S07:E01+02 - Celestial Advice/All Bottled Up

[Truffles 2,033]

17 minutes ago, JH24 said:

My reaction was more about that Spike is so loyal that as soon as he saw the cups he took it up himself to clean them, while he had actually planned to read his comics.

Yes, that bothered me, too. Here he was all set for some well-deserved "Spike time" to get through three of his new comic books, but he ended up cleaning and then helping look for the lost map table.

17 minutes ago, JH24 said:

I like how Spike is more mature, acts as a voice of reason and is still his sarcastic self at times. He seems so much more confident than he was in the earlier seasons.

Indeed. He was snarky in season 1, but all the same there was an omen of things to come in how his very first scene in the series was the first instance of Spikeabuse. =(

Hopefully they don't overdo it on the snarkiness and voice of reason stuff, however. It wouldn't take much for him to go from being a fun character to becoming "Captain Obvious," as some have already noticed when he kept interrupting Celestia's story.

 

 

Now, as for another topic one of the great things about these two episodes are the fun little details they inserted into scenes. Some of these have already been noted, but these are some of the things that made me smile:

• The shading on the manes of many of the ponies at the ceremony looked really spectacular. Most notable was Lyrica, but many of the other ponies had smooth-shaded manes for a change!
• When Discord teleports away his funny glasses fly into the air and Thorax ends up wearing them.
• Discord waters the bouquet at the table near him with the tea Twilight drinks.
• The series continues the continuity of giving the changelings anatomical bug names, this time with "Cornicle," which is a part of an aphid.
• The new changelings can still mimic other species, or at least Twilight believes they can.
• The dragon that was cheered up by Garble in "Gauntlet" gets a cameo. I didn't see Crackle, however.
• We get to see the same lava pool the dragons dove into in "Dragon Quest." It makes sense in Twilight's fantasy since she was there to see that contest take place.
• Filly Moondancer makes a new appearance, along with all of Twilight's old friends!
• While Spike feeling obligated to clean the newly-transmogrified teacups was a mixed bag for me, I loved that they stuck this almost-an-Easter-egg visual here, since he could have been cleaning anything, really.
• "Magic is friendship 'n stuff." Trixie's reversal/mangling of the show's motto. XD
• We get to hear another weak "ta da" from Trixie, which is still one of my favorite moments of the S6 finale.
• Trixie (probably purposely) using Twilight's throne as her seat.
• The writers remembering Bulk Biceps working at the spa and making a joke about it being his other job.

Both of these episodes were a lot of fun. If the rest of the season can be this successful this could be the best season yet.

[Castle Bleck 19,167]

Huh, evidently, the more bats***-crazy Starlight is, the more her magic grows.

 

...

 

TFW you realize we finally, finally have a(n) (semi-)explanation for her OP moments:

 

 

Edited April 17, 2017 by A.V.

[The Nth Doctor 652]

Finally, Starlight speaks for everyone who despises Trixie, who finally gets served some humble pie and called out for being insufferable.

Shame they didn't force-feed it to her, but that's what fanfiction is for, especially since Trixie didn't learn her lesson at the end of the episode.

I think Starlight should teach Trixie about friendship, what with graduating from being Twilight student in 1/15th the time it took Twilight to graduate from being Celestia's student.

Edited April 17, 2017 by The Nth Doctor

[JH24 385]

1 hour ago, Truffles said:

Yes, that bothered me, too. Here he was all set for some well-deserved "Spike time" to get through three of his new comic books, but he ended up cleaning and then helping look for the lost map table.

Indeed. He was snarky in season 1, but all the same there was an omen of things to come in how his very first scene in the series was the first instance of Spikeabuse. =(

Hopefully they don't overdo it on the snarkiness and voice of reason stuff, however. It wouldn't take much for him to go from being a fun character to becoming "Captain Obvious," as some have already noticed when he kept interrupting Celestia's story.

True, I did feel Spike interrupted a bit too much near the end of the episode. But I can overlook that because they got the other scenes with him right. Personally I feel they've found a balance with his character during the last season. I also like how he's, besides being a close friend, a kind of a mentor/advisor to Starlight as well at times. 

Nice list of details of the episodes by the way. I had missed several of them.

[GrimGrimoire 4,970]

23 minutes ago, The Nth Doctor said:

I think Starlight should teach Trixie about friendship, what with graduating from being Twilight student in 1/15th the time it took Twilight to graduate from being Celestia's student.

 

If she didn't, you would have to wait until the end of season 8 when she becomes an alicorn.

[Thrond 3,257]

9 hours ago, Jeric said:

I agree that what she did was unhealthy, but not at the point that one can say that it is unthinkable someone would do what she did. Ultimately she is guilty of repressing her anger and not communicating. Far removed from purposely fiddling with ponies free will. 

Celestial Advice also did something interesting. It compared Starlight's graduation and possible departure with Twilight's assignment to Ponyville. Im fact, it went out of its way to reinforce this point. Prior to Celestial Advice, I hadn't considered the flexibility of Twilight's own path and how there weren't neat dividing lines. 

