Dark Qiviut

@, Honestly, I don't know. If you ask me, it's been a very common problem in the series dating back to Friendship Is Magic, Act 2. It may be a trap to say this, but you're seeing this critique now because we're in season four, and parts of the long-standing issues are coming more into the light. Furthermore, there are too many S4 episodes where the ensemble had no reason to be there, and some of the redundant dialogue lately is cringeworthy.

@@Never2muchpinkie: a. DT got significant character development in Ponyville Confidential. You don't need to slowly make an evil character good to give character development. You just need to give the character a good reason for his or her actions. Ponyville Confidential developed Diamond Tiara as an antagonist with similar ambition to her father's, but opposite him. b. You're dead wrong here. Both Babs and Apple Bloom were supposed to share the room together. To have Apple Bloom sleep on an unkempt pile of hay in the far corner of the room instead of next to it with only a magazine or newspaper to cover herself would raise eyebrows from anyone, much less her peers. They know Apple Bloom very well and wouldn't ignore peculiar situations surrounding her for no good reasons. Chances are they could've shown up at some point to see how both of them were doing in Apple Bloom's room, and in the morning interrogate them. If not, they would've shown up in her room when they're not home, witness the chaos, and then interrogate them. If any one of Apple Bloom's guardians had a Celestia-given brain, they would've investigated the matter immediately. Does it mean they'll find anything? No. But not getting involved is irresponsible of them. If anything, it makes Babs look worse. d. To quote from the episode's transcript: In both exchanges, the Cutie Mark Crusaders excused Babs's bullying. They didn't want to tell Applejack because they feared to be tattletales (despite Sweetie suggesting multiple times), which is understandable. Her pushing them around all week ate them up. Feeling they had nowhere useful to go, they wanted to fight back because they were absolutely sick and tired of it. They decided to defend themselves without thinking ahead. Publicly humiliating anyone is absolutely wrong. I don't care if it's the one who was bullied or the one who bullied. That does nothing. But the way One Bad Apple portrays the bullying problem in four ways: How fighting back and defending yourself from bullying is wrong, period. If you tell a grownup, the bullying problem will go away very quickly. If you ever stand up to a bully in any way and fight back against a bully, that makes you the bully. Because Babs was bullied, she's given the license to bully the Cutie Mark Crusaders emotionally and physically. And OBA doesn't even hide it. You see where One Bad Apple's problems lie now? OBA paints a one-size-fits-all solution. It's unrealistic, and bullying never goes away in the blink of an eye. Like a person's fingerprint, no two situations of bullying are ever the same, and none of them are solved the same way. In real life, some bullies pack weapons that can kill you instantly. If any bullied child ever puts this botched moral into practice, they can be put in serious danger. Do you want to know how to portray bullying in a more realistic light? Have the Cutie Mark Crusaders tell Applejack, but have her not believe them because it's typically implausible for any child who was mercilessly bullied would suddenly become one. Then teeter the perspectives back and forth from the kids to Applejack. Have AJ feel guilty for not believing them earlier and punish Babs, DT, and SS for their bullying. Hell, when a fanfic following the timeline of OBA portrays the consequences of bullying better than OBA, you're doing something wrong. There's already one episode to explicitly show the severe consequences of bullying plausibly: the episode she wrote prior, Hurricane Fluttershy! It provided the backstory to Fluttershy's personality, transforming her from simply shy to psychologically broken and in need of long-term repair. Not only were the consequences shown. It was shown realistically. e. There's a much better review that counteracts this (specifically from the 4:30 mark onward): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXDAzT355Tc&feature=youtu.be&t=4m32s And as for this: I won't sugarcoat it. Digibro's statement's bullshit! Being "MLP:FIM" doesn't excuse Morrow of skirting over a precious, gray subject. If you're going to tackle bullying, make sure you know what you're doing, and do it right. One method is to never excuse Babs's evil behavior like what Morrow did throughout OBA and not utilize an archaic solution to solve bullying. It doesn't matter how much it's defended. One Bad Apple is badly executed and factually one of the worst episodes in the show for screwing up SO badly. (If you want my list, One Bad Apple and Bridle Gossip share the top spot for worst FIM episode [with the censored version of The Last Roundup somewhere in the bottom five, but that's a different topic].) Like what I wrote before, FIM has a track record of addressing a sensitive, real-life subject and screwing up, sometimes horribly. Bridle Gossip and One Bad Apple are the two worst cases; when AKR and Morrow screwed up, they didn't try to fix it. The writing was so horrific, the scripts deserved to be shredded and sent back to the drawing board for a better rough draft. Once more, if you're going to address a sensitive subject, address it correctly and tell it like it is. Don't use it as a lame gimmick for a moral, address a complicated one as black and white like bullying (when bullying is grayer than the grayscale), throw in poor vocabulary and dialogue, use one-dimensional bullies to cheaply address a sensitive subject like Scootaloo's possible disability, sloppily sugarcoat it, and lackadaisically research. No skirting. No excuses. Do it, and do it correctly.

