/note]], but the son became a true PointyEarsBoss; he demanded that the lumberjacks wear uniforms -- which they had to pay for out of their own pockets -- and that any damages to the equipment likewise were paid for and replaced by the workers, or they just went unnoticed. Eventually, this drove the majority of the lumberjacks away, and when word of his incompetence and greed spread, he couldn't lure any new workers to replace them. Ultimately, he locked the place up and abandoned it. The town has been slowly dying ever since.

* BothSidesHaveAPoint: In the Harvest/Apple clan feud. The Apples are right that the Harvests can be a bunch of jerks about it, but the Harvests are also right that the Apples can be kind of smothering and individuals have a right to be known for their own merits.

* FridgeBrilliance: An InUniverse example; Applejack realises that Rainbow Dash's aversion to "wild weather" makes sense after thinking about it, eventually deducing that, to a pegasus from Cloudsdale, clouds that move on their own would be kind of like having lumber or soil crawling around under its own power to her; it's just unnatural.

* {{Irony}}: The Flower Trio deeply want to meet a real forest spirit -- but, when they meet Lord Barleycorn, they adamantly insist he's "just" a puppet being remote-controlled by a talented and charming unicorn who won't show himself. Carrot Top is dumbstruck by this. As for Lord Barleycorn, well...

* ChekovsGun: Just why ''does'' Slim Harvest's old chest of clothes contain so many things sized and shaped perfectly for Lord Barleycorn?

* AristocratsAreEvil: The ultimate source of Hollow Shades' woes; the lumber mill was originally owned by a lazy and disinterested noble, who then passed it on to his even worse -- and pompous -- son. The young stallion caused such trouble by insisting on unreasonable rules of behavior, refusing to maintain the building, and attempting to practice crooked business techniques of the "company store" variety that the lumberjacks revolted. Upon realising that he couldn't simply treat it as a case of "show up, get money, go home", he locked the place up and abandoned it. With no way to work, the lumberjacks drifted away and the town has been slowly dying ever since.

* EldritchLocation: Hollow Shades seems this way to more sheltered ponies, but the locals have grown quite adapted to it.

* GeniusBonus: An InUniverse example; when Lord Barleycorn starts singing the song "John Barleycorn", most of the ponies find it off-putting at first, until the town brewers realize it's actually an allegory for harvesting barley and turning it into beer, which they cheerfully explain.

* {{Irony}}: The Flower Trio deeply want to meet a real forest spirit -- but, when they meet Lord Barleycorn, they adamantly insist he's "just" a puppet being remote-controlled by a talented and charming unicorn who won't show himself. Carrot Top is dumbstruck by this.

** Invoked: [[spoiler: Jack takes up the Lord Barleycorn guise because the first pony to see his naked face flees in terror. Even those ponies who don't believe Lord Barleycorn is an actual spirit still often think of him as creepy from his unusual anatomy.]]
** Subverted: [[spoiler: When Carrot Top finally sees Jack's real face, her reaction can be summed up as "...that's it?" She admits he's ''unusual'', but hardly '''terrifying'''. It's subtly implied in another chapter that the pony who fled Jack is the town's resident coward.]]
* KickTheSonOfABitch: The bunnies lose any sympathy from the reader by virtue of the fact that, really, they're rotten little thieves who're stealing food from the mouths of destitute pony farmers and expecting to get away with it scotfree. Even InUniverse, Applejack disdains the little monsters and thinks they're just making up lies to "justify" why they went from terrorizing the farmers of Hollow Shades to doing the same thing in Ponyville.

* MugglesDoItBetter: Zigzagged. Part of why Hollow Shades isn't doing so well is that the natural energies of the Everfree Forest resist the comparatively meager Earth Pony Magic of the settlers, and though the farmers would be very productive elsewhere, their farming practices and traditions have been established on virtue of that magic, so they're not doing very well. To put things in perspective, the healthiest crop on the Harvests' farm is a field of corn, because it's been planted in what would have been a barley bed, like last year, if the Harvests had the barley to spare. That's right, it's the first time they've ''ever'' practiced anything akin to crop rotation. Applejack is still so impressed with the results that she notes to herself she'll have to talk Granny Smith into trying something like that on their own farm.

** He plays "John Barleycorn" during his grand display to the town of Hollow Shades.
** He plays and sings a ponified version of "This is Halloween" from ''WesternAnimation/TheNightmareBeforeChristmas''.
** His plan for a play is a modified version of "Trick or Treat", a 1957 Disney ''WesternAnimation/DonaldDuck'' cartoon featuring Donald, the Triplets and Witch Hazel.
** He sings "Grim Grinning Ghosts", a Disney song from a halloween special, at one point.
** He sings only the refrain from ''Music/{{Blue Oyster Cult}}'s'' "Harvest Moon" at one point.

* WhyDidItHaveToBeSnakes: Several of the Ponyville ponies find "wild" (self-controlled) weather to be unnatural and terrifying. ''Rainbow Dash'' ultimately confesses to having a genuine phobia of the stuff, although she sees her trip to Hollow Shades as a chance to help her get over it.

Hollow Shades is a small farming and lumberjacking community, a tiny bubble of Equestria smack in the middle of the Everfree forest. Things have been hard-going since the lumber mill was closed down by its aristocratic owner, and the town is slowly dying. The fate weighs heavily even on the town's youth, with young filly Corn Crib of the Harvests being intimately aware of the fact things aren't going well for her family and friends. And then, a ray of hope comes into her life when she encounters a most unusual figure on the road nearby; a talking scarecrow, one that claims to be Lord Barleycorn, the King of Autumn, who promises to help her however he can. Can the two of them succeed in breathing life back into Hollow Shades?

* ChildrenAreInnocent: Corn Crib is the best example of this, but all of the children of Hollow Shades

* IdiotBall: [[spoiler: Despite Carrot Top's warnings earlier, Lord Barleycorn drops claims to Twilight Sparkle about being an old friend of Princess Celestia. Naturally, Twilight immediately contacts the Princess based on this claim.]]

** Carrot Top (fan-created name) and Golden Harvest (official toyline name) are both used for the same pony, and even worked into the story. Carrot Top's real name is Golden Harvest, but she keeps to her alias because she doesn't want Applejack to realise she's a distant relative; she does like Applejack, but she wants to be known as "Carrot Top, Ponyville's premier carrot farmer" than as "that weird Apple pony who prefers growing carrots to apples".