In these last hours...

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I sit here and I wonder... how bad will it be?

Because I'm going to lay it out for you... there's no way that this finale isn't going to suck.

I'm sure I sound like a pessimist and somebody crying "RUINED FOREVAR" at the moment, so let me be perfectly clear... over the past few weeks I've turned this over in my head so many times, to the point that I feel pretty much numb to it. And that's allowed me a new perspective on the situation at hand. One basically set completely in logic rather than emotion and knee-jerking at this point, due to the aforementioned numbness. And no matter what way I look over the current situation, there is no outcome in which there is a lack of suck.

So... in these last hours before the brony fandom is put to the ultimate test... in these last hours before I, and many other people potentially decide to pack up and leave... let's go over the situation at hand.

Alicorn Twilight.

This episode won't suck simply because Twilight becomes an Alicorn. As far as ideas in general go... it's not even necessarily a particularly bad one. Heck, when you get right down to it, it's a better concept than "reforming Discord" was, and even that COULD have been okay, if they hadn't given the job to Dave "Crapmaster" Polsky and had made it a two-parter like they should have.

No, the reason this episode is going to suck is twofold. And it's not so simple as "Twilight can't become an Alicorn because that ruins my headcanon/fanfiction/whatever other reason you may come up with."

The first reason this episode is going to suck is because they're biting off way more they can chew.

How long is an episode of MLP? About 22 minutes. Now let's think of everything they're going to have to do in those twenty-two minutes. They're going to have to...
1) Open the episode,
2) Present the problem at hand,
3) Show the general results of the problem whilst identifying the issue,
4) Find the solution to the problem, and
5) Resolve the problem.

In a normal episode, this would be fine. you could do all this easily. However, this particular episode seeks to load itself down by adding these next stages:
6) Find the time to put in AT LEAST four songs, and, if rumors are true, seven of them,
7) Find a way to make Twilight into an Alicorn,
8) Explain how and why Twilight became an Alicorn making sure that it isn't a BS explanation (very important),
9) Have Twilight go through her coronation ceremony thing
10) have a proper denouement to both the episode and season.

In other words, they're putting the content of TWO episodes into one twenty-two minute episode.

There is no way they're going to make this work.

Ah, but I should trust the authors, right? I should just trust them that they're going to make something spectacular and wonderful. After all, isn't that what they always do?

Well... no. In fact, I'd say "absolutely not."

This past season has been, in a word, disappointing. Of all the episodes so far, there have been only three that I haven't been able to look at and point out a whole bunch of mistakes and errors. "Sleepless in Ponyville, Just for Sidekicks, and Games Ponies Play." And I'm actually a little iffy on that last one. Every single other episode, has had something very, VERY wrong with it. Whether it be only a little bit wrong with it, like "Magic Duel" where the big problem was the pacing was too fast and it really needed to be a two-parter to really reach its full potential... to a single mistake that tainted the whole episode like the 'mass murder' scene in "Too Many Pinkie Pies"... to a single character being woefully destroyed like in "Spike at your Service" while everything else in the episode was actually pretty good... to the episodes where everything that could have gone wrong did, like "Keep Calm and Flutter On."

In every episode, save for the three I mentioned, there was something very wrong. Something that made almost every episode this season into ultimately a disappointing experience.

So... no. I don't trust the authors. I don't believe in M. A. Larson. And really, neither should you. Because for the past twelve episodes, none of them save Corey Powell have given us any reason to trust them.

Especially since M. A. Larson's only other episode this season was "Magic Duel." And as I said, that episode's big problem was not having enough time to accomplish everything that episode should have accomplished, leaving the pacing rushed and many things feeling half finished. Magic Duel was a relatively simple plot too. Basically, just "Twilight vs. Trixie." And he couldn't even deliver fully on that. So how do you think he's going to fare with this monster of an episode?

It's not going to work.

"But the last time everybody cried about something horrible like this was at the end of Season 2 with Cadance!" everybody cries. "And we all saw how that went, right? Everybody loved those episodes!"

Keep telling yourselves that.

First of all, the reason that event was anywhere NEAR passable was because they had two episodes to work with. Cadance would never have been NEARLY developed enough if there hadn't been two episodes.

Secondly, you assume that the Season 2 finale was 'amazing.'

It wasn't.

