Honestly... "Over a Barrel" is probably my second least favorite episode of Season 1. That's not to say I don't like it, uhuh, far from it. But at the same time, something's just off about the episode's execution. So, I guess let's start with the pros.

First of all, this episode is extremely entertaining! Applejack's adorable attachment to Bloomberg is both hilarious and kinda cute, especially seeing our favorite cowpony's softer side brought out for an apple tree of all things, the Fluttershy tree sequence is still one of the funniest scenes in all of Season 1, and Spike has quite a few funny moments of his own. The buffalo and Appleloosans are both pretty cool as well. Chief Thunderhooves especially shines; I'm glad that, despite some humorous moments, they played that character pretty straight. I like Little Strongheart, Braeburn, and Sheriff Silverstar as well, but honestly, we don't learn a whole lot about those characters, especially Silverstar, so aside from not doing anything ridiculously stupid, I can't complain too much about them. Finally, for a one-shot episode, the conflict in this episode escalated to quite a dramatic and epic climax! The storming of Appleloosa by the buffalo herd had quite a bit of suspense building up to it and was actually a fairly dramatic scene; again, despite some comedy bits, I appreciate that the writers pretty much played the conflict straight, resulting in one of the larger battle sequences we'd see in the whole show until "A Canterlot Wedding" in Season 2, if you really think about it.

Ummm... this is a kids show, right?

However, if there's a place where this episode falls short at all, it's in its themes and how the Mane 6 try to resolve things, or rather, fail to resolve things. The conflict pretty much escalates because Applejack and Rainbow Dash prevent Little Strongheart and Braeburn from talking things out and trying to resolve each others differences in a peaceful, civilized manner and coming to a compromise that works for both groups. I get that the writers were clearly trying to convey the irrationality and talking past each other that so often sadly characterized settler and Native American conflicts throughout American history, but the problem is using Applejack and Rainbow Dash to further escalate the conflict; they've just been introduced to the conflict, and so really shouldn't be taking it upon themselves to be the primary representatives of the Appleloosans and buffalo, respectively. Sure, things escalate more on account of Sheriff Silverstar and Chief Thunderhooves, but they don't even really try to talk things out with each other, and that again happens only AFTER Applejack and RD prevented the two groups from talking things over. The next way that the Mane 6 fail in trying to resolve the conflict really irks me to this day; Pinkie's song. The theme of the song itself is not bad; what's bad is the very idea of resolving a conflict like this through song itself! Pinkie trying to solve this type of conflict by singing a song feels too much like something that would happen in an episode of MLP back in G3, or even something a generic Disney feature would try to do these days. The writer's of MLP are smarter than that, so it just feels really lazy and poorly conceived; I'm not saying it's necessarily OOC for Pinkie, but the fact that the Mane 6 can't really come up with anything better than that is stupid. In addition, "You Gotta Share" is probably to this day my least favorite song in the show, not counting any songs in "Equestria Girls"; I don't really think it's all that catchy and memorable is all, and just never get anything out of it. After that, the Mane 6 just don't do anything at all; heck, the episode really is "Over a Barrel" in every sense of the word! Over a barrel, according to the MLP wiki, means being in a helpless position where others are in control, and that pretty much describes the Mane 6 in the whole episode. While that's kind of clever, and no doubt intentional, at the same time in execution it just doesn't work, because the Mane 6 just don't feel like they even belong there or have any point in being there, other than serving as helpless observers of this conflict. In the end, the situation kinda resolves itself on its own in a way that it should've been able to resolve itself in quite easily in the first place without this conflict escalating as much as it did!

Overall, however, I still like this episode. I just have some problems with it thematically and in its execution. Still, there have been far worse Western or Cowboys-and-Indians episodes in other TV shows than this, and I've said it before and I'll say it again, it gets the Cowboys-and-Indians conflict down far better and makes it far more compelling and believable than movies like "Pocahontas" or "Avatar" (the latter of which I hate with a passion and in my opinion is one of the most undeservably over-hyped and overrated movies of all time!!!) do, which is no easy feat and says a lot about the talents of the writers of MLP. Still, its execution is far from perfect, its escalation is far from believable, in no small part due to its easy resolution at the end. All in all, while I enjoy "Over a Barrel" for its entertainment, it's definitely my second least favorite episode of Season 1 due to its thematic and execution problems and for containing my least favorite song of the series, and is definitely one of my least favorite episodes of the show as a whole.

But yeah, no matter how many problems the episode may have, that scene will always be amazing!!!