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HereComesTom

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  1. HereComesTom
    The moment they were setting their simultaneously-ruined gifts on the coffee table, I knew something magic would happen and fix them all. That seems to happen a lot in G-5: Zipp and Izzy make a dilapidated trolley with wings that are falling off, and the magic lantern turns it into a sleek, modern-looking airship with advanced tech. The airship is crashing, and the lantern causes it to stabilize. Magic is turning into a predictable deus ex machina that the mane five aren't even controlling; I understand that magic is relatively new to the G-5 world, and IMO things like the "frostyshivers" and "warm wishiehoof" incantations from Bridlewood are well-done examples of how they haven't really figured magic out, yet. But when it's used as a deus ex machina like this, it feels like it's making things too easy for the mane five. EDIT: I just remembered that Sparky farted fire. Spike never did that!
  2. HereComesTom
    A lot of them have been holiday episodes so far. I wouldn't call them same-y beyond that, though.
  3. HereComesTom
    The jokes on this one really landed TyT is a pretty good comedy series! The way I see it, the Marestream is probably one of Hasbro's toys (though I don't remember noticing it when shopping for Toys for Tots this year), so they're probably going to give it a lot of focus during the Christmas season---and then it'll probably be a once-in-a-while thing after that. I hope.
  4. HereComesTom
    I thought this was a pretty typical episode in terms of quality: well-timed humor, character-driven plots, and a good payoff at the end. Though I have to say, the shout-outs to G-4 plots are coming in thick and heavy: Sunny infiltrating the palace is a lot like Twilight and Pinkie and Spike trying to get into the royal library, and Sunny breaking a tooth on the cookies reminded me of Applebloom falling and chipping a tooth in...I think Season 2, it was?
  5. HereComesTom
    My introduction to the Marestream was from MYM, and...well, what disappointed me was that this all but confirmed that TYT and MYM are in two different continuities; both had the magic lantern transform Izzy's unicycled tramcar into the Marestream, but the circumstances were different. It felt like they were the same continuity when things like the Crystal Brighthouse were shared between them, but now... I think it would've been better if Zipp and Izzy had gotten the tramcar to fly without the lantern's help, and then the Marestream was introduced in MYM, though---MYM did have Izzy and Zipp saying they'd been working on the tramcar before the other characters knew about it.
  6. HereComesTom
    Slipped on the ice on the road outside my condo walking home, and hurt my hand pretty bad. At least nothing is broken, but now the fingers and palm are really swollen and sometimes sore.
  7. HereComesTom
    It's not the first time, though at least, unlike Pinkie's version in the 2017 movie, this one wasn't a cannon! ...Wait...it WAS a cannon, wasn't it?
  8. HereComesTom
    I'm not sure---it felt like the scene where they got the unicorn crystal from Alphabittle showed that unicorns have a pretty robust sense of property ownership. Don't get me wrong; I'd like to learn more about unicorn culture, and how it's different from earth pony and pegasus culture---it's one of the G-5 world's most unexplored areas. Their culture could be the explanation for Izzy's lack of boundary respect, but I kind of doubt it.
  9. HereComesTom
    My first take was that this was another episode where Izzy doesn't respect other ponies' property (or even respect boundaries in general), and it felt like her character development from before this episode went down the tubes. But as I thought more about it, there haven't been any Izzy-focused episodes where she actually feels bad about not-respecting-other-ponies-property-or-boundaries, or where she makes a real effort to start respecting them...until this one. If Izzy simply doesn't happen to disrespect properties or boundaries in a given episode, well, that's not exactly character development; her feeling bad about failing to respect boundaries and trying to change is character development. And that's what this episode delivers on. There've been better episodes, but it's still a good one.
  10. HereComesTom
    It was surreal, but hilarious! The humor was well-timed, I loved how Rufus ignored the chaos and kept eating, and the opening was actually pretty good, too! I'll admit it's not realistic to expect that Pipp could be baked into a pie without anypony noticing or Pipp being hurt, but we probably shouldn't be too heavy on realism critiques about a show about talking horses that fly, use magic, and have more color variation in their fur than anything that metabolizes in real life. Though I'm surprised no one tried throwing smaller pies at the big zombie pie. I mean, they fought a war that way in Appaloosa in G-4, after all!
