Sonic5421

I saw the movie at the first showing today at my theater, but it was pretty empty for the first showing of debut day. Just a couple families in the theater alongside me and my brother. Despite that, I really enjoyed the movie myself. For all it's worth, the animation and the music was amazing. Also, since Wikipedia and the MLP Wiki have written up the synopsis for the movie already, I'm not sure whether I'll be okay writing up my take on what happened in the movie as it is. Either way, here's what I saw: Everything is going great for the first annual Friendship Festival being held in Canterlot. Twilight is struggling to handle the stress as she tries to get the other Princesses to help with lighting for Songbird Serenade's performance that night, but they assure her everything is fine without them. Following a song by the Mane Six involving a few other ponies, including cameos from many characters, like Cheese Sandwich, Coco Pommel, Sassy Saddles, Starlight, Trixie, the Crusaders, Bulk Biceps, and more, the song is ruined at the end as Twilight is buried in a five-layer cake by Pinkie, before having to speak to Songbird herself. However, things take a turn for the worse when a thunderclap draws everyone to the sky as the storm clouds preceding the Storm King's armada approach, and as Tempest's airship touches down, the other Princesses join Twilight as Grubber appears and introduces Tempest. When Luna makes the mistake of asking Tempest how she is going to take their magic when she is sorely outnumbered, the panic caused by the arrival of the Storm Guards gives Tempest the chance to begin encasing the Princesses in obsidian with her Obsidian Orbs, starting with Cadance, then Celestia, and finally Luna, who Twilight barely saves from shattering before Rainbow saves Twilight from meeting the same fate, leaving Derpy to end up being caught in the crossfire. Crushing Twilight's discarded tiara underfoot, Tempest sends Grubber to find her, but when a Storm Guard reflects Twilight's spell with his shield, it destroys the bridge, and causes the Mane Six to be swept away to safety. Tempest does not take it well, and after telling the Storm King she'll have everything ready for him in three days, sets out in pursuit with Grubber and her two personal Storm Guards. The Mane Six decide to hunt down Queen Novo, hoping she'll help them, leading to them arriving in Klugetown and meeting Capper, who protects them from the locals, but double-crosses them when he tries to sell them off to crime boss Verko to settle his debt, before Tempest's arrival allows them to escape once more on the airship belonging to Captain Celaeno and her crew, who nearly throw them overboard before their mandatory lunch break interrupts, allowing Rainbow to convince Celaeno to revolt and resume her old life as a pirate. However, Rainbow's celebration with performing a Sonic Rainboom alerts Tempest to their whereabouts, leading to the Mane Six escaping again, while an enraged Tempest destroys Celaeno's airship with her, her crew, and Capper still aboard. Reaching Mount Aris, the Mane Six are soon swept underwater where they nearly drown, before being saved by Princess Skystar, who takes them to see her mother, Queen Novo, who reveals her Pearl of Transformation as she turns the Mane Six into seaponies and Spike into a pufferfish. Though Twilight attempts to convince her to help them, Novo refuses, mostly out of fear of her Pearl falling into the wrong hands, especially considering how she nearly lost it before to Tempest. However, Pinkie Pie, through song, manages to convince Novo to agree to help them, only for the effort to be in vain when Novo is alerted to Twilight having tried to take the Pearl in the meantime, convincing her that the Mane Six were as untrustworthy as Tempest was, and she exiles them from her kingdom, returning them to normal as well. Pinkie Pie erupts at Twilight at how all her effort in talking Novo over was for nothing, while Twilight tries to convince her friends that she only did what she felt she had to do because it is her Tempest is after as she's the only Princess left not captured in obsidian, so Canterlot's fate hangs on her shoulders. Finally, when Pinkie pushes her too far, Twilight erupts at her in fury, thinking she'd be better off without them, only to realize what she just said too late as, angry, bitter, and upset with Twilight, the rest of the Mane Six leave her to contemplate her actions. Heartbroken at having essentially destroyed Equestria's last hope of salvation, Twilight is easy prey for Tempest to capture to finally take back to Canterlot. When the rest of the Mane Six learn of it, joined by Capper, Celaeno, and her crew, who survived the destruction of Celaeno's airship, along with Princess Skystar, the gang set course back to Canterlot to help Twilight. Meanwhile, back in Canterlot, with most ponies enslaved, while others like the Crusaders and Songbird are kept in cages, Storm King arrives to finally complete his plan as he embeds the Staff of Sacanas at the center of the pattern in the middle of the throne room floor, causing it to create a process that sees Twilight and the petrified Princesses have their eyes glow as their magic is sucked out of their horns and into the Staff, finally granting Storm King the power to control the weather, along with a few other abilities as well, such as controlling the Sun and Moon himself. The Mane Six are able to slip back into Canterlot acting as Capper's prisoners to deliver to the Storm King with a congratulatory cake containing Skystar and Celaeno, along with Celaeno's crew, but when Grubber blows their cover, they are forced to go into action, fighting their way to the castle, though Fluttershy uses her kindness to actually get one Storm Guard to break down crying as he talked with her before she had to rejoin the others. Unfortunately, when Storm King sees what is happening, he decides it is time to wipe Canterlot from the face of the planet, and summons a tornado to tear the capital apart. When Twilight saves a double-crossed Tempest from being sucked up by the tornado, Tempest begins to realize her error with siding with the Storm King in the first place. However, before Storm King can finish Twilight and Tempest off, the Mane Six, fired towards the castle from Pinkie's giant party cannon by Celaeno's crewmen, disarm Storm King of the Staff of Sacanas, leaving it embedded in the stained glass window over Celestia and Luna's thrones. As the Mane Six and Storm King vie to see who reaches the Staff first, the window finally gives way from the stress, leaving Storm King and Twilight, with Twilight clutching the Staff, to be sucked into the tornado. For a moment, as the storm dies down and the tornado dissipates, the Mane Six fear Twilight was lost forever, but the Princess of Friendship soon descends with the Staff of Sacanas in her hooves, battered, exhausted, but triumphant. As the Mane Six reunite and share a group hug, Tempest turns to leave herself, before discovering the Storm King preparing to finish the job she started by turning the Mane Six into obsidian statues themselves with a spare Obsidian Orb. Tempest sacrifices herself to ensure the orb only affects her and Storm King, leading to the Storm King's body to shatter when it hits the ground below, while Tempest is restored to flesh and blood by Twilight and the Mane Six. Afterwards, Tempest helps to repair all the damage she caused as she helps restore Celestia, Luna, and Cadance back to flesh and blood, which then results in the restoration of Canterlot to its shining glory once more. With everything restored, the Friendship Festival resumes, and Songbird takes the stage for her performance. Everyone the Mane Six met on their adventure is in attendance for the performance, and even Queen Novo and a few of her people arrive to join in on the festivities. Twilight confronts Tempest, who believes she should just take her leave since her horn will never be restored, and convinces her to use her magic for something good. Tempest takes Twilight's advice and uses her magic to create a fireworks show for Songbird's performance, before ending the movie with revealing her real name, which Pinkie agrees to with her usual excitement. All in all, I loved this movie, it was awesome, amazing, and great, and I give it a big 10/10 for my rating. Also, apologies for spoilers if anyone did not catch the movie yet. Sorry for that.