A case can be made that Starlight may actually be undergoing an exponential growth that exceeds Twilight's own growth. After all, Twilight did have Lesson Zero after Celestia decided Twilight reached a point that she needed to go elsewhere, and I consider that on par with what Starlight did last season to her friends. 

Now we're are at a point were she learned to communicate her disatisfaction. Normally we are presented with the character unaware of their own flaw in the episode until they learn a lesson. That isn't the case here. Starlight made it clear that she had created outlets for her anger.  We learned that she is possessed of a rare gift ... awareness of her own flaws. She is guilty of trying a wrong technique to address it. 

What I'm saying is, there is nothing in that episode that suggested she isn't learning or even ready to go mostly solo. What I did see is initiative that I rarely see among mature adults in the real world. 

If Rarity wasn't already my locked in favorite, Starlight would have taken the crown with this episode. 

 

4

I think what continues to irritate me about Starlight is that her distribution of episodes hasn't really let us get to know and like her in any other capacity than "she lacks forethought," "she mind controlled Twilight's friends that one time," and "but she's getting better." I agree that this was a step up; she's actually thinking about how her responses affect others, and her mistake this time around, while dangerous and irresponsible, doesn't show a lack of consideration for others like "Every Little Thing She Does" did. But we almost never see Starlight in any other context, her understanding of how to deal with emotions in a healthy manner still seems severely underdeveloped, and I guess I just feel like her character arc is going by too fast. I'm really not on board for "an exponential growth that exceeds Twilight's own" - her arc already feels like it's missing steps, and if she continues on that path, I feel like she'll never settle down long enough for me to actually find her growth satisfying.

But I think what really gets me about this particular episode is that the second Twilight leaves, Starlight proceeds to screw something up. It's the context which gets me, and there's even a montage which contrasts the strong friendship of the mane six to the dysfunctional one between Starlight and Trixie, and I have no idea what I'm supposed to take from that aside from that Starlight still has a really long way to go. "Lesson Zero" was an anomaly for Twilight; "All Bottled Up" is just another Tuesday for Starlight. And really, I'm not entirely against that idea as long as the show doesn't then try to play her as having "graduated," as long as she doesn't get unhealthy praise for hiding her issues, and as long as we see her do anything else. Either an episode where she's left alone without screwing everything up or even a single lighthearted comedy episode involving her would help a lot for me. Even in the S6 finale, she spends most of the running time avoiding taking any initiative because she's afraid of herself, and now I only feel like she's proven herself right. 

Edited April 17, 2017 by AlexanderThrond

[The Nth Doctor 652]

2 hours ago, GrimGrimoire said:

If she didn't, you would have to wait until the end of season 8 when she becomes an alicorn.

I'm still waiting for them to show Starlight's community service/jail time flashback

[Olsen1987 133]

2 awesome and adorable episodes (haters can have themselves a wheat bun).
after watching episode 2, this came to mind.
 

[Fluttershyfan94 5,738]

That was a good opener for the new season, I enjoyed both though all bottled up was really great. 

[ImpctR 155]

All Bottled Up

Don't know how this episode ended up liked less than the first episode. This episode was so much more fun than the previous one!

Firstly, I started liking Trixie more in 'To Where And Back Again' . Seeing her in this episode made me like her more and look she started using real magic! I don't know if that is right though, it was okay when she was just the illusionist. I thought not every unicorn pony had the potential to use spells, which is why Trixie was just imitating magic. But not anymore. I still wasn't sure, wasn't it Trixie who used the Invisibility spell in in 'To Where And Back Again' to hide from the changelings occupying Twi's castle? So like in some RPGs I thought she has the 'priest' spells or tricks, while Starlight has the more powerful wizard spells. But now it looks like she is also about to go the wizard way. I am not sure if good, it was better to have the different type of tricks no other had. Exciting to see her using spells. nonetheless. Also she seems very adept to already do a teleportation spell.

 

Trixie acted like a jerk but im okay with that, some would call her out of character? She totally isn't imo, she does feel careless in other episodes too. Starlight did get angry like never before since her reformation but it was natural seeing all the things Trixie did wrong. That cloud of anger, though, weird. Found it funny when they were comparing Trixie saying 'if they could see me now' and Twilight saying the same, each of them not realizing what was going on.

 

I find Starlight cute looking with this mane style, except for the cases she had bags under the eyes:

 

Spoiler

 

Also red glowing eyes Granny Smith and Biceps, that looked scary for a little ones show. Overall nice episode showing more of SG and Trixie. I am still confused if Trixie should go the magical path, still, interesting.

Edited April 17, 2017 by ImpctR

[Music Chart Fan 818]

Overall, I don't much like "Celestial Advice". I can tell where the episode is supposed to have emotional appeal - seeing Celestia give advice to Twilight, seeing more of Celestia's relationship to Twilight, seeing how much Twilight cares about Starlight, etc. - but it doesn't really end up resonating with me. Perhaps my biggest issue with this episode is that most of it revolves around Twilight being pressured by Discord into announcing that Starlight is graduating and Twilight panicking about coming up with a plan for where to send Starlight after graduation. And yet I don't think it's ever satisfactorily explained why Starlight is ready to "graduate" and supposedly has nothing more to learn from Twilight, and why Twilight has to come up with a plan for where to send Starlight when Twilight already had plans for more friendship lessons for Starlight to do. This episode reminds me in a bad way of "What About Discord?", in that Discord again provokes Twilight into doing things that make her look bad in order to amuse himself at her misfortune. In this episode, though, I'm not even sure if Discord is trying to teach Twilight a lesson, or what lesson that would be.

