Hello everypony, and welcome to a super special spoooooooookkkkyyyyyy edition of "Batbrony Reviews"! First of all, a Happy Halloween and Nightmare Night to you all (and to any of my fellow Lutherans out there, Happy Reformation Day as well! ). That out of the way, let's dive into Episode 21 of Season 5, "Scaremaster"!

Overall, I don't have a lot to say about this one. Not cause it wasn't fun or didn't have a good message, oh no, I liked it on both of those counts, but I suppose it wasn't quite as... fresh, if you will, as say last week's episode was. This was a wonderful episode, but a somewhat predictable one as well, at least once it was clear what the issue is. Basically, the episode was an extended version of this:

You may think that's an exaggeration, but not really. So what was going on here? Well, Fluttershy, as we all know, hates Nightmare Night. Like, a lot. It's really never been her cup of tea, and she generally as a rule of thumb just spends the night literally hiding under her bed. With her animal friends. Including Harry the Bear. So what goes wrong this year? Angel Bunny, that's what. Because of course he would. Yes, poor Flutters has to go out and about on Nightmare Night after Angel Bunny demands she pick him up some carrots, and for the first half of the episode she basically has a panic attack. Even after she finds her friends and tries her best to celebrate the holiday with them, nothing really works out for her. She just seems too uncomfortable with the notion of a holiday dedicated to scary things and ponies scaring each other. Oddly enough, Angel Bunny eventually steps up and helps her find a solution... of sorts. She ends up, with the help of her animal friends, delivering the biggest scare of the night to her friends, but also comes to the conclusion that, really, this holiday just isn't for her, and she's OK with that. She sees that it really is a fun night, but at the same time something she just doesn't want to be a part of. She's happy, her friends are happy, all ends well.

If there's one critique I have of this episode, it's that the message is a bit confused at times and the entire episode is pretty by-the-books as far as a Fluttershy episode goes. Fluttershy has deep insecurity about something and needs her friends help to overcome it, we have seen this MANY times before, and executed much better. Not that this wasn't an issue, oh no, we've known since Season 2 that Fluttershy has a big problem with Nightmare Night. But there were bits in the first half of the episode that were just ludicrous, namely when Fluttershy kept questioning whether something horrible would happen if she tried to partake in some games with her friends (seriously, that scene was kind of asinine, I've never seen Fluttershy overthink something THAT MUCH! Even Twilight rarely goes to those lengths, and she's far more OCD than Fluttershy ). Also, even though I understood that Fluttershy was content with not partaking in Nightmare Night at the end of the episode, it was a bit confusing just what exactly she thought of the holiday from then on. Like, it seemed like she understood the appeal and thus was less bothered by it, and I know she doesn't want to scare her friends, but if that's the case why doesn't she just celebrate with them from now on in ways that don't involve scaring them? Look, I get that the message is saying you don't have to partake in something that everyone else does, even if it's a good or harmless thing, if it's really not something you like, and that's a good message to be sure, but here it was just a bit odd how it was executed. I don't know, maybe again as I said before my biggest problem was just that we've seen Fluttershy do this song and dance before, it's just this time it involved Nightmare Night specifically.

The most important bit of canon to come out of this episode

Those issues aside, I loved this episode very much. Nightmare Night is a very fun holiday as presented in the show, and Ponyville looked just as great this time as it did in Season 2 during "Luna Eclipsed." All the costumes, the festivities, seeing who's going as what and what everypony was doing, it was a blast. I especially got a kick out of Derpy's "Princess Twilight" costume and Spike dressing as a dragon (again!), this time a two-headed one (so original Spike, so original ), and Rarity's "Mermaid/Sea Pony" costume was pretty funny too, but they all were great. Just like "Luna Eclipsed" as well, this episode was also very, very funny. Between Fluttershy's panicked behavior, Granny Smith scaring the bejeezus out of her, Fluttershy's failed attempts to celebrate with the gang (culminating in the best scene of the episode, the least scary "Scary Tea Party" ever!), and the climax in the Apple's Haunted Corn Maze, there were just laughs after laughs after laughs. We even got to see the "return" of Flutterbat, and that was a pretty entertaining nod to that bizarre episode from last season.

DAT LIP BITE, HNNNGGGGGGGG!!!

Besides all that, Fluttershy and the rest of the Mane 6 were spot on overall. Spike and the Mane 6 tried their best to give Flutters a good time, even if it took away from their own fun at times, and Fluttershy had a solid episode overall, even if it was hardly her most serious appearance ever and the conclusion and message left something to be desired. I was just a tad disappointed that Princess Luna didn't show up in any capacity at any point, but eh, that's a very minor complaint. All in all, while not quite as amazing as "Luna Eclipsed" was and still is, "Scaremaster" is for sure a worthy successor, and a wonderful way to kick off Halloween this year. Hope ya'll enjoyed it as much as I did, and that's all I got for this one. Have a great and Happy Halloween this year everypony, and be sure to stay safe no matter how you may be celebrating it (especially if alcohol is involved in your festivites, drink responsibly ya'll ). This is Batbrony signing off. I'm off!!! *cue dramatic exit*