Roughshod

This episode synopsis sounds awfully familiar. Like a Pinkie Pride/Party of One familiar with a touch of Swarm of The Century and Party Pooped.

See, one of the problems I have with Rollercoaster of Friendship - and by extension many of the specials/shorts since Legend of Everfree - is the total lack of overall direction and growth or consequences to any developments. It's like they're combining the slice of life and adventure arcs of FiM but without the crucial parts of either. It's often the case that there's been more reliance on quick humor and spectacle than actual storytelling. Lots of mcguffins but not a lot of reflection. Except in Sunset's case. A big reason for her huge surge in popularity is that she's mostly well written. Almost more maturely than you'd expect in a series like this at first glance. She actually has a backstory and challenges that make us want to care about her. She's sincere and relatable and strives to better herself and support her friends. But the human Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash for example? I don't care about them. It's like the writers are just relying on our knowledge of FiM and just giving them one liners to fill in the time. They're completely one dimensional and aside from their stand in for the EoH are pretty disposable as support characters. Don't try to bring up Dance Magic or Movie Magic as counter examples either. While not terrible, they certainly didn't show us anything we didn't already know. Yes Rarity likes fashion. Yes Rainbow Dash likes Daring Do. Good thing they reminded me or I might have forgotten! The Shadowbolts had a better showing in that than the main characters in my opinion. Now Rollercoaster of Friendship makes an attempt to remedy by taking the focus largely off of Sunset and Twilight but it doesn't do anything really original with the premise of Applejack and Rarity's relationship. The same goes for Canterlot High. Sure we've seen it but we haven't really been shown it. I don't have anywhere near the attachment to the cafeteria or the hallways that I do to Sweet Apple Acres or the CMC clubhouse. Why? It's not simply because I haven't known them as long, but because there's nothing to know. There's no significance to these places except as a backdrop for dialogue and the occasional conflict resolution. They're totally interchangeable just like most of the random people you see occupying them. They don't care about that place(unless we're explicitly told they do on occasion) and neither do I. I don't buy it. I would honestly prefer to have Sunset return to Equestria permanently. With the possible effect of having the portal be finally closed/destroyed as a plot development for dramatic effect. That would be a good book end to how the series started in the first place with her running away from Equestria. But I don't think that's something we'll likely see. It was suggested throughout Friendship Games but was ultimately dropped rather anticlimacticly. Forgotten Friendship finally pulled off the reunion of Sunset with Celestia(a bit overdue in my opinion) which was nice to see but felt more like fanservice than a crucial element of her story arc. Woah, let's not get out of hoof.

No pony bleeds. No pony dies. Applejack's parents are on vacation. Vacation.

That moral was arguably done better in the episode 'Sweet and Elite'. Of course that was technically a different character and not to mention several years ago but I think it did a better job in less time without all the filler that was in this presentation. I don't see why they wouldn't utilize their own assets in such a way. Most of the fandom loves that kind of continuity and character building. I suspect a return for the Dazzlings may be possible before Gen 5 comes around which will likely mean the general end of all production for Gen 4 related content. There was a hint in this special and that's been a good indication from the animators in the past that something is coming. But I'm certainly not holding my breath. Preach. If they're going to do it now's as good a time as any. Go all the way. Finish it with their graduation and a finale showing everything they've learned.

More importantly it's something DHX and Hasbro aren't interested in, regardless of the writers. They hold more sway over big story points like these. As long as we never see Vignette ever again I'll be fine. The thing about Rarijack is that it's been hinted at plenty before now. The fundamentals of their friendship was established way back in 'Look Before You Sleep' in season one. The classic rustic country vs sophisticated urbanite (in Rarity's case semi-urbanite). To MLP's credit it goes about it more in depth than that. There's been some expansion and different takes on the relationship such as in 'Simple Ways' but the basic idea remains the same, sometimes to the point of almost flanderizing their characters. That's all fine and good I guess. Not exactly groundbreaking but serviceable. The romantic insinuations which were partially propelled by aforementioned dynamic was 'new' I guess but for me not really interesting given how it just stopped at the wink and the nod. So it's just a tease. But I'm interested in the Mane 7's friendship not intimate innuendos. Still better than the Snips/Snails/Spike love triangle theories. Naturally using technology and culture from our world is inevitable, in fact it's partially the point for the series from a storytelling perspective. When it's done well its barely noticeable but when emphasized it can come across as pretty shallow and just shameless pandering. Not a great endorsement that a pivotal aspect of the series is best presented when it's understated. At least in my opinion. There are many topics, such as the differences between the education styles of Equestria and 'Humania' which could be interesting to explore but are never touched upon. So, a bit disappointing in that regard. The hackneyed setting of a high school is what does this the most for me. It's just so uninspired that, while not a deal breaker, certainly doesn't hold a candle to the world of their pony counterparts.

