S02:E15 - The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000

[Righteous Fury 344]

After the Flim Flam Bros. started sucking up whole trees and making cider out of THEM, I started saying, "Hey, maybe they should have a TASTE test instead of a cider-making test!"

basically yeah

 

I mean trying to compete by volume was really dumb to begin with

 

they should've had a 'hey let's see who can actually make cider because they have apples' contest

 

like the Flim Flam Bros. could never have driven SAA out of business once you remember that they'd have to sell at an equal or lesser price while paying for both apples and delivery costs

 

actually even if it wasn't for that they couldn't have driven SAA out of business because as long as demand exceeds supply there's no reason Ponyville can't support two cider companies

 

really it's best not to think about this episode at all because once you do it all falls apart

[Starlight Song 43]

Double Applejack episode!

Even though technically they really aren't if you would ever watch the Youtube Video: Why Applejack Gets No Love. It basically explains that to be a true character episode it has to focus mainly on the character, the character has to overcome a problem, and then the character has to change in some way. well, Applejack already knew the lesson of the story. So therefore it wasn't an Applejack episode.   WHHHHHHYYYYYYY

[Dowlphin 463]

My thoughts on the Fluttershy blushing scene:

If it was just meant as a random gag, it was a very bad one, because it just doesn't make any sense in Equestria.
And because it doesn't make sense, it teases to come up with SOME explanation that does. And that can kind of backfire. Here is my attempt at finding an explanation:

It's completely normal in Equestria to be naked in public. Rainbow Dash removes Fluttershy's blanket, she sits there, back on pillow, legs slightly apart and blushes. Awkward situation.
Possible explanation: One of several kinds of 'accident' happened down there.
Since she very likely would have taken precautions if she had had her period at the time, I suspect that Dashie interrupted her during a wet dream.
 

[Jack Spades 162]

Shouldn't the Apples join with the Flim Flam Brothers? They would have both made even more profit together other than all by themselves? 

[Righteous Fury 344]

It's a worth-while watch.

See also Singin' In the Rain.

Music Man is WAAAAAAAAY better than Rain. Paul McCartney never regularly performed a song from Singin' in the Rain. Jus' sayin'.

[BlueEyedPegasus 59]

Maybe I'm just biased because I still think Big Mac was kinda harsh towards the CMC in "Ponyville Confidential", but I feel that his Bad@$$ Baritone status was put to better use in this episode. Sure, it's just one line ("No deal.") and it's considerably softer, but it's a lot better on the ears in my opinion. Anybody agree with me?

[Blue Bay 1,027]

Just came to me recently: Aren't they just producing apple juice?

 

They are just squeezing the apples. There is no maturing, there is no fermentation and they are not using any bacteria cultures to speed up the progress. So as far as I can see there is no apple cider. :I

 

Besides the song of this episode was catchy as hell, still can't get the chorus out of my head.

(Well you've got opportunity In this very community)

[Boop Beepington 24]

Is it just my imature humor or is the title of the video... ya' know... weird?

[Tails_155 68]

WHERE DO I BEGIN?!

 

I HATED this episode. I'm actually going to quote a whole essay I wrote on my disagreements with this episode, and continue thereafter.

 

 

Firstly, my opinion of this episode was heavily negative. If I had seen this as my first episode I probably wouldn't have even watched the series in full. I will forego the overly lengthy and annoying musical number which bothered me so much other than making this note to analyze the episode from primarily a business standpoint.

I got lured into this series by a friend's suggestion, and here I am picking apart an episode because wow. This didn't fully make sense.

Hypothetically, the Apple Family COULD be understocked for the opening of a seasonal good, it's not impossible. However, there are several issues with this as it is represented:

They're not just understocked, they're GROSSLY understocked. Apple cider is indeed a perishable good, but does NOT perish in a single day. They, consequently, set the day they release the cider to the public. They could analyze the sales numbers and boost the number of units released per seasonal opening, when things clearly seem to be very busy, by backing up the release date to satisfy a greater number of customers.

To satisfy the most of the customers, they could do as many companies do with products for things like sales or, possibly, though I don't know for sure, limited release items, and have a limit per customer.

