ph00tbag

The culture of Friendship is Magic is really all over the place. In terms of aesthetics, you have classical Greco-Roman in Cloudsdale, medieval Near-East in Canterlot, Old West in Appleloosa, medieval Central European in Ponyville, Art Deco in Manehattan, and something completely unheard of in the Crystal Empire. Technologically, there's a smattering, as well. Stuff like quills, velum paper, etc., are all pre-Industrial Revolution. Trains, cheap stainless steel, and rolled printing presses are all late 19th Century, but there's actually a lot of mid-to-late 20th century stuff, too, like the hydroelectric dam, the battery-powered flashes on the compact cameras, everything about Vinyl Scratch, and the construction equipment. The material culture of MLP is definitely more a tool for the show's whimsy, than a hard-and-fast element of the world-building. This is unfortunate, since the roughly Industrial Revolution tech level was apparently part of Lauren Faust's intent, but even then, she acknowledged that reference to modern technology was acceptable for gags. As time has gone on, the tech level's value to world building just wasn't that great, so gags took control.

I don't really get what is supposed to come out of this little rhetorical hissy fit. Are you saying that no top shelf episodes have come out of the season so far? Every episode is terrible? Or are you just pointing out the only aspect of a post you don't like that you can objectively say is technically inaccurate? Because I don't get what this has to do with the main point of the discussion.

Well, if you're dead set on believing otherwise, there's nothing I can do to convince you. I'm curious, though, what season you think has done better in their first half.

So I've been watching this show from about halfway through the first season, and here's the thing: People have been saying the show is no longer good since the second season. Why does this happen? I have my own speculations about that, but there's no real way to prove any of them. In the end, histrionics about the show's quality are always going to be around. Someone's always going to be saying this episode or that signals the final downfall of this once great children's cartoon. I can't even say that the fandom drama has been recent. Maybe it has briefly spiked, but for me, it hasn't broken the noise floor yet, so I don't know. The fact is, some of the show's absolute best episodes have been this season. The voice acting is as on point as ever, the music has been mostly superb, and the animation has literally never been better. Yes, we're in a thematically wholly different place from where we were in the first season, but even that isn't inherently bad. It's just different. Point is, rather than listen to the people who are more concerned with why they didn't like this episode or that than why they liked it, just form your own opinions, and focus on the positives. Once it becomes consistently impossible for you to like anything about a season, then maybe it will be time to sound the death knell of My Little Pony. Until then, my advice having been in the game for over five years, is just have fun with it.

Traditional mythology holds that Unicorn horns are made of a substance known as Alicorn. The crazy thing is, people actually had things they would sell off, calling them Alicorn. Obviously, since Unicorns do not actually exist in our world, these things could not have come from one. Instead, it turns out they were narwhal teeth. So, strictly speaking, Alicorn is a combination of dentine, enamel, cementum, and other toothy stuff. Anatomically, it seems odd that a structure made of enamel would form on the forehead of any animal, even a Unicorn. There's just no reason a Unicorn horn would need to be that hard (enamel is far and away the hardest substance the vertebrate body builds, and given its tendency not to use it anywhere else, and not to replace any enamel that is lost, my suspicion is that it is metabolically expensive to create. Therefore, my suspicion is that it's much more mundane. Instead, I expect that it is made of the same stuff as any other horn: a layer of keratin over bone. In the case of Unicorns, I suspect there is also some form of organ that translates nerve impulses into magical energy that is focused through the keratin of the horn. In fact, I suspect that keratin in general has unique magic-focusing properties, and that Unicorn horns have a particularly specialized keratinous structure. This explains how ponies can lift things with their hooves (which are made of keratin), how Pegasus ponies can fly on their wings (feathers are made of keratin), and how Earth ponies can hold things with their manes and tails (hair is... well, you get the picture).

