NOTE: Apologies for getting this blog published so late. I was just waiting for the art above to get posted on DeviantArt and it took longer than usual.

OK, so this episode was... strange. Not everything about it was bad, but it was just, I don't know, strange is all. Don't get me wrong, the premise itself is fine, and I don't mind the show going into fairly dark territory in showing a character becoming completely corrupted by an artifact containing dark magic, but the execution in many places just seemed off. Ah well, might as well get this review out of the way while everything's still fresh in my mind: this is "Inspiration Manifestation".

So to start, let's talk about Spike, seeing as he was the star of the show. The first third of the episode, he was just fine; they showed him in a very supportive role trying to just be a good friend to Rarity as he continually fawned over her (and to be fair, the writers did nicely set up that Spike could potentially let his adoration of Rarity cloud his better judgment). But after he got her the book and Rarity became mad with power, Spike started going a bit downhill. This was "Spike At Your Service" levels of OOC behavior for him, but whereas with that episode I usually just laugh it off, if only because we'd never seen him actually working at Sweet Apple Acres, here, we saw him behaving quite OOC in what is easily his second most important relationship in the show, that being his friendship with Rarity. I know that the episode was trying to convey the message that you can't let friendship stop you from being honest with someone when they're doing something wrong, and that's an admirable lesson to be sure, but it just seems like it wasn't executed properly. Spike spent far too much of the episode shrugging off Rarity's madness and blindly supporting it, and that just rubbed me the wrong way. He's not just her friend, he quite honestly loves her (this was best conveyed in "Secret of My Excess"), but here, his love came across as an obsession that blinded him to just how wrong Rarity was behaving. So not only was it OOC of Spike not to take action sooner, but in the process the episode kind of cheapened his very love for Rarity; if he truly cared about her as we know he does, after almost four seasons no less, he would've acted sooner. If this episode had debuted in Season 1, I could probably forgive it for that, but this is Season 4; instead of taking so long to act, Spike should've started trying to stop Rarity sooner, perhaps through a variety of efforts on his part. She wasn't behaving like the pony he knows her to be, and he should've taken action sooner for that very reason. But I know why this didn't happen, and I don't like it one bit; it's because of the weak plot device/deus ex machina the episode had to resolve everything. The bizarre catch for breaking the spell on Rarity (i.e. telling the truth about the corrupting effects of the spell, which seems like it would only be a problematic thing to do for someone as obsessed with not hurting another's feelings as Spike was with Rarity) came across in the end as far too easy (heck, it even reminded me of a similar plot device that showed up in "The Cutie Pox", another kind of meh episode), and everything overall just resolved too quickly. Overall, aside from having some funny bits in the episode, especially when he was at the Castle of the Two Sisters, Spike had quite the weak episode, definitely his weakest since "Spike At Your Service". "Power Ponies" this most certainly was not.

Ummm... just a bit.

LIES!!!

One can never have too much bedazzle!!!!!!!!!!

Next, let's talk Rarity. Honestly, I don't have too much to say about her here, she was really spot on. Before she got the book, she was her usual, wonderful, over-the-top-diva self. I hated seeing her so sad and forlorn (though again, why did a puppeteer hire her to design a traveling puppeteer cart? She's a fashion designer, not a carpenter, and I know she loves designing all sorts of things as well as interior decoration, but that seemed to be a stretch), but it was quite hilarious seeing her eating away her grief (helped by Tabitha St. Germain's hilarious emphasis on each bite of ice cream Rarity took ). Once she came under the influence of the spell, her descent into corruption and madness didn't feel OOC in the slightest, but quite natural, at least given that she was being corrupted by the spell. Hopefully most people get that she was simply corrupted; I mean yeah, it doesn't change the fact that she was doing some serious damage and pretty terrible things all over Ponyville, but again, she couldn't control herself at that point, her redemption all depended on Spike sharing the honest truth with her. Overall, Rarity had quite a good episode actually; she was quite funny throughout, in a normal sense at the beginning and in a far scarier sense as the episode progressed, it was quite interesting seeing her in a villainous turn (and a quite different one at that from her turn as Nightmare Rarity in the comic books), and it's scary to see what could happen when her imagination pretty much ran wild and got out of control, more or less.

Even when she's sad, Rarity still finds a way to make me laugh.

Meaning no offense Rarifans, I swear.

As for the rest of the episode, it was mixed bag of good and bad as well. Once again, Owlowiscious did absolutely nothing for me. I don't mind him being a voice in the back of Spike's head, a sort of physical manifestation of Spike's conscience, but he really made barely any contributions to the episode when you get down to it. Also, that "hoo" gag is STILL not funny after trying to make it funny for four seasons now! Seriously DHX, stop it, just stop it, cause it'll NEVER be funny!!! Gosh bucking dang it, I hate that gag. The Mane 6 were just fine, but I thought they were far too sparse in their appearances. Considering this was dark magic they were dealing with, I would've especially liked to see more of Twilight here, but instead we only got two short scenes with her (the second of which was quite hilarious, when Twilight was just an absolute mess and pretty much ready to kill Spike at the very end ). I think the reason we didn't see more of them was because the episode was filled with way too much filler of Rarity and Spike going around town as she changed everything (which also raised the question as to how exactly she got away with everything without anyone noticing it was her, seriously, she was just a few feet away from some ponies when she changed things, sometimes out in the open. I know we can assume that Spike told Twilight at the end, but still, that bugged me). I did like how much of Ponyville we got to see, along with quite a few background ponies and supporting characters, some of whom we haven't seen in quite some time (in addition to seeing Cloud Kicker with her sister Alula (nice bit of continuity there ), we also got to see Mayor Mare, Mr. and Mrs. Cake, Filthy Rich, Magnum and Pearl (Rarity and Sweetie Belle's dad and mom), Blossomforth, and Octavia (both of whom rarely ever show up, especially the latter)). The animation itself was top notch as usual, and it was interesting seeing more and more of Ponyville getting transformed in increasingly extreme ways.

Sweet, confirmation that Magnum is a unicorn! 'Bout time he showed up without a hat.

Overall, while there were plenty of good elements in this episode, I think the bad ones were most amplified by the wonky pacing and execution. Some parts of the episode were too short, others, most notably Rarity's corruption sequence, were too long and focused far too much on Rarity and Spike. On top of that, Spike was quite OOC, the lesson, while strong in substance, came across as weak in its execution and delivery in a far too quick and easy resolution. All in all, "Inspiration Manifestation" was just an OK episode; it didn't disappoint me nearly as much as episodes like "Bats!" and "It Ain't Easy Being Breezies" did this season, but it didn't really do much for me either and had plenty wrong with it. When I look back on this episode, besides some deliciously funny Rarihumor, the first word I imagine that'll come to mind will most likely be "meh".

Spike, darling, you were simply awful in this episode!

Really?