I can name a few more on my mind. Twilight being shoehorned in season one. I don't think anyone will disagree on this. She was inserted in many episodes where she had no reason for it aside from writing the friendship report to Celestia. Look Before You Sleep, A Bird in the Hoof, Stare Master, Green Isn't Your Color, and The Show Stoppers all come to mind. (MrEnter accused Fall Weather Friends of shoehorning Twilight, although here, her inclusion is much more natural and settled more organically than the rest). But that was a season-one issue only. Following Lesson Zero, Twilight hasn't been shoehorned as much. Sisterhooves Social was the first FIM to not have Twilight involved, and it's easily one of the best in the show. On the other hoof, since last season/late season two, we're now seeing the Mane Six in its entirety shoehorned too much, only worsening this season. Dragon Quest (Act 1 only), MMMystery on the Friendship Express, A Canterlot Wedding (although their roles were important, the Sidekick Five were pushed to the background), The Crystal Empire (same thing), Spike at Your Service (shoehorning Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie characters unnecessarily), Daring Don't, Rainbow Falls, Simple Ways, and It Ain't Easy Being Breezies. It's debatable if the Mane Six were shoehorned in Wonderbolts Academy, as Dash and Pinkie were the only ones with a purpose, yet had a reason to go. One important thing season two did right wasn't shoehorn every single character all the time; if they were there, it was for a reason. AJ, AB, Rarity, SB in Sisterhooves Social. Pinkie and Cranky in AFiD (the others as cameos). Rarity, Pinkie, and Fluttershy in Putting Your Hoof Down. Dash, Fluttershy, Twilight, and Spike in Hurricane Fluttershy. Rarity, Dash, and Twilight in Dragon Quest (the others cameos). While not all did it right, the fact that S2 didn't fall for the "shoehorn-the-M6" trap should be a factor to tell the team not to plug in every single character lest it's mandatory. Several stories didn't need the moral to be shoehorned. Bridle Gossip, Over a Barrel, The Cutie Mark Chronicles (then again, the story called this out, but it doesn't mean I'll give it a pass), Bats!, Castle Mane-ia, A Canterlot Wedding ("trusting your instincts" is valuable, but has no place to be uttered by Celly in the last minute), Spike at Your Service, Rainbow Falls (although Dash learned it herself, it was so clunky by how blunt it was), and Mare-Do-Well really shoved the morals in unnecessarily or too bluntly to a character who was too dumb to figure it out. If your episode didn't need a moral spelled out, leave it out. Otherwise, show, don't tell. This is one thing season three did decently in. Magic Duel, Sleepless in Ponyville, Wonderbolts Academy, and Just for Sidekicks didn't spell out the morals via a report or journal. They figured it out and sometimes let us, the viewer, decipher it. But the one-shot to handle this the best was Pinkie Pride: It's also one of Maud Pie's strengths: The moral wasn't spelled out so bluntly nor reiterated in the journal. It was said once at the end, and that was it. (That said, the execution of said moral is another question, as the morals itself lacked focus, but that's another issue.) If you ask me, the recited moral is no longer necessary, and it would be more interesting for the audience to figure it out themselves. By doing this, the writer trusts the audience into knowing what the lessons were. As of this point, the Twilicorn hasn't been taken advantage of at all. When Magical Mystery Cure and Equestria Girls were released, Twilight's ascension was treated as the evolution of Friendship Is Magic. Instead, Twilight's ascension has played a very minimal role and sometimes pretended it doesn't exist. Yes, Twilight Time did reference it, but it came way too late. Personally, that should've swapped Flight to the Finish's place as the fifth episode this season. So far, she's been the "I'm-right" or "I-have-the-solution" median for several of the episodes despite not having any business being there. If you're thinking, "Well, they've done this before," that's the problem. It's happened too much, and Twilight is simply a role-player instead of a character. IAEBB used Twilight, who was a background pony that episode, as a blatant DEM. Currently, the writers behave like they have no clue what to do with her. Far too many episodes skimp on Celestia's reasoning and background stories of the villain. Currently, the only two stories with the most told backgrounds are Nightmare Moon and Sombra. Discord's and Sunset's expositions were brief and told very little. From my revised review for Keep Calm