Do you think The Last Crusade somewhat 'cheated' on the audience?

[Sepul-Coloratura 756]

Spoilers from The Last Crusade!

Spoiler

Do you think the revelation of Scootaloo's parents is lying to the audience or at least somewhat cheating on the audience for suspending the clear truth for that long? They technically didn't lie, but they somehow made the audience believe the same thing : Scootaloo's parents hasn't been with her, and they weren't with her when she needed a support. And some (many) audience thought Scootaloo was an orphan and related to her. Don't blame the audience for believing that, it's not that far fetched. The writers needed to walk though laser beams to make Scootaloo's parents even exist. Even those laser beams weren't that hard to avoid, that still says something.

Applejack's parents weren't mentioned specifically in the show, but it was hinted and nuanced. Later on, they decided to explicitly speak out about it. If their parents just popped up before season 7 and said they were busy for some important work from far away, (and the shooting stars were just a coincidence) the audience would be confused at best.

I don't mind that much about who Scootaloo's parents are, as much as I didn't care about Spike's parents and even Applejack's parents and Rainbow Dash's parents, Starlight and Sunburst's. (They showed Pinkie's Twilight's, Rarity's parents before we even thought about it. The show was a step ahead of the audience. Now the audiences are few steps ahead of the show.) But I also think that the writers should have been aware of what the collective perception of the show was before they wrote the story. (episode 100 specifically digged into this idea. Lyra and Bon-bon are pretty much a canon gay couple. Don't think so? If the show makes an episode about Lyra's boyfriend just to invalidate that, it would be similar to what I'm saying right now.) And the reason they wrote The Last Crusade in the first place was exactly because of the 'collective perception'. That and to tie up the CMC saga too, of course. They wanted to explicitly state that Scootaloo isn't an orphan. They particularly are dependant on that aspect especially later seasons.

It was very close when Scootaloo said that she didn't had that much of a support from her parents when she needed, and sadly dropped her head. And also the episode ended like Scootaloo having a new family that she never had, and I wouldn't be surprised if the Rainbows adopted her at that point.

But somewhat the show decided that she had her parents alive all along and her parents were just busy, somewhat diluting the weight of previous episodes and the character, which are just misconceptions in this point. I don't see the significance and a necessity, most importantly - a compelling story to show her parents in that way. They even emphasized that Scootaloo's aunts are very nice, as if we worried about her miserable childhood (which we did).

It would be brutal to think that Scootaloo didn't grow without any adult's care, but they pretty much covered it with Parental Glidance. And there could have been any other ways. Better yet, they could have stated it very early in the show. It's their fault to say it this late in the show, if they were gonna say it at all.

I also kinda feel similar about Spike's wings. If Spike was never gonna fly, I could have lived with that. Some ponies fly, some don't. I would accept if some dragons just don't have wings. (and we have seen him physically grow two times without wings, so it's not hard to picture) It didn't matter if he ever flies or not, just like Scootaloo not being able to fly. The show couldn't stand any longer for unanswered questions, and just gave him wings with a not so compelling story wholely made for that.

I feel similar about lot more things in the show. And if the show is going to fill the obvious blanks, I wish they did it better, or not touch it at all because some blanks aren't meant to be filled. I don't dislike The Last Crusade or think it is a bad episode, but it could have been done better with better directions, and most importantly I'm curious what people think of this.

What do you think?

Edited June 24, 2019 by Sepul-Coloratura

[Metemponychosis 1,236]

This whole episode is weird. She could simply live with her aunts from the start and that was it.

I feel like they used Scootaloo's parents just because they wanted to feature her aunts and didn't really know what to with them without her parents showing up and then leaving like it's nothing. Or maybe the message is that she can live with her aunts just fine. I don't know. I feel like they had a cool idea for her parents and then threw it away because it's the final season anyway and nobody would care.

Like I said in another post. MLP is good at feeling, not at thinking.

[Sunlight Glisten 368]

What about the whole elephant issue of THEY ABANDONED HER FOR 9 YEARS. All while her aunts were house sitting. FOR 9 YEARS. Then opp they're back now lets just go to our house that we havent been to in a decade. 