There are clearly still unpicked apples in the orchard, as such, a financial success like the orchard is, they should hire more workers and expand the enterprise. With more workers things wouldn't be rushed, they could properly train the workers to provide the "love" or "care" they need to produce quality product. Clearly they are willing to accept outside help, they do in the episode. They have family out of town, if any of them needed a job, they could come to town and work there. There is no reason to have such a terrible understocking situation. The customers are dissatisfied, and customer dissatisfaction can cripple sales.

The competition which so ostentatiously comes to town, consequently, has every right to pick up the slack with an invention which would (when properly used) provide quality product at a better price. They wouldn't win over every market: they're not local, they are using an artificial process, etc. However, had they set up an agreement correctly, or had any negotiating knowledge, they would have been able to make a windfall.

The Apples, at this point, own the orchard. As such, they have the control of the resources needed for Flim & Flam to do anything. They have the larger bargaining power, because otherwise Flim and Flam would have to import, at the price of import, and would probably be willing to cut a better deal to save money.

When it came to the competition, the Apple Family could have said they needed to provide their own apples. The brothers could have huffed and puffed, but couldn't have blown down that house. They're out of stock, as such, they are unequipped for the challenge, and would lose by default.

Once the orchard IS lost, the masses disapprove of second rate cider (which only made up the later barrels, and as such, Flim & Flam hurt their own case by not starting with the quality cider which would have won approval of some, even if it didn't win everyone's heart [which it clearly wouldn't have, loyalty, etc.]) The brothers leave town and the Apple Family just gets their land back. This is business. If they wanted to cripple their competition they could either sell the land back to them at a crazy price, or sell it to a major manufacturer or anyone who wanted to buy the land. The way they left was not the way a business would have handled things. They beat the competition. They won. They would want to remove the opportunity for the competition to return without cost. That's not how business works.

These are just some unpolished criticisms of the most recent episode as of the publication date. Here are my thoughts and the reasons I was unsatisfied with the plot of the episode.

Personality issues also show up: Pinkie may indeed be a snack-addict, however, she loves her friends and only shares the multiple mugs of cider she has at the end. She hogs a lot of cider at the start and then rubs it in Rainbow Dash's face when she talks about the cider. This seems out of character even for someone who is always seen as snacking.

Rainbow Dash is so bitter by not getting cider that she doesn't just want to be ahead of Pinkie in line, she wants to gloat in front of a friend. Her symbol is loyalty, and she essentially wants to tantalize one of her 5 closest friends for being enthusiastic and early. A recent trend in the episodes is to make Rainbow not only to make her very self-interested, but to make her rude, even mean. I don't know if it's on the shoulders of the scriptwriters or what, but they're doing a lot of work to turn her into the most disliked character, which seems like a bad idea for the series as it is. I think the scripts should show her as potentially loud, arrogant, or rude, yes, but not just unlikeable as they seem to be trying.

 

 

From there, I'll expand on the limit per customer and why it makes logical sense for a business:

 

A limit per customer on specialty and limited release items means that more individuals can sample, share, and talk about the item in question. If one person buys multiple of something, that lowers the available stock. If one person buys a great deal of said stock, and the company already knows they are going to run out, it's poor business strategy. More customers who are unhappy with the lack of stock will bring their business elsewhere. It is, in that way, valid, the business competition theme of the show. The execution, however is not.

 

The Apple Family IS a business. A business, in modern times, (or even in many older times) would not be so cavalier as to risk everything on a competition with someone they know nothing about. It just makes no business sense. They sacrifice their home to show off to some doofuses they don't even know. Granny Smith knows business, even if she's a koot. She would not be so reckless as to risk her whole household family over some silly competition. Applejack is no doubt business-minded. It's like, the main focus of her on many episodes. She would not be taunted into such a risky bet. Being taunted is fine. Being homeless isn't.

 

The very framework of the episode is so unstable, not to mention my loathing for the song that just felt a LOT longer than it even was, just made this my absolute least favorite episode. It only has one close competitor. *end rant*

[Speedy_Dashie 11]

The Flim Flam brothers really ticked me off, especially their song.. sooo circus. And I never really seen Twilight cry honestly.. Or even Applejack..

[TheLuigiLightning 65]

The Flim Flam Brothers song is very catchy.  I think it's one of the best in the entire series.  It probably partly because all of the girls are usually singing the songs, and it's a nice change.

[PianoOfMuffins 38]

Likely this has been pointed out by literally the whole world before, although I still couldn't help but make a "thing" out of this:

 

 

From 4:06 into the episode.

