S08:E04 - Fake It 'Til You Make It

[JH24 385]

I honestly want to like this episode, but I can't. It had some good moments and I understand what they were going for, but the setup and the suspension of disbelief is too much. Fluttershy calling the raccoons rodents and sending them away... I don't care how much acting she did, you can't tell me she was not able to at least make that distinction between her friends and customers.

On a positive note, Andrea Libman's performance as both Fluttershy in this episode and Pinkie in the previous one was absolutely amazing.

Edited April 8, 2018 by JH24

[Nyactis Mewcis Catlum 672]

16 hours ago, Jeric said:

Honestly, the concept for this episode is fine, it just needed another character. Maybe RD or even make it a CMC episode with Sweetie Belle in the central role. RD would be better for the natural brashness at times.

This is actually a really interesting idea. Rainbow would make the most sense as she's impulsive about reacting to aggressiveness. In fact, the fact she only reacted as aghast as everyone else in this episode was strange to me. 

Plus, it'd be a much more interesting lesson to have that you can't be a jerk back to someone just because they're a jerk to you. It's a lesson a lot of people need to learn.

And it'd be an interesting variety over the countless episodes in which she's made insensitive for no good reason. In this case, you could actually sort of understand why she would be like that.

 

Interesting premise that got muted because of its execution deciding to trail after "Putting Your Hoof Down". That's how I can sum up this episode. Also, Andrea Libman was The Bomb, too bad the episode itself isn't that great.

 

Also, I don't like "be yourself" morals very much and I think this episode exemplifies why. The methodology Fluttershy was using at the beginning for the storepony persona was actually pretty good, especially the first thing she said while using that persona. You're kind of supposed to do that when you're acting as a businessperson. If you don't know the answer to a customer's question, you kinda gloss over that, praise the customer, and advertise how the product would benefit their life anyway and how their potential complaint about it could be circumvented.

[FlutterForever 330]

I want to add that this seemed a bit different from before; where Fluttershy was trying to be a bit different or assertive, it seemed more like she has personality problems (don't take that in the wrong way). I however prefer to view it as her being a lot better at acting than anyone expected her to be, even herself. It could more be that I didn't like the episode that much because it didn't seem like the Fluttershy I came to know and like; however, that does not mean it was a bad episode. Perhaps it is a good episode toward those that always belittled Fluttershy for never changing after all this time.

[gingerninja666 487]

I actually think this plot makes perfect sense for Fluttershy.

 

Flutters and RD are similar in a way. They're both incredibly insecure. They just express it differently. Fluttershy wears hers on her sleeve unless she's in her element, and RD covers hers with her massive ego. I can totally see Fluttershy coping with a role she isn't built for by retreating into other roles. This isn't the first time Shy has done this.

She became Flutterguy in Season 4 to take over for Big Mac, being someone she wasn't and becoming enamoured with doing it because it let her do something she loves.

In Season 5 she became Flutterbat to try and take part in her friend's activities and instantly stopped when she realized she was scaring her friends. It wasn't for her.

Here though, it's different. She's not doing something she loves, and she's not trying to take part in her friend's activities. She's doing a favour for a friend in a professional environment. She feels obliged to stick with it, and her roles eventually consume her.

The problem came from how they chose to resolve this. They made the situation dire by bringing in the element of Shy being mean to her animal friends, then had a jokey resolution to the conflict with the multiple firings. I thought that joke was actually really well done and Rarity plays it great, but then they try to go into the sentimentality and moral stuff right afterwards.

[CypherHoof 26,483]

1 hour ago, Rhythm Red said:

1. TELEPORTING RACCOONS. WHAT THE HECK?:

In other words, the travel times were awful short. That’s pretty unrealistic, if you ask me.  

Not sure about that. We have seen Spike and a whole catalogue of animals sneak onto a train without apparently anyone knowing or caring - seems only ponies need tickets (presumably because only ponies get seats)

Times still seem a little short, but I would just roll with it and assume time was compressed a bit during the episode.