Also, you ain't Steve Erwin (God rest his soul). Its still too soon for those of us who loved him. Steve Erwin was an excellent father, not like this chump who abandoned our scootaloo for 9 years. 

End of rant

P.s. scootaloo's mom is hot. 

[Metemponychosis 1,236]

@Sunlight GlistenI haven't looked at the transcript yet, but I think that the dialogue left implicit that her parents didn't stay out all the time. They just didn't appear, not that it makes it right to me, but it's better that the episode acknowledged that.

And, yeah. Steve Irwin was awesome. I thought of it like a homage.

[Steve Piranha 28,782]

While I loved this episode, two details kinda felt down to me:

1-With Scootie the Cutie’s aunts there, the absence of any of the Moon family didn’t go unnoticed to me, as fan of the Ponyville Mysteries book

2-And most importantly, I think the ending would have been far more powerful emotionally if Scootie left. I mean, it’s the goddamn final season, there’s no status quo to worry about at this point 

[RDDash 18,866]

The episode made such a big deal out of nothing. I am also pretty sure the whole issue was overblown out of proportion as well. Is there some kind of law that forbids children left unsupervised in Equestria? If so, then it was obvious from the very beginning that the filly wasn't just living on the streets. 

I am not sure how would the show made people cheated, unless somehow she suddenly will learn to fly.

Edited June 25, 2019 by R.D.Dash
Fixing awkward wording

[MAIKUN 262]

Did the CMC disband or something?

[Will Guide 21,325]

On 6/24/2019 at 9:46 PM, MAIKUN said:

Did the CMC disband or something?

That would be like me abandoning Disney which would be NEVER EVER, EVER. 

[Steve Piranha 28,782]

I have read something in EGD soapbox and is something worth adding, and I agree: Growing Up is Hard and The Last Crusade should have swapped airing times. Leaving The Last Crusade as the final cuties episode. why? Because Growing Up is Hard to Do, other than seeing grownup cuties, felt like a standard cuties episode. While The Last Crusade, independently on how I feel about about the ending, was better left as the final cuties send off 

 

[Will Guide 21,325]

22 hours ago, Steve Piranha said:

I have read something in EGD soapbox and is something worth adding, and I agree: Growing Up is Hard and The Last Crusade should have swapped airing times. Leaving The Last Crusade as the final cuties episode. why? Because Growing Up is Hard to Do, other than seeing grownup cuties, felt like a standard cuties episode. While The Last Crusade, independently on how I feel about about the ending, was better left as the final cuties send off 

 

You're right. The final scene in the Last Crusade with many of the characters the CMC helped over the seasons gave the CMC a triumphant final victory kind of feeling showing how far they came since getting their Marks.

While Growing Up felt like something that could have easily been done all the way back in Pre-Cutie-Mark Season 1

[Megas 27,064]

The way they the explained a lot of things in the episode in regards to Scootaloo's living situation to her aunts and her parents, all of this really just hurts the episode in the long run. If they had just had her living with her aunts and they were simply never shown, pulling a Shining Armor, would have been much preferred. Making it so so they take care of her every what, 2 days? 2 weeks? Is an incredibly annoying situation and just needlessly makes everything harder on Scootaloo. It reminds me of how everyone asked the writers how the mane six were gonna have time on their hands with both their careers and their jobs at the school and the writers tried to pass it off as cartoon logic, which would be fine, if they didn't make it so their lack of time would become a major plot point for several episodes going forward. And then there's Scootaloo's parents themselves, who are honestly just awful parents, and for the writers to make it so they're amazing people(based on real heroes, one of which who made plenty of time to be with his family) that Scootaloo admires despite both them never being around and a couple episodes saying otherwise. It really just comes off as incredibly cheap. Having Scootaloo resent her parents, maybe have them actually try to let her see their perspective, maybe actually have them try to improve as parents actually try to be their for her; it's clear that they really do love her. They can be good people and be awful parents, and there's still a chance for them to get better.