It wasn't terrible, really. It was average. Run of the mill. Middle of the road. Its most fascinating feature really was just how perfectly its phenomenally good aspects were balanced out by its horrendously bad aspects, leading to little more than a rousing cry of 'meh.' But the only reason it even reached that level in the first place was because it had two episodes to work with. This time, we do not.


But you know what? Okay. Let's assume a hypothetical here. Let's assume that, by some combined grace of God, Buddha, Allah, Siva, Zeus, and Cthulhu that M. A. Larson actually manages to pull it off. Somehow, the stars align and this episode is actually, somehow, written well and not paced too quickly and everything from a narrative standpoint comes out perfectly.

In the end, it's still going to suck.

You know why?

Because there's nowhere to go from here. This is the show blowing its load.

Think about this for a minute. Really REALLY think about it.

Twilight has become an Alicorn. Where do you go from here?

Do you send Twilight back to Ponyville and have things basically go on as normal? That wouldn't work. After such a dramatic change and shift in the status quo there is no way she could logically do that in context, not to mention the fact that it would be terribly terribly anticlimactic, leaving all of season 4 feeling like a boring slog through molasses.

Do you attempt to move the show on to "bigger and better" things? The please enlighten me what in the world could possibly be bigger and better than ascending a character to nigh-godhood? (and please, don't argue the 'Alicorns aren't gods' thing. Because, in the old, Hellenistic sense, they are.)

Once you achieve something like godhood, there is nowhere to go but down.

This is the sort of thing that should have been saved for a show finale. Not just a season finale, and definitely not so early a season as season three.

Not to mention just how little sense Twilight becoming an Alicorn at this stage makes. I mean think about it for a minute. Think.

Do you really think that Twilight is ready to become a Princess? To basically enter the highest political level Equestria has?

Let's remember that Twilight panics at the drop of a hat. If her schedule gets even the teeniest bit out of order, she flies right of the handle. If there's even the slightest hint of danger or that something might be going wrong, she goes into an outright frenzy.

Being at the top of the food chain in politics means that your schedule is ALWAYS on the fritz and EVERYBODY is breathing down your neck EVERY SECOND OF EVERY DAY.

Does that really sound like something Twilight is ready for?

And even if, hypothetically, she was ready on a mental level... is she really responsible enough to hold such power? Let's review some of the things she's done...
- Brainwashed the whole town into nearly killing each other over a doll, just because she had a late paper.
- Accidentally set ravenous parasprites on the whole town
- Caused an avalanche after bringing a snowplow to life
- Meddled with the fabric of time and space, and lastly...
- Messed around with dark magic.

At the end of the day... Twilight Sparkle is the LAST pony I want to see in power. In fact... come to think of it... I'd be more inclined to see ANY of the other Mane 6 in power before her.

To sum up, Twilight is not ready for this. No matter what anyone tries to say.

But honestly, that wouldn't be a problem at all. They could still make her an Alicorn... if they'd bother to give her more development.

This is why I say it's too early. If they had waited... spent more time over the next season or two developing her, making her more calm and responsible, perhaps have an episode where she actually takes over for the mayor for a weekend or something and give her some experience with politics or something... make it obvious that she's changing and growing as a person... then I could believe it.

What's really funny is that it looked like they were setting up such an arc at the end of the Crystal Empire. Remember that book that Celestia and Luna were looking at? I, like many others, assumed that it was a book of prophecies or something, and that, after some of the more important events of the show, we'd cut to Celestia and Luna, looking over the book and sharing knowing glances and nodding or something as they realized that it was all coming to pass or something. Setting up an arc or something, slowly leading up to this.

Sadly, no. We've barely seen Celestia at all this season. She had a non-speaking role in Magic Duel and showed up for twenty seconds in Keep Calm and Flutter On, in an appearance that was SO out of character and incredibly irresponsible that it almost outright ruined her as a character right then and there.

As for Luna, she had a pretty big supporting role in Sleepless in Ponyville, but beyond that, zip.

And the book? Well, apparently it's an unfinished spellbook or journal or something by Starswirl the Bearded that's going to show up in the next episode and be some macguffin if the latest leaked clip is any indication.

So much for that plot. So much for stretching it out and building tension over several seasons, or some other sound narrative decision.
And now, like I said, they're blowing their load. This is basically the TV show equivalent of premature ejaculation. They've reached the logical high point of the series and it's only Season 3. It's all downhill from here. There is nothing left to do.