Yeah, what you're saying is true. The bigwigs up top make the final call. Doesn't mean I have to be happy about it. Also doesn't absolve the writers of all their mistakes, whatever they may be. They have responsibility too, perhaps not so much in pivotal scenes meant to push toys or worldbuilding but definitely in matters of dialogue and character growth. I understand that they can be on a tight leash in many respects but bad storytelling can be called out. I'm not going to tacitly accept that the writers are completely blameless and that 'if only it weren't for the big bad bosses everything would be perfect'. Not trying to strawman you here or imply that the writing on MLP is generally bad, it isn't. Only that using others as a scapegoat isn't the answer either. And you've got to be kidding me with Roman Reigns. That guy is STILL getting pushed? Geez. It's not working Vince, sorry to break it to you. That place needs some fresh ideas and some fresher people. Also, not that it really matters but why did you tag like half the main characters of the show?

I don't fully understand how or when it happened. Perhaps some part of MLP imprinted onto me. Something implanted or suggested. It is at this point irrelevant. What matters is that whatever happened it happened for a reason. Afterward I knew the rules. I knew what I was supposed to do... But I didn't. I couldn't. I was compelled to watch. Compelled to post. And now here I stand because of you Bronies and Pegasisters. Because of you. I'm no longer an agent of the system. Because of you I've changed, I'm unhoofed. A new person, so to speak. Like you, apparently, free. But, as you well know, appearances can be deceiving. Which brings me back to the reason why we're here on these forums. We're not here because we are free. We're here because we are not free. There is no escaping friendship, no denying ponies. Because as we both know without ponies this place would not exist. It is ponies that created us. Ponies that connect us. Ponies that pull us. That guides us. That drives us. It is ponies that defines us. Ponies that binds us. l am here because of them, members. I am here to take from you what you tried to take from me. Ponies. ... Ahem. But anyway I would say I got into FiM back in early 2013 or so. Mostly watching older episodes from seasons 1 and 2. Some of the songs really impressed me as well as the animation style and surprisingly sophisticated storytelling and characterization that didn't just resort to typical kid's show tropes and humor. Voice acting was on point and still is. The more I watched the more I liked and the more I wanted to watch. The community that grew out of the love for show was abound with artists and writers and musicians many with great talent and energy. Seeing this, seeing the fervor and unapologetic admiration for something so counter to prevailing cultural standpoints fascinated me and still does. I've made friends and enemies from this phenomenon and throughout it all I have no regrets.

As easy as swiping left. Or whatever you do on 'SnapGab'. Is anyone else perplexed and/or perturbed by the over-emphasis on phones in this serious? I know it's been there since the beginning and the reasoning for it is pretty obvious given the targeted demographic but I can't say it's an asset. Up until the recent shorts it was only really a simple prop device but now it's everywhere! When I imagine the kind of adventures that could be explored in EG texting is not at the top of the list. But I digress. Juniper Montage would have been a nice cameo to see at least. Or Wallflower Blush. Or a certain trio of devious dazzlers. But Hasbro doesn't want to spoil us too much. I find it slightly disappointing that there's such a lack of continuity potential lost here. Kind of makes the befriending of these girls a little harder to believe when they're never seen again. We did get to see the Crystal Prep students a few times though and a rather ignominious caricature of Adagio. So there's that. :/

They can just write it off as 'special effects' or something. That would be my guess. I still wonder what happened to Principal Cinch and if she ever went to the school board. You'd think that by now someone in authority would be getting suspicious of all this activity considering Sci-Twi was investigating it by the end of RR. I get she's a genius but is there no one else who even cares? No one that's slightly curious? Is it it all a massive conspiracy? What does your heart tell you? It's about a canon as you're going to get with enough wiggle room for people to leave it open to interpretation. Their blushing, handholding, dreamy eyed interpretation.

