S01:E01+E02 - Friendship is Magic

[GrimGrimoire 4,973]

Watched the first episode, thinking it was gonna be another stupid kids' show to calm me down, and hopefully bore me to sleep, but was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. I loved the almost, 'fairy tale' style of the episodes. By the end of both episodes, I was completely convinced that it was not just a 'show that only little girls watch' afterwards. (Even though I am a little girl, but I'm not like 6 years old or anything, so I'm not that little, but still little in the sense that I'm under 18. Nevermind, please ignore this.)

 

 

Also, this is really stupid, but when I was introduced to Fluttershy, I almost cried because I felt like I finally found a character in a show that I could relate to. (I suffer from severe social anxiety.)

 

 

I kind of went into it with the same mindset... that it was going to be a dumb show for little kids or something and the best i could hope for was a solid laugh before changing the channel and forgetting about it... however... I too was surprised. With the very first episode i was actually intrigued and enjoyed it enough to want to see another, and then another.. and it just snowballed from there. So you are not alone in thinking the show was probably gonna be crap, and then discovering it most certainly is not.

 

Strangely enough it was also Fluttershy who hooked me, although Twilight became the character I gravitated towards because of similarities.

 

I think the intro did a perfect job of laying out the basic history, introducing the characters and building a world that is still growing to this day.

[GoddessRarity 48]

Once upon a time I was insecure about expressing my love for this show. I didn't know what people would think of me because of it. Then...I realized something...........I DON'T GIVE A FLYING FLUTTERSHY WHAT THEY THINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MLP FIM LIFE FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

[Zachary 5,521]

This episode got me into My Little Pony since I watched the 2nd Episode!

[Sovereign Leader Rarity 12,006]

My friends and peers were very confused when I informed them of my new passion for mlp. But you guys...you guys get it.

[LuminaraRose 22]

Just rewatched the first four episodes with a friend (against his will, muah haha) and loved it even more. I also finally realized the whole episode is about being afraid of the dark/not wanting to go to bed. It only took me watching it 3 times for it to click . That made me like it even more since it's dealing with a real issue for it's target demo (ie, not me).

[Tropico 226]

I'm rewatching the show and I just watched these two. as a note: i rewatched all the season premieres/finales lots of times but the rest of episodes just once except a few ones that i love (specially rarity's ones  ), but only rewatched them before summer 2015.  so rewatching them all now 2017 its pretty new and refreshing, cause i dont remember a lots of them and less their jokes xD so i laugh like its new xD

 

I remembered this premiere a lil less childish and more fast-paced, but still I loved to see the begging of the show. btw Seasons 5&6 tend to be hated saying they differ from the first seasons but they feel so much elaborated than the first ones, I love them too.

I love how grumpy and anti social is twilight at first. Also a lil shady. Recent seasons have a so much more bland twilight which is a shame. At least now we have starlight that she is a bit like first seasons twilight xD

Celestia knew about the profecy and sent twilight to make friends so she could defeat nightmare moon. But how she knew she could defeat her just making friends? And couldn't Celestia herself make some friends and defeat her?   XD

Also Apple jack telling twilight to trust her and let go at the riff and nothing more. I'm like wtf just tell her that the Pegasus will catch you! XD also I realized how egocentric and annoying rainbow dash its since EP 1 ugh I can't stand her worst pony imo

And I love the painted intro so much. Very beautiful. I wish they made more flashbacks/legends told with that style.

I enjoyed watching the episodes again tho. Very nice<3

Edited February 21, 2017 by Tropico

[princess_flutterpie 3]

It could have been a little better but it was good enough to keep me watching for 5 years. I would give it a 9/10.

[blackstarraven 142]

I must be the only person it would seam that went in knowing it was not going to be stupid.
I only say this because I have never seen anything that Faust has done that was "Bad"
I have seen stuff I don't like. (Fosters, I know Sacrilege) But I openly aknolwedge that the show is brilliant. Just not my thing.

And I also kind of figured the show would have good world building.

And If you want to sell me on a show you need two things.

#1: A character I can relate to or sympathies with.

#2: WORLD BUILDING... 

-

And this episode has both in spades.

The show literally starts with some of the most watchable exposition I can think of.. yes it is a children show and you more or less need to except that, because that is the kind of exposition we are talking about. Your basically going to listen to a short fairy tail at the start of this show. And Its a great lead in for the show. - But right away we also get something important about this show. It strait out gives a sympathetic back story to the villain for the episode. Few shows do this. And even fewer children's shows.

The first introduction of each character is strait and to the point without actually being over the top... most of the time.