I missed the episode on Saturday due to a con, but I caught it tonight on The Brony Show, and I really enjoyed it. The Crusaders decide to help multiple fillies at once instead of one-at-a-time, including Pipsqueak, but find a difficult customer in Thunderlane's little brother Rumble. When he seems to be unexcited with all the activities at Camp Friendship, and leaves later on to go watch his big brother, the Crusaders follow, and finally get the truth out of Rumble that he doesn't want to get a cutie mark, fearing that doing so will condemn him to that single activity his cutie mark represents and prevent him from doing anything else he's interested in. Despite the Crusaders' best attempts to help him, when he gets the idea from Thunderlane that he can't be a blank flank forever, he manages to convince all the fillies at the Crusaders' camp, including Pipsqueak, to go with him to his camp. Any attempt by the Crusaders to talk the other fillies out of it fall on deaf ears, so they decide to tell Thunderlane of what happened. Learning of it, Thunderlane decides to help talk some sense into Rumble, and returns to the Crusaders' camp, where when the fillies see Thunderlane with the Crusaders, they decide to abandon Rumble to see his big brother. After some resistance, Rumble comes over to watch his big brother as well, and is surprised to find Thunderlane cooking, despite being a Wonderbolt due to his cutie mark. Following Thunderlane explaining how he loves to cook, despite being destined for his speed and being a Wonderbolt by his cutie mark, he finally manages to convince Rumble to join him and try his hand at cooking as well, finally convincing him that he can still do what he loves, even after getting a cutie mark. With Rumble finally having been able to overcome his fears about getting a cutie mark thanks to Thunderlane, the Crusaders consider their camp a success and another mission accomplished. I really liked this episode, so I'll give it a 9/10 for my rating.