and Flutter On: If you're going to have Celestia give a reason, make sure they're efficient and not shortened for time. It cheapens her character and makes her like an inept control freak. Several characters are one-dimensional. Snips/Snails, Shining Armor, Cadance, Dash's bullies, the teenage dragons in Dragon Quest, the plothole ponies from the marketplace in Putting Your Hoof Down, DT/SS lately, Sombra, Flash Sentry, Jet Set, Upper Crust, Trenderhoof, and Sunset Shimmer are flat, one-note characters. If you're going to introduce a character, at least put in some effort to give them some dimension. Make them real. One-dimensionalizing a character makes them walking cardboard cutouts. They're not interesting and waste everyone's time. (Gilda is flat as well, but at least Morrow tried, and she's two-dimensional.) For too often, when a character does really bad or stupid things, they don't get punished for it. When a character performs such a vulgar stunt, then she should suffer the equal amount of consequence followed by a resolution in response. Sometimes, the punishment (if there is any) doesn't fit the crime. To give you examples: a. Babs Seed from One Bad Apple. Already explained this. b. Rarity from Sweet & Elite. Here, Rarity decides to stay in Canterlot to attend the party over celebrating Twilight and her birthday party. To say the least, what she did was unbelievably cruel and didn't exactly have a good reason for it. S&E presented Rarity as very out of character. To make matters worse, when Rarity was confronted, she not only was forgiven, but was rewarded, and she was still able to keep her vile lies a secret. Just because she learned her lesson doesn't mean she shouldn't have been punished for it. Rarity should have been scolded, embarrassed, and shunned for her betrayal of trust. c. The Cutie Mark Crusaders for poisoning Cheerilee and Big Mac. They realized how badly they screwed up and wanted to fix it so badly. Hell, they felt very guilty for doing this. I can agree that making them do Mac's chores is sufficient, but Cheerilee and BM rubbed salt in the wound by acting like the love poison never went away. It was cruel, disgusting, and out of character of Big Mac (for a while, he went into my hated character list before I smartened up), Cheerille (same here, except I never liked her that much in the first place), and the show. d. Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon for coercing Babs Seed to bully the Cutie Mark Crusaders and mocking Scootaloo's inability to fly. e. The Remane Five acting like hypocrites in TMMDW. If you want to get your point across, don't do the same thing and embarrass one of your closest friends behind her back. It was a disgusting act that NONE of the characters would ever do, and they were rewarded for their efforts. f. Stalkerjack driving Apple Bloom so crazy, she decided to deliver the pies herself. The fact that AB had to do this in order for AJ to realize she was babying Apple Bloom was insufficiently stupid. Instead of AJ suffering the consequences of her actions, Apple Bloom's the one who will. Idiocy to the core. g. Spitfire and Fleetfoot for being assholes and lying to both Soarin' and Rainbow Dash so she gets to be on the Cloudsdale team over him. They purposefully abandoned their closest teammate for no good, in-character reason. And what d'ya know it? It was all forgive and forget, and RF acted like it never happened. If you want Fleetfoot's and Spitfire's cruelty to hit, have them kicked out of the Cloudsdale team and replaced by other members, punished for violating the codes of the Wonderbolts, and have Soarin' temporarily end his friendship with them. h. Pinkie Pie in Filli Vanilli, Apple Bloom in Bridle Gossip (leaving AJ for dead in the Everfree Forest), every one of the Mane Six sans Rarity in Ponyville Confidential (being massive hypocrites by endorsing the gossiping before turning around after realizing they were the victims of it), the Mane Six in Games Ponies Play (being stupid and out of character, only to get rewarded for their efforts), and Philomena in A Bird in the Hoof. No effective consequences for their bad behavior. There needs to be more and more episodes where the characters suffer the consequences for their bad actions. If they do something bad and suffer the consequences, make sure it fits the crime and not to overdo it, or risk making it look abusive. Examples of such punishments that fit the crime: a. When the Remane Five trespassed the Castle of the Royal Sisters in Castle Mane-ia, they suffered from some darkly hilarious hijinks, including Fluttershy believing Angel was crushed by debris. Funny, yet disturbing. b. Rarity in Sisterhooves