Word of God, as well as the Journal of the Two Sisters, do indeed both suggest that Luna and Celestia were born as Alicorns. However, their origins are made unclear by actual main show events. Celestia says, of Flurry Heart's birth, "The birth of an Alicorn is something Equestria has never seen!" This is in direct reply to Rarity musing that Alicornhood must be earned. Luna adds, "It is beyond even our understanding." Given the context, it would take some semantic gymnastics to fit in an interpretation that they were born as Alicorns. So while a lot of secondary material has explicitly stated that they are Alicorns by birth, primary material heavily implies that they, like Cadence and Twilight, earned their status, rather than it being a birthright. As it stands, primary material trumps secondary. Thereby, Celestia and Luna were not born as Alicorns. As to their longevity, I have a feeling Alicorns have, to a certain extent, the ability to choose the time of their passing. Celestia chose to live until her sister returned, but perhaps she and her sister may move on, which would explain why she groomed two new Princesses to take their place. In that event, Flurry Heart's birth would be something of a wrinkle in her plan. But this is all veering headlong into the realm of headcanon, by this point, so it might not be pertinent at all.

I am a firm supporter of any and all consistent continuity in this show. I give a little cheer every time a previous episode's events come up in another episode. It actually used to really irk me that this didn't happen more often.

The map is literally a cell phone. Turn it back on, and get overwhelmed by all of the missed calls. "Coriander Cumin." I bet he smells great. All in all, this was a pretty good episode. Not the best, but I find no really great flaws. I like how the girls still kinda fumble their way through the friendship problems. The fact that the map only calls in ponies whose specific skills and knowledge are needed forces them to think outside the box not only about themselves, but about each other. The map has been a great mechanism for continuing to teach the Mane 6 despite all that they've learned.

All and all an enjoyable episode. As a creative personality, myself, I found Zephyr's struggle to be quite relatable. The fear of failure can be incredibly daunting, and can ultimately stifle any pursuit, but once you get past that first step, and commit to finishing, each next attempt gets that much easier. I do kind of wish that they had also referenced the adage that the most successful people have simply failed more than anyone else, that failure is okay, because it's how you learn, and how you get better. But they hit the nail on the head with the other point, so that's fine by me. Things I liked: There was a certain Schadenfreude in watching Rainbow's reactions to Zephyr and Fluttershy's parents suggesting she has feelings for him, despite her clear disinterest. The background was active and engaging without being distracting this episode. Kudos to the layout artists. Peeved as strong language to be using around foals is amusing. Geez, just as Angel warms up to the garden gnome-bunny, Zephyr takes it away. Rude. Plants can grow in Cloudsdale. So many expressions! Things I didn't like quite so much: The Parents were rather uncompelling. What did I really expect, though? Although I found much entertainment from Dash's reactions, I do wish she had dropped the hammer a little more explicitly here or there. A lot of what Zephyr was doing edge toward the line of harassment, and seeing a role model like Dash just fidget uncomfortably when a dude creeps on her doesn't really set a great example. Granted, Dash kinda sucks at expressing herself verbally, but she can do incoherent anger pretty well. Just have yell at him to leave her alone or something.

Didn't really find much to enjoy on a deep level this episode. It felt like an odd tack for AJ to really excited about the spa (and almost obsessive about the steam room in particular), and for the spa visits to be a regular thing between AJ and Rarity, and yet a regular thing that AJ doesn't really understand any of the particulars about. I feel like the story would have felt more consistent with what we've seen before if AJ had been simply eager to spend time with Rarity (partly because boats), and the spa was as good an excuse as any, so she agreed to a first time full spa day with Rarity. This also would have provided a bit more tension for Rarity because there'd be the question of whether AJ really wanted to go to the spa or if she was just stalling. Instead, Applejack's motivations just seem all over the place. Along a similar note, Rainbow Dash's preference for hooficures was confusing. I thought she didn't like ponies touching her hooves? I can see her going for a massage, sure, but I felt like the sensitive hooves thing was a quirk worth keeping. I loved St. Germain's performance, though, as I usually do. I also really enjoyed the overdone generic Eastern European accents of all the spa ponies. In particular, I laughed out loud at "Appleyak." I await the fanart eagerly.