As mentioned above, perhaps my biggest issue with this episode starts when Twilight first talks to Discord. Discord asks what Twilight is going to do with Starlight, and Twilight replies that she's "planned enough friendship lessons to cover the next three years". But then Discord laughs and says that "clearly Starlight is beyond basic friendship lessons", that Starlight has won a medal, and that Twilight must be joking. After that, Twilight seemingly does a 180 and decides that Starlight should graduate and be sent away. If Twilight believed that Starlight had at least three years' worth of friendship lessons to do, then why is Discord able to pressure Twilight so easily into believing the opposite?

In fact, right after Twilight tells Discord that she's "planned enough friendship lessons to cover the next three years", the episode seems to flip a switch and commit to the ideas that (1) Starlight obviously doesn't need friendship lessons anymore and is ready to graduate, and (2) Twilight has no plan for Starlight, such that Twilight has to panic and come up with one or else she'll be embarrassed and revealed to be a terrible mentor, or something. But aren't these two ideas contradicted by the fact that Twilight just said that she had three years' worth of friendship lessons planned for Starlight? Throughout the rest of the episode from that point on, I kept thinking "What happened to the three years' worth of friendship lessons?". I'm utterly baffled by how those friendship lesson plans were dropped so quickly and completely.

It's not like Discord makes any particularly compelling argument to Twilight to give them up. Again, all Discord says is that Starlight is "clearly" beyond basic friendship lessons, that Starlight has won a medal, and asks if Twilight is joking in a manner that suggests that Twilight is obviously wrong.  Why should we or Twilight believe Discord's assertion if Twilight seemingly had good reason to believe otherwise? Does Twilight think that Discord's asserting (without further explanation) that Starlight is beyond basic friendship lessons and asking if she's joking is representative of what most of the others think? In other words, does almost everyone else actually strongly believe that Starlight is ready to graduate and do her own thing, and therefore, it would be embarrassing and the wrong decision for Twilight to have Starlight continue friendship lessons? But then, what reason do we or Twilight have to believe that? Discord is known to try to mislead and trick the characters for his own amusement, so why should we or Twilight just believe him without question when he asserts that Starlight is "clearly" beyond basic friendship lessons?

And yet, after that exchange with Discord, Twilight really seems to commit to the conclusion that Starlight is beyond friendship lessons and both deserves and needs to graduate. We see Twilight sitting and looking through a pile of parchment saying "She's already good at that! She mastered this!". Later, Celestia says to Twilight "So you have an overachieving student. Sounds familiar". And at Twilight's "big announcement" near the end of the episode, Twilight says that Starlight has proven herself to be "a kind, loyal, strong, honest, and truly magical friend" and that Twilight knows that there's nothing more that she needs to teach Starlight. But during these scenes I'm just thinking "Starlight is already good at what? She mastered what? She's an overachieving student in what? How do we know that Starlight is a great friend and that there's nothing more she needs to learn from Twilight?". Are these statements supposed to be referring to friendship lessons that Starlight has already completed? If so, then are they from lessons that we've seen in prior episodes? Which ones? I really don't know what's being referred to here.

Twilight also makes an argument to Celestia that Twilight had planned those friendship lessons before Starlight "stepped up" in "To Where And Back Again", but then Starlight's actions during that episode somehow prove that friendship lessons aren't enough for her anymore. But, for one thing, after Discord asked Twilight what she was going to do with Starlight, Twilight seemed pretty confident in her initial answer that she has three years of friendship lesson plans for Starlight. Twilight apparently didn't see any need to rethink those friendship lessons at that point, even after the events of "To Where And Back Again" and after Starlight has been awarded the Equestrian Pink Heart of Courage. So, again, why does Twilight's brief conversation with Discord make her suddenly and totally change her mind?

Furthermore, I don't see how Starlight's actions in To Where And Back Again prove that Starlight has mastered friendship so much that friendship lessons aren't enough for her anymore. Sure, Starlight demonstrated a certain amount of bravery and initiative by gathering Trixie, Thorax, and Discord and venturing off to confront and defeat Chrysalis. But what did that do to demonstrate Starlight's mastery of friendship? Starlight worked with Trixie, Thorax, and Discord to save the day, but that was kind of forced on her by necessity in dire circumstances. Can that really be translated to having mastered friendship in her day-to-day life?

Also, what about what we've seen Starlight do, and not do, in her other episode appearances? We've seen Starlight repeatedly commit grave moral failures, while having to be told that she was wrong and never actually articulating an understanding of why she was wrong. And at the same time, we saw Starlight deliberately avoiding friendship lessons as much as possible, and we've only ever seen Starlight do a handful of friendship lessons, with a good chunk of those being the very basic initial friendship lessons she was putting off in "Every Little Thing She Does". Are we supposed to assume or speculate that Starlight has actually completed lots of friendship lessons offscreen? But, if so, then why isn't that ever even mentioned? Where are the results of that having occurred? I just don't think Starlight's past or current actions that we've seen illustrate any particular mastery of friendship.