 

1 hour ago, Rhythm Red said:

2. Fluttershy got way too caught up in acting:

This also seems unrealistic. Is it possible to get so caught up in a certain character that you forget you’re acting? Doesn’t make sense to me.

Actors do it all the time - get so caught up in their character they DREAM in character, and react during off-set time as their character would react. Where that doesn't mesh is where Fluttershy can switch rapidly between three radically different characters; that would seem to be more a mental disfunction than a common effect of over-living your character.

 

1 hour ago, Rhythm Red said:

”I’m gonna fire your characters, that will fix everything!” Doesn’t make a lot of sense, either. This kinda ties in with number two.

I think Rarity was just rolling with it on that one, and after the second one popped up almost immediately, just went with it. I am more impressed by the rapidity of the costume changes

[Carolina 212]

This was a really weird episode. I was definitely entertained, but more in a watching-a-train-wreck kind of way. At some points, Fluttershy straight up seemed to have Multiple Personalities and no control over what the three separate characters said or did. On the other hand, I will say that all three characters were pretty fun, especially the hipster one, but I don't know why the writers had her be so mean to the customers. Did she want Rarity to lose her business? I did think Fluttershy was forgiven very quickly all-things-considered, but that's often how it goes with this show and its morals, so eh.

Also, for some reason, the focus of the episode really made me seriously consider how weird the idea of ponies wearing clothes is (and, by that same token, the idea of how they walk around naked if clothes exist). For some reason, it just seemed way more jarring than usual to see Rarity, fashionista extraordinaire, walk around in the nude while Fluttershy is wearing not only shirts and dresses (which we have seen before) but also pants (which as far as I remember has never been the case). Why do ponies need pants? And why do some wear them and some don't? That makes it look like you can either be half-naked or completely naked all the time. Just struck me as really odd.

Edited April 8, 2018 by Carolina

[Buttonmash1973 1,026]

deleted

Edited April 11, 2018 by Buttonmash1973

[Brainstorm 4,111]

Fluttershy might've gotten a little carried away, but, in her defense, she was trying to help Rarity's store, and her characters were her only way to help with the different styles in clothes.

And it was cool seeing Spike able to translate what the Raccoons says, it shows he's learned something from Fluttershy. 

[Dark Qiviut 22,423]

6 hours ago, Victoria Sponge said:

I hate OOC arguments, they seem to suggest that people stick to the exact same thing for their entire lives and never deviate, which just isn't true. People change their attitudes and personalities when they're trying to make an impression, when they're emotional and even as they age. Fluttershy acted differently because she wanted to do Rarity's job well, unfortunately she just took it too far. It was a little weird that she was mean to the raccoons but as she said to them at the end, she was just pretending. She wasn't being mean to them because she hated them she was being mean because she didn't want to break character, she got too into these different personas.

Your reasoning falls very flat, because they're fictional characters for a TV show, not real people. In real life, people do regress or become out of character, because as @Jeric pointed out, RL personalities are dynamic. But writers can manipulate what fictional characters are capable of and choose to go forward with it or not. In fictional, character-driven shows like this one, the audience expects them to stay true to their characterization and stick to what they learned, especially when they're role models, like the Mane 8.

Fluttershy is out of character in this episode, because she abused her friends and especially her animal friends. It was Fluttershy who convinced Rarity to not only let Smokey et al to stay in the shop, but help serve them, too. An IC Flutttershy understands they can be trusted and will defend them regardless of any mistakes they make, especially if a Manehattanite spits on their faces. Here, FS yelled at them, directly insulted them, and threatened to evict them if they blunder a third time. Rarity also became out of character for insulting her customers, implicating she opened Rarity for You for self-serving purposes.

Edited April 8, 2018 by Dark Qiviut

[Nyactis Mewcis Catlum 672]

6 hours ago, Victoria Sponge said:

they seem to suggest that people stick to the exact same thing for their entire lives and never deviate, which just isn't true

DQ already pointed out flawed reasoning, but I want to focus on this in particular.

