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Pony Tales Volume 2 (Microcomic Issues 7-10, August 22nd, September 11th, November 13th, December 18th 2013)

 

Only four issues in this one, unlike the six in the previous volume.

 

Cutie Mark Crusaders

 

Wait, Cutie Mark Tattoo Artists? Who the heck let the CMC near them with needles and ink?

 

Sweetie Bell channeling Derpy's dangerous rump here.

 

Interesting cave formations. Due to the cubic shape it looks like this entire area has been carved. Maybe this is an old Diamond Dog cavern. Or Equestria's prone to isometric crystal formations at a scale far beyond this reality.

 

A sclerometer is a tool invented near the end of the 19th century to measure the 'hardness' of materials. It measures the width of scratches made by a diamond with a very specific amount of pressure behind it.

 

Spike is fully aware of this thing right off, even though he should have no more experience with them than Twilight does. He didn't even touch it, but knew when he got close. So there is an instinctive reaction here, pulling off of cues we can't see.

 

'Greater' Equestrian Mimicker? As opposed to a 'Lesser' one? Interesting. Again, this is a expy of a D&D monster called the 'Mimic' that was introduced to the game back in the 1st edition Advanced D&D monster manual in 1977. In that, though, the 'Lesser' mimic is sentient while the larger 'Killer' mimic is more animalistic and aggressive. Since then, mimics have shown up in a variety of video games that have no official connection with D&D.

 

It appears the mimic communicates via musical tones, like a whistle.

 

And shapeshifting like this takes energy, so the creature becomes tired. However, the amount of shapeshifting Imp goes through before becoming tired is pretty impressive. That's a lot of reserves she has.

 

And she can get to a pretty impressive size as well.

 

Heh, MST3K reference. Cute. Actually, up until now, this issue has been pretty stand-alone, with minimal pop-culture references.

 

Huh. I'm not entirely sure what I'm seeing here. Imp is turning into all the things she turned into before, and that's somehow turning into a cyclone funnel that projects her into the center of town?

 

Flea Market. Those tend to be fun, if you're into salvage, antiques, and whatnot. This one is turning into a mini-carnival with farm stalls and games. Including a face painter-equivalent who looks to be painting cutie-marks onto young foals. That's a bit of culture reinforcing.

 

And the mimics seem to have some form of family structure, as Imp returns to be greeting by a much larger 'maternal' figure.

 

Celestia

 

Normally I don't mention covers or things like that, but this splash page of Celestia is interesting. The headwrap with the Elements of Harmony charms and large solar fascinator is an interesting style. Looks very late 60's. Plus that the artist has the bust image being supported by Luna and Cadance in sleeping poses is curious.

 

Introduces a teacher/parent meeting for the School for Gifted Unicorns as a High Tea function. Following a kind of English private school model there.

 

Hidden reference to Gordon Ramsey in there. There was a fanfiction where they actually made the head chef of Canterlot castle a sheep just for the 'Ram'sey pun. Pity they didn't go with that here, I would have found that amusing.

 

I've seen that hairstyle on Floribunda before in real life. It's even worse in real life.

 

Ha! Special little snowflake.

 

Technically, yes, the animated rabbit-monster *was* far more efficient.

 

Interesting. Canterlot being under attack. Given the apparent age of Inkwell, I would guess that this happened shortly after the Apple family founded Ponyville. I wonder who the attackers are, in that they're using siege weaponry, and are being presented with non-pony silhouettes.

 

The attackers were 'formed from shadows', so perhaps they're a spin-off of the Nightmare Forces?

 

Inkwell seems to have gone up against creatures in a similar way as the current Mane 6, and the damage done to her eye was unhealable. So magic healing has limits.

 

In the School for Gifted Unicorns, Inkwell has the title of Professor. While in America many teachers at University are called 'professors', but most of those are assistant or associate professors. Being a full professor is still reserved title for only the top ranks. This also reinforces the idea that the School for Gifted Unicorns is a higher-education equivalent, like a College or University, and schools like the one in Ponyville is for primary education.

 

Spike

 

A Daring Do comic book. Adventure comics used to be quite common. Now-a-days it's rare to see a non-superhero comic book, but back in the 50's, 60's, there were many different genres of comic books, including military, western, romance, train... yes, train comics. Don't ask, it's not worth it.

 

And yes, comics were full of ads for absolutely useless junk, including Sea Monkeys adverts that looked a lot like that. Sea Monkeys were actually a specially hybridized brine shrimp who's eggs could survive freeze-drying. The trick to make them appear 'instantly' is because the eggs are introduced to the tank the day before with the 'water purifier' packet, not with the supposed 'egg' packet. Brine shrimp have very short lives, and because they were sold to kids via comics, they tended to be put into tanks with not enough salinity or oxygen circulation to encourage further generations. Also, the claim that they were 'trainable' was completely bogus. These tiny shrimp were as trainable as fleas. Meaning they weren't.

