Oh finally, I apologize for not getting this out sooner everypony. Life's just been crazy lately, ya know? Anyways, let's get this review going. "Testing, Testing, 1, 2, 3" was a delightful episode; not only probably Rainbow Dash's best of the season, but one of the best episode's of the season all around. Since there's quite a bit to cover I'll try to keep everything as concise as possible.

First of all, as I said, this was probably Rainbow Dash's best episode yet this season. One thing that actually worked to great effect were the many different sides of RD we got to see. She started off the episode brash and cocky as usual; next we got to see her functioning, or rather failing to function at all, in a classroom setting, displaying almost ADD-like behavior; as the episode went on, we got more and more the sense that, even when she wanted to learn, she simply couldn't learn or retain knowledge at all through traditional means; after giving in to despair, we saw RD in probably the most depressed state we'd seen her in since "The Mysterious Mare Do Well", illustrating yet again a lot of the insecurity that she harbors beneath her confident exterior; and finally, we got to learn something quite intriguing about RD, that she is brilliant in her own way in that she can multitask like no other when she's doing the thing she loves most, that is, flying. While the almost Rain Man-like nature of her subconscious like information-absorption is a bit strange, it still made sense when you take into account that Rainbow's spent years perfecting her flying and doing everything she can to become the peak flyer in all of Equestria. The only other inconsistency that I noticed was that we've seen Rainbow Dash reading Daring Do books while grounded perfectly fine before, she hasn't had to fly while doing so, but that was a minor inconsistency that I could waive given the fact that she had so little time to study for her test. Overall, Rainbow was pretty much written perfectly here; I do wish that the fact that she'd procrastinated in her studying would've been critiqued more in the episode, but other than that, she was adorable, sympathetic, likable, and we learned some of the most interesting new things about her character that we've learned in awhile.

Our deuteragonist, Twilight, had a pretty darn good episode as well. I've always loved Twilight's love and respect for knowledge, so seeing her in her element here was quite awesome for me, especially seeing as the subject in focus was history, which actually is my very own major and what I'm going to continue studying in grad school next fall. She not only covered quite a few effective learning and studying methods that one can practice both inside and out of the classroom, but she also got in quite a few diatribes about the importance of knowing history no matter what your occupation is. On top of that, despite her frustration, Twilight stayed a true friend to RD and never gave up on her, no matter how many study methods failed, how frustrating RD could be to work with, or how despairing she got towards the end. She was clearly in charge of this endeavor, and once again proved herself the main character of the show and the leader of the Mane 6 in her efforts, especially her organizing the Mane 6 and all of Ponyville to boot at the end there. Overall, Twilight was in her element here, and had one of her own best episodes of the season as well; she was a great teacher, a great friend, and a great leader from beginning to end. As a quick aside, the few times that she and RD discussed her still adjusting to her new wings was a nice bit of continuity.

Fluttershy had her own moment of note when she not only calmed both a frustrated and bickering Twilight and RD down, but was also the first pony to recognize that traditional methods of learning and study might not work for RD. Granted, her theatrical presentation didn't really help (and it certainly didn't help that it was silent theater ), but her heart was in the right place, and as said, she was the first one to try something different. She was also pretty adorable in her organizing all the animals in the first place, and her Celestia cosplaying at the end was too cute.

Pinkie Pie had what might quite possibly be the most random moment we've seen all season when she broke out into her Pinkie Rap. It may not have helped RD at all whatsoever, but gosh dang if it wasn't funny, and the fact that she kept coming back to the rapping and her wicked tight fedora as the episode went on just killed me. Despite her study method's utter failure, Pinkie Pie proved herself yet again to be the Queen of Random.

Rarity and AJ both had probably the worst attempts at helping RD, but at least they were true to themselves. I'm not exactly sure what RD was supposed to learn from seeing the Wonderbolts different outfits, but they certainly were interesting looking (and looked fabulous on Rarity to boot ), and AJ was hilarious in her blunt honesty that she knew absolutely nothing about the Wonderbolts. Either way, they both delivered some comedic humor, and made up for their earlier failure when they helped RD in the end.

Besides the characters, there's a few other elements in this episode of note. The Wonderbolts' history was very interesting to hear and learn about (that is, when we could pay attention to it, but thankfully they repeated it enough times that we got the gist of it). The only thing I found confusing about it were the ranks of some of the historical figures in the Wonderbolts; I caught General, Colonel, Commander, and Admiral. I know it's just a kids show and we can't expect the guys at DHX to know too much about the military, but they were mixing branches with those ranks for crying out loud, and being the history buff I am, it was just a bit confusing. Other than that, however, the history was a very interesting bit of MLP canon to learn, and quite a delight if I do say so myself. The humor was spot on and really every character that showed up got a good bit of humor or comedy in there at some point. Definitely one of the better ensemble episodes we've had this season, especially in the comedy department. Finally, the ending was simply spectacular. The twist in Twilight's solution was extremely original and unexpected, seriously, completed blindsided me on my first viewing, and the effort that all of Ponyville put into helping Rainbow Dash was very touching to see. I really did also like the lesson that traditional learning methods don't always work for everyone, and sometimes we need to think outside the box to teach and educate others. It was very unique and original in both its content and delivery, and one that I hope viewers young and old take to heart.

My only complain about the episode remains this, although I'm not as angry about it now as I was initially; as I've said before, procrastination was not addressed at all in this episode. Now if RD had just passed her test, I probably wouldn't be so mad about this; but she didn't just pass, she got 100% when she had less than 12 hours to study for it. If they'd given her a week or even a few days left before her test, then I could've seen her getting 100%, but instead, they gave her less than 12 hours and she got 100% after discovering a freakish talent for absorbing information while in flight. Let's be honest, few in the real world can be expected to have a similar ability for having such an incredibly eidetic memory. As some pointed out, procrastination wasn't the subject here, and they could also only fit so much into this episode (and let me just say that the pacing was stupendous here as well), but still, that doesn't change the fact that they could've executed this episode differently with only a few minor tweaks and made it not look like procrastination doesn't matter at all, because, it does. Most successful students, such as myself, put in hours of work to get the success we achieve in the classroom, so seeing something like the end result that RD got was just a bit insulting and unrealistic. Again, though, I'm not too mad about it at this point, and it doesn't take away from the fact that, overall, this was an amazing episode, definitely one of the best of Season 4 for sure. It hit all the right notes, was pretty much perfect in its content, execution, humor, and everything else really, and is just a fun and moving episode to watch. Well done DHX, well done indeed; we've just got five episodes left, and I anticipate that each and every one of them should be quite a treat indeed. Till next time everypony!