EP 14: The Cart Before The Ponies
Rating: 4 4 3
Cheerilee is making the foals build derby carts and race in them. They have one day to carve out a giant block of wood with an older pony. So in a single day, two ponies have to carve out a block into the shape of a cart and engineer a way to make it drive? What the fuck kind of overly complicated shit is this? And of the adults, how many in Ponyville even have an inkling of skill to do either of these? Not everyone knows carpentry and motor engineering.
There's three rewards in the derby and Apple Bloom wants to be the fastest, Sweetie the most traditional, and Scoots the most creative. Scoots is getting help from Rainbow Dash but she wants to make the fastest, Apple Bloom's getting help from Applejack who wants to make the most traditional, and Sweetie's getting help from Rarity who wants to make the most creative. This is all against each of the CMC's wishes. We also see a Rarity flashback where Derpy beat her as a filly in the most creative category.
The next day, they begin building the carts and the ponies helping the CMC are being cunts talking about how the carts are theirs and not the CMCs. This feels like a season 2 episode. Also when Cheerilee meant they had a day to make the carts, they actually have from dawn to noon to make them. What the fuck? There is no way you can build a drivable fucking cart from a block of wood in like six hours. Eventually, Scootaloo tries decorating her and Rainbow Dash's cart with chicken stuff. Whoever during storyboarding or the animatics phase added this, fuck you. I'm deducting 1 VB and I'm not joking.
You're not funny.
Cheerleader Cheerilee. That is all.
Then a song that's fine starts and look and the image below, this is the race track. What the fuck is this? This is some shit you'd see in one of those GTA Online stunt races with an intersection where everyone crashes into each other and fucks up your placement. And what do you know, they all do crash into each other and destroy the carts.
The CMC confront their helpers who realize they're being cunts. They rebuild the carts in the CMC's visions and redo the race. What is powering the carts? Somehow they're mechanically powered in a way they can actually be driven. We've already seen parade floats be driven but these are the closest thing to actual cars in the show. Clearly, Equestria has some sort of automotive technology but isn't at a point to be used by anyone for actual purposes. At least this means no roads ruining urban design and introducing regulation that restricts freedom of travel.
Another fine episode. 4 EV. Would've gotten 5 VB for the message of standing up to adults that won't listen to you but you know how I feel about Scootaloo chicken jokes so I'm staying true to my word by deducting 1 VB making this episode only get 4 VB. 3 DV because no actual development happens.
EP 15: 28 Pranks Later
Rating: 3 3 3
Rainbow Dash terrifies Fluttershy in a prank and makes her cry. Fluttershy tattles to the other four to confront her. After they call her pranks lazy, she decides to prank them all to prove her pranks are actually great. Ah schweet, another season 2 episode.
Then we get a boring compilation of her pranking the residents of Ponyville. Tired of her shit, they get Pinkie to go tell Rainbow Dash to cut it the fuck out and at her house, Rainbow Dash reveals her grand plan to prank all of Ponyville in a single prank by switching out Filly Guide cookies with rainbow-filled cookies that stain their mouths.
Later, Rainbow Dash finds Pinkie's sick and then goes to help the CMC sell the cookies. They nearly sell out and that night, Rainbow Dash is confused why no one's complaining about the results of her prank and goes to check if the prank actually worked. She returns to Sugarcube Corner and discovers the Cakes and Pinkie are now zombies and finds the whole town has also turned into zombies. Next is another boring compilation of her escaping to places just find the residents are zombies. Do they do these compilation things to save on the budget or what?
Rainbow Dash goes to warn the ponies she was helping sell the cookies and the zombies from the town find them and they have to escape.
I find this image amusing.
They escape into a barn the zombies then break into and they corner Rainbow Dash and right before they get her, they reveal it was one giant prank on her. Instead of learning her lesson, Rainbow Dash decides she has come up with a greater prank to top this one.
Gets kinda boring at parts so it only gets 3 EV. There's nothing to vibe with so it gets 3 VB. I know this is one of those episodes everyone hates but while it is very weak, I don't believe it's this horrible, out of character abomination people make it out to be. Gotta agree with ShellyD's commentary on this. No real development so 3 DV.
EP 16: The Times They Are A Changeling
Rating: 4 6 4
We're returning to the Crystal Empire and Twilight states how she hopes Shining and Cadance don't think it's too soon for her to return. While it's possible she hasn't been there since The Crystalling about a year ago according to my timeframe theory, it's very likely she's been there since then.
Twilight, Glimmy, and Spike arrive to learn there's a changeling on the loose and everyone's freaking the fuck out. After meeting up with Twilight's family, Spike goes with some guards on a scouting trip where he then falls into a cave and finds the changeling who's named Thorax. Thorax states he's not evil and just wants a friend since he defected from the changeling hive to find friendship and share love instead of feed off it.