 

Due to their size, brine shrimp eat equally tiny stuff, like actual yeast, plankton, etc. Another reason why sea monkeys don't survive is that a lot of kids tried to feed them fish-food instead.

 

Interesting. These sea beasts are actually not that far off of the illustrations, and are being depicted as tadpoles.

 

Wait, tadpoles that can reproduce by fissiparity? Usually that's restricted to creatures like coral, worms, starfish, etc.

 

And now the tadpoles have grown into their next form with legs. They're retaining the tail, though. And they have their own language.

 

And now have a vague attempt at a civilization. I swear I've read this story before. Oh, yes, Sandkings by George R.R. Martin, back in the late 70's in some pulp magazine.

 

Uh.... Flowers for Algernon? Really? Poneigh Decart? Fine. Roll with it.

 

Luna: The Day Shift

 

And Luna's splash page is a mirror to Celestia's. The colors on my Kindle copy makes it bit washed out so it's harder to see but otherwise it's fine. Given that Cadence is still a supporter, I wonder if there was an intent to have a third one in the set with Cadence along before this series was cancelled.

 

Again, Luna is one of the few issues of this series who get's a proper title to their story. Interesting.

 

Love Celestia's bed-head. So cute.

 

Standard stereotypical bureaucratic organization. I'd say it was fictionalized, but I regularly run into these exact same kinds of people, so I know they really exist.

 

Poor Luna, the bureaucrat is leading you in the wrong direction. The term you're looking for is Freemen, which is above Villein (which you are modernizing into civilian), Bordars, and Slaves. All of which are technically peasants but different grades. Using your terminology they aren't nobles or clergy, which are the only other options in that system. The merchant/craftsman class (middle class) wasn't acknowledged in that system.

 

Here they are using the classic Hollywood-style police station exterior with the glass globes as the bottom of the stair. Historically, these globes would have been lit by a kerosene lamp, not gas or electricity like you would think. Not surprisingly, the idea of the police station being extremely well-lit for safety occurred to people pretty early on. Long before electricity or piped in gas lines. In many areas, the lamp-lighter's guild would be in the same building, if they weren't the same people entirely.

 

Oh, yes. And this indicates that the comic-book team also thinks the Guard occupy the a similar societal position as the police do here.

 

This must be taking place before the Equestria Girls movie, due to the presence of Flash Sentry in the Canterlot guard.

 

Hiding an elite area in a condemned building. How prohibition of you.

 

Crystal Empire Winter Snow Day requiring sign-off from Canterlot? That's odd. It seems to indicate that in this continuity the Crystal Empire is subject to Equestria, but that's an extreme level of submission. A trade agreement or the like I can see, but this is definitely not that, even with the doves thrown into the mix.

 

Ha! Cut the baby in half indeed. Various call back here to prior issues and episodes of the show.

 

A good chunk of this isn't Princess work, but stuff that should be handled by... corgis? Is the Queen of England visiting, and Luna's walking her pets?

 

The ponies have an interesting attitude towards Luna. They're fearful of upsetting her, but not that they're really *afraid* of her. They are, in fact, treating her as royalty.

 

This spa pony looks so much like Lotus, Aloe, and Vera that this must be a standard fashion for the industry.

 

What the heck?

 

Okay, Luna broke. Somebody get the crazy glue.

 

Ha, Rarity's brand's still going strong.

 

Again, poor Luna. That was mean of Kibitz.

 

Luna Gets a Pet

 

Mini-comic in a micro-comic? Okay, cool.

 

Obviously, Luna is a much more... physical than her sister, and enjoys sports such as boxing and the like.

 

Actually, no, there shouldn't be any copyright issues with the Owlbear. D&D is currently owned by Wizards of the Coast, which is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hasbro. So they could bring in any of the copyrighted D&D creatures like the Owlbear, the Beholder, and the Mind Flayer. Though those last two are a touch hard to present without bringing in darker themes than what MLP normally likes to go into.

 

Tibereous? As in the Roman Emperor? (As an interesting note, the Roman Emperors were actually called 'Prince' [Princept], as the term 'Emperor' [imperator] officially only applied during military action. The idea of 'Empire' as a geopolitical organization comes out of this, but the Roman Empire was quite different from what people use the term 'Empire' to cover now-a-days. Just like the way Equestria is organized, how about that. ) I think they're actually looking for the word 'tenebrous' which is derived from the Latin tenebrae, meaning darkness.