Luna the Matchmaker

Luna the Matchmaker is a My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fic by dlazerous and is the third in his series focusing on the characters about 5 years after the series. As might be expected lots of WAFF but there are more serious elements, particularly with the rewrites that are currently ongoing. The focus is on the future and the joy and trails that brings.

Tropes used in Luna the Matchmaker include:

• Abusive Parents: Rarity’s are this. Her mother, at least.
• Affectionate Nickname: The next-gen characters Honey and Jato have these for each other. He calls her "Honeybee" while she calls him "Baby Bird".
• All Love Is Unrequited: Averted. With Luna running the show no one ends up alone.
• Amusing Injuries: Averted Hard. Getting hurt is bad no matter who you are.
• An Arm and a Leg: Dawn looses a leg in a snow storm.
• Artificial Limbs: Dinky Doo builds a mechanical leg to replace Dawn's leg.
• Badass Bookworm: Twilight is able to rebuild a spell minutes after having read it.
• Bad Future: Discord hints that the future isn’t going to be sunshine and roses, hence why he gives a roomful of ponies functional immortality in hopes of changing the future.
• Beige Prose: The usual style the author uses, though for some parts he can slip into Purple Prose.
• Berserk Button: Do NOT mess with Sweetie Belle’s family, especially her daddy.
  • Also, think twice before you decide to be a terrible pony to Luna with Twilight Sparkle anywhere around.
• Big Eater: Dawn, who manages to eat a few cakes during the kids-only party.
• Big Good: Celestia and Luna’s mother.
• Bitter Wedding Speech: Subverted. When Applebloom realizes she’s growing increasingly jealous and bitter over everyone’s love lives and cutie marks, she leaves on a quest to find herself and prevent this very trope. She leaves behind a letter to Luna detailing her feelings just before the wedding, requesting that they simply forget about her for now.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Applebloom due to an encounter with a Blackthorn Creeper.
• Bratty Half-Pint: Though as old as his friends, Jato is quite small and can come across as this.
• Break the Haughty: Proud Wing.
• Broken Bird: Apple Bloom becomes this.
• Brought Down to Normal: Luna for a brief period of time.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Proud Wing. and Twilight when overpowered in Luna's dream
• Complete Monster: Nearly all of the villains in the story end up like this.
• Contractual Immortality: All of the Mane Characters are immortal like Alicorns in that they will forever, but must be careful not to run out of magic.
• Cool and Unusual Punishment: Discord was banished to a world without rules instead being turned back to stone.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Proud Wing is forced to admit and take responsibility for his actions before being made to dig the graves of everyone he caused to die, then banishement
• Dark and Troubled Past: Kirin
• Easy Amnesia: Averted Kirin is stated to be under a massive memory charm to alter his memories and it starts breaking down fairly quickly.
• Everyone Can See It: Dusk and Tootsie Flute, with some She Is Not My Girlfriend moments until some pushing and manipulating by everyone around them convinced them to have a Relationship Upgrade.
• Every Pony Has Lots Of Sex: Given that it's a story about the Mane Cast and their children, this is to be expected.
• Evil Matriarch
• Fairytale Wedding Dress: ALL of the mane cast gets one, as well as Ditzy Doo.
• Family Relationship Switcheroo: Rarity is actually Sweetie Belle’s mother. No word on who the biological father is, and no one seems to really care.
• From Nopony to Nightmare: Kirin
• Gadgeteer Genius: Dinky Doo, who’s also a Wrench Wench that borders on Mad Scientist.
• Gayngst: A light, brief peppering of this occurs when Luna, Twilight, and Sweetie Belle all try to come to terms with their sexual orientation. Averted with Dinky, Scootaloo, and Dawn.
• Genre Blindness: Rarity’s mom suffers from this so, so hard. Openly admitting EVERYTHING out-loud in the home you share with the man you haven’t told the truth when he could possibly walk in on it and listen to some of the most highly respected members of pony society is rather foalish.
• Half-Pony hybrid: Kirin is a cross between dragon and pony.
• Happily Married: Most of the Mane Cast
• Het Is Ew: Averted. There are more heterosexual couples than homosexual, an impressive feat considering the fandom.
• Heteronormative Crusader: Bon Bon and Lyra have a run-in with one in 'And Tootsie Flute Makes Three'. Their friends and the rest of the ponyfolk beg to differ.