You are aware that the people who complain about characters being OOC are doing so because of character development, right? Character development, by definition, suggests that a character changes over time.

Also, Jeric pointed it out earlier, but while people do have different attitudes and change their dispositions in certain situations, people also generally have a moral compass that they will not defy no matter the circumstance, and insulting her animals would be one for Fluttershy. Insulting other ponies is one thing (it's still atrocious, especially the comment that she made to Rainbow which was extremely out of line and literally actual stereotyping), but animals are Fluttershy's livelihood and her special talent, it's nigh impossible to buy that she would insult them under any circumstances. It might be an easier sell if - hilariously enough - the episode took a "Putting Your Hoof Down" approach in which Fluttershy would tear up and outwardly feel awful about it, but it actually didn't. Fluttershy seemed a little down about it, sure, but not the crippling guilt that she has been demonstrated to feel when hurting others in other episodes.

Yes, there are certain people with whom I get upset when I'm normally pretty chill, but even in those situations I never resort to name-calling. Ever. No matter how upset I've gotten. It just doesn't happen, period. That's what I mean.

[gingerninja666 487]

I can see the OOC criticism more here than in the last episode. Mainly just because I found Pinkie Pie encountering someone who rubbed her the wrong way as something we've never seen before, so I'd consider that seeing the character in a different light rather than something being contradicted.

 

Also it's totally possible Rare opened Rarity For You for the few good manehattanites, and the ones who mainly frequent Saddle Row are especially vexing.

Edited April 8, 2018 by gingerninja666

[RDDash 19,183]

7 hours ago, Victoria Sponge said:

I hate OOC arguments, they seem to suggest that people stick to the exact same thing for their entire lives and never deviate, which just isn't true. People change their attitudes and personalities when they're trying to make an impression, when they're emotional and even as they age. Fluttershy acted differently because she wanted to do Rarity's job well, unfortunately she just took it too far. It was a little weird that she was mean to the raccoons but as she said to them at the end, she was just pretending. She wasn't being mean to them because she hated them she was being mean because she didn't want to break character, she got too into these different personas.

The biggest inconsistancy was definitely her lack of fashion knowledge and Rarity choosing her as the last pony to ask, even after the CMCs. Fluttershy showed herself to have a weird knowledge of sewing in the past and she did a brief stint as a model and yet she was the last person Rarity asked and also couldn't croquet very well. That annoys me more than the whole OOC thing. Doesn't change my opinion on the episode though, it was a good one in my eyes.

But they're not real people thought, they're fictional charaters. And the biggest mistake people make is to treat them as real people when they are not.

Twilight almost makes the same mistake when she refers to the characters in the book as real people, when she takes offense to "my character should have stayed in Canterlot." Well, maybe it should have been, we would never know what would be the result of that.

Edited April 8, 2018 by R.D.Dash

[Drunkfrank 1,125]

I like Josh Haber as a writer, but he as a story editor really doesn't work I feel. Something tells me Lewis and Songco wouldn't have approved FITYMI.

[Ganondox 899]

10 hours ago, Jeric said:

And they are usually perceived as assholes (Jim Carrey and Jared Leto are prime examples of this). 

Some OOC complaints are very valid though. Yes people are dynamic IRL, and do some things that they usually wouldn't, but IRL people also have lines they never cross. Evicting the racoons seems to go beyond a IRL OOC moment. Here's an example. I rarely if ever raise my voice, but I have yelled at my kids in rare lapses of control. That said, I sure as hell would never kick them out on the street. One is OOC ... one is a line I am incapable of crossing. 

Everyone in the episode noticed this though, that’s what shocked all her friends. She wasn’t Out of Character, she was In Character. The bottom line is she didn’t mean to actually evict her friends, as she said so herself she thought they knew she was just pretending. 

[CinnamonSwirl 90]

I honestly didnt like it. I mean too into character to to where she bullies her friends andnratity then all of a sudden she snaps out of it? That was weird and anti climatic. It didnt take a moral or long speech or anything for her to go back to normal? Also I thought fluttershy had freaky knowledge of sewing when she sewed that dress for Rarity but she can't see a tea cozy?