Then there was the situation with Scootaloo moving away with them which honestly does make for an interesting scenario, but the way the episode addresses it is just really underwhelming and much like the rest of the episode is an incredibly and unnecessary convoluted mess. The entire episode feels like the writers chickened out of addressing some more complicated problems, especially when they got a set up that could have easily made it work

Honestly, the more I think about this episode the more disappointing it becomes. I actually think it's one of the most disappointing episodes in the show, up there with the likes of Newbie Dash and Father Knows Beast. But I will say, unlike those episodes, which actively mock their audience's expectations, it really does feel like an episode with good intentions, with the ending it really feels like something important, emotional, and they wanted people to be happy with the end result, but a lot of solutions they came up with just weren't satisfying enough

Edited March 23, 2021 by Megas

[Thrond 3,257]

I didn't really mind the weird complexity of Scootaloo's home situation. I found it interesting. Plus it seemed like it was working out for her. I wonder how it developed; maybe the parents had meant to come home more often, and then they just didn't. We know that they came back because they realized they had been neglectful, so it makes sense that they might have been concerned about Scootaloo living on her own but never got around to fixing it. I wonder if the aunts considered moving in with her before, but didn't want to intrude on a situation which seemed like it was mostly working. 

I was never really invested in Scootaloo being an orphan, first because the fandom had assumed that of every character whose parents had not been introduced, and then later because we already had Apple Bloom to fill that role in the CMC. The result we got - that she had a family who was never around, in contrast to Apple Bloom having no parents but still living with a loving family - was much more compelling to me. The best part of that episode is how it exaggerates that situation: Scootaloo's parents don't just have demanding jobs, they share a crazy, awesome job that requires them to spend all their time on a whole other continent. I found that very amusing. 

My key gripe with that episode is that Scootaloo doesn't seem to resent her parents for this at all, which I don't think makes sense. She sure does love those parents she never sees and barely hears from. I think showing her feeling that way also would have resolved the inconsistency with "Parental Glideance" - even as is, it's a fact that Scootaloo's parents were never there while Rainbow's were always fawning over her. It would have added a lot more emotional weight to an episode that seemed to go out of its way to avoid anything really thorny. Did that episode really need to mostly consist of the CMC's harebrained schemes? They had to lean on the CMC's weird jobs at Cutie Mark experts because god forbid they try to be thoughtful. This didn't seem like a story where everything should have turned out perfectly for everyone. 

But I don't recall any sort of hints to her home life or backstory before season 7 or so. For a long time it could have gone in any number of directions, and even in the later seasons nothing implied that her parents were dead, merely that they weren't there for her. And, I mean... they weren't. By the time that episode aired, most of its ideas had already been openly discussed by the staff a long time ago, so I took them for granted. Or maybe I just never got that invested in the CMC, I dunno.

I agree that Spike's wings are inconsequential, but I think they got a good story about puberty out of it. That episode definitely had more on its mind than "I dunno, give Spike wings." 

Edited March 19, 2020 by AlexanderThrond

[ZiggWheelsManning 7,368]

A shame we didn’t see more of her aunts.  And if the two had gotten more screen time, would that have gotten in the way of certain parents taking their daughter away from her beloved home town?  The episode had to have been limited to showing Scootaloo’s aunts as they are the ones who were truly parents to her. 

The CMCs story should have stopped with “Last Crusade”.  It bugs me their voice actresses couldn’t put their feet down or object outright that it makes no sense to give them another adventure after “Last Crusade.  The CMCs were kept as an afterthought by not enforcing a rule that their story should have ended at “The Last Crusade”.  Did the writers just run low on gas to not use some other characters who don’t hold the same experience as the CMCs for the grown up plot episodes later? 

So the final season gave us three episodes on the CMCs, three finales.  Thinking about it, it’s like they gave the CMCs alternate timeline finales.  The first being Scootaloo’s family, the second is the CMCs being Grown Ups and finally the third episode, which is “The Big Mac Question”, is their role with the pie.  And we’re the ones having to fight over which finale is the cannon one.  The Grown Ups episode should have happened anywhere within season 7. 

As for the grown up Scootaloo in this, we were told in “The Washouts” that she cannot fly which should have signaled to the writers we fans have brains.  We know she cannot fly but you proceed for no reason in the Grown Ups episode to show us her tiny wings and keep her flightless.  “The Big Mac Question” should have been the episode to happen first in the final season as the CMCs also caused trouble in that episode.