Unpopular Opinions Regarding the Show

[heavens-champion 1,905]

Cozy Glow is not an impressive villain. Normal looking pony? Starlight Glimmer did it better. Manipulative? Discord did it better. Draining Equestria of its magic? Tirek did it better. Unless Cozy Glow can manipulate entire nations, turn one of the heroes evil, and shoot lightning out of her hooves, I am not impressed.

[O-78 28,606]

Pinkie Pie should have been the one to reform Discord, not Fluttershy

Starlight Glimmer > Sunset Shimmer

Cozy Glow is the worst villain in the whole show

Seasons 2 & 3 sucked and are by far the worst seasons of the show (when binging the first six seasons in 2017, I nearly quit after S3)

Canon x canon shipping is stupid

Babs Seed is the worst character in the show's history

I'm not actually that sad about the show ending, I just hope it goes out with a bang

[Here No Longer 5,276]

I'm not distressed at all that it's ending.

[Flutterstep 47,073]

The mane 6 are very 2-dimensional 

[Misty Shadow 7,866]

-I don't believe any episode of the show has ever been close to being unwatchably bad.

-I don't believe any season of the show is bad.

-I've never been a big fan of background characters.

-I still really like Pinkie Pie and was shocked to learn a lot of people hate her now.

-I have high hopes for G5 being good. 

[DonMaguz 1,023]

27 minutes ago, CloudMistDragon said:

- I have high hopes for G5 being good. 

I wouldn't say high in my case, but I'm definitely very curious about it and think it will be a great show.

It still can be a great show which doesn't grab my attention though.

[Them's Seeing Ponies 282]

I find The Times They Are A Changeling to be merely an average/lower end of 'decent' episode. There's a lack of the more glaring structural flaws that define the show's worst episodes as a whole (including the episode directly preceding it) yet I simply don't happen to find the episode particularly satisfying - while I admire that the situation of a changeling infiltration is treated in-universe with appropriate gravitas (it's a shame that they were seldom, if not ever, used to their full potential in that capacity), the episode is also overly dramatic through most of its runtime (which led to the impression of the staff straining too hard to inform the audience of the story's grandiosity and in turn scenes like Spike and Thorax's reconciliation and the ending come off as more hokey than emotionally driven to me) and Spike and Thorax's actual chemistry is surprisingly shallow, which lends Spike's constant reiteration of Thorax as 'his friend' kind of artificial. I appreciate the show attempting to tackle this type of premise, but, while they at least created a (mostly) functional plot on a technical level, I feel they fell short in giving the topic the additional layers of nuance it actually deserved (perhaps spreading Thorax's gradual acceptance into pony society would have lent more weight to this episode, his character and the S6 finale, instead of, y'know, pointless and tedious filler such as Buckball Season and PPOV?).

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Pinkie's character has degraded as the show has gone on. She's become a lot more annoying to have on the screen.

I agree wholeheartedly. The main issue, from watching S1-7 over the past five months or so, seems to lie in the balance of traits underlying her character. During the Faust seasons (S1-2), Pinkie was presented in a far more 'human' light, with her main character traits being her optimism and quirkiness and her corresponding cartoonish antics stemming from her fun-loving nature (with an edge of savviness to her treatment of these moments), whilst Pinkie from S4 and onwards is written as more of an over-the-top gag machine whose wacky antics (which she now executes almost religiously as opposed to lightheartedly, giving an air of delusion at times) are more the central point of her character, which has led to her appearances becoming more grating than in S1-2. 

Edited March 12, 2019 by Them's Seeing Ponies

[Castle Bleck 19,354]

I'm disappointed by...

 

Sombra

...returning in S9, because it means...

 

s***canning all his development and lore from the comics and putting him right back at square one as a Generic Doomsday Villain (not to mention likely reducing him to a glorified Snoke just to put Grogar over). #NotMyKingSombra

Edited August 7, 2019 by Anti-Villain

[Black Sabbath 2,486]

Starlight's motivation for creating her cult wasn't really that bad. Especially when compared to the other villains' motivations. 

 

[DonMaguz 1,023]

10 minutes ago, Black Sabbath said:

Starlight's motivation for creating her cult wasn't really that bad. Especially when compared to the other villains' motivations. 

 

What do you mean by 'Starlight's motivation'?

[Black Sabbath 2,486]

Just now, DonMaguz said:

What do you mean by 'Starlight's motivation'?