Social is one of my all-time favorites that follow this demonstration and is slowly climbing up on my all-time favorite list as a result. She didn't pay any attention to Sweetie Belle, lost her cool, berated Sweetie, and didn't want to spend any quality time with her. As a result, their relationship was fractured, and Sweetie was too hurt to easily forgive her. When Rarity tried to say sorry, Sweetie didn't simply forgive and forget because she hurt her and wanted it to stick. Therefore, Rarity had to team up with Applejack to rectify it. By disguising herself as Applejack, Rarity was able to team up with Sweetie Belle and come in second. They forgive and forget, and Rarity learns a valuable lesson. c. Because Suri took advantage of Rarity's generosity so vindictively, Rarity all but abandoned her biggest quality because she felt it made her look worthless and didn't want it to happen again. She got so involved into one-upping Suri in the Fashion Week contest, she didn't realize she took advantage of the Remane Five's effort. After realizing what she had done, she grew extremely upset and no longer cared about the show anymore. (God, that episode did SO much RIGHT! ) d. In Suited for Success, the Remane Five acted as clients within their respective personality perimeters, disregarding Rarity's sense for design in favor of what they wanted. In return, they got extremely embarrassed in front of Hoity Toity, and Rarity became a laughingstock. To remedy their misdeeds, they teamed up to complete Rarity's dress for the Grand Galloping Gala. e. After Lightning Dust continued to disregard anyone's lives except her own (including nearly killing Dash's friends), she got demoted and kicked out. Although the original ending had Dust realizing what she'd done and gave the episode closure, Dust's actions would've been considered to be okay and not worthy of an expulsion. By emphatically ripping the leader badge from her uniform, Spitfire made the consequences stick. It was the more satisfying conclusion. f. Applejack and Dash were at their (in-character) worst in Fall Weather Friends, trying to one-up each other and mocking Twilight for deciding to enter the Running of the Leaves. But by focusing on themselves, they didn't do what they were supposed to do, resulting in fighting and tying for last place. After their fight, they look like they got scraped badly, embarrassing themselves and realizing their big mistake. They learned a very hard lesson, and it worked deliciously well.

Spike. As a big fan of him, it's very annoying how he is constantly the butt of jokes. Ever since the pilot, he's a basis of comic relief. Except Spike isn't simply a character the writers can abuse all the time. He has a personality that is asking to be fleshed out, but DHX doesn't live it to its potential. Instead, he's just the one we can see struggling or victim of abusive slapstick. It was funny if a character deserves it or is an adult. But he's a kid dragon, and Spikabuse isn't funny at all. If it was, it got old very quickly. Now that Power Ponies vocally criticized his sidekick role, it's under subject of more criticism because DHX all but pretends PoP doesn't exist. And when he's the one who's given an important role, either primary or secondary, the writers are so inconsistent with him. Sometimes, they play him as an immature kid who inadvertently insults the character centric in the story (Twilight in Winter Wrap-Up, Fluttershy in Hurricane Fluttershy, himself in Owl's Well and Just for Sidekicks), a very smart foil (Simple Ways, Lesson Zero, Equestria Girls), just plain out of character (Spike at Your Service, Just for Sidekicks), or not written in at all when it would've made sense to have him included into it (Sweet & Elite, the latter half of Pinkie Pride's third act, Maud Pie). On the flipside, only one Spike episode is good: Secret of My Excess. Each writer varies his character so much, there's little consistency. We're almost four seasons in, and these problems haven't vanished. Give him some consistency so the audience can finally understand what he's like. I wrote this two months ago in another thread, but it bears some relevance: Following Rainbow Falls, it's improved, but it needs more improvement. Way too often, an episode deals with a real-life subject that gets very sensitive, but the show doesn't pull it off so effectively. linked a whole analysis debate between Dr. Wolf and CloudCookooCountry on YouTube off-thread, but I'll address it here, too. Bridle Gossip is the first by addressing racism, but it's such a poorly told story, it's one of the worst episodes in the show. To tell you some of the problems: Ironically, BG is