Believing him, Spike tries to get the ponies to not try to kill Thorax. Spike has Thorax transform into a pony and act as his friend and guides him around the city. Spike and pony Thorax are then brought into the throne room so they can meet Spike's new friend but while seeing the stupid cringe baby, Thorax's changeling thirst for love overpowers him, causing him to go back to his changeling form and run away while the others try to attack him and protect Spike. Thorax should've just taken Flurry Heart and punted her out the window. New Crystal Empire pastime: Throw a baby with wings out a tower window and if they survive, they win.
Spike returns to the cave to get Thorax to come back to prove he's good or something and back at the castle, Twilight says "out of hand" at a point. Spike and Thorax return and Spike has to mansplain with a song Thorax isn't evil. Song's fine. At a point during the song, you can see Starlight realize the changeling is no different from her and she'd be turning on her own redemption if she didn't accept this changeling could be good.
Spike passes the speech check and gets them to accept Thorax isn't evil. Thorax also reveals he wants to one day teach the other changelings about friendship and undermine changeling society.
Pretty entertaining so it gets 4 EV. I give 6 VB for the fact they realize Thorax simply being a changeling doesn't make him evil and a lot of people need to learn this lesson in real life. Just because someone comes from a society or culture people deem bad, doesn't mean they as an individual are bad. This episode is an excellent Spike episode akin to Dragon Quest. Whereas that episode is about oneself realizing they aren't beholden to 'their people', this one is about others than yourself recognizing this. 4 DV for meeting Thorax and beginning the changeling reformation arc.
EP 17: Dungeons And Discords
Rating: 3 3 3
The ponies are being taken on a diplomacy tour in Yakyakistan and Fluttershy tells Discord to go hang out with Spike and Big Mac while they're gone. Discord thinks they're cringe and doesn't want to hang out with them though.
At the train station, Pinkie calls back to the yeti from Party Pooped and they set off. Discord's an awkward little shit prompting Spike and Big Mac to invite him to their thing. Discord at a point calls Big Mac monosyllabic which considering his most known quote "eeyup" is actually two syllables, is incorrect.
So eventually their guys night begins and they reveal they're playing a tabletop RPG and Discord is not having any of this nerd shit. Spike explains the game and tells Discord to make a character before explaining theirs which reminds me of back when I used to play Cube World back in 2013. I played as a human warrior also named NightMox and had a black cat I think named Kitty. I often played on this one I think German PvE server and those days were fun. I remember helping some girl on like my second day playing on this server who then became all flirty with me but I just wanted to play the damn game. Then eventually some guy gave me hacked equipment so now I had a bunch of extremely OP shit. He also offered me a hacked horse but I wasn't replacing Kitty. I remember I planned to meet him the next day at a specific time but we never confirmed timezones which I think is why I never saw him again. I think his name was Lucas.
Anyways, Discord starts getting mad at the game prompting Spike and Big Mac to laugh at him. Discord then throws a fit and teleports them all to a casino or something where they continue to try to play the game and tell Discord if he doesn't want to play, he can sit and watch like a cuck. Discord says fuck it and just turns reality into the game. As Spike and Big Mac are almost killed, they reveal they only invited Discord because they felt bad for him prompting him to take them out of the game where they explain Discord's a complete loser. Is Discord actually a NEET incel?
So Discord doesn't go off and kill himself, they let him back into the game and have him put them back into the game world and they get a Game Over and die. The end.
3 EV because I don't think it's as good as the 4 EV episodes. No vibe so 3 VB. No development so 3 DV.
EP 18: Buckball Season
Rating: 4 4 3
After a bunch of exposition about buckball, Applejack and Rainbow Dash need a unicorn to complete their team and have Flutters and Pinkie go find some to try out. Also, Rainbow Dash can fly with one wing and we see the cream pony again.
All the unicorns fucking fail and Pinkie and Fluttershy turn out to be better than Applejack and Rainbow Dash. Then Snails appears and turns out to be the unicorn they need. Now that they have their team, Rainbow Dash and Applejack make Pinkie and Flutters do intense training that has nothing to do with the game and they decide this whole thing is fucking stupid and don't want to play anymore. Eventually, Derpy sighting:
On the train to Appleloosa where they're supposed to compete, Flutters has a mental breakdown with Pinkie and they go hide away from Rainbow Dash and Applejack. Later, they find them in the storage car holding each other which is really cute.
They regain their confidence and win the thing. The end.
4 EV for having a few amusing moments. 4 VB for the message that different stress types affect people differently whether positive or negative. No actual development so 3 DV.