[Victoria Sponge 1,017]

I don't agree that just because they're fictional means they should be unrealistic. An element of realism is needed to keep things fresh and relatable, rather than the same characters doing roughly the same thing ever episode would be boring, I like surprises where they act odd sometimes. I also think people are too quick to jump on the OOC argument because a lot of the time characters haven't crossed a line. Like in this episode, Fluttershy was acting/pretending to kick the raccoons out for the sake of the customers, she didn't suddenly break character and start hating them, and they knew she was in character, they weren't worried so much that she disliked them, just that she was getting too deep into the personas she'd created. Another example of people calling OOC was back in 28 Pranks Later where people commented that Rainbow Dash shouldn't have pranked Fluttershy because in an earlier episode she'd promised not to prank her because she's too sensitive. It wasn't a break of character or continuation to scare her, but rather her believing that Fluttershy had grown more confident and could take it, it also fits quite well with her personality which can be arrogant and sometimes egotistical and so she decided to prank Fluttershy even though she knew she wouldn't like it, for the same reason she pranked everyone else in the village despite them not liking it.

[PacificGreen 1,163]

Judging by the poll results, this seems to be quite a polarizing episode.

I kinda enjoyed it at first, seeing Fluttershy as those different personas, but yeah, I kinda felt like her out-of-character escalation felt...well..out of character. Plus the fact that the whole charade was over and Fluttershy becoming apologetic literally a second after she was fired, made the whole resolution a bit too abrupt. 

I still kinda liked this episode, since it was a bit entertaining. 

[Music Chart Fan 819]

Overall, I agree with many of the posters here in not liking the episode, although it had a few amusing moments. It seems like the characterization and motivations here are kind of a mess, and it's hard for me to see why Fluttershy acted the way she did in cranking the snootiness and the customer insults to maximum. However, it also seems like Rarity might not have handled the recruitment of Fluttershy and the explanation and training for her job very well, either. I also found the timeline of events in the episode, and which customers were in the boutique at what times, kind of confusing. I'll discuss each of those points in turn below.

-----

First, I'll talk about Rarity's decision to have one of her friends run the boutique, and how she handled leaving Fluttershy in charge.

I've seen some people who point out that Fluttershy had some amount of sewing/fashion knowledge way back in "Suited for Success", and therefore, we might expect Fluttershy to be one of the first of Rarity's friends to be asked to temporarily run her boutique, and we might expect Fluttershy to know, e.g., what "thread count" means. (Twilight did organize Rarity's merchandise by style, color, and fabric back in "The Saddle Row Review", so she too might at least start out with a bit more knowledge.) Instead, Rarity asks all the rest of the Mane Six and many others like the CMC, Granny Smith, Maud, etc. before asking Fluttershy. And I think those are good points.

I'm not so sure, though, that some amount of sewing/fashion knowledge on Fluttershy's part is, in itself, sufficient for the job of running Rarity's boutique. My impression was that "Rarity For You" isn't like the clothing section at Wal-Mart or something, where customers are generally expected to browse the merchandise and decide what to buy (and try on) by themselves. Rather, I thought that "Rarity For You" features personal assistants who synthesize customers' ideas of what they might want, as well as knowledge of clothing etiquette, current fashion trends, etc., into specific personalized outfit recommendations. And I'm not sure that Fluttershy, or nearly anyone else that we saw Rarity asking to run her boutique, is equipped to do that. Furthermore, if the Manehattanite customers tend to be demanding or hard to please or whatnot, then that should also be a factor that Rarity considers when trying to get one of her friends to run the boutique. Yet Rarity doesn't even mention or attempt to teach giving potentially demanding customers personalized advice before asking Fluttershy to "give it a try". Does Rarity think that Fluttershy or her other friends know these things? Does she just think that it's not that hard and that her friends could easily figure it out on the fly?

