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Were you disappointed about Rainbow Dash's Wonderbolts arc?


Sepul-Coloratura

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I was very curious how things would go in Newbie Dash, because it's the point where reality chushes ideals. I wanted to know how the ideal, moral, nice ponyland logic would deal with systemic absurdity.

Turnrs out that Raimbow Dash adjusted to the wrong tradition and system, just like what all her friends told her to.

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They could have explored her as a wonderbolt(and the other wonderbolt characters too for that matter) more, the whole aspect of her being a wonderbolt was pretty much pushed aside for the rest of the series, her role in the wonderbolts was pretty much nonexistence, we never get to see her in action with the bolts apart from a couple of air shows. I would have loved to see at least a full wondrbolts episode, them doing something military for example, so instead of building dash's character further she started to become stall(same for the arc, the bolts never really got to shine, they were usually either jerks, defeated easily, incompetent or simply did nothing), this whole arc was one of MLP's real disappointments.  

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Newbie Dash might be not the best Rainbow Dash milestone kind of episode but any episode that relate to Wonderbolt after that point was pretty good all-round so i cant complain. RD's wonderbolts arc is meh but it could be worse.:Thorax:

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(edited)

Personally, I wasn't disappointed. Overall the progression felt right and it was nice to see the later episodes where she really felt like part of the team.

As for the Wonderbolts being jerks or incompetent, I can't help but think that's partly because the writers hadn't fully decided yet on their characters. They seemed nicer in the later seasons and helped out RD a few times.

Edited by JH24
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Not really; I was never turned against the Wonderbolts like a lot of people did, and for all its problems I still think that "Newbie Dash" is a fairly unique and satisfying way to end her arc. It was always exciting to see Rainbow get one step closer to that dream - "Rainbow Falls" was weak, but it also didn't really seem like a forward step in her career; meanwhile, "Newbie Dash" has her accomplish that and then makes its entire story a metaphor for the journey. In the first season, we saw her in their shadow, looking back to a past where she was called "Rainbow Crash" as an insult. In season 6, we see her a member of them, and the name "Rainbow Crash" is instead a reward for her accomplishments - exactly the opposite of what it was before. 

My Little Pony was never really set up to tell long-running storylines; it's the kind of show where the characters should have found a new, smaller goal to work towards every so often. And yet we had a run where, every year of the show, Rainbow Dash got a little closer to her goal, and then finally achieved it. And then we got a bunch of neat episodes out of her career and her relationships with her coworkers, if only in broad strokes - "Top Bolt," "Parental Glideance," "Grannies Gone Wild," "The Washouts." Wish we had gotten more of that in season 9 instead of that dumb cheerleading episode.

I was never really a fan of the military motif - it added a lot of baggage that the show never addressed. It never really seemed like being a soldier was Rainbow's goal, even though by season 6 she had already saved the world numerous times without the Wonderbolts. But I liked that her goal, the reason for her goal, and her progress towards her goal were always well defined - Rarity was similar, to the extent that their careers intersected in "Rarity Investigates." Careerism was their "thing" in a way it wasn't for other characters, and I was always excited to see their progress. 

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