Sometimes its better to turn the blind ear to the hating and be happy with your pony friends =)

Rainbow Falls doesn't deserve an ounce of praise whatsoever. Even though it has a moral (albeit weak), the way it's told is completely terrible. It's the worst written episode of the show for several reasons, all you can find in my review here.

It doesn't matter what messages or morals you put into the product. What will make the messages convincing is the story. The basis of an objectively good episode is how well the story's told. Is it well-paced? Are the characters in character, likeable, endearing, and held accountable if done wrong? Is the story not full of plot holes? Is the moral woven well, or is it full of dangerous implications? Does the comedy have a purpose, and will it age well? It keeps on going.

If your story is a mess, then the moral is purposeless. How can anyone appreciate or tolerate the moral if the moral is poorly explained via the presented context? You can't.

Take a look at Somepony to Watch Over Me. On the surface, the moral is good: You can't watch over your loved ones all the time. But the way it's handled makes it one of the worst in the entire show. Applejack pampered AB because she saw her spill a bowl of soup. But when Bloom gives her really solid justification for babying her, she sees this as the reason to make her more independent. This terrible logic creates a slew of dangerous implications.

People analyze because they like the show as much as the people who don't analyze. As I said in my interview in the newsletter, the analysis community analyzes for one main reason: It's fun. But there's more to analysis than that. There's also a standard of quality to expect out of this show, and part of the BAC's job is to tell them to live up to that standard. Otherwise, expect to hear a barrage of criticisms no matter where you go.

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I mean this show is rated TV Y and mainly targeted towards kids and most shows of that rating have some sort of educational value in in addition to innocence.

The content and market audience are no excuses for publishing bad quality. You don't use this excuse for products targeted to adults. Likewise, you don't do the same for ones with families in mind. Friendship Is Magic is an all-ages, gender-neutral cartoon. No matter the demographic, general audiences can watch and enjoy it. "TV-Y" means it's suitable for all ages. The best family cartoons have well-written subtext and context that bridge to multiple demographics. The Cutie Map is one of the best examples to come out of this season, and the same can be said with the comedy in Make Friends, But Keep Discord.

Analysis has had its place from the very beginning even before bronydom started. There's no reason to stop now. So, no, it's not "overanalyzed." In fact, the real answer is it's underanalyzed.

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And bronies that hate certain changes such as Twilicorn. I feel most of the plots especially the "bad" ones in every episode should be taken less seriously and just appreciate the messages they are trying to tell. And even changes to the show such as Twilicorn should be taken less seriously as well.

I wrote an answer to this a while back, and I'll do it here. There was anger in spots because the Twilicorn was poorly executed. If her ascension was well-written, then it wouldn't be such a controversy.

I think it's fun.

  On 2015-06-06 at 9:05 PM, Dark Qiviut said:

Rainbow Falls doesn't deserve an ounce of praise whatsoever. Even though it has a moral (albeit weak), the way it's told is completely terrible. It's the worst written episode of the show for several reasons, all you can find in my review here.

 

It doesn't matter what messages or morals you put into the product. What will make the messages convincing is the story. The basis of an objectively good episode is how well the story's told. Is it well-paced? Are the characters in character, likeable, endearing, and held accountable if done wrong? Is the story not full of plot holes? Is the moral woven well, or is it full of dangerous implications? Does the comedy have a purpose, and will it age well? It keeps on going.

 

If your story is a mess, then the moral is purposeless. How can anyone appreciate or tolerate the moral if the moral is poorly explained via the presented context? You can't.

 

Take a look at Somepony to Watch Over Me. On the surface, the moral is good: You can't watch over your loved ones all the time. But the way it's handled makes it one of the worst in the entire show. Applejack pampered AB because she saw her spill a bowl of soup. But when Bloom gives her really solid justification for babying her, she sees this as the reason to make her more independent. This terrible logic creates a slew of dangerous implications.

 

People analyze because they like the show as much as the people who don't analyze. As I said in my interview in the newsletter, the analysis community analyzes for one main reason: It's fun. But there's more to analysis than that. There's also a standard of quality to expect out of this show, and part of the BAC's job is to tell them to live up to that standard. Otherwise, expect to hear a barrage of criticisms no matter where you go.

 

The content and market audience are no excuses for publishing bad quality. You don't use this excuse for products targeted to adults. Likewise, you don't do the same for ones with families in mind. Friendship Is Magic is an all-ages, gender-neutral cartoon. No matter the demographic, general audiences can watch and enjoy it. "TV-Y" means it's suitable for all ages. The best family cartoons have well-written subtext and context that bridge to multiple demographics. The Cutie Map is one of the best examples to come out of this season, and the same can be said with the comedy in Make Friends, But Keep Discord.

 

Analysis has had its place from the very beginning even before bronydom started. There's no reason to stop now. So, no, it's not "overanalyzed." In fact, the real answer is it's underanalyzed.

 

I wrote an answer to this a while back, and I'll do it here. There was anger in spots because the Twilicorn was poorly executed. If her ascension was well-written, then it wouldn't be such a controversy.

I'm not saying poorly written episodes are good with morals I'm just saying the story doesn't have to be super amazing for the moral to work, so you can have an okay episode and a good moral would still work.

At least many of the "bad" episodes aren't as poorly written as the Spongebob episode A Pal for Gary which is painfully written. That's an episode so bad for a kids show.

Also, if people weren't so full of themselves and self righteous about their opinions on the show and it's storyline, characters, etc.; then I would be far less annoyed by it all.  Sensible critiques are fine as long as they have a well-constructed basis and analysis for why that specific person disliked said character(s) or moral(s) portrayed within a specified episode.  The arguments and critiques that aggravate me are the ones that could've been created by a being with the intelligence level of a vegetable.