Furthermore, when Fluttershy is hesitant about running the boutique and says that Rarity makes it "look so easy", Rarity tells Fluttershy that she's conquered her shyness many times already, and that she can't let the customers "undo all that progress". But it doesn't seem to me that Fluttershy's shyness is, in itself, the main problem here. Rather, it seems to me that Fluttershy might not have the knowledge or experience that customers expect, and therefore, that it would be understandable that Fluttershy isn't acting confident here, because she might not have the knowledge or experience that would create confidence. In fact, it almost seems disingenuous how Rarity is framing Fluttershy's apprehension at running the boutique by herself as merely an issue of conquering her shyness and accessing her inner strength, while not really expressing any understanding that Rarity is throwing Fluttershy in the deep end with little explanation or training, particularly on giving outfit recommendations, and without necessarily having much knowledge of the specific merchandise for sale in the boutique.

So, for example, when the brown male pony in the suit asks Fluttershy about the thread count of a shirt, even if Fluttershy knew (or should have known) what "thread count" is, would she have any means to find the answer to that question? Would Fluttershy necessarily be expected to know what fabric was used to make that shirt, and what the thread count of that fabric is? Does Rarity keep any centrally-organized information about the outfits on the racks? If so, then it would have been nice to tell Fluttershy about that in her 3 minutes of job training; if not, then that's a significant issue with trying to leave the boutique with someone else who doesn't know those things.

And all of this makes me wonder whether having one of Rarity's friends run the Manehattan boutique, with only a few minutes' explanation/training and without much (or any) experience in serving customers in the way that they would expect, was really the best option. My first thought was that Rarity might hire temporary help in Manehattan - someone who has experience in the fashion industry. But Rarity says near the end of the episode that "I'd never trust some horrible Saddle Row pony to run my shop. That's why I wanted a friend to do it". So apparently Rarity thought that anyone in Manehattan that she might temporarily hire couldn't be trusted, or could have a bad attitude when serving customers, or something like that. Rarity also says that "this is Manehattan's busiest shopping season, and I can't just close the shop". But then, we saw that getting one of Rarity's friends who isn't in the fashion industry to run the boutique is a lot of stress for whoever agrees to do it, and could result in alienation of customers who don't get the service they expect. So, as I see it, all of these options have significant downside risk of Rarity's boutique losing reputation or whatnot, and I'm not sure that roping one of Rarity's friends into running the boutique when doing so might be over her head was the best (or least bad) option.

Maybe Rarity could have kept the boutique open with one of her friends, but with a disclaimer that the usual personal assistants (or whatever you call them), who would be giving personalized advice, are out of town at the fashion show. Or if Fluttershy and Rarity presumably had to travel to Manehattan on the train or whatever, then perhaps they could have used that time for a bit more explanation or training on how to run the boutique, if they didn't do that already.

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Next, I'll discuss Fluttershy's behavior when running the boutique, and how it's difficult for me to see what she was thinking when doing that.

First, I'm not sure I like the idea that Fluttershy's adoption of different personas and acting confident was able to "work" in running the boutique, at least at first. So, for example, when the brown male pony in the suit asks Fluttershy about the thread count of a shirt, Fluttershy never does give an answer about the thread count. Instead, she just asserts that the shirt "defies typical attempts to quantify its quality, but rest assured, it will make you the envy of all who see it", and there are other comparable examples. So is the implication here that customers who are asking questions about the outfits or stating their desires for clothing don't want or care about actual answers? Instead, they're just shallow posers who only want someone who talks/acts like them and asserts the greatness of the outfits, even when that person is deflecting the questions or making stuff up out of whole cloth in the process? I'm not so sure that that would work on all the customers. Couldn't some of them want actual answers or actually want what they say they want and not be distracted/deterred by Fluttershy's personas or confidence in avoiding answering them?