Oddly enough, I think the worst thing they've said so far is that they're 'not going to be shaking up the dynamic too much.'

I know, weird right? That I'd be upset that they DON'T intend to change Twilight beyond what they seem to assume is the simply cosmetic? That they DON'T intend to change the formula of the show as a result of these events? I should be relieved that the show is going to basically remain where it is, just with another pair of wings, shouldn't I?

But you know something? After this, it's sorta called for that they start to do something crazy and new. Otherwise, you just end up with something mediocre, like I've already explained. And this show deserves better than that.

If they had said, 'the show is going to change dramatically as a result of this' then I might actually be excited. Who KNOWS where the show could go if it were to change dramatically? Why... I can picture Twilight and the rest of the Elements of Harmony teaming up and forming a roving group of heroes, alongside supporting characters like the traveling Trixie and the reformed Discord, purging the world of monsters and evil, battling the great demon Tirek and the horrible lovecraftian monstrosity known as Smu'uz. Dungeons and Dragons crossed with MLP.

Twilight: Warrior Princess

I'd watch it. I'd enjoy it.

If you're going to jump the shark, you have to do it awesomely. You gotta jump that fucking shark on an Acme rocket with your hair on fire, hammering a keytar.

Otherwise, you end up with nothing more than mediocrity. A show that feels like it's changed fundamentally, constantly leaving you with a disappointed feeling in your gut and no sense of satisfaction.

Like Buffy the Vampire Slayer after Season 4.
Or Transformers G1 after the movie
Or the Pokemon anime after Misty left
Or the Superman films after Superman 2

You see what I'm getting at. If the show hasn't done so already... this is its Shark Jump moment.

Hell... it might have already happened at the Season 2 finale, if the quality of this past season is anything to go by.

So honestly, the worst thing that they could be saying is "This isn't going to change the show's dynamic." Especially since they also said, at one point "This will allow us to do bigger and better things."

Let's think about this for a minute.

If this didn't change the show's dynamic at all, how would that make sense. Can you really picture Twilight just trotting around Ponyville as an Alicorn? I sure can't. Ponies cower in fear and bow in reverence when the Princesses are even in the same TOWN as them. To have ponies just not take notice of it would be seriously off.

You could liken it to something like this... say one of your friends suddenly got really famous, making blockbuster movies and oodles and oodles of cash. Even if he didn't change much in personality, the dynamic around you would definitely change, since he'd be constantly swarmed by adoring fans and press. See what I'm getting at?

This WILL change the dynamic of the show. More likely than not, pretty much all of Season 4 will focus on Twilight learning to be an Alicorn and a princess and coming to terms with her new position, biology, and abilities. This is a good idea for a fanfic... not so much for the show itself. Because let's face it, this will inevitably push all of the other characters to the side. It won't focus on the friendship between the characters at all. It'll be all about Twilight.

The Twilight Sparkle Show: starring Twilight Sparkle.

And that's not what I signed up for.

You know something? When the authors of the show tell me that it's 'not going to change the dynamic of the show' all that much, and yet, at the same time, tell me that they're going to 'do bigger and better things,' you know what that tells me?

It tells me, that the authors have no idea what they're doing.

Yeah. I said it.

I know that a lot of people have recently been saying that we shouldn't put Lauren Faust on a pedestal. After all, this team has always been here. But I can't help but notice that ever since Faust left the show, it's been a lot harder to enjoy. I've noticed that almost all of the Season one episodes are at least watchable, save two or three. I notice that in Season two, when Faust was an executive producer rather than a director, that about half of the episodes were phenomenally good, while the other half were almost unwatchable, with only a smattering falling into middle ground. And now it's Season three, and most episodes range from mediocre to downright vomitous.

I'm sorry... but this trend makes it very VERY hard to not put Lauren Faust on a pedestal.

And now... with only five hours to go, I can't help but wonder... just how bad will it be? Because it's going to be bad. The only question now is can it be recovered from, or will it mean outright ruination.

Thinking from a logical standpoint... with everything working against it... I'm leaning towards the latter.



...But you know what? That's okay. Because once it happens... I think I can move on. I've been obsessed with these ponies far more than can possibly be healthy for so long... perhaps it's time I left them behind for something else.

It's been real, bronies.

© 2013 - 2024 Midnight-Cobra
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McGack's avatar
:shrug: i liked most of the episodes except spike episodes of course