Nyactis Mewcis Catlum

It's not for me. It's not because after "Wonderbolt Academy", it was pretty clear that Rainbow learned that pushing yourself to be better by integrity is paramount over being the best of the best. Lightning Dust wanted to be the best at the detriment of other ponies. Despite Rainbow clearly still being the competitive self she is in that episode (see: her disappointment at being wingpony), she was visibly uncomfortable with the way their competing (which she initially sucked up and agreed to do with Lightning so she could be the best there, by the way!) was hurting other ponies. The final straw came when it harmed ponies that were close to her, in which she outright volunteered to quit the Wonderbolts entirely. As for AJ, she literally decried Rainbow for playing dirty in "Fall Weather Friends", and although I don't like playing the whole "element" game because yeah, it can be reductive, we have been shown repeatedly of her moral integrity that comes with her Element of Honesty, and it's a stretch to me that she would value competition over that integrity when that integrity is her greatest pride. It might have been easy for me to believe in Season 1, but after seeing episodes that have similar moral dilemmas and seeing how the characters performed in those, it's strange seeing them behave this way here. That's a bit of a literal response. I mean to say that it shares story beats with other episodes that have used those story beats better. Their competition going out of hand and blinding them from what they should be doing/the more practical solution has already been done before; others have already mentioned the episode it was done in. Stubbornness in Applejack leading to her causing the problem has been done in multiple episodes. Rainbow putting others in danger for her selfish desires has happened before, too. (Granted, one of those is in an episode I don't see favorably, but the point still stands.) And the differences the episode does have are not in its favor. Putting a child in danger and receiving no comeuppance for it (other than Twilight scolding them, that is) is definitely going to leave a sick taste in people's mouths, not to mention goes against what "Wonderbolt Academy" suggested about Rainbow's integrity and Applejack's own repeatedly demonstrated concern for fillies (such as Scootaloo in "Sleepless in Ponyville"). In addition, and perhaps the greatest slight against it as far as differences are concerned: it's just not fun to watch. "Fall Weather Friends", which also focused on Rainbow and Applejack being too competitive to their detriment, had whacky hijinks that made it fun to watch, whereas Rainbow and Applejack are consistently arguing. This point was brought up within this thread. If anything, if this episode was a perfect 1-to-1 retread of FWF, that would be a good thing. It'd certainly be better than what we got. You're right, popularity doesn't reflect how good something is, but if a complaint is reiterated about something over and over, it does give that complaint a bit more weight than if just one person said it. I concede popular opinion is not fact. That being said, a repeated criticism likely has some merit. Ganondox, I'm not ignoring you. But I really don't feel like responding to your post either. When I saw you tell me what I think instead of asking me what I think, when you don't know what I think, all civility and all attempts to get you to understand flew out the window. I'll admit this straight up: I don't have the fortitude, the strength of character to respond to someone who speaks for me like that. It is extremely frustrating and tiresome for me to read, let alone even think of responding to. And I don't want to upset myself and spend hours trying to be civil to someone who can't respect me enough not to speak for me. Someone else will have to respond to you. I'm sorry I can't come up with anything better. But for the record, no, I was not under the impression you liked the episode. I read what you said about it in the original post.

It's interesting people are saying Rainbow's attention grabbing design is a flaw, and yet doesn't match her character - her character IS attention grabbing. It fits her well. I like all their designs, I couldn't pick a least favorite. I think Lauren Faust did a great job designing them.

You're right. It would be boring if they aren't petty or they don't have moments where they get snippy or slip up sometimes. The problem is that 1) for these particular characters, it's hard to believe they would slip up in nearly the exact same way they've slipped up in multiple times and this time in a far higher stakes scenario and 2) the way they slipped up wasn't entertaining and didn't tread any new ground that other episodes haven't done already, and haven't done better. I can accept a slip up that's similar even with a character that's already grown if something interesting is done with the idea - like you said, conflict is the bread and butter of a story - but in this case, I don't think that was actually accomplished. Given the way the episode is rated, a good majority of those who watched it don't think so, either. Certainly the Idiot Ball can be necessary for some plots, but the utter distaste that the fandom generally exhibits toward it is because of its utilization habitually within MLP: FiM, not necessarily because the Idiot Ball itself is inherently bad. In this case, the Idiot Ball was handed to characters who 1) did not learn their lesson, 2) don't really fit that particular Idiot Ball (this is especially the case for AJ), and 3) don't do anything interesting while they have it. To say simply that the issue people have with this episode is merely the fact that RD and AJ are OOC, even if that is the complaint most commonly communicated, does a disservice both to the episode and to the people who dislike it. Even if you don't agree with that reason, simplifying that reasoning to make it look more ridiculous doesn't make your argument look more credible, just fyi. Response to 2 - To be honest, entertainment should be paramount over realism. The argument that it's "not realistic" is an argument that doesn't work in many contexts, and I would argue this is one of them. Also, it's not even a working argument here, anyway; it is entirely possible for someone to get over a vice once they recognized it is a vice and not just backslide, especially if it targets specific actions. For example, I used to name-call. Someone called me out for it. I immediately stopped name-calling, and haven't done so since. To give this blanket statement that it is absolutely impossible in a realistic setting to get over a vice is, in itself, an unrealistic expectation, and even potentially a dangerous one, depending on the behavior you're being dismissive toward. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and suggest that in all cases, it's unrealistic for someone to get over a problem they had or to stop doing a bad behavior when told no. It is NOT entertaining for a GOOD MAJORITY of people to see the hero struggle with the exact same problem in nearly the exact same way multiple times, and as I said before, entertainment IS paramount over realism; if realism must be sacrificed in order to make something more entertaining to watch, then it absolutely should be encouraged to be done; if sticking to realism was 100% the goal that MLP should prioritize, then we shouldn't have talking ponies to begin with. Also, saying that it removes any possibility for conflict seems creatively bankrupt to suggest. You really can't think of any way a conflict can be introduced without retreading the same ground the show has already gone through? Really? Especially when we have new characters, we have new developments, we have new relationships that have formed? If the only problem, the only problem, that RD and AJ can ever go through is to have their competition get out of hand, then that suggests these characters are incredibly flat. There's not any other problem that the two of them can have with their dynamic? Not one? There's nothing we can explore further with them? That's the issue with this retread and supporting this retread: you limit the amount of things that can be done by not challenging the writers to find something else to grapple onto with these characters. They go back to the same thing, over and over again. Perhaps you find this okay and entertaining, but given how often this complaint arises, that is not a popular opinion to have. Lastly, and I don't have a big opinion piece for this, but just because a choice was intentional, doesn't mean it was a good choice.

Even Scootaloo? Surely all the Wonderbolts know about her by now.