The thing is, though, that after Fluttershy's persona "worked" on a couple of customers, she says "I feel I should push the snootiness further", and the raccoons agree. But why? What would be further accomplished by "pushing the snootiness further" beyond what she's doing already? And of course, Fluttershy continues to crank up the snootiness, even when it seems pretty obviously to be putting customers off from buying anything and driving them away.

One possible explanation for that comes when Rarity finally returns to the shop with the rest of the Mane Six. At that point, Fluttershy tells Rarity that she "totally gets how lame customers are" and that she "understands that the couture in this shop is far too brilliant to even consider selling". So is the idea that Fluttershy judged all of these Manehattanite potential customers to be "unworthy" of Rarity's creations, and therefore, that Fluttershy was deliberately trying to offend them and not serve them, so that none of them would buy anything? Of course, that would seem pretty far from what Rarity would want Fluttershy to do in running the boutique. Is it Fluttershy's job as Rarity's employee to decide which people coming in to the boutique "deserve" to buy the merchandise? I would imagine that almost any business deals with customers with unpleasant attitudes or whatever, and I also would imagine that employees are expected, within reason, to still serve those customers - not for employees to make their own decisions to drive away customers that they don't like. And of course, if Fluttershy's attitude is that "the couture in this shop is far too brilliant to even consider selling", then how does the boutique stay in business?

This explanation seems to be in conflict, though, with Fluttershy's saying in her apology that "I got so caught up trying to please all of your customers". Believing that the customers are unworthy to buy Rarity's outfits doesn't seem compatible with trying to please the customers. And it's hard to see how telling customers that they're not good enough for the outfits that they're considering is trying to please them, either. Or, in one case, Fluttershy is reading something behind the counter and tells a customer that "I would seriously help you right now, but, like, I don't wanna, you know?". How is doing that trying to please the customers?

I've also seen the potential explanation that Fluttershy just "lost herself" in her personas, apparently to the point of not even realizing what she was doing. But then Fluttershy tells the raccoon family in her apology that "You know I was only pretending, right?". That would seem to imply that Fluttershy was aware of what she was doing in her personas, and was doing it willfully.

Finally, I was baffled that Fluttershy keeps up the charade with her personas, even to the point that Rarity has to fire each of them individually, but then Fluttershy IMMEDIATELY adopts the contrite look and says "I guess I owe everypony an apology". If Fluttershy realized that she messed up, then why did she insist on still doing the personas and forcing Rarity to "terminate" each of them? Or did Fluttershy only realize that she messed up in the one second between her final persona walking off-screen and the camera panning left to her looking contrite?

-----

Finally, I was kind of confused with the passage of time in the episode and the logistics of how some the events of the episode played out.

When Rarity first recruits Fluttershy, Rarity says that the fashion show is in Canterlot tomorrow. So I could imagine that Rarity and Fluttershy traveled to Manehattan that night or early in the morning to get to the boutique before it would open. And then the rest of the episode would presumably be taking place that day.

So, after Rarity leaves the boutique, Fluttershy helps a brown male pony in a suit; he buys three suits, which are bagged, and he leaves the boutique and runs into Rarity. Fluttershy also helps a Berry Punch-style pony with a gray coat; she buys a dress, which is bagged, and she apparently leaves the boutique. Then, when Fluttershy starts adopting more than just the salespony persona, she suggests a dress with a translucent flowery back to a light-colored pegasus with a red mane; she says that it's "exactly what I need". There's also a tall male goth pony that Fluttershy helps with a leather jacket, which he says "completes him". When Fluttershy begins to put off customers, one of the customers she puts off is a cream-colored pony with dark blue mane, yellow ribbon, and red earring, who seems to be implied to be leaving in a huff.

But the thing is, we see all of these ponies in the boutique again later. After the scene with the raccoon family in Ponyville, we still see the cream-colored pony with dark blue mane, yellow ribbon, and red earring in the boutique, and Fluttershy proceeds to insult her again; we also see the Berry Punch-style pony with a gray coat at the counter. Then the camera pans to show the rest of the Mane Six and Spike observing all of this. So did the cream-colored pony still stick around in the boutique for the whole time that it took the raccoons to travel to Ponyville, explain the situation, and for everyone to travel back? I thought it was implied in the earlier scene that the cream-colored pony left, although the episode doesn't show that explicitly. And why is the Berry Punch-style pony back again when she had already bought her dress and presumably left? Did she come back again on the same day?