Is anyone going to the Saginaw Quality 10 GDX to see the movie on opening day? Or the Fashion Square Cinemas? I don't want to be going alone to it and have people think ill of me when they see me in my Brony swag once I get there to watch the movie.

I'm probably looking into catching it in the morning on October 6th before I go to my brother's wedding rehearsal and dinner that night so I can get it out of the way and not have it distracting me on his big day.

This was a pretty good episode to see Zecora in as the second episode in a row for her this season. This episode also brought up a lot of Nightmare Fuel because of the fate of anyone who was infected with Swamp Fever and never were given the antidote in Flash Bee Honey in time. Fluttershy really stood out here as she felt that Zecora becoming infected was all her fault for asking for her help for the animal sanctuary, and refused to get any sleep until she could find the cure. This only made things worse for Fluttershy when she became infected, and combined with her fatigue, proved to cause her to pass out for three days. Three days that could have been avoided if she had just taken Twilight's advice to get some sleep first and prolonged saving Zecora from the fate of her own infection. However, Fluttershy was not going to risk putting Twilight and Meadowbrook's descendant Cattail at risk with getting infected as well, and once she discovered how Meadowbrook got the Flash Bees to let her have access to the honey, she cured herself, then Zecora. However, the final irony of the episode was when the doctor who first analyzed Zecora became infected himself. Karmic payback. With all the Nightmare Fuel this episode brought up, along with the last of the characters from the Legends of Magic comics being introduced in Meadowbrook, I'm giving this episode a 9/10 for my rating.

A nice slice of life episode for us to see Zecora with a speaking role again after so long, along with the Cake twins, Pound and Pumpkin. Pinkie overdoes it with celebrating when the twins had their first sneeze with the silly string, so they go see Zecora for help with two things: Cleaning up Sugarcube Corner, and Rarity getting her mane and tail cleaned up for a photo shoot with Photo Finish. However, when Rarity panics regarding some bad ideas Zecora brings up, the potions Zecora made for Pinkie and Rarity's problems get mixed up, and Rarity ends up with the removal potion that was supposed to help Pinkie, leading to Rarity just about rendering herself bald and tailless when she sees the aftermath. Fearing for her photo shoot, she turns to the rest of the Mane Six and Starlight for help, but nothing they try is able to help her, leading to her confining herself in Carousel Boutique to once again drown her sorrows in ice cream. However, once the Mane Six convince her that beauty does not lie on the outside, but on the inside, Rarity is able to work what's left of her mane and tail into a punk-style look, and is able to continue with her life, before finally realizing that Pinkie got the shampoo meant for her from Zecora, and arrive to find that the shampoo really spruced up Pinkie and the twins' manes and tails, but really made a mess of the store alongside the silly string. Cut to several months later, with Pinkie and Rarity's manes and tails back to normal, with Rarity's fully regrown and in its normal style again, and it turns out the Mane Six had Photo Finish covertly take pictures of Rarity for the magazine anyhow, inspiring Ponyville to take after Rarity and style their manes after her punk look as a fashion trend. This was a good episode for me. I loved how Pinkie's mane and tail looked after the shampoo worked it over, and I'll give the episode a 9.5/10 for my score.

Yeah, I'm thinking that the orb we see her buck off-camera as it zooms in on her face afterwards, full of malice, disgust, and hatred, contains some sort of portable version of the Cockatrice's stare that Storm King acquired to help Tempest incapacitate the Princesses to make it easier to acquire their magic for the Staff of Sacanas.

And the only way to reverse the effects from the grenades is with the power of the Staff of Sacanas, give or take after the Princesses have had their magic transferred into it?