The other issue, of course, is that several times it's implied or outright stated that Twilight doesn't have a plan for Starlight. For example, Discord says to Twilight "Obviously, you should have a grand master plan for her, the same way Celestia set you on the path that eventually made you a princess", to which Twilight replies with a nervous "Yep" as though she actually doesn't have one. Or in the scene where Twilight is going through the pile of parchment, she says "Why didn't I come up with a path for Starlight? Princess Celestia had it all figured out for me!". But again, what happened to the three years' worth of friendship lessons? Is that not a plan for Starlight that Twilight had figured out? Besides, didn't Twilight supposedly learn at the end of "The Crystalling" that Celestia taught Twilight by giving her space to make her own decisions? Doesn't that kind of contradict the idea that Celestia had it "all figured out" for Twilight, and therefore Twilight better have it "all figured out" for Starlight? I would think it also contradicts the idea that Twilight must send Starlight away, just because Celestia did that with Twilight. And yet Celestia just goes along with it, rather than, say, pointing out that she didn't have everything planned out and that Twilight doesn't have to do everything the way Celestia did it.

In summary, it seems as though the episode wants us just to take everyone's word for it that Starlight doesn't need friendship lessons anymore and is ready to graduate, but I just can't believe that, given what we've seen about Starlight's development to this point. And the episode wants us to believe that Twilight has no plan for Starlight and needs to come up with one, but Twilight previously appeared pretty confident in her friendship lessons plan for Starlight, and it's never satisfactorily explained why that whole plan is discarded so suddenly.

And the ambiguity about what exactly Starlight has accomplished to have "earned" graduation then leads to further ambiguity about what it even means for Starlight to have graduated. Is Twilight no longer going to give Starlight friendship lessons or try to teach her? Is Starlight supposed to take on friendship responsibilities of her own now? As we see even in the very next episode, Starlight still seems to have a lot to learn. And, as I'll repeat again, Twilight earlier in the episode had plans for years' worth of friendship lessons for Starlight. It looks as though the status quo is basically restored at the end of the episode, but it's unclear what, if anything, is supposed to be different now.

Finally, there's a message throughout the episode that Twilight really cares about Starlight, like Celestia really cares about Twilight. Twilight is horrified at having to send Starlight away, is so proud of Starlight's accomplishments that she smiles until her cheeks are sore, gets Starlight the mirror surrounded by her friends, is relieved and couldn't be happier that Starlight isn't ready to leave, etc. I can tell that all of this is supposed to be emotionally impactful, but it just doesn't resonate with me as much as intended. I don't think we've really seen Twilight and Starlight develop that close and personal of a friendship, and so I as a viewer haven't developed much of a connection to that relationship.

Now for the rest of my miscellaneous observations:

Why did Twilight and Spike need to measure the space for the mirror in Starlight's room while Starlight was there? Why couldn't they have asked Starlight to do something somewhere else for a little while, or just waited until she was out of the room?

It's kind of funny that I don't think we've ever seen Equestrian Pink Hearts of Courage being awarded before. The Mane Six ought to have lots of those by now.

When the medal won't fit over Thorax's horns, couldn't it just be teleported around his neck? Although then the question might be how he would get it off. As I saw pointed out, the real solution would be to have some kind of snap or clasp on the ribbon.

Spike really gets on Twilight's case about reading at a party (...again) as soon as she leaves the room. Maybe Spike knows he has to put a stop to that quickly before Twilight takes it too far.

I'm not really sure why Starlight would be particularly qualified to help the changelings adjust to their new way of life, other than the idea that, well, Starlight has to be sent somewhere.

Celestia isn't aware that she's an expression? Did the phrases using "Celestia" in place of "God" only start being used recently? If they're in common use, wouldn't Celestia hear about it some time in the hundreds of years she's ruled?

At least Starlight's continuing her magical studies with Sunburst would play to her demonstrated strength, and is something I could better imagine Starlight actually doing. It wouldn't really have anything to do with what Starlight has supposedly learned about friendship, though.

Why is it that Twilight imagines that Starlight and Sunburst are conducting an experiment with potions/chemicals/etc. right in the middle of the library? Wouldn't that obviously be against the rules, and something that Twilight would be horrified at the prospect of them actually doing?

Celestia's outburst of laughing comes out of nowhere and is just weird; I half thought that Celestia was actually Chrysalis the whole time or something like that. I don't see how it "humanizes" Celestia.

Celestia's story about how she came up with worst-case scenarios when thinking of where to send Twilight also strikes me as weird, as though the episode is trying to retcon Celestia into being more similar to Twilight in order to create emotional impact. After Celestia has lived and ruled Equestria for hundreds of years, I might think that she would learn not to sweat the small stuff like that.