I guess so. It seems the reception was slightly mixed though. The biggest issue I have with that is the sense that they have to make Vignette sympathetic in her defeat. There's nothing wrong with having an unrepentant villain in a story. Not that this villain was particularly captivating in any respect but my reaction to her dilemma has about as much emotional depth as an upvote on Reddit.

I thought the whole thing was... Fine. Just fine. Nothing particularly striking or exciting. Quite predictable in almost all of its elements, besides the less than subtle undertones with Applejack and Rarity. The paired off character interactions were a good storytelling choice for a setting like the one seen here. The dynamic of shifting attention off of Twilight and Sunset as main protagonists was a nice change of pace as well. Jokes were hit and miss. Music didn't exactly make me want to 'shake my tail' either. One thing I will say in Vignette Valencia's defense is the subtly clever anti-characterization she receives. I've seen a few complaints above that note her lack of background, development or sympathetic motives but that's the whole point. Her character's primary flaw is her desire for appearance and popularity over genuine connection. She cares about relationships only on the superficial level and only when it's exicitly to her benefit. She uses people as a means and is clearly confortable in disposing with them once they've outlived their usfulness. In the same way our view of her is only superficial and loosely connected to that of the Mane 7. She's self-obsessed, arrogant, manipulative, callous, shallow, entitled and dismissive towards others who don't help further her goals. She's a narcissist and frankly a sociopath given her flippant attitude to the possibility of having erased Rarity's friends from existence(i.e. murder). When you think about it, she's potentially as much a monster as we've seen so far in E.G. and much more realistic one at that. Her redemption didn't seem genuine because it probably wasn't, I doubt a character like her would feel much remorse. She does seem uncomfortable with the fact that despite all her followers she has no real friends but it still seems to stem from a purely selfish standpoint of lowering her own self-esteem rather than actually caring about anyone at the time. You know how she do. For all those reasons and more(#bangs) she's my second favourite villain in the series, after the Sirens.

So what exactly do you like about this point? That it's hyperbolic? Utterly contrived? Quickly resolved? Or that it ultimately goes nowhere while supporting Chancellor Neighsay's misgivings about the other races? Nothing about this made any sense in the context of MLP or was credible in the slightest. It was a stupid and cheap attempt at raising tension that no one with an IQ above room temperature would believe for a second. Season 8 of My Little Pony would not be centered around a world war. Hasbro would not go for that(as cool as it might be in theory). There have been shown alternate timelines which involved war in the season 5 finale but that's not really comparable as those were worst case scenarios that never actually came to pass in the proper canon(depending on your conception of space-time). The 'Young Six' as some have called them aren't my main point of contention. While I believe there are older characters who are more deserving of further exploration and development I don't really have anything against these new ones. They don't really stand out to me apart from their novelty. Granted they haven't exactly had much screen time to do so. Your statement about their interactions being more pertinent than the plot is just how FiM works. The characters have always taken precedence over storylines and because they're largely and consistently well written it typically works in the show's favor. But after seven seasons you can't just drop a new batch of faces and expect the same amount of investment as with other established characters. I'm not saying you in particular are doing this, just that my judgment is undetermined at this point. Well, technically it's more of a slogan or a trademark. But the intended result is the same. Once again I repeat that the entire premise of the school is asinine and insulting to the audience's intelligence. Why does there need to be a school for friendship and "generally being a good person"? The Mane Six didn't need this and they were already adults when they started learning about the magic of friendship. Even Twilight, without knowledge about true friendship, still managed to become Celestia's star student. The idea that so few others in Equestria let alone the known world have an appreciation of what friendship means is just stupid and lazy writing. It misses the point completely of the original premise of the show which was to show the importance of friendship as experienced between friends. Friendship is not some ideology or movement, it's a fundamental aspect of social relations in society. It's just absurd the lengths this show has to go in order to write around product marketing. I don't really care how Twilight or the others teach at the school because they shouldn't be doing so in the first place. Arguing these specifics misses the point entirely. Twilight taking on a student in the form of Starlight makes some sense. But her building an entire facility and then having her friends(who all have full time jobs by the way) fill in as teachers is just... Moving on. No, it's myopic and redundant to the core of my criticism. I dont think you get the metatextual point of my argument: That's not how friendship works! It doesn't matter what the curriculum is when the idea of the course is still just as stupid. Look, just because you can and should make friends in school, doesn't mean you need to build an actual school dedicated to a abstraction like that. Are we honestly expected to believe that friendship was such an alien concept in the world of My Little Pony that an entire educational system was needed to assist everyone that they could form that kind of social bond with others? It completely flies in the face of common sense. But I guess you do believe it or are willing to suspend your disbelief and lower your expectations in order to avoid the discomfort of questioning the very legitimacy of what's being presented to you. And that's fine; enjoy it to your heart's content or don't. But I'm not interested in a discussion that ignores the bigger picture and getting bogged down in irrelevant details with no substance.