Another episode that references the Legends of Magic comics, and the next entry with seeing A.K. Yearling/Daring Do again. I have to admit, Dr. Caballeron's plan was clever. He tried to break Daring's spirit with lies and misinformation to discredit her among the people of Somnambula, and when he felt the time was right, kidnap Rainbow Dash to keep hostage in the Sphinx's pyramid to perish, knowing that Daring would be too doubtful of herself to try and attempt to rescue her. Too bad he did not count on Pinkie Pie being there to help out with restoring Daring's hope and faith in herself so they were able to rescue Rainbow and expose Caballeron as the real thief who stole Somnambula's offerings to the statue of said pony, foiling him again so he was forced to take his henchponies and escape to vow revenge again, while Daring made amends with the ponies of Somnambula to ensure her reputation was restored fully among everyone she helped. Also, loved the Egyptian theme for Somnambula herself and the Sphinx. This episode gets a 9/10 from me as my score.

Sounds like Storm King will end up being a sore loser once he loses the Staff of Sacanas and all his work with taking over Canterlot is undone as the Princesses are restored and Equestria is liberated, so refusing to accept defeat and how Evil Cannot Comprehend Good, he will take one last, desperate gamble to reclaim victory from the jaws of defeat, and that will make him pay the ultimate price for it while Tempest asks for forgiveness for her betrayal in allying with the Storm King in the first place and is welcomed back to Equestria with open hooves.

Well I'll be dipped and boiled in molasses...I guess I figured it would be Twilight who restores her fellow Princesses back to flesh and blood since she's saved them so many times in the past with the likes of the Plunder Vines, Lord Tirek, and from those alternate futures caused by Starlight. I should've known Meghan would have used the same idea again for the movie with Twilight saving her fellow Princesses after the villain dealt with them early on. Though I do wonder as to if this happens after Tempest repents, or once the Storm King is dealt with, since I know Twilight would not simply restore the other Princesses until it was safe to do so after getting the Staff of Sacanas from Storm King. Alright, thanks. Perhaps I'll still hold off on getting the junior novel until after I see the movie proper to get the full details from that first before looking into the reading material next.

This was a great episode for me to watch. Not only does it continue what Thorax mentioned back in Triple Threat with the trouble he was having with renegade Changelings, but we're introduced to Thorax's big brother, Pharynx, who refuses to complete his metamorphosis due to how the Changelings behave now, but still wants to protect the hive from threats, and due to how close Starlight and Trixie are to Thorax, they head to the hive to help him, showing how much the land around the wrecked hive has changed as the effect of Chrysalis' throne was gone, giving the land a chance to return to normal. However, the Changelings are dealing with a new threat, and Thorax is hesitant to kick his brother out of the hive due to his family ties to Pharynx, even as other Changelings want Pharynx gone for his behavior to them. When Pharynx overhears Starlight and Trixie starting to agree with the Changelings, he decides to strike out on his own, but can't bring himself to leave the hive completely unprotected due to his loyalty to it. Thorax can't leave Pharynx out there to fight the new threat to the hive alone, and goes to help his brother, joined by Starlight and Trixie, and soon the rest of the Swarm arrive to help, only to find themselves sorely out of combat prowess compared to Pharynx and his old duties as head of the guard for the hive. However, thanks to Pharynx and Thorax using their old tricks from when they were younger to cause the threat to beat himself up and injure himself, it soon flees, and after the Changelings apologize to Pharynx and make amends with him, Pharynx finally undergoes his own final metamorphosis and takes on an appearance similar to Thorax, but with a darker color scheme and looking a little younger than Thorax. Pretty good episode that focuses on Thorax, his brother, Starlight, and Trixie. I'll give it a 10/10 for my rating.

Are you sure about that? Because I was considering that as one of the scenarios as well if Tempest does not petrify her when she willingly surrenders to Tempest to protect the rest of the Mane Six, if the images of Twilight being caged back in Canterlot from the junior novel is any indication of that.

Sounds like she sees the error of her ways and helps the Mane Six defeat the Storm King, but the novel doesn't mention if she restores Celestia, Luna, and Cadance to flesh and blood, or Queen Novo does it with her pearl since Celestia did tell Luna before being petrified to seek out Queen Novo, indicating she might be able to reverse Tempest's spell on the Princesses if Tempest could not do it.

Makes sense to me. Have Tempest go in and petrify the Princesses that are no longer or never were bound to the Elements of Harmony, but leave Twilight alone, knowing that the staff is tied to the Tree of Harmony, thus would never hurt her, or allow her to be harmed due to her status as the Element of Magic. Storm King might possibly need her to actually control the staff after the transfer of the Princesses' magic to it, and thus leave the other Princesses either petrified, or have Tempest return them to normal to witness Equestria's downfall like he did with past conquests like Capper's homeland.