When Celestia tears up and says she must send Twilight away while looking up at the moon with Luna still banished there, I'm not sure what the intended message is. "Sending" (i.e., forcefully banishing) Luna to the moon for a thousand years doesn't seem comparable to the decision to send Twilight somewhere to get her to try to make some friends. Is Celestia thinking that she needs to send Twilight to learn about friendship in order to get Luna back, like she does in this comic?

When Twilight says that she will always need Celestia, I know that's supposed to be a heartwarming sentiment, but I can't help thinking whether it's really a good thing for Twilight to "need" Celestia, considering that Twilight is living independently and needs to take care of her own responsibilities, and Celestia has plenty of responsibilities too. Also, does Twilight actually "need" Celestia, considering that we haven't really seen them talk to each other much over the past few seasons?

During the scene with Twilight's "big announcement" about Starlight, I couldn't help noticing that Thorax uses the half-lidded "bedroom eyes" quite a bit.

When Starlight asks if Twilight is sure about graduating Starlight, Twilight says "Believe me, I've thought long and hard about this". Yeah, so much so that Twilight completely changed her mind about it just a short time ago because Discord pressured her.

[Music Chart Fan 818]

Overall, I found "All Bottled Up" mostly to be exasperating and annoying. This episode also reminds me in a bad way of "What About Discord?", though for a bit of a different reason. "What About Discord?" was deliberately designed so that the audience would be frustrated and regretful along with Twilight as both of us endure inside jokes that we don't understand and are reminded repeatedly of what a good time Twilight missed, while the other characters are oblivious to how they're making Twilight (and us) feel. Similarly, this episode seems deliberately designed so that the audience would feel annoyed and angry along with Starlight as both of us endure Trixie's insufferable self-absorption, lack of tact, and total obliviousness to how she's making Starlight (and us) feel. In both cases, it quickly becomes obvious what the problem is and what the solution should be, but the problem is dragged out over the whole rest of the episode as we're left just waiting for the final realization. And in both cases, I don't like the episodes for a large part because I want to watch this show to feel good and to find food for thought, not just to feel unproductively frustrated and annoyed. I can't help wondering whether it's even worthwhile for Starlight to hang out with Trixie if Trixie is normally this self-absorbed and oblivious. If this is the way Trixie normally acts, then it's no wonder no one else has wanted to be her friend.

The other big point about this episode to discuss is Starlight's actions and attitude. First, I can acknowledge that, in some respects, Starlight has slightly improved in this episode. Starlight does take some precaution (though not enough, it seems) and tries to impart at least a little responsibility when teaching Trixie to do magic. Starlight does say something to Trixie at the end of the episode about not always trying to use magic to solve her problems. And this time, Starlight's backfired magic might not have been quite as bad as it was in previous episodes. But I can't ignore that Starlight once again performs magic without considering the consequences and creates another "incident" that has to be fixed (although Starlight does at least fix it herself). Did Starlight ever consider what she was doing to do with her bottled up anger energy, or consider what might happen if it escaped and how she would mitigate the damage if it did? Because of Starlight's escaped anger energy, Bulk Biceps throws his whole nut cart on top of Trixie, and it's only because of cartoon physics that she isn't likely seriously harmed. And this time, Starlight hides the whole incident from Twilight and even seems to be getting away with it, with Twilight praising Starlight for "taking initiative" in learning a friendship lesson caused by her own reckless use of magic. In the previous episode, Starlight apparently "graduated", and the previous episode told us several times that Starlight doesn't need friendship lessons and that she has nothing to learn that Twilight could teach her. But then this episode seems to put the lie to all of that, leading me to wonder again why the previous episode drove those points so hard and what it even means for Starlight to have "graduated". This episode continues the trend of Starlight's characterization being exasperating and unclear.

I think that's all the big-picture points that I wanted to make, so here's all the rest of the various observations I made:

Rainbow brags about the Mane Six being "poster ponies for amazing friendships", but it's not like that in itself is going to get them the record time for solving the room. Sure, working as a team of friends helps, but their individual intellect, ingenuity, etc. are still needed to be able to solve the actual problems quickly.

If the first step of a teleportation spell is to concentrate on the object you want to teleport, then wouldn't Trixie have been concentrating on the apple and not the table? If Trixie wasn't concentrating on the table, then should her teleportation spell have actually worked?

We see Spike washing all the teacups that Trixie made with her spells, but isn't Spike curious where they all came from and why they all need to be washed? It seems like something that he might ask Starlight about first.

I do have to wonder why Starlight's anger manifesting as a physical cloud of magical energy is only seen happening to Starlight, and has never been seen to happen before this episode. Haven't we seen Starlight get pretty angry before, even as she doesn't cast magic to "channel away" the pent-up magical energy, without this occurring?

When Starlight is talking to Spike in the kitchen, Starlight only mentions in passing that "I've got to get that map back", and Spike volunteers to look for the map in the castle without even asking what happened to it. Did Spike overhear what happened while he was working in the kitchen? How far away is the kitchen from the map room, anyway?

I'm not sure why, when Starlight asks the jeweler if she's seen the table, Starlight describes it as having a magical map on it with cutie marks shooting out. Unless Starlight expects the map to have called the Mane Six sometime after Trixie teleported it, the table wouldn't have the map on it or cutie marks shooting out of it anyway.