not an episode I hate. I like it because it was funny. But I refuse to give this a free pass because from an objective quality perspective, it's terrible. Like what CCC said on YouTube, the context of racism would've been suited better in Hearth's Warming Eve because it addresses the issue without hammering it in so blatantly. Over a Barrel is another, ponifying the struggle between the white settlers/cowboys and Native Americans. In it, Polsky tags in the moral: By itself, this is a great moral and one all of us can relate to, but hammering it in in the present context doesn't make any sense. Historically, the Natives have the upper moral highground because the settlers entered the Natives' homeland, misplaced them, and slaughtered them. When Columbus discovered the Caribbean and Central America, he helped enslave and eventually commit genocide of ancient Native tribes. The moral and storyline concept worked in the context of the show, but they were an insult to the historical context OaB used to present the moral. One Bad Apple addressed the concept of bullying, and boy, did it screw up. To get it out of the way, the song was fantastic and actually painted a plausible portrayal of bullying. But there are numerous problems. a. DT and SS are flat, one-dimensional bullies again, nullifying the character growth from past seasons. If you're going to make the context convincing, don't hammer in one-dimensional personalities just to get the message across. It cheapens the whole presentation. (This issue is evident in Flight to the Finish, too.) b. Applejack and the rest of the Apple family are incompetent because the bullying resulted in AB sleeping on the floor. If they had the competence and intelligence, they would've spotted it immediately and get to the bottom of things. The only reason they didn't was simply because "the plot says so." It's annoyingly contrived. c. The pace in itself is sloppy, going way too fast. Take the time to address the issue of bullying. Don't rush it to finish the plot. d. The entire idea that the CMCs are bullies themselves because they got sick and tired of being bullied and decided to fight back. No, that's NOT bullying. They wanted to defend themselves because they were sick and tired of being pushed around, and they wanted Babs to know exactly how it feels. "Don't act against a bully because doing so makes you as bad as a bully" is a terrible moral! e. The fact that Babs Seed became a sadistic bully because she was bullied in Manehattan was excused in the script. That's NO excuse for bullying! f. One Bad Apple paints a one-size-fits-all method to combat bullying, which is to come to AJ (or any other adult) in case of bullies (something SB suggested several times earlier!). That doesn't always work because some don't care, while some adults enable the bullying or are the bully. Bullying is a very difficult subject to address because it's so multi-layered, and it's very important to address it sensitively. To make it worse, Babs Seed not only wasn't punished. She was basically rewarded for her immoral behavior. You don't screw up a very sensitive subject. You know what happens if you do? You could cause a reverse effect and enable this kind of behavior. The sorry way OBA's story and moral were written could also put kids in serious danger. It's victim-shaming at its finest, and it's disgusting! Sometimes the endings are very contrived just to reach a conclusion. To give you three examples: a. Sonic Rainboom. With Celestia watching, Rainbow Dash descended to catch her and the Wonderbolts, creating a Sonic Rainboom in the process. There are several big problems with it. Firstly, Celestia did nothing to stop the fall and simply stood back and watched. What if Rarity and the Wonderbolts died from the fall? If they did, Celestia would look like an even bigger asshole than Nightmare Moon and Discord combined. To make matters worse, Twilight would never want anything to do with Celestia, Canterlot, the Royal Sisters, and the School for Gifted Unicorns as long as she lived. Celestia had no place being there. Fluttershy and crew reacted to Dash's Sonic Rainboom despite the fact that the danger wasn't through yet. If they (including Dash) got killed in the fall, the celebration is over. The premature celebration trivialized Fluttershy, the others watching, and the whole predicament. This leads me to the next issue. Dash pulled off the Sonic Rainboom before catching Rarity and the Wonderbolts. Rather than having her do it before she catches them, how about catching them during the fall and then forcibly trying to turn around at even higher speed so none of them crash to the ground? By doing that, then you