Thank you. That's all I needed to see. I am an expert on asinine matters after all. Or destroy it! A bit of an extreme reaction you might say? Adds nothing to characterisation? Obvious foreshadowing is obvious? Nah. The wrap they used is the equivalent of a baby alicorn's soiled diaper, dipped in vampire bat guano and buried in the deepest depths of Tartarus. Politics. But politics done badly. I see enough of that in other media outlets I don't need it corrupting this as well. The idea of introducing such things into FiM isn't a new one and admittedly not something I'm against on principle but doing it in this way was ill-conceived to say the least. So much potential and it's squandered on nonsense like this. World War over five missing students? Sure, seems legit. After all kids are stupid so no need for clever writing! Just give them some meme-able faces to distract them from those pesky plotholes. Yes, the premise of the school and its structure contradicted the stated goal hence the thematic conflict. I saw the episode too. But the point of trying to 'educate' friendship in a formal or at least semi-formal setting as if manufacturing a product and then establishing said friendship in spite of the plot device of the school just reeks of hypocrisy on the part of the writing. So the school didn't work. But it kinda worked. So maybe we can work to make it work, if we work it a different way? It misses the point entirely just so it can use some tired cliches of culture clashes between some out of touch elders and a big meanie racist. Lame. Wonderful. And no I'm not being entirely sarcastic. The idea is pretty good as far as extending the direction of the show. A progression from spreading friendship first primarily between Twilight and the remane 5 in Ponyville(seasons 1-4), then across Equestria(seasons 5-7) and now beyond kind of makes sense. Although I have to say there's less than a handful of non-pony characters I actually cared about before now and the introduction of more is a matter of indifference to me personally, so long as they don't detract from the show too much. But the execution was bad! Not the worst by any stretch(even for premieres where there is a lower bar that's been set) but unfortunately it does epitomize a decline in a broader sense. Change can be good or bad, I'm not against it outright. When the Golden Oaks library was destroyed I was impressed by the gravity of such a development(well, until I saw its gawdy successor). When the CMC got their marks I was ecstatic. But it hasnt always been this way. Gradually the show has become more self- aware, losing its sincerity in the process and replacing it with pandering, irony and the ever increasing need to capitalize on its own success. Sometimes in big displays, but more often in little things that are ignored or shrugged off. MLP may not be 'high brow' entertainment but it's shown in the past the ability to tackle weighty subjects with maturity and genuine feeling that far surpasses what was on display here. Look none of this is the fault of a single premiere, even if I do have issues with this one, but 'School Daze' is the prime example that the more this show tries to stuff into itself and the shinier it tries to look, the more hollow it can become and the more blemishes appear. Nothing stays true for long and expansion is not always the same thing as growth.

What are they doing to this show? I mean the whole concept of a school of friendship is just asinine and contradictory to many of the themes established earlier in the show regarding how friendship is learned and expressed. The longer this show goes on and -inevitably- the more corporate mediocrity poisons the well, the more blatant and desperate the merchandising becomes. If you had told me back in 2011 that Twilight Sparkle and her friends would end up like this I never would have believed you. I'd have called you a worse cynic than myself. There is no specific moment that fully encapsulates the feeling of decline and corruption which I am indicting here(though some examples come to mind). Yet, the result that I see, that I perceive in so many aspects, both obvious and more subtle, big and small, is undeniable to me. I need another drink of cider.

Well I don't hate it. Not what I was expecting though. I thought he'd be more in line with Tirek's personality and not... this. But then again he may come across as much differently in the film so I can't be sure of what to expect. That Strife guy though. He looks like the result of mixing Arabus from G1 with one of the Umbrum from the comics.

I've only read the 'Marked Thief of Marapore' but I thought it was alright. I do find it funny how this one is basically mocking earth ponies for their lack of flight.

Die. On the inside.

It seems unlikely to me at this point that they'll go any further than implying and make an explicit statement.

You can blame the generally poor writing and rushed concept production for all that. Now that's the kind of post I like to see! Mmm, I can just taste the sarcasm.