Our first encounter with twilight makes it clear she's not really much of a... umm.. pony.. pony? Ponies Pony?.... She's a book worm, and, well. She's OCD, I mean kids are not going to pick up on this, but its pretty clear to adult viewers that this Pony has some social and personal quirks. And that's great. Having a strait up perfect main protagonist is lame even by children standards, and I'm glad that cartoons in general have stepped away from them.

Also a great vocabulary joke..... Twilight actually talks like a bookworm/academic, and the show knows that some viewers are not going to get it.. and this leads into a wonderful joke with Spike and his letter.

-

The character introductions are.... Well...

Pilot...ish.

Its clear this is a pilot to a adult viewer..

And while the character introductions might suffer from this, they are by no means bad, and by pilot standards there quite good.... Except for... THE PINK ONE...

Side Note #1: ~Boo, Booo Pinkie Pie... your bad.~

Side Note #2: That was not 10 seconds flat Rainbowdash... Its was 7.8 Seconds. I know... I checks...

Side Note #3: Sexy pony.. is sexy?.... ~Shrug~...

Also... French is a thing in Equestria... Apparently..

Also... Also... Casanova is a thing?... Darn it Rarity why you have to cause so much OCD Continunity issues in my AMAZING BRAIN!

 

But... Then there is nightmare moon.. and I'll be honest out of all character in this, this is the one I have the issue with. And its not because of the voice acting or the character or anything like that... its because I really just am not feeling the character design.

Side Note #4: Hehe... you foal.. Hehe.. Pony pun...

 

The 2nd part of the pilot takes us into the everyfree forest. Giving us some more good world building. And we get the part of the show where each one of the main six shows off there connection as a element of bla bla bla... This part actually dives really deep into the entire concept of DESTINY!

This is pretty deep meta stuff that kids are not going to think of, but really having all six of them there. Its a matter of destiny, or the Elements of Harmony are really not as picky as we think they are. (More on that latter) - This also leads into a train of thought of how music QUEEN! Celesta... PRAISE THE SUN! - knows about what is going to happen.. Like is she just rolling the dice, or does she know the future? I'm betting on her being drunk the whole time and watching everything happen like.

Nah! TWILI WILL HANDLE SIS, YOU GOT THIS!

It also occurs to me that the first song in the whole show is from... The pink one...

 

Bla bla bla...

Dramatic Showdown...

AND THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP!

 

AND THEN EMPRESS CELESTIA! THE EMPRESSES LIGHT IS MY TORCH!

Also.. Luna.. I guess.

No no. I joke WUNA is adorable in this.

I like the later Luna more, but this smaller more fragile look at her is nice, its a good end point to the fairy tale aspect of the story.... And then the Pink one Ruins it... Like everything....

 

What I mean to say is.

Hail the moon and Praise the sun!

Our eternal Goddess Empresses are return to us!

 

-

But look, it a over all great fairy tale story.

Its not hard for a adult to watch.
Its not hard for a MALE to watch.

There is a real reason that this is so popular with adult and male Viewers.

The story is just left to be its own thing. There is no need to make things COOL or RAD! Its a kind of adventure story where marketing it left up to good characters and good story telling. Its a good example of how quality can over come demographic boundaries.

5 out of 5...

Except for the pink one....

Edited October 2, 2017 by blackstarraven

[ChaigeleyJacob 15]

On 30/03/2017 at 0:06 AM, princess_flutterpie said:

It could have been a little better but it was good enough to keep me watching for 5 years. I would give it a 9/10.

That episode alone wouldn't have kept me on for 5 years, the next episode though! Wow!

[ChaigeleyJacob 15]

On 11/01/2017 at 4:36 PM, GoddessRarity said:

Once upon a time I was insecure about expressing my love for this show. I didn't know what people would think of me because of it. Then...I realized something...........I DON'T GIVE A FLYING FLUTTERSHY WHAT THEY THINK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MLP FIM LIFE FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

Thats easier said than done...

[bronyboy824824 2]

I thought the first episode was alright. Not much else to say.

[Thrond 3,263]

Cute. 

This is a pilot, so it was never gonna be the best episode to go back to, but even just watching this one episode does remind me of why I got into this show to begin with. The show doesn't feel like this anymore, and I think the high points of later seasons are definitely higher (excepting the finale, of course), but right now I'm feeling the urge to go back and re-watch the entire first three seasons all over again. The show can probably never be like this again, but I do wish it would find an alternative which allowed it to be as fun and relaxed as these early seasons. It just tries too hard lately. 