I like how this episode was a callback to Sleepless in Ponyville with the Crusaders and their big sisters heading up to Winsome Falls on an annual camping trip, only for this trip to be ruined by some very annoying pests in the fly-ders. Despite Rainbow taking some pretty nasty bug bites, she at least saved the campfire so the big sisters could tell their stories of their legendary heroes that were actually the stories told in the Legends of Magic comics, including Rockhoof, Mistmane, and Flash Magnus. They still manage to find their way out and find a shortcut to Winsome Falls, and the Crusaders generally enjoyed hearing the stories. Also, excellent work with the Flash animation to integrate the Legends of Magic characters and their time periods into the episode. That was amazing work with Rockhoof's Viking homeland, Mistmane's Chinese origins, and Flash Magnus' Roman heritage. This episode definitely earns a 10/10 from me.

I generally enjoyed it myself since we got to see Thorax and Ember appear again and forge an alliance between dragons and Changelings.

I think for me, this was a great episode. Not only do we see the return of Princess/Dragon Lord Ember and Thorax, but Spike sure has a vivid imagination when he pictured a war between dragons and Changelings leading to Armageddon for Equestria. Plus, it is interesting that because of his worry about Thorax and Ember meeting face-to-face, he essentially forced the Cutie Map into assigning him a friendship mission to ensure he repaired his friendships with Ember and Thorax. As for Ember and Thorax, it is interesting that both leaders were having difficulty with their new roles. Despite Ember having taken her father Torch's place as Dragon Lord, many dragons were living in shame and sadness when they lost the dragon competitions due to the pride and boasting of those who won. Thorax may be leader after helping to oust Chrysalis, but there were those Changelings who remain loyal to their former Queen and refuse to accept Thorax and the rest of the Swarm's way of life and final metamorphosis. After both leaders told off Spike for his lack of helping them and went off to speak to each other in private, it allowed them to work through their problems together, come back to confront Spike over his actions and have him apologize for his behavior, and it made their friendships stronger than ever, not to mention now making the Changelings and dragons allies instead of enemies like Spike first feared, so now Ember is more than willing to aid Thorax when Chrysalis returns for her revenge on Starlight, and possibly the Mane Six and Royal Family if she still aims to attain that vengeance as well. This episode earns a 10/10 from me.

I'm not quite sure myself. Spoilers aside, the Look & Find showed Celestia and Cadance turned to stone at some point. Whether this is part of the ritual to transfer their magic to the Staff of Zirconis, or a move by Tempest to subdue them for the ritual while she went after Twilight so the ritual could be performed is anyone's guess. Either way, even if the movie doubles back to Canterlot at a couple of points to show Celestia, Luna, and Cadance petrified in between Twilight and the Mane Six traveling to Klugetown, Queen Novo's, and elsewhere before returning to Canterlot, I have no idea if the other Princesses, especially the Royal Sisters, will have much screen time at all at the start and end of the movie.

I only posted one post in this topic regarding my thoughts on the episode, I don't know how you thought I posted two of them when I only post one and wait to see if anyone likes it or quotes me on it. Could have been a glitch when I posted due to other people posting around when I put mine up at the same time though.

You seem to have quoted me twice in your reply.

This was a pretty interesting episode that brought up the common idea that fandoms in the real world deal with. That common idea being everyone's varying opinions and questions that have yet to be answered in the show lately. Also, it was nice to see the return of the Friendship Journal since the events of Season 4, and how time has really done a number on it since then with the disuse and age on it before Starlight thought to create new ones for each of the Mane Six. However, once Twilight got the idea that she should publicize it for all of Equestria to learn from, she didn't expect things to spiral out of control like they did, and the song the Mane Six performed did nothing to convince the crowd to reconsider their opinions. However, thanks to those two fillies that Twilight helped previously, who actually got the message that the Friendship Journal was putting across, it gave the Mane Six hope that friendship will always prevail, even through fads and trends that ponies deal with every day. Pretty good episode, so I'll give it a 9/10.

My brother's wedding may be on opening weekend of the movie, but I will still catch it on Sunday once my brother's big day is behind me on Saturday. Fate can be cruel, but I can handle it.