You know, the fact that the reason she started her cult in the first place was because her friend moved away.

[DonMaguz 1,023]

Just now, Black Sabbath said:

You know, the fact that the reason she started her cult in the first place was because her friend moved away.

Ohh that one... then you're wrong.

That's the reason she became afraid of making new friends, which eventually led to her thinking Cutie Marks and special talents were a problem. Her motivation to start her cult was to spread her misguided view on Cutie Marks and friendship, because she never had a friend after Sunburst's departure.

Saying Starlight started a cult because she lost her friend is like saying Messi is one of the best soccer players in history because people in Argentina didn't give him a chance as a juvenile, it's a stepping stone but definitely not the direct motivation.

[bigbertha 414]

-Seasons 2 and 3 are the only good seasons from 1-6

-I love The Mysterious Mare Do Well

-The show went downhill after season 3

-Newbie Dash is great

-I love Spike at Your Service (though it's more as a guilty pleasure)

-Despite hating Stare Master, I like The Show Stoppers

-I don't like Dragonshy, Applebuck Season, Return of Harmony, Princess Twilight Sparkle, Rarity Takes Manehattan, Twilight's Kingdom, The Cutie Map, Amending Fences, Crusaders of the Lost Mark, and The Mane Attraction, with the last two being on my bottom 5 of the series

-Stranger Than Fan Fiction is the only 10/10 episode in seasons 4-6

-I dislike more than half the episodes in season 5

-Despite liking Gauntlet of Fire, I don't think it's the best Spike episode. I think both Equestria Games and Just for Sidekicks are better

-I like Pinkie Pride, but it's nowhere near my top 5 or top 10 of the series

-I kinda like One Bad Apple. It's not exactly good, but I look back at it positively overall

-Simple Ways is in my top 5 favorite episodes of seasons 4-6

-Aside from Make New Friends But Keep Discord and To Where and Back Again (if that counts), I don't like any of Discord's episodes.

 

 

[Sovereign Leader Rarity 12,006]

1) Queen Chrysalis is a vastly overrated character and villain.

2) My least favourite season of the show is neither 3 nor 6.

3) Shadow Play (part 1, at least) was just straight-up not a very good episode.

Edited March 14, 2019 by Rarity the Supreme

[heavens-champion 1,905]

Season 6 abused the use of funny faces. Take Fluttershy's breakdown in Buckball Season for example.

"Friends Are Always There For You" feels like it was a little forced, now that I think about it. I'm starting to understand why the finales after The Cutie Re-Mark don't have any songs, now.

If they weren't going to make Rainbow Dash a more important character, they shouldn't have made her Sonic Rainboom so important. But then, we wouldn't have War Dash, would we?

Edited March 21, 2019 by heavens-champion

[TheAnimationFanatic 3,594]

Most of the arguments about the show peaking in Seasons 1-3 are by people with rose tinted nostalgia goggles.

[bigbertha 414]

-I have no idea why people dislike Flurry Heart. She's just a cute baby and she doesn't need to be anything more. I've heard arguments that she messes with alicorn lore, but that makes no sense. It's simple genetics. 

-Putting Your Hoof Down is decent

-The Cutie Re-Mark is one of my favorite finales

-Season 3 is the best looking season

-Season 3 in general is really solid and my 2nd favorite season

-I like Fake It Till' You Make It

-I hate what the show has been doing with Celestia recently

-The show isn't good overall

[JH24 385]

- I still think "Newbie Dash" ranks as one of the better episodes for Rainbow Dash in terms of character development.

- It still irks me that Starlight was treated much more leniently by the Mane 6 than Discord ever was.

Edited August 7, 2019 by JH24

[CypherHoof 26,483]

1 hour ago, bigbertha said:

-I have no idea why people dislike Flurry Heart. She's just a cute baby and she doesn't need to be anything more. I've heard arguments that she messes with alicorn lore, but that makes no sense. It's simple genetics. 

It gives an important part of alicorn lore - that alicorns were previously made, not born - that contradicts a LOT of fan headcanon, not least because it also contradicts some of the stuff in the books.  there isn't anything not to love about Flurry Heart herself though (and Applegeek's reaction to the heart shattering is epic...)

 

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-Putting Your Hoof Down is decent

It shows a side to Fluttershy many fans didn't want to see.  She lets her new-found assertiveness training go to her head, and as one of the most OP ponies in the Mane 6 (and that's saying something!) you really don't want that to happen.