have the characters celebrate not just the event, but also the daring rescue. (This is partially why I rate Wonderbolts Academy better than Rainboom. Unlike SR, WA correctly handles the ending.) b. Maud Pie and The Crystal Empire. As everyone watches, Maud and Cadance suddenly come in to help out. The climaxes would've ended more plausibly if Rainbow Dash was the one to rescue them. Here's an idea to improve them. TCE: As Spike falls, Rainbow Dash flies, grabbing Spike and the Crystal Heart. Then once she descends to the altar, Cadance descends, too, and give her speech to honor the Heart and expel Sombra. MP: As the rock starts to teeter, Rainbow Dash flies over to try to move the rocks. Maud follows and smashes the rock to free her, and Dash and Pinkie run off. Then as the big boulder tumbles down, Maud jackhammers through the boulder, disintegrating it. Far too many episodes could've been resolved in the middle of Act 2 if the characters didn't behave like idiots just to force the plot along. Boast Busters, Owl's Well, Green Isn't Your Color (the Twilight/Pinkie side-plot really related to it), Swarm of the Century, Mare-Do-Well, Sweet & Elite, Games Ponies Play, and Rainbow Falls all could've been resolved early, but because of the twenty-minute script time, they had to pad them with unnecessary crap. And on a related note, one of my biggest peeves in entertainment is making characters stupid and incompetent (especially if doing so is out of character) just to fit the plot. Far too often, Twilight's intelligence and ability to handle powerful magic are dumbed down to embellish the conflict. But it isn't just her. The other characters are affected, too, like Applejack in Somepony to Watch Over Me, Dash in Daring Don't and Rainbow Falls, Rarity and Trenderhoof in Simple Ways, the Diamond Dogs in A Dog & Pony Show, Snips & Snails, the entirety of MMMystery, Pinkie's flanderization post-Hurricane Fluttershyand so on. Stupidity and incompetence make for cheap storytelling and cheap humor. It tells me the writers are stuck with the conflict and want to write either an easy way out or humor that doesn't belong. Furthermore, having characters be stupid or incompetent just to make the opposite look better undermines the conflict and moral. Equestria Girls, Bridle Gossip, Feeling Pinkie Keen, A Dog & Pony Show, Mare-Do-Well, Rainbow Falls, A Canterlot Wedding, Dragon Quest, I'm looking at you!

I know all of that. The awkwardness of how the ponies had trouble communicating with Maud and her matter-of-fact deadpan is played for laughs. That I get; I have no problem with that. Plus, I know Maud wasn't stupid. In a way, I can somewhat relate to her because she's really dedicated to her work despite not showing so much emotion. But then the script, either intentional or unintentionally, switches that around and says you should feel bad for laughing at the scenario, much less thinking about it. That's the problem. It would've been better if the script didn't come across as tut-tutting to the audience for laughing despite the fact that it wants the audience to laugh at what happened in the first place. ——— Please read the edit. I DON'T want to repeat what I have to say again. *rubbing forehead impatiently*

*sigh* Again, that's not what I'm saying. It doesn't matter that you didn't judge her like the Mane Six nor the fact you were laughing innocently. What I'm saying is that Maud Pie's script wants you laugh and then tells you to feel bad for laughing. Doing so manipulates with the audience's emotions. It comes off as manufactured.

For the most part, "TV-Y" is about how to approach a topic without being lewd, vulgar, violent, or graphic about it. Addressing Maud's attitude and psyche will likely not affect it as long as the content itself is suitable for children. In the scenes where her matter-of-fact deadpan is a big factor, the way she and the others respond to each other is played to make you laugh. However, because she's actually serious and the Remane Five are uncomfortable around her, you're supposed to feel for her and question yourself why you laughed, as well.

I went with "other" as my choice, because the episode's biggest flaw (beyond the "YMMV" dryness of the humor) is how the episode wants you to laugh and criticize you for doing so. Throughout, the scenes, communication, and awkwardness of everything causes you to want to laugh. At the same time and later on, the writing and script of Maud Pie switches it around and ridicules you for it. Maud Pie would've been better if the scenes weren't played for laughs and instead focused on a more neutral, somewhat serious side in response to the awkwardness and miscommunication.