Edited October 13, 2013 by PianoOfMuffins

[Batbrony 16,055]

Oh nelly, "The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000"!  This is a fun episode, to say the least, namely because it added a very fun fact to MLP canon: ponies like their liquor!    Yes, it appears that the ponies of Equestria have a nigh unquenchable thirst for what appears to be hard cider, to the point that apparently every single pony in all of Ponyville foregoes all of their business for days on end just to partake in Cider Season and get some delicious Sweet Apple Cider.  Can't really blame them, seeing as I'm quite the fan of hard cider myself, and if Sweet Apple Cider is as tasty as Angry Orchard's Crisp Apple Cider then I totally understand where they're coming from! 

 

Sweet Celestia these ponies like their cider!!!  

 

Now I'm not really exaggerating when I say that cider is at the center of what makes most of this episode a blast.  To be honest, it kinda really is.  Most of the jokes revolve around cider, a shortage of cider, or the making of cider.  The entire conflict is due to the Apple Family's inability to keep up with cider demands during Cider Season and their competition with Flim and Flam to be sole cider producers in Ponyville.  The episode starts with cider, it ends with cider, cider, cider, cider, cider, CIDER!!!  It's all over the place in this episode and it makes for a fun episode without much of a lesson but full of tons of humor, fun times, a compelling conflict, and of course, CIDER!!! 

 

I smell a catchy-as-buck Daniel Ingram musical number!!!  

 

Of course, there's more to this episode obviously than cider, namely two elements: (1) the Flim Flam Brothers, and (2) the not-lesson learned.  Let's start with the former.  The Flim Flam Brothers are kind of the first secondary antagonists the show had really had that the Mane 6 faced off against since, I want to say, the Diamond Dogs back in Season 1 (that's not counting Diamond Tiara, seeing as she's an antagonist to the CMC, not the Mane 6).  They enter the show with a bang, seeing the delightful "Flim Flam Brothers Song" which, up until this point in the show, was probably the most musically impressive song that Daniel Ingram had thrown together.  It's a hilarious and fun parody of "Ya Got Trouble" from "The Music Man" (a musical I've actually performed in myself, making the song all the more delightful to listen to), and to this day it remains one of my favorite songs of the entire show, and one of the only reasons I can't ever bring myself to dislike Flim or Flam that much, despite the fact that they prove themselves to be jerky con artists.  Actually, despite the obvious play of their name on the con artist term "flimflam", it doesn't feel right calling them con artists, namely because their machine actually works.  The Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000, when used properly, seems to make perfectly fine cider, and the episode, rather than being honest workers vs. con artists, is more John Henry vs. the Steam Drill (which the episode is actually an homage to).  In the end, it's really their sacrifice of quality that proves to be their downfall, for while they outpace the Apple Family and Mane 6, they end up producing terrible cider as a result, compromising the integrity of their product and leading to their being driven out of town.  Besides their less admirable qualities, the brothers, when they're not being arses, are kinda fun to watch, and unlike any other secondary characters the show's ever had before or since.  In fact, I kinda hope they even learned a lesson from all of this and are now doing honest work somewhere, simply because they're undeniably charismatic and you certainly wouldn't want guys like that to keep digging their own graves.

 

SWAG!!!  

 

Next, the not-lesson of the episode is fantastic as well.  It really is true what Applejack says at the end; she didn't learn anything because, really, all she does in this episode is put things she already knew to be true into practice.  She's grown up her whole life being taught that there is no substitute for hard work, honesty, and integrity in all activities, and her faith in that credo pays off.  In addition, she carries over a lesson that she'd learned in both "Apple Bucking Season" and the previous episode, "The Last Roundup", that being, she could always rely on her friends for help and support when she and her family needed it, and her faith in her friends pays off as well.  It's really great seeing the ponies, rather than learning a new lesson, simply putting what they've learned into practice in their lives, because that shows character growth and progression, and it's something we've seen more and more as the show has continued.  Finally, the not-lesson is also responsible for what is quite possibly the greatest trolling of Princess Celestia of all time, that being of course, AJ's delightful proclamation "Ah didn't learn anything!!!"   I'm sorry, but every time I hear her say that, I absolutely lose it.