  11. HereComesTom
    Ehhhhh, I'm not seeing it. There's another background pony with something close to her colors, and I thought she was a pegasus, and she might be related. But Jazz? Not seeing it. I'm glad this was a slice-of-life episode instead of being another villain-drives-the-plot ep; MYM left me thirsty for some MLP slice-of-life, and left me feeling like I should've been careful what I wished for when I wished G-4 had had a season where there was a season-wide main villain whose machinations drive either the A plot or the B plot of the majority of the season's episodes: that describes literally every episode of MYM. In other words: MYM had no filler episodes and no pure slice-of-life episodes. Now, what G-4 didn't do, G-5 is doing, and in general that's good. But without slice-of-life mixed into it, it just doesn't feel like My Little Pony! That's why I wasn't wishing for every episode's plots to involve the villain then, and why I'm glad to see some slice-of-life now! All that being said, Opaline getting called on the mirror while she's got a facial mask and hair curlers on was a genuinely funny moment, and at least it reminded us that she's still in the plot. That's fine; it's still a slice-of-life episode! One thing I don't quite like is that they're relying on toilet humor again. I couldn't believe the word "poop" was actually in the start of the episode, but once that ice was broken, it didn't surprise me as much to actually see it---though the poo being pastel and rainbow-colored was a surprise!
  12. HereComesTom
    I liked it as a standalone episode. It was good: good humor, good pacing, good acting, good writing. The haunted house plotline worked and was plausible, and it was well-executed. What I kind of don't like about it is that Opaline and Misty have kind of taken over the show, at least in the sense that there haven't been any slice of life episodes since those two characters were introduced. Don't get me wrong: they do not suck as characters---just the opposite, in fact. Their dynamic of Vile Villain and Laughable Lackey really works, and it's something the G-4 series never gave us (and that I wished it had), unless you count Grubber in the 2017 movie. But...well, I'd like it if some slice of life episodes were mixed in with TYT, or even with MYM. I think every episode of TYT since Chapter 2 of Make Your Mark was released had Misty and Opaline in it, and...well, none of them have really been slice of life since. It makes me feel like something's missing in my MLP.
  13. HereComesTom
    I hope they start having some slice-of-life episodes again; it feels like every episode since MYM came out had Misty and Opaline sneaking around. What I like about this one, though, is that Opaline made assumptions about the ponies' magic, and didn't see what happened when they worked together---it hints that Opaline might not be as formidable as she thinks she is!
  14. HereComesTom
    I expect so, but the question is when she will. And it might not be for a long time. On the one hand, we're sympathetic to her, rooting for her to have a better life than the one Opaline's given her, and the most satisfying end to a story arc for her would be her switching sides. On the other hand, the moment she reforms, her Vile Villain / Laughable Lackey dynamic with Opaline disappears. There's room for a lot of comedy and exposition with her dynamic with Opaline, and if I were a writer, I'd want the freedom to use that.
  15. HereComesTom
    Maybe I got stockholmed by G-4: I actually kind of wanted to see filler in MYM after several episodes of serialization. That feeling didn't last all that long, though.
  16. HereComesTom
    It was a good episode. Coincidentally, I saw it just after I saw the eighth episode of MYM's chapter 2, and it felt like it was a funny and wackier take on the same plot. At the time I was watching it, it didn't feel like it was a bad thing that it was a repeat plot; I was entertained, and even Opaline and Misty's introduction into TYT felt like it was played mostly for laughs. And, of course, Misty's motivations weren't exactly the same as what they were in MYM. The jokes were at a good pace, the plot was paced reasonably for the 5-minute format, and it was engaging. I have to say, I don't like Misty's TYT design---at least, not when juxtaposed next to her MYM design. Either design standing alone isn't bad per se, but I feel like the TYT design is just too different from the MYM design: MYM's design pushes her hair to one side, and TYT's feels like it doesn't---just like how Izzy's mane is normal-sized but wavy and a little crazy in MYM, but huge in TYT: either design on its own isn't bad, but they don't don't mesh together well. And while Misty's mane in MYM looked like it was iridescent and intricate, TYT's design looks static, two-toned, and simple.
  17. HereComesTom
    I have to agree. It's the eyebrows that I personally found to be the most offputting, but I'm guessing different people will have different opinions on what precisely the problem was---or what the worst aspect was.
  18. HereComesTom
    In the video game, Sunny does have EP magic, and actively uses it to turn sunflowers into giant springboards that she can jump onto to reach higher places. I'm not sure how canonical the video game is, of course, but I'm pretty sure Sunny's intended to have EP magic in general in G-5. So far, I've seen the first three or so episodes. They were pretty good, and so far at least, I'm starting to see in G-5 the one thing that I wished G-4 would give me, but never did: a season where there's a main villain whose machinations drive the A-plot or the B-plot of most episodes. For that "or the B-plot" part that I'm emphasizing so much, I'd had in mind episodes that were mostly slice-of-life, but that had villains' plans running in the backdrop and getting thwarted as the B-plot, which more or less describes one of the episodes I've seen. It left me looking forward to seeing more, but I intend to pace myself on watching them; some part of me wishes Netflix had released the content one-episode-per-week instead of all at once like this, but at least this way, I can decide how much I want to consume at a time.
