It's the holidays, and you know what that means!

 

......D....Depression?

 

....Actually, come to think of it, that makes perfect sense.

 

Anyways, Welcome one and all to the season three wrap-up of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic!

 

 

 

 

Here we are, folks. The penultimate episode. Next week is the last episode of season three, and will be my last review of the year before taking my holiday. Therefore, you'll get three weeks of rest before having to put up with my shit again, 'cause I'll return to review season four on January 6th, 2017. But enough technicalities. We have an episode to review. Without further ado, put your hands together for "Games Ponies Play". Spoilers ahead!

 

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So this episode opens up from one of the scenes in the previous episode, "Just for Sidekicks", after Twilight leaves Spike with all of the animals. And.....yeah, I can definitely see it, this episode probably should've aired first. Also, the audio on the episode seems to be really fucked up on Netflix. If you have the time, go and listen, all of their voices sound like they're coming through a Leslie speaker. Ignoring all that shit, the prologue involves them discussing the Equestria Games arriving in the Crystal Empire, and Rainbow Dash having PTSD about Cloudsdale missing the Equestria Games when she was a kid. Nice little gag. After the title sequence marinates my liver in urine, we see the mane six practicing their welcoming cheer before finally arriving at the Meth Kingdom.

 

Applejack's going Heisenberg on our ass in this episode for sure.

 

When they arrive, they discover that the Crystal Ponies have been sprucing the place up in order to hide the drugs from prepare for the Equestria Games inspector or something. Yeah, I've already forgotten what's going on, but it's not my fault. I've been too distracted by the shitty audio. It's at this point in the episode when they start playing that little gag from the prologue...seriously. As in, they make Rainbow Dash obsessive over getting the Equestria Games to the Crystal Empire. Ehhh, I'm not sure about this. On one hand, someone might conclude that this is realistic for Rainbow Dash, which I agree with, but on the other hand one might argue that the two are too loosely tied together to be a focal point of the episode...which I also agree with. We'll see where it goes, at least. Right now, it's time for the mane six to reunite with Princess Cadence.

 

"What, there's no doomsday threats against the world going on during your visit with me? How fucking generous."

 

However, right on schedule, shit starts going south when Cadence needs a traditional Crystal Empire headdress, but her hair stylist caught AIDS or something. Thankfully, Rarity steps up to the plate with her herpes and what not, although problem still arises when the inspector, Mrs. Harshwinny, is arriving earlier than scheduled. It's here when the other plotline of the episode is revealed; Twilight tries to remain calm and handle things in a responsible manner. Wow, how fucking exhilarating. Twilight being in charge? Someone, give the writer of this episode a medal for most ingenious idea of all time. So she decides that the five of them should go to the train station and greet Mrs. Harshwinny herself. They're supposed to be looking for a flower-print luggage....which I think is the worst way to identify someone ever. How many flower-print luggage do you think could possibly exist? What are the odds that you spot the wrong person with a flower-print luggage and give them all the attention and glory that was supposed to be given to the real agent, which has to stay and the train station getting themselves fucked over.

 

.......

 

Oh, DON'T TELL ME THAT'S THE PLOT DEVICE OF THIS EPISO-

 

FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK SHIT FUCK FUCK.

 

I mean, this isn't "Simple Ways" level of tired plot device, but I can see this getting really old really fast. What's that? We're only 7 minutes into the episode? Oh you, son of a bitch. Well, time to suffer from suicide-inducing boredom. So let's see, instead of taking the real inspector on the journey of their lives, they took some green-haired hick that's probably from Appleloosa instead, the first stop being the ever-glorious Eiffel Tower of the Crystal Empire, where they perform their cringe-inducing cheer for the overexcited country folk. They then take her on a tour of the castle, which is led by Pinkie Pie as Twilight breaks off to see what's taking Cadence so long. We then discover that Cadence's mane looks like a prickly bush of frozen hell (thanks, Rarity), and that she needs more time, so Pinkie Pie stalls with mundane facts about rooms she's never been in before. It's revealed to us that this hick pony seems to have some kind of claustrophobia. Which, if is the case, then why the fuck was she on a train? The other ponies mistake this as her getting bored, which is not the case. It's the audience that's bored right now. Quick, Pinkie Pie, save us!

 

....It's no use! This episode is so mundane it's making PINKIE PIE dull!

 

Meanwhile, Twilight goes to visit her brother, Shining Armor, who's training the athletes for the games I assume. She opens up to him about all the crap that's going on, but also reveals to herself that she's not worried.Before we can get much more attention to this, the faux inspector makes her way to the track where she over-excitedly runs around outside because claustrophobia. Then she gets her head stuck in vase, so Rainbow Dash has to chase her to pull it off and stuff...............you know, this episode is just a series of events happening. Like, there's nothing to invest in and nothing to care about, just stuff happens. That is, until the plot unfolds when the hick explains to Shining Armor that she's just a country pony here for vacation. That's when Twilight and Rainbow Dash flip, and the five of them run around looking for the real inspector. They find that she's in the same spa as Cadence, and when the two meet, it's up to Rainbow Dash to explain everything.......apparently.

 

There we go. Now Pinkie Pie's back to being godly again.

 

Rainbow Dash explains the plight of missing the Equestria Games in Cloudsdale, and that she wanted to make up for that disappointment by having the Crystal Empire host the games. She takes quite the bit of responsibility for all of this...even though she barely did jack shit throughout the episode. However, just before we can mop our "tears", Mrs. Harshwinny explains that Green-Haired Hick told her all about the welcome she had received in her place, which.......means she accepts the Crystal Empire as the host of the Equestria Games? I......I don't follow her logic. You just had the worst reception of your entire life, but because they'd given such a warm welcome to someone else, you figured that it was all fucking worth it? I know Equestria is a unrealistically generous world, but this is just fuel to the fire. It's so hastily rushed together in a matter of 75 seconds, too, which would practically blow this episode down the tubes in any other story. In the end, the Crystal Empire does get to host the Equestria Games as previously mentioned and we get to see the callback cliffhanger of the previous episode.

 

Hey guys, look! A good episode is hiding under the seats! Grab it!

 

And so concludes "Games Ponies Play".

 

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So, as I said in the previous paragraph, the incredibly unrealistic and rushed ending would've blown any other episode completely out of the water, making it a nice and shitty experience for me. However, this episode is so mundane and inconsequential that it just further proves this episode amounts to nothing. I know this is part of the set-up of the Equestria Games arc that leads all the way into season four, but let's remind ourselves that the entire arc was essentially bullshit and amounted to nothing in the end. So what's this episode worth? Nothing. It's not a horrible episode, but you're better off not really watching it for anything other reason than its "impact" on continuity in future episodes. Twilight's development is weak, Rainbow Dash's plight comes out of left field, and as evidenced by the scatterplot telling of events in this review, the whole episode is little more than things happening. So, no, I didn't think this episode was anything special. The harshest criticism I can give it is that I regret wasting my time on it. Otherwise, "Games Ponies Play" deserves a 5/10 for just being a mediocre lump of 22 minutes.

 

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Well, this is it folks. Next Friday, we review the infamous "Magical Mystery Cure". So many questions will be answered. What will season three amount to? Is "Magical Mystery Cure" as bad as its reputation holds? Who is Eric Cartman's father? And which of these six main cast members of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic will be killed off? Find out next time on...

 

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Yu-Gi-Oh GX!