 

Overall, "Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000" is an incredibly fun episode with cider, a great song, cider, lots of laughs, cider, a wonderful not-lesson, cider, a couple of fun secondary antagonists, cider, some touching interactions between the Mane 6, namely, their being there for Applejack and her family when she needs them most at a moment's notice, and of course, cider!  In the end, I think we can all agree that this is what we took away from this awesome episode. 

 

[Vertigo_95 572]

This episode was pretty good but i'm still disappointed about how easily the Flim-Flam brothers gave up because if you actually think about it they had a few good barrels of cider before they started to ruin it, but hey what can you do. I'm sorta relatable to a bunch of episodes. I know the pain of Rainbow Dash. Waiting in line expecting something for them to run out as soon as you get there. Just that I wasn't waiting for Cider, it was French Fries at school.

[Flim Skim 4]

Flim and Flam are best villains.

[Firehearted 120]

Flim and Flam. Where are they now? 

[Singe 2,111]

The show still leaves open that next year, the same problem will arise again with them running out of cider.

[Rift enchanted 380]

It's funny how hasbro was able to bring back flim and flam from this episode in season 4.

 

I'm pretty sure we also learned a valuable lesson from this episode.

[ShadOBabe 18,997]

I don't want to read through all 15 pages of this, but can someone explain why so many people hated Applejack saying she didn't learn anything?

I mean it was TRUE. It was an important lesson and her experience gave her validation. She wanted to share it.

 

She DIDN'T learn anything and she WAS right the whole time.

[Red Cedar 1,408]

I don't want to read through all 15 pages of this, but can someone explain why so many people hated Applejack saying she didn't learn anything?

I mean it was TRUE. It was an important lesson and her experience gave her validation. She wanted to share it.

 

She DIDN'T learn anything and she WAS right the whole time.

I personally thought that Applejack's assertion that she didn't learn anything was actually the most brilliantly original letter to Celestia in a long time, and probably of the entire series. I laughed myself out of my chair when she said it in the episode. She had the best friends she could hope for and she knew it, and they simply renewed her faith in and love of them. All in all, it wasn't so much a testament to her stubbornly refusing to learn as it was a heaping of praise upon her honourary family.

Just came to me recently: Aren't they just producing apple juice?

 

They are just squeezing the apples. There is no maturing, there is no fermentation and they are not using any bacteria cultures to speed up the progress. So as far as I can see there is no apple cider. :I

 

Besides the song of this episode was catchy as hell, still can't get the chorus out of my head.

(Well you've got opportunity In this very community)

Barring the differences in making alcoholic cider (which they obviously weren't going to do in a kids' show), apple juice (of the sort found in grocery stores) is filtered and typically pasteurized for preservation. Apple cider is unfiltered (and so is opaque because of the apple particles floating in it) and served raw. Therefore, what the Apples were selling appeared most definitely to be apple cider.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_cider

[Blue Bay 1,027]

 

Barring the differences in making alcoholic cider (which they obviously weren't going to do in a kids' show), apple juice (of the sort found in grocery stores) is filtered and typically pasteurized for preservation. Apple cider is unfiltered (and so is opaque because of the apple particles floating in it) and served raw. Therefore, what the Apples were selling appeared most definitely to be apple cider.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_cider

 

I guess the definition of apple cider has got a regional difference. Around my place for example it's simply defined as fizzy apple wine. Ordinary fermentation, carbon dioxide is added, that's the whole thing.

Thanks for the clarification though.

[ShadOBabe 18,997]

 

 

I personally thought that Applejack's assertion that she didn't learn anything was actually the most brilliantly original letter to Celestia in a long time, and probably of the entire series. I laughed myself out of my chair when she said it in the episode. She had the best friends she could hope for and she knew it, and they simply renewed her faith in and love of them. All in all, it wasn't so much a testament to her stubbornly refusing to learn as it was a heaping of praise upon her honourary family.

EXACTLY!!

I don't get the dislike of the line.

[stranger1212 3]

Oh  the Flim Flam Brothers, how I F***ING HATE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

 

But seriously it was awesome that AJ learned nothing

Edited April 21, 2014 by stranger1212

[Pastel 7,630]

Wonderful song, great ambiance, very interesting story and good moral: one of the best episodes of the season!

 

We need more episodes like this one.

[Sir Punicpunch 1,688]

I felt so bad for Rainbow Dash, especially when she ate the dirt just to drink the cider, that was horrible.