Then, after the rest of the Mane Six and Spike go and tell Rarity what's going on, we switch to the boutique and see the brown male pony in the suit, the tall male goth pony, and the light-colored pegasus with a red mane, who's holding the same dress with a translucent flowery back as before. So now, why are all these ponies at the boutique after not just the raccoons' trip to Ponyville and back, but also the trip to Canterlot to get Rarity and back? The brown male pony in the suit had also already bought his stuff and left earlier, so did he also come back again on the same day? And did the other two just hang around in the boutique the entire time?

Part of the confusion here is that it would presumably take a significant amount of time for the raccoon family to travel to Ponyville and tell Spike and the rest of the Mane Six about the situation. Can the raccoon family take the train? How often are trains from Manehattan to Ponyville scheduled? And how long is that trip? After that, I suppose that Twilight could be teleporting the whole gang from Ponyville to Manehattan to confront Fluttershy, then to Canterlot to tell Rarity, and then back to Manehattan again with Rarity in tow. That does seems like a lot of magical power for Twilight to be exerting in a pretty short time frame, but I guess Twilight might just be that good.

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Now for just a few other miscellaneous observations:

I don't recall if we've seen this in the show before, but I guess ponies and other animals are okay with eating jello or other foods made with gelatin, which is derived from animal bones and skin.

The rest of the Mane Six other than Fluttershy had reasons why they were busy and couldn't run Rarity's boutique, but they were all apparently able to drop everything and go to Manehattan to investigate Fluttershy's behavior. Did they all miraculously finish the things they were busy with before? Did all of them just not want to run Rarity's boutique, but also didn't want to be straight with Rarity about that, so they came up with things to tell Rarity that they were "busy" with, but not really? Were the things they were busy with important enough not to be able to run the boutique, but not so important that they couldn't drop them for the (vaguely defined) emergency of Fluttershy not acting like herself?

Smoky's being called a rodent was so shocking and offensive that he passed out and apparently stopped breathing, such that he needed to be resuscitated. So words really did (almost) kill in this case?

Finally, if Rarity tells Fluttershy that "I'd never trust some horrible Saddle Row pony to run my shop", what does that make Rarity's assistants for the Manehattan boutique, then? Maybe Rainbow just happened to find the exceptions to the rule when she found these three assistants back in "The Saddle Row Review".

[Thrond 3,263]

16 hours ago, Victoria Sponge said:

I hate OOC arguments, they seem to suggest that people stick to the exact same thing for their entire lives and never deviate, which just isn't true. People change their attitudes and personalities when they're trying to make an impression, when they're emotional and even as they age. Fluttershy acted differently because she wanted to do Rarity's job well, unfortunately she just took it too far. It was a little weird that she was mean to the raccoons but as she said to them at the end, she was just pretending. She wasn't being mean to them because she hated them she was being mean because she didn't want to break character, she got too into these different personas.

I'm totally fine with characters acting unusually as long as I understand their motivations. I often hesitate to use "out-of-character" as a criticism, and try to analyze character behaviour in different ways. Sometimes, like last week, I confess to wishing a character would exhibit somewhat more dignified behaviour than they do, but that's not an "out of character" complaint. 

You're probably not talking to me, because I didn't call Fluttershy "out of character" here, although that seems to deliberately be the point; her friends even intervene because she's behaving so unusually. In truth, I really do think the big issue is that the episode doesn't explain her motivations very well, which makes her behaviour difficult to understand. When this show seems inconsistent, I think it's often just because it's lacking in detail. 