 

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-The Cutie Re-Mark is one of my favorite finales

Its an important episode in Starlight's development, and the last few scenes (where she accepts she is on a self-destructive path and places herself and her fate in Twilight's hooves) are some of the best in the show - but the various distopias are painful to watch or re-watch.

 

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-Season 3 is the best looking season

-Season 3 in general is really solid and my 2nd favorite season

I feel one of the great tragedies of the show is how they cut short S3 and rushed Twi's ascension; had they had more time, I am sure they would have made it less forced - but the "unfinished spell" is a massive cop-out; on it's own, it is a decent episode, the ascension of Twi, with celestia celebrating her achievements and growth, nothing wrong there, but joining the two and making one frankenstein's monster out of them? blech.

If they could have had a set of episodes where Twi had to show her mastery of an Element (where the resolution required Twi to be more honest than she wanted to be, or show loyalty to spike say) for each Element, then a final episode where she demonstrated her mastery of Magic (not unlike Boast Busters) would have fitted better.

 

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-I like Fake It Till' You Make It

I could see the trainwreck coming and it made me uncomfortable, first time though, because Hoof Down.

On a rewatch, I could see Fluttershy adopting each persona due to her insecurity, and "method acting", and just like Hoof Down, she took things too far, but I could see where she was going with that (each persona had given her success and more confidence, and if a little worked well, maybe a lot would work better?). While I didn't think much of SnootyFly, FlutterGoth and HipsterShy were awesome (and adorable, in their own ways)

Where I still dislike the episode is after she has discarded her personas, she is fitted for her "warrior of inner strength" dress, and then is mean to the bratty fashion pony; she has apparently forgotten the lesson she learned in Hoof Down, that she can use her inner strength to be strong and not be a doormat, without having to be aggressive or mean.

 

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-I hate what the show has been doing with Celestia recently

I am not too sure where they are going with that. They started early at normalizing 'tia's relationship to her subjects (look at the scene with the Cakes, way back in season 1, where she fools them into refilling an already full cup, but also note how terrified all the ponies are of offending her; clearly, she has not always had or wanted such a good relationship with her subjects, and you have to wonder if Luna has had something to do with that)

Horseplay though, was... odd.

 

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-The show isn't good overall

In my opinion, the show was and is one of the best; since the very early days, the writers have taken the fandom into consideration, and that is a good thing (look at Derpy for example, although I still don't think the retroactive edit was justified) but it occupies a unique moment in time - it came into being just as it became possible for something like the Brony fandom to happen; it had a cohesive storyline, compelling and complex characters, a simple and wholesome moral fabric and a simple but effective graphical style that pushed the boundaries of what you could do in Flash animation.

As the show has grown, it has spread out; we have explored new races (while not really seeing much of old ones; we still know only of one Zebra and one Minotaur, but have yaks, hippogryphs and two varieties of changeling), the crystal empire (and ponies), and now Kirin.  We have had the Table and it's friendship missions, finally met various parents and aunts, and seen the return of the Pillars. Some are unhappy that the show has grown beyond its core of the Mane 6, in Ponyville and sometimes Canterlot, solving problems with friendship (or failing that, a rainbow-coloured bitchslap) but I don't think you could carry 9 seasons (and specials, and spinoffs) on just that. For a show that essentially exists to sell toys, that isn't bad.

 

Edited August 7, 2019 by CypherHoof

[bigbertha 414]

1 hour ago, CypherHoof said:

I feel one of the great tragedies of the show is how they cut short S3 and rushed Twi's ascension; had they had more time, I am sure they would have made it less forced - but the "unfinished spell" is a massive cop-out; on it's own, it is a decent episode, the ascension of Twi, with celestia celebrating her achievements and growth, nothing wrong there, but joining the two and making one frankenstein's monster out of them? blech.

If they could have had a set of episodes where Twi had to show her mastery of an Element (where the resolution required Twi to be more honest than she wanted to be, or show loyalty to spike say) for each Element, then a final episode where she demonstrated her mastery of Magic (not unlike Boast Busters) would have fitted better.

Yeah despite how much I like season 3, Magical Mystery Cure is a mess. It's the first example of the show rushing to a conclusion without enough build up. Twilight was not originally  supposed to ascend that early into the series and it shows. The staff tried to shove some progression into season 3 with The Crystal Empire and Magic Duel to an extent, but it still comes off as unnatural because it's clear she wasn't supposed to ascend for a while.