The characterization found here is a bit different from even later in this season, though. Rainbow Dash is less coarse, and Fluttershy is actually shy rather than cowardly. Twilight seems really disinterested in friendship until the end there, but even by that point she naturally takes her usual preachy leadership position. That said, Rainbow Dash already shows some of her subtler nuances, like not actually buying into her own boasting - when the Shadowbolts mention "the best flyer in Equestria," she assumes it's someone else. She's confident mainly because she knows what she's capable of, but she still has some modesty. I really don't think she gets enough credit. 

Plot-wise, this has a lot of fuzzy vagueness to it, and the worldbuilding is clearly just cute window dressing for a character-driven story, even though the "Nightmare Moon" mythology is quite fun on its own terms. I guess it's later episodes which made people so invested in the show's lore, because it's very lightweight and unimportant here. Definitely works for pushing Twilight towards friendship, though, and it puts the pieces in play for the season's character arcs. I bet Celestia made Twilight staying in Ponyville the new focus of her studies entirely because Twilight wouldn't stay otherwise, but later events imply she had some kind of plan... meh, I'll just choose to ignore that. 

Score:

Entertainment: 8/10

Characters: 9/10 (I mean, you've gotta give it credit for introducing everything.)

Themes: 8/10

Story: 7/10

Overall: 80/100

[Jeric 46,850]

I am shocked that I hadn't voted for this one. 

Rated it a 3. 

The first episode was actually decent, it was the conclusion that was clunky and had some poorly constructed moments (like AJ's Honesty 'challenge') 

 

[Pippinjack 12]

I found this episode to be decent. Not really great, but I guess okay for a pilot to present the cast and each characters quirks.

It's not the only show I liked that only had a mediocre first episode. (thinking of Avatar: The Last Airbender. That introduction also didn't really get me) When I started watching MLP, I saw some random episodes (I can't actually remember what my very first one was) and they were great - I wonder whether I had continued watching MLP had I started with the pilot.

[JadeSerpent 7]

I liked it, but it was too cheesy and pinkie pie annoyed the crap out of me. But, I stuck through it!

[bubblyNightmare 9]

Ok so I really enjoyed these episodes but I feel like it was false advertisement in a way? The rest of the season is so happy and I feel like I hallucinated this dark beginning together with any hints of a plot. The series right now feels very much like an episodic type of thing and while I'm pro character-driven stories, I feel like there should exist an overall arc when there isn't. I'd rate this pilot a 4/5 with the rest of the season at a 2.5/5. (I love princess luna/nightmare moon though. Her design is lovely)

[TwiTracker 973]

I liked this episode alot, but by far not one of my favourites.

The plot line was brilliant! The pilot to one of the best shows around today, and introduced one of mt favourite Villians Nightmare Moon <3

There were countless things I didn’t necessarily enjoy, such as the fact that Nightmare Moon didnt just destroy the elements immediately upon discovery, which was when Twilight and co. Were still in Ponyville. Or even better, if she just upfront dealt with them, given her immense power being an Alicorn with what I’d assume more powerful magic than Celestia, given the Season 4 premiere flashback.

However, in general, enjoyable.

Id rate it a solid 4.5/5 

[Buttonmash1973 1,026]

This month marks the7th year of FiM

[Sparky Hoof 78]

The regret is real in this episode for me. This was the moment I realized that I really shouldn't have made fun of those kids in elementary school for always talking about MLP. After watching this, I instantly fell in love with the show. 

Oh, the irony...

[blackstarraven 142]

Stuff.

Stuff and things...

 

 A

[Forest 35]

it was a great pilot show, and it made me fall in love and want more lol! princess luna looks amazing and her transformation and making up with princess celestia was prefect 

[Twilight Luna 31,345]

The pilot was very good. It did some world building, introduced the characters, and set up the rest of the series. What more could you want?

[NathanW200 306]

I enjoyed this part of the series a lot I got to experience how enjoyable the characters personalities where and how they all became friends with Twilight

[Wonderbolt Slipstream 263]

I think this was a good start to starting the show, it wasn't the same old "new hero defeats the enemy" the mane 6 saved Luna from herself. Although...now that I think about it, they really didn't know what the elements would do...🤔

[Meushell 52]

Aw. I can’t vote.

It’s good at introducing so many characters, then getting into the plot. The only thing that sort of bugs is Applejack’s honesty test seemed kind of forced. Why wouldn’t she just tell Twilight that Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy were behind her? It would still be honest.

Are Nightmare Moon and Luna the same person, or is there more to it? Like she used too much of the dark side and it took over her? The instant change in personality after being defeated came off as a sort of possession. That and that she basically gave them the means to gain the power of each element makes me think that Luna really wanted to lose.