EP 19: The Fault In Our Cutie Marks
Rating: 5 5 4
We start with Scoots helping some filly outside in a sand pit while Sweetie and Apple Bloom are in a meeting with the filly's parents who are consulting them on a cutie mark problem. Seeing these grown-ups having a formal meeting with the fillies is pretty goofy.
Turns out the filly has a skull and bones as a cutie mark but it's just some archaeology shit after she finds dinosaur fossils. Well, now we know some sort of dinosaurs used to exist in Equestria.
The CMC explain how they've been helping ponies find their purpose in life and solving their cutie mark problems since the last CMC episode. They then come across a griffon camping at their clubhouse named Gabby. Turns out the CMC are famous in Ponyville and Gabby heard about their tales from the townsponies and now wants a cutie mark. We get her backstory of how she wanted to spread happiness as a mailgriffon or something. We see she witnessed the events from The Lost Treasure Of Griffonstone and came to the conclusion cutie marks had to be linked to why happiness came to the griffons in that episode. She then waited for an opportunity to deliver mail to Ponyville to start her quest which was a letter from Gilda to Rainbow Dash. Considering my timeframe theory, it took Gilda well over a year to get around to sending that letter leading to this episode.
The CMC know griffons can't get cutie marks and try to explain this to Gabby but she just flies away in excitement expecting to get one soon. They decide to go to Twilight to ask her if griffons can get a cutie mark and when she says there's no known instances of griffons getting cutie marks, Sweetie asks if it's possible to use a spell to get Gabby one to which Twilight references the last time she tried to do that with Apple Bloom and failed. They leave having learned nothing.
The CMC try to explain to Gabby she can't get a cutie mark but she just copes and denies what they say. The CMC give into her cope and decide to try to get her one anyways. We get a song next and fuck, this one's good. Gabby's parts are especially good. During the song, Gabby mentions teaching precalculus while it shows Cheerilee's classroom. I looked up when precalculus is taught and apparently it's only taught in advanced classes usually 11th to 12th grade or ages 16-17. According to my timeframe theory and my own guessing, the CMC would be around ages 15-16 at this point so this kinda fits if you take the lyric seriously. Although, Cheerilee and the CMC are the only ones present in the classroom so it's more likely Gabby's just proving she knows how to teach precalculus as opposed to literally teaching it to the foals. Fun fact, I did not know what calculus actually was before writing this. Also, very sneaky Derpy sighting:
After Gabby's polymathy fails to get her a cutie mark, the CMC tell her they can't help her and she runs away coping and seething and returns later to show she did get a cutie mark. She then just leaves again and the CMC go to tell Twilight who believes the story with no skepticism at all which doesn't really seem like her. She's experienced cutie mark trickery and she knows for a fact, no griffon has gotten a cutie mark before. Why does she just accept what the CMC are saying and get excited about it?
The CMC find Gabby and find out her cutie mark is fake. After some sappy shit, the CMC make her an artificial cutie mark and make her a Cutie Mark Crusader.
Very entertaining CMC episode with a really good song so it gets 5 EV. 5 VB because I really like Gabby's character and the message that you don't need some symbol or trophy to mark your abilities. 4 DV for the CMC continuing their stuff and the multiple callbacks.
EP 20: Viva Las Pegasus
Rating: 4 3 4
Applejack and Flutters are sent by the map to Las Pegasus. Some dude named Gladmane is running the casino or whatever family friendly thing you'd call it and guides them around but he doesn't seem bad. Later, they find the Flim Flam brothers are there. They're trying to sell tickets to some showing where ponies drink Flim Flam Brothers Miracle Cure Tonic™ before fighting to the death. Turns out, they are no longer working together but against each other and their new disdain for one another is the friendship problem.
Flutters tries counseling them but fails and we see all the other ponies working for Gladmane begin bickering with each other like Flim and Flam are. Eventually Flutters learns from the animals there Gladmane's been running psyops on the workers to turn them against each other while staying loyal to him. They get Flim and Flam back together to run a counter op against Gladmane. At a point, they mention how Applejack never lies when she literally has in the show before.
The op fails as Gladmane saw through it but because Gladmane is prideful and gloats about his savviness for conning, Fluttershy simply holds a speaker button as he does so, exposing his crookedness to the whole resort. Gladmane is then kicked from his position as the owner of the place and the Flim Flam brothers take over. They then track Gladmane down, kidnap him, and throw him into one of their death shows where he's killed in front of a cheering crowd.
Fine enough for 4 EV. No vibe so 3 VB. New location and more Flim Flam brothers stuff so 4 DV.
MLP Commentaries IndexWritten 2025-2-10 Published 2025-3-1