• Homosexual Reproduction: Lyra and Bon Bon in a prequel story and Luna and Twilight Sparkle in the main canon. Both couples have the excuse of magic though.
• I Have No Daughter: Rarity’s mother sends a letter saying that she and her father are disowning her for her mistakes as well as dumping Sweetie Belle on her permanently. Later subverted in that Rarity’s father had absolutely no clue on what his wife was doing and desperately scrabbled to restore his relationship with his daughter and granddaughter as well as cut off his wife in all ways possible, who was also setting things up to kill him off.
• I Will Protect Her: Inverted by Celestia and failed
• Idol Singer: Sweetie Belle
• Interspecies Romance: Spike and Rarity, Celestia and Kirin and Kirin's parents.
• Intoxication Ensues: Applebloom gets into Big Mac’s secret stash to hilarious and somewhat worrying ends.
• Kick the Dog: Rarity’s mother disowning her. Via letter.
• Kill the Cutie: Kirin
• Les Yay: Justified, as the number of colts to mares in the matching ‘verse is extremely unbalanced and almost requires all colts to be straight while some mares pair up with other mares.
• Living Forever Is Awesome: The conclusion most of the ponies (and dragon) granted it come to after some time to think on it.
• Love At First Sight: Garnet, for Applebloom.
• MacGuffin: Varies through the story as it’s more a collection of numerous short stories with the overarching plot focused on Luna’s matchmaking efforts.
  • Luna and Twilight Sparkle’s lockets, which will show them the one they’re meant to be with. This actually makes Celestia the first one to pair a couple up even if she didn’t know it though it’s really Luna and Celestia’s mother pulling the strings.
• Manipulative Bastard: Discord, all the way up to his self-mindwipe.
• The Matchmaker: Guess.
• Mood Swinger: Dawn, especially after ingesting a few cakes.
• Multigenerational Household: The Apple family
• Murder Is the Best Solution: Rarity’s mom had this in mind for Rarity’s father since he’s the one that has the money and being connected to Rarity has, in her eyes, sullied her reputation, requiring a dramatic break. Why a divorce wouldn’t do she doesn’t really explain too well...
• The Namesake: Luna and her efforts to match all her friends up with their perfect mate.
• Not So Stoic: Big Mac after Applebloom leaves everyone to go find herself.
• Only Sane Pony: Sometimes it feels like Tootsie Flute is the only one who stops to consider some things, even among the parents.
• Overprotective Dad: Braeburn.
• Parental Marriage Veto: Braeburn with his daughter, Honey, and Jato.
• Plot-Relevant Age-Up: Spike
• Plucky Mare: Dinky Doo
• Power of Love: It's the Power of Friendship Up to Eleven
• Pulling Themselves Together: Discord
• Pyrrhic Victory: Jato’s divebombing of Charger takes the vengeful colt out of commission before he can go after Jato’s mate, but the attack leaves Jato in a near-death state with the possibility of being grounded forever.
• Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: Why Braeburn has such a hard time letting his daughter find someone to love what with his friend being a victim.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Discord
• The Runaway: Applebloom.
• Shaming the Mob: Scootaloo does this to Julien, Big Mac, Braeburn, Caramel, and Soarin’ when they try and force their way into the Canterlot castle.
• Stealth Expert: Applebloom. She has epic hiding skills, considering how she managed to hide from all her friends, family, legions of guards, and Princess Celestia herself for as long as she did!
• Story Arc: How the story is set up. The overarching plot is Luna pairing everyone up with minor/side plots forming various arcs throughout.
• Time Skip
• Took a Level in Badass: Man, that Time Skip certainly saw Applebloom turn into a kick-butt mare!
• Triang Relations: Type 8 for Pip, Diamond Tiara, and Twist, as confirmed by Word of God.
• Walking the Earth: Applebloom's 17 years in Everfree count, since she comments that she "want to be somewhere familiar" after the ordeal with the Blackthorn Creeper, indicating that she never stayed in the same area for long.
• Weddings for Everyone: Probably one of a handful of examples which is NOT an overall ending trope, though it is the ending of one of the arcs.
• Who Wants to Live Forever?: Applebloom has a bit of this, especially seeing as everyone is finding their mates for life and cutie marks while she’s still lost and alone.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Twilight suffers from this when directly powered up by the elements and Celestia at once.