Why is it that there are so many disjointed possibilities of what place Trixie was thinking of when she teleported the table? Is Trixie schizophrenic or something?

The jeweler possessed by Starlight's anger says "You just had to give Twilight those smelly pretzels!", but when in the episode were the pretzels said or implied to be "smelly" prior to that statement?

I don't find it amusing that the Mane Six inexplicably feel the need to sing a friendship song and thus barely lose out on beating the previous record. I knew as soon as they didn't turn the key that they needed to turn it to finish the room, and that therefore they would be wasting time while they didn't turn it. I'm not laughing at this situation, I just feel bad and regretful on their behalf, and (again) I don't want to feel bad while watching the show just for the sake of an unfunny joke. I would think that they could have cut extraneous chatter and moved faster while solving the room, which would have saved much more than the two seconds they lost by, even if they still sang the song.

During the song, while the Mane Six are trotting "around the world" as the seasons change, I can't help thinking that their planet would be pretty small if its curvature is on that scale compared to them.

Of course, after Starlight admits that she's really mad at Trixie, Trixie says that she had no idea Starlight felt that way, and I think Starlight lets her off way too easy when she says "But to be fair, I don't know how you could have known". It seems like if Trixie had a bare minimum of tact and attentiveness, she could have figured out how unhelpful, self-centered, and downright annoying she was acting.

So we spend the whole episode with Trixie demonstrating how self-absorbed she is, with all the potential places the table could be being related to Trixie's thinking about things she wants to get for herself, but then we're supposed to believe that the last place she was thinking of was where she met Starlight, because Trixie was just so glad to be friends with Starlight?

After Twilight says that she's "so proud" of Starlight, it's kind of weird that Twilight retains her wobbly smile for several seconds afterward, even after blinking.

I've mentioned before that it's strange to me how often we see the characters in the show go to the spa, considering that I would think that spa trips are rather expensive and not usually done that frequently. But here, again, all the characters decide on a whim to go on a spa visit, with nothing said about whether they had made an appointment or the cost of doing so (although I think Rainbow says something about a coupon).

[StormBlaze 991]

Episode 1...... Denz and I were both rather let down by this episode. For starters it should not have been a premiere episode, made worse by being only 1 parter. It would have been better received if it was placed early in the series but not starting. Yes ok so Starlight is now at Twilight's near princess level, but this episode just did nothing. Twilight's paranoia didnt feel very entertaining, apart from maybe the study of arcane arts part, but it was tiny. The episode had no pacing, nothing really funny and no excitment to it at all. I only really liked Celestia's laugh towards the end, because, hey we've not seen Celestia in ages! 

The changelings though......UGH hate them so. Thorax's voice should have been matured a slight touch, its just stupid to have him be this majestic prince creature with a wussy squeaky teen voice. 

My problem mainly with this being a premiere episode is that all of them have had some form of conflict or world affecting problem (Flurry Heart) and the mane 6 were involved in some way. The finales are the same formula. After feeling like Season 6 was lacking in excitment too and just dragged, Im quite disheartened with what s7 has started off with. I think Denz has decided to call it quits because of that. I will still watch them, but unless they bring back the literal magic of the older seasons, I just dont think I can enjoy this one. 

We've been watching S1 and S2 episodes just on and off whilst we were waiting for s7 to start and it reminded us how much and why we loved MLP in the first place. The older ones were so well written, had some great refs and jokes, felt very colourful and actually lift the spirits to watch. We were both smiling through these episodes even though we knew what was coming. The finales and premieres too, they're so well done. The Tirek fight is still the one that tops them all for me. I just love watching that scene. 

Maybe that is what these new writers need to do. We need another well written villian. There needs to be another threat looming over the whole season or an event like S1 Gala that the episodes work up to a grand finale.......not like the Equestria Games, where that was hyped the whole way and then just stuck into an awful Spike episode. They did this right in S5 with Starlight just popping up through the series until she made her big move, but now she's reformed.... theres no threat and no conflict and well no reason to have Friendship or the Elements of Harmony. Theyre obsolete because there is nothing to fight!    

[Zachary 5,517]

Just Watched these Episodes and They were Awesome!

I'll give them both 9/10

[zerox 1,050]

I watched celestial advice and frankly speaking I expected more. 3,5/5 from me.

 

I have yet to watch all bottled up.

Edited April 18, 2017 by zerox

[Kaneki 1,072]

Just started to watch episode 2 (All Bottled Up). I like it so far, especially the beginning part. That was pretty funny!

"Turn into a teacup!"

[Sonic5421 423]

On 4/15/2017 at 11:42 AM, Batbrony said:

Celestia's already gotten better treatment than she got in all of S6... seriously. 

That I'm willing to fully agree with. Celestia had this a long time coming, especially after her treatment in To Where and Back Again with the rest of the Royal Family and Mane Six.

[Truffles 2,033]

20 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

After that, Twilight seemingly does a 180 and decides that Starlight should graduate and be sent away. If Twilight believed that Starlight had at least three years' worth of friendship lessons to do, then why is Discord able to pressure Twilight so easily into believing the opposite?