 

1 hour ago, CypherHoof said:

I am not too sure where they are going with that. They started early at normalizing 'tia's relationship to her subjects (look at the scene with the Cakes, way back in season 1, where she fools them into refilling an already full cup, but also note how terrified all the ponies are of offending her; clearly, she has not always had or wanted such a good relationship with her subjects, and you have to wonder if Luna has had something to do with that)

Horseplay though, was... odd.

Having Celestia show different sides of her personality is fine, but at this point she feels like a completely different character. Instead of working off the foundation set by the early seasons, I feel like the staff are wiping the slate clean and starting fresh with her. Between Dark and Dawn is the worst example.

1 hour ago, CypherHoof said:

As the show has grown, it has spread out; we have explored new races (while not really seeing much of old ones; we still know only of one Zebra and one Minotaur, but have yaks, hippogryphs and two varieties of changeling), the crystal empire (and ponies), and now Kirin.  We have had the Table and it's friendship missions, finally met various parents and aunts, and seen the return of the Pillars. Some are unhappy that the show has grown beyond its core of the Mane 6, in Ponyville and sometimes Canterlot, solving problems with friendship (or failing that, a rainbow-coloured bitchslap) but I don't think you could carry 9 seasons (and specials, and spinoffs) on just that. For a show that essentially exists to sell toys, that isn't bad.

One of my big problems with the newer stuff is how unfocused it is. The show doesn't want to abandon its roots so there's still a lot of slice of life stuff, but it also wants to do story arcs. This has caused problems in every season since season 3. Season 3 rushed Twilight's ascension. Season 4 ignored Twilight's ascension for most of the season. Season 5 ignored Starlight for most of the season and explained nothing about the Cutie Map. Season 6 also ignored Starlight for most of the season. Season 7 started the pillar arc halfway through and only characterized one of the pillars past one basic trait. Season 8 barely characterized the Student Six past basic tropes and ignored Neighsay and Cozy for most of the season. And while season 9 is definitely doing the best so far at actually addressing its story arcs, it's too little too late.

And that's just the seasons failing at their current arcs. The pillars got one followup episode in season 8 that just hand waved away most of them without giving them any more personality. The Student Six are still as basic as ever. Nobody cares about the Cutie Map anymore. And the School of Friendship is being shoved off to Starlight to make room for a new arc of the Main Six being put in charge of Equestria, something that has not been built up to in the slightest. The staff is so obsessed with throwing in new ideas that they ignore what they've already established. Why not have another flash back episode with the Main Six? What was the dynamic in Ponyville before Twilight showed up? Let's check in with Gilda and see how Griffonstone is doing. Let's check in on Diamond Tiara. Let's look at Pinkie Sense again. How about Discord's past? Or Celestia and Luna's? Are there more Zebras than Zecora? How about another look into Equestria's past, maybe picking up where Hearth's Warming Eve left off? We still don't know that much about Starlight's past. The Crystal Empire is still shrouded in mystery. Dark magic completely vanished after The Crystal Empire aside from one bit in Princess Twilight Sparkle. Why can't we explore different kinds of magic like that dark magic and get some material out of that? I'm sure it'd be more interesting than the pointless, underdeveloped new additions we've been getting. 

And that's not even getting into the slice of life stuff.

[Will Guide 21,360]

2 hours ago, CypherHoof said:

I feel one of the great tragedies of the show is how they cut short S3 and rushed Twi's ascension; 

The real reason Season 3 was only 13 episodes was because they were initially contracted to make 65 episodes which were spread over 3 seasons. 26 for S1, 26 for S2, and the remaining 13 episodes went to S3. The popularity of the show during the first few seasons convinced the higher ups to make more and so the S3 Finale had to be changed from its original ending to what we got in the end. Simple as that.

[RulesofRarity 493]

Shadow Play is probably the worst finale after The Cutie Remark, to be honest.

[heavens-champion 1,905]

I see no problem with villains being reformed. I mean, I get it, already. You hate forgiveness. But if that's not the case, than what is, because I pretty much expect most villains in a show about friendship to get redeemed. Come on. What's the big deal?

Edited August 10, 2019 by heavens-champion

[TheAnimationFanatic 3,594]

I generally think that Josh Haber handles Twilignt better than Meghan McCarthy.

[Lucky Bolt 35,063]

Tempest Shadow is grossly overrated. Her and Spitfire both