For example, a simpletons argument that has no real meaning or value would be ,"I dislike/hated this episode", or, "I despised the characters portrayed here", with no context given to explain that argument.  These are the arguments that make me physically ill to read.  Similar to the like/dislike systems on Metacritic, YouTube, and FiM Fiction (I hate them).  Basically, if you don't have anything constructive to say then don't say it at all.  

Though, in the end, all I want to do is watch what I consider to be a comedic show about colorful cartoon equines; not to critique it due to its blatantly obvious flaws.

I just joined the fandom about 2 months ago, when I joined I was worried about I stepped into the fandom too late. I still don't know and I hope these kind of things don't stop people from liking the show. 

You're right in that the morals and messages are the most important part of the show, but the execution within the plot should support these morals. A glaring oversight in the plot can hurt the credibility of a moral.

For example, the reasons why I'm constantly ripping the Twilight subplot of "Trade Ya!" are twofold: one is that the plot fails to consider an opposing argument which is equally valid speaking from a matter of fact, and another is Pinkie Pie's frenetic and antisocial behavior being the vehicle for which the moral was delivered. It's a botched message because of how it was portrayed in the plot and it's great to get people to consider that thought.

Most reasonable analysts know not to expect The Godfather levels of complexity from this show, but just a plot that soundly backs up its moral. Morals don't have to be told, but shown. Most of the show's writers who come from a comedy background don't recognize this well enough.

To be fair, I'd rather take MLP at its worst over 99% of cartoons that are popularly considered as "bad", and just as much over a considerable amount of passably "good" ones as well.

sure the story writing is top notch and alot of adults can enjoy it

but the main demographic is little kids some people have forgotten about that

and expect thought provoking stories everytime

People take it seriously because they like the show. If they arent interesting in this show anymore, they will leave this fandom and watch something else. So analyzing is good, they improve the show, over-analyzing is... still ok i think =]. I love MLP for its community. 

  On 2015-06-06 at 8:49 PM, ooBrony said:

Sometimes its better to turn the blind ear to the hating and be happy with your pony friends =)

For me, I'm just an average viewer so i follow MST3K Mantra's advice and succces =]]. There are about 10% of episode that i didnt enjoy in the whole series (yay!). Maybe i'm just a "easy to please" kind of customer =]].

  On 2015-06-06 at 11:50 PM, Wind Chaser said:

You're right in that the morals and messages are the most important part of the show, but the execution within the plot should support these morals. A glaring oversight in the plot can hurt the credibility of a moral.

 

For example, the reasons why I'm constantly ripping the Twilight subplot of "Trade Ya!" are twofold: one is that the plot fails to consider an opposing argument which is equally valid speaking from a matter of fact, and another is Pinkie Pie's frenetic and antisocial behavior being the vehicle for which the moral was delivered. It's a botched message because of how it was portrayed in the plot and it's great to get people to consider that thought.

 

Most reasonable analysts know not to expect The Godfather levels of complexity from this show, but just a plot that soundly backs up its moral. Morals don't have to be told, but shown. Most of the show's writers who come from a comedy background don't recognize this well enough.

 

To be fair, I'd rather take MLP at its worst over 99% of cartoons that are popularly considered as "bad", and just as much over a considerable amount of passably "good" ones as well.

I'm just saying people are expecting was too much from the plots to the point where they want the show to be darker or more epic when you should find a different show that is darker or more epic. And yeah there are a few episodes that aren't executed well even though they still have good morals but I doubt most kids would notice.

Oh you would take MLP at it's worst? Then try G3.5 or Newborn Cuties.

  On 2015-06-07 at 1:54 AM, TheJLeeTeam said:

I'm just saying people are expecting was too much from the plots to the point where they want the show to be darker or more epic when you should find a different show that is darker or more epic. And yeah there are a few episodes that aren't executed well even though they still have good morals but I doubt most kids would notice.

 

Oh you would take MLP at it's worst? Then try G3.5 or Newborn Cuties.

Those are mainly the latter-day pseudo-analysts who saw the popularity and cult of personality around the original analysts who will nitpick insignificant things for the sake of "analysis" without getting a full grasp of the concept and also some of the original analysts themselves (namely Tommy Oliver and Digibro) getting jaded and unrealistic in their expectations for the show. That's an issue more on the individual level, and it's not worth calling out the whole analysis community for it.

Of course I only meant G4.

I completely fail to see why MLP, which was never intended to have such a desirably large and flexible consumer base to begin with, should be taken seriously. One either finds it entertaining, or doesn't. And yes, I agree that the morals are overlooked, especially considering the other garbage that children watch these days.

over analyzing runs in the fandoms blood...

Yes, it is over-analyzed. Constantly. One could argue that we're over-analyzing every time we bring up something that didn't occur to the writers, or go into more detail than the episodes themselves did. It's not as bad as it sounds. It only stands out to me when people do it constantly or are jerks about it.

I think we expect a little too much continuity from the show; for example, ripping on the repeated lessons in Rainbow Falls and criticizing Fluttershy for not being assertive yet. It's easy to talk about that when we're on the receiving end of the content being produced; continuity is hard when you have to cobble together an episode under time constraints, then put it right out of your mind so you can move on to the next.

Occasional nitpicking is one thing, but I find myself increasingly bored with "pseudo-analysts" who pick out a recent episode seemingly at random and nitpick it to hell as if it's the worst thing ever. That routine got people's attention for a while, but I think it's exhausted now.