It seems to me like Twilight realized she didn't see the forest through the trees, so to speak. That she had gotten so caught up in the idea of having all these lessons that she didn't realize they didn't actually take Starlight anywhere that she had already gotten to by doing her rescue mission in the finale and her lessons were leading Starlight nowhere. Granted, if that's what they meant I agree they should have indicated it in the story, but I will say from recent personal experience it's easy to get so caught up in creating something that when someone comes along and points out a gaping hole in your idea that for me at least I had to stop what I was doing and take a step back and completely reevaluate what I was working on. =(

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

Besides, didn't Twilight supposedly learn at the end of "The Crystalling" that Celestia taught Twilight by giving her space to make her own decisions? Doesn't that kind of contradict the idea that Celestia had it "all figured out"

Perhaps Twilight is simply assuming Celestia having planned it all out and she's just plain wrong and Spike was right? It seems to me that Twilight simply forgot his advice to her and went ahead and kept on with the lists and rigid schedule of friendship lessons all through season 6, just like the list she handed to him to get her back with Sunburst, which wasn't really much of a help in the end.

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

Why did Twilight and Spike need to measure the space for the mirror in Starlight's room while Starlight was there? Why couldn't they have asked Starlight to do something somewhere else for a little while, or just waited until she was out of the room?

Heh, yeah. She's operating too much like the government entity she represents and ends up doing it the hard way. Admittedly, it did give the episode time for our favorite Exposition Dragon to do his usual stuff and fill in the audience who happens to be seeing the show for the first time. XD

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

It's kind of funny that I don't think we've ever seen Equestrian Pink Hearts of Courage being awarded before. The Mane Six ought to have lots of those by now.

The Mane 6 and Spike got their awards via stained glass. =)  I'm thinking these medals could be a Twilight invention since this seems to be her ceremony for them and she doesn't have any such windows that we know of. Or maybe Celestia's all out of windows to use in her castle? =)

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

Spike really gets on Twilight's case about reading at a party (...again) as soon as she leaves the room.

It was the "again" part that got a laugh out of me. It does indeed indicate she's known for doing this, probably to the dismay of Pinkie and her guests.

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

Celestia isn't aware that she's an expression? Did the phrases using "Celestia" in place of "God" only start being used recently? If they're in common use, wouldn't Celestia hear about it some time in the hundreds of years she's ruled?

I guess it's possible she spends so much time in her castle that the visitors she gets when she holds royal court wouldn't dare use her name in such a manner. But it is strange she'd never heard of it or read a story where such a phrase is used in the dialogue. Maybe things are different for a citizenry that lives with the closest thing to a deity?

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

Why is it that Twilight imagines that Starlight and Sunburst are conducting an experiment with potions/chemicals/etc. right in the middle of the library? Wouldn't that obviously be against the rules

I think it was taking place in the privacy of Sunburst's home, and presumably the two of them can do anything they want together there whether it be magic-related or not. 

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

When Celestia tears up and says she must send Twilight away while looking up at the moon with Luna still banished there, I'm not sure what the intended message is. "Sending" (i.e., forcefully banishing) Luna to the moon for a thousand years doesn't seem comparable to the decision to send Twilight somewhere to get her to try to make some friends.

This scene is vague, and maybe intentionally so. I couldn't decide by her looking at her sister in the moon whether she was feeling bad about having to send another pony away (even if it was under far different circumstances) or whether she knew more about the prophecy than she let on in ep 1 and she had to do it to get her sister back someday.

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

When Starlight asks if Twilight is sure about graduating Starlight, Twilight says "Believe me, I've thought long and hard about this". Yeah, so much so that Twilight completely changed her mind about it just a short time ago because Discord pressured her.

XD Yeah, touché. I can't argue with this. I guess maybe she meant she thought hard about it over the last hour or so but even with a holodeck spell helping her it doesn't seem like a lot of effort, does it?

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

We see Spike washing all the teacups that Trixie made with her spells, but isn't Spike curious where they all came from and why they all need to be washed? It seems like something that he might ask Starlight about first.

He probably stopped questioning everything after living with Twilight for a few years. XD

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

I do have to wonder why Starlight's anger manifesting as a physical cloud of magical energy is only seen happening to Starlight, and has never been seen to happen before this episode. Haven't we seen Starlight get pretty angry before, even as she doesn't cast magic to "channel away" the pent-up magical energy, without this occurring?

I think the clue in in where she states she hasn't been doing all of the evil stuff that she's done in the past. Not that she needs to do evil, but it seems the spells she's used to casting must drain enough of the magic from her so that it doesn't become a problem. Probably since her goof-up with the mind control she's been trying to cut back on the magic use and like she says now her anger is triggering this uncontrolled magic cloud.

21 hours ago, Music Chart Fan said:

When Starlight is talking to Spike in the kitchen, Starlight only mentions in passing that "I've got to get that map back", and Spike volunteers to look for the map in the castle without even asking what happened to it. Did Spike overhear what happened while he was working in the kitchen? How far away is the kitchen from the map room, anyway?