[Luminance 2,186]

This episode seems off for a bit with Fluttershy's alternate personalities going a bit too far to the point of insulting the customers. She didn't stop and came to realize that she herself were driving the customers away, ultimately going against Rarity's wishes and her element of kindness. Of course, not the first time  as seen in "Putting Down your Hoof". Seeing this as the opposite of her character in which the way she removed herself from her friends when they came to help her realize her fault is really quite shocking for Fluttershy, regardless of which persona she pretended to be. The turnaround in this episode felt flat, like Fluttershy knew what she caused and yet when she got to the point of termination by Rarity she openly stated and acknowledged her mistakes like it was like a game of some sorts. The resolution felt contrived and the last bit with her and Rarity criticizing yet another customer felt like it wasn't needed after the previous events.

[Thrond 3,263]

57 minutes ago, Music Chart Fan said:

Furthermore, when Fluttershy is hesitant about running the boutique and says that Rarity makes it "look so easy", Rarity tells Fluttershy that she's conquered her shyness many times already, and that she can't let the customers "undo all that progress". But it doesn't seem to me that Fluttershy's shyness is, in itself, the main problem here. Rather, it seems to me that Fluttershy might not have the knowledge or experience that customers expect, and therefore, that it would be understandable that Fluttershy isn't acting confident here, because she might not have the knowledge or experience that would create confidence. In fact, it almost seems disingenuous how Rarity is framing Fluttershy's apprehension at running the boutique by herself as merely an issue of conquering her shyness and accessing her inner strength, while not really expressing any understanding that Rarity is throwing Fluttershy in the deep end with little explanation or training, particularly on giving outfit recommendations, and without necessarily having much knowledge of the specific merchandise for sale in the boutique.

While I don't personally think Rarity was nearly as misguided here as in "Honest Apple," where I didn't understand her reasoning whatsoever, this would be the second time she severely overestimated the ability of her friends to assist with her work. How peculiar. 

1 hour ago, Music Chart Fan said:

I don't recall if we've seen this in the show before, but I guess ponies and other animals are okay with eating jello or other foods made with gelatin, which is derived from animal bones and skin.

I was gonna suggest it was a vegan alternative, but a couple seconds of searching didn't give me any evidence that such a thing exists. Again, peculiar. 

 

[Ganondox 899]

21 minutes ago, AlexanderThrond said:

While I don't personally think Rarity was nearly as misguided here as in "Honest Apple," where I didn't understand her reasoning whatsoever, this would be the second time she severely overestimated the ability of her friends to assist with her work. How peculiar. 

I was gonna suggest it was a vegan alternative, but a couple seconds of searching didn't give me any evidence that such a thing exists. Again, peculiar. 

 

They've had gelatin products numerous times in the show before, just run an image search. I don't know how it's made, but vegan jelly does exist. 

[Thrond 3,263]

9 hours ago, RyanMahaffe said:

I like Josh Haber as a writer, but he as a story editor really doesn't work I feel. Something tells me Lewis and Songco wouldn't have approved FITYMI.

Lewis and Songco's run certainly seemed to try harder to explain characters' motivations, even if mostly through exposition. But I don't want to give them too much credit; they approved "Honest Apple." 

[RDDash 19,183]

Fluttershy knows how to sew? Anyway, season 1 is so ancient I don't think even writers remember that fact. From what I understand is that all fice of them pitched in to fix that dress in the episode 14.  Discorded Fluttershy is a jerk and hates animals, according to the same logic she is going to be an ooc because she is not nice, even thoug she would be extremely accurate to the opposite Fluttershy

Edited April 9, 2018 by R.D.Dash

[gingerninja666 487]

1 hour ago, AlexanderThrond said:

While I don't personally think Rarity was nearly as misguided here as in "Honest Apple," where I didn't understand her reasoning whatsoever, this would be the second time she severely overestimated the ability of her friends to assist with her work. How peculiar. 

I was gonna suggest it was a vegan alternative, but a couple seconds of searching didn't give me any evidence that such a thing exists. Again, peculiar. 

 

Well Rare did seem to go to everyone up to and including the CMC and Maud as well. I think she just desperately needed SOMEONE.