  19. HereComesTom
    You know, I forgot about how they turned her into a sociopath with no respect for other ponies' property or personal space...that was pretty bad, and didn't seem like Izzy-from-ANG at all. I'm glad you mentioned it! I think you're right---Hitch hasn't gotten many focus episodes besides the Translation one, and they really could do better with how they use him as a character.
  20. HereComesTom
    I watched the first episode over lunch. To keep it spoiler-free: I was surprised at how little physical danger or adventure there was in it; it felt slice-of-lifey while still setting up some future plots about the villain, and dropping a little information about the history behind her and what she wants. But what I was shocked about was how Netflix released all the episodes at once. Is that normal for Netflix? I'll be honest: I haven't really used Netflix to watch new shows; I've mostly used it to watch older shows, so I don't know whether this is how Netflix generally releases content or not. I'd been expecting Netflix to release a new episode every week, or something like that; when I saw that all eight episodes were all available, it made me wonder if someone accidentally pushed the wrong button and released too much content too fast!
  21. HereComesTom
    I think it kind of worked for Hitch. Hoof polish might look to us like nail polishing, and that might not be what we'd call "conventionally manly". But in real life, horses in horse competitions do get their hooves polished. IMO, hoof-polish-to-nail polish isn't an exact mapping; maybe a better mapping would be a little more like comparing it to trying on a new pair of shoes, or facepaint...on your feet... Besides, what we view as masculine/feminine/neutral in our culture and what they view as masculine/feminine/neutral in their culture needn't be the same. That's my take on it, anyway. If you're talking about Izzy's mane, then I totally agree---she's got a long, curly, moderately-crazy mane in the CGI G-5 content, and IMO that's not a bad design. But her mane looks huge in the 2-D TYT cartoons, and doesn't match up to the CGI content at all. Though I wouldn't call her huge mane inherently bad, but it is definitely dissonant with what we see in the 3-D toons.
  22. HereComesTom
    I'm hoping there'll be both multi-season story arcs and distinct chapters in G-5. I mean, having distinct chapters means stories come to satisfying conclusions, but multi-season story arcs mean there's more coming and questions that're still worth answering/exploring.
  23. HereComesTom
    I'm excited, but I'm not planning of staying up and watching it at midnight---I'm planning on watching it after dinner tomorrow, and then coming back here to yak about it
  24. HereComesTom
    I'd call this one a good episode---a bit better than the last one, I feel like. Seeing Pipp experimenting with magical products added a new layer to her character; she's not just a shallow pop star, but actually knows enough science/magic to experiment with new beauty products! Having their cutie mark magic add to the product was a nice twist, but it does leave me wondering how she'll be able to mass-produce it...
  25. HereComesTom
    I was just thinking about how G-4 and G-5---heck, even G-3 and G-2---had a limited mane cast of characters that all episodes focused on. But it felt like G-1 didn't have a mane cast like that, not really. I mean, there were some ponies in G-1 that recurred decently many times throughout G-1's episodes, like Wind Whistler, Fizzy, Buttons, and Gusty, but if you look at the movie or some of the more special episodes of G-1 like the pilot, those aren't really the ones that get focus. So the way I see it, G-1 didn't have a mane cast in the same way as the other incarnations of MLP did. First question: Was this shift toward focusing on a core cast of characters Hasbro's writers learning from their mistakes? I mean, G-1 spreading out its focus on numerous different ponies meant it was (kind of) marketing a larger number of toys in its episodes, at least in general, and while I haven't watched that much G-1 Transformers, I feel like G-1 Transformers was doing something similar, having different casts of autobots and/or decepticons in different episodes, again with the goal of marketing a lot of different toys. It was the latest G-5 episode, the "All That Jazz" one where Izzy helps a non-mane-five pony out with one of her problems, that made me think of all this, and it's making me think that G-5 is taking a kind of a hybrid approach: there is a mane 5 in G-5, and they have consistent characterization, but plenty of episodes give focus to non-mane-5 characters to (again) market more different toys. Second question: Do you suppose this hybrid approach will get to be more common in Hasbro's toy-based series? I mean, Hasbro's got other toy franchises that can and/or have featured large casts of characters: Transformers, Care Bears, and Strawberry Shortcake come to mind, and it wouldn't surprise me if there were other franchises with large casts of characters, as well. Do you suppose Hasbro will try this have-a-core-cast-but-have-different-episodes-focus-on-different-characters format in general, not just with My Little Pony, but with its other franchises, as well? Third question: If they do, do you think that's a good thing? Or does it simply depend on how well they implement the concept?
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