It does seem like there's a continuity issue here, doesn't it? The last we see of Spike before this is him standing far away in the hall to avoid getting rather gruesomely turned inside out by Trixie. But why would he suddenly leave to go to the kitchen right when she's casting the teleport spell? He should have seen the table disappear and knowing Spike he would have run over in a panic wondering what to do just like Starlight did. So having him calmly cleaning in the kitchen seems like a misstep by the writers, even if the scene itself was amusing.

 

[Music Chart Fan 818]

39 minutes ago, Truffles said:

The Mane 6 and Spike got their awards via stained glass. =)  I'm thinking these medals could be a Twilight invention since this seems to be her ceremony for them and she doesn't have any such windows that we know of. Or maybe Celestia's all out of windows to use in her castle? =)

Heh, yeah, I forgot about the stained glass windows in Canterlot Castle, and of course Spike is immortalized in a statue in the Crystal Empire as well. That would be a good idea for Twilight to get some stained glass windows depicting great historical feats in her own castle.

45 minutes ago, Truffles said:

I think it was taking place in the privacy of Sunburst's home, and presumably the two of them can do anything they want together there whether it be magic-related or not. 

You're right that the scene where Starlight and Sunburst make the chalk symbol on the floor and create a black hole looks to take place in Sunburst's home. I was thinking of the scene before that, where Starlight and Sunburst pour some kind of potion over a log and Starlight touches her horn to it to create a cuckoo clock; that scene looks to take place in the middle of the Crystal Empire library.

[Dzastur 1,719]

"Yay, Trixie! You're so great at magic...and having good hair!"

Loved the dialogue in "All Bottled Up" - and have to give props to Kathleen Barr for a hilarious vocal performance.

(Lots of nice animation touches in this one, too. Starlight's "quiet!" face from "The Cutie Map, Part 2" re-emerging was a personal favorite.)

[Truffles 2,033]

1 hour ago, Music Chart Fan said:

I was thinking of the scene before that, where Starlight and Sunburst pour some kind of potion over a log and Starlight touches her horn to it to create a cuckoo clock; that scene looks to take place in the middle of the Crystal Empire library.

Ah, yes. I misunderstood there. Good point about her seemingly not worrying about the books in such a grand library!

Of course, she was willing (as a last resort) to lock a greedy fire breathing dragon in a room full of books in the past, but maybe those were not particularly informative tomes? XD

[FizzyGreen 908]

So okay, i don't wanna get into too much detail here, because it wouldn't matter anyway and if i had so much to say i would make a video.

I think the episodes were quite nice. I almost never give a five/5 because there can always be something making it better. When i give something a 5/five, then that episode must've been something that amazes me as a whole.

In this case, i didn't have such a thing, i just saw nothing wrong with them. They were pretty good episodes and i really liked them. They were enjoyable, yes, i even consider them ones of the better ones.

But nothing that made me fall of my chair. Just something that made me really enjoy it.

So, yeah, i really liked Celestial advice because of well, Celestias characterization and screen time, as well as some other things like those fantasies of twilight and things like discord, and everything. It overall was an awesome episode. Pretty good. 

All Bottled Up really deserves it's title, because Starlight really did bottle it all up. It was a valueable lesson to learn even for people like me. It's about telling somebody when something is wrong. <- Important friendship aspect.

It was overall nicely conveyed and i liked the interaction between trixie and starlight. I only question what magic can do in equestria. Cause at this point it seems like a mass murder weapon. But that i don't wanna get into now. Also, classical Mane6 friendship interaction with an AWESOME song, really.

The Mane6 seem like the kind of friends where everything is right and everything works and Trixie and Starlight seem like the kind of friends where there are always problems but they still get through with it. <- Just an assumption.

I liked that episode, just like i liked the one before that. "It overall was an awesome episode. Pretty good."

 

Dammit, now i ended up writing too much. This goes fast. 

Edited April 19, 2017 by FizzyGreen

[Foliha 395]

 

So, someone said (about Ep. 2) they didn't see the point of all the back and forth of the Mane Six solving the room puzzle, and Starlight and Trixie freaking out.  I thought it was fun editing, and the dialog matching was entertaining too.

But the real reason I liked that part of the ep. was that I've been waiting for months to see ALL of the mane six.  Thanks to the room puzzle I got to see some of all of them, and hear them sing a fun song.  I don't much like Trixie or Starlight, and if I'd had to watch an entire episode of those two I'd have been pretty peeved.  

(I really enjoyed Bulk Biceps' remark about wearing many hats.  He keeps reminding me of Mr. Horse from Ren and Stimpy.  I just hope that someday he says, "No sir, I don't like it!)

Oh, and I loved the 4-seasons motif in the song...

Oh again.  Why does Dashie's forelock never blow back as she's flying?  Well, HARDLY ever...

 

Edited April 19, 2017 by Foliha
forgot something

[IronCaptain19 14]

My Favorite part is when Trixie was yelling "TEACUP" while zapping things in the kitchen.

[LaceySurprise 56]

Missed the cliffhanger that has been in other premiers. :'(

At least the next episode will have baby Flurry Heart. So excited for that!