Bats Review · 8:39pm Dec 28th, 2013
So I was told that this episode had a bit of a tribute to Danny Elfman's music style, thanks to Meghan McCarthy's tweet about it. Well, the episode didn't disappoint!
Bats was a really neat episode, it was smart and also very fun. With Applebuck Season back in full swing, Applejack is ready to make the best of it! But she runs into a problem upon finding that the apples are actually damaged in thanks to vampire fruit bats. Calling upon her friends for help, she has the plan to draw out the vampire fruit bats and drive them out.
Fluttershy, however, disagrees and thinks that they should try a less aggressive approach. Very much in-character of her. These parts, I did like. It creates the conflict without the clear answer of who's right and who's wrong. You can see exactly where Applejack and Fluttershy are both coming from.
As a farmer, it's Applejack's job to make sure that the crops aren't threatened by insects and/or wildlife. Because there is a lot at stake, you can see why she's trying to take effective and logical measures.
But for Fluttershy, who cares about animals and understands why they do what they do, it's no wonder that she thinks they can figure out a way to protect the crops but not starve the vampire fruit bats.
Neither of them are wrong. They're both understood and are making logical methods, even if both of them might seem unable to work.
As it goes along, there's a twist. Twilight uses a spell to stop the vampire fruit bats from eating the apples. Much like back in Swarm of the Century from season one. But of course, the plan succeeds...and backfires all at once.
The vampire fruit bats aren't eating the apples. But something else is. What could it be? The Main Six go to investigate this, and find very strange clues. Especially with Fluttershy slowly changing.
It's eventually revealed that the spell had caused Fluttershy to slowly become a vampire fruit bat. Resulting in transforming into a hybrid pony vampire fruit bat! Whoa! I knew she was eating the apples, but I did not see that coming! Her design was really neat, being both creepy and yet adorable.
So now they have to stop Flutterbat-no seriously, Pinkie calls her that-from devouring the apples and to change her back to normal. It's especially apparent that Applejack cares more about her friend than she does about the apples, which was really heartwarming to see.
After all is back to normal, a lesson is learned. Sometimes you do have to say no to your closest friends, you shouldn't be pressured to do something you don't feel is right, and sometimes a short-term goal isn't exactly the best method.
This was definitely a very smart way to teach a lesson, as well as very fun and interesting.
The ending was... well, it's sparking something. Either something's going to happen from it, or it was just a silly gag. I guess we'll have to wait and see!
Now of course, the song. The song was fantastic! :D It definitely did feel a lot like a song Danny Elfman would write and compose! There was a lot of sampling from The Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack, to be sure! This Is Halloween, Making Christmas, Oogie Boogie's Song, Jack's Obsession, and even a bit of Sally's Song! It all came together so well, in that it was doing its own thing, but was still a neat tribute to the sources of inspiration. I loved it! Daniel Ingram really did channel his inner Danny Elfman. XD
This is definitely one of my favourite episodes of season four so far. It was a lot fun, really silly, taught a smart lesson, and was just an overall good time. There was great comedy, funny lines, good callbacks, a good conflict, great interaction, awesome visuals, it all came together so well. I really enjoyed it very much!
Really nice episode!
I didn't enjoy the end bit of the song when the rest of the cast joined in. It ended up not serving any purpose since they just re-explain their taking of sides right after and that extra time could have been used to more effectively portray the 4 as reasonable middle-grounders that select AJ's plan (for the cider!). EDIT: The other 90% of the song was fantastic though. ^_^
Kissing Scene!
RD: Shy, let's kiss!
Shy: No, Dashie, not in front of everyone!
Actually this episode is my kind of thing, being one of those weirdo kids who love creepy stuff
. I really love it when a cartoon show does something creepy whether it's friendly or actually trying to be scary, it's really enjoyable for me. 
I'm kind of seeing Fluttershy's fang as a gag. I mean I was wondering the same thing with the Castle Man-ia ending. When the shadow pony revealed his shadow and yellow eyes. I did think that was a gag the first time, but then I thought "Is this Shadow Pony going to be a new villain for later?. None of us really until we see what happens. But you know after seeing two episodes with a similar nding you end up just seeing them as gags. Somehow I hope I'm wrong
And that song, I love it. My favourite if the whole show so far!.
I realise as I comment on this review that I forgot to comment on your Power Ponies review. I also realise I forgot to reply to comments made on my own blog concerning Power Ponies. I'll probably not go back and comment on them as the thoughts have left my mind, my responses would be shabby to comment now. Instead I thought best to reply and comment on the relevant, fresh in my mind stuff as quick as I can. So let's begin with this comment.
I was not aware that such a tweet came before the episode but the moment I heard the tune of the song and when it shifted between Applejack and Fluttershy I thought, 'This reminds me of Nightmare Before Christmas'. I also thought to myself, 'NintendoGal is going to love this'. Then the ending part of the song came and I questioned whether you would. Actually, let's discuss that first.
The song itself was wonderful. The drastically different tones of Fluttershy and Applejack smoothly flowed from one to the other. It worked wonders, it was catchy and the animation was majestic. It's shocking then that ultimately I didn't like the song, no thanks to how it turns out. When it was just Applejack and Fluttershy it was fine but when the others joined in, all siding with Applejack, it turned nasty. Now Applejack's tone was nasty throughout but it made sense given the circumstance but when the others joined in it all felt wrong. The others having the same tone, watching as Fluttershy curled up into a ball and cowered before her singing friends, that was downright bullying happening. The imagery and tone turned from a positive to negative when the addition of the others joining with Applejack occurred.
Ultimately it was how that song turned out is my one definite negative to this episode. Moving onto happier things let us go through the rest of your review of this great episode.
Exactly! The episode did a real good job of balancing the arguments out. It would have done a better job if the others staid more neutral, it would have still lead to Twilight trying to mediate an alternative solution to the problem but what we got presented with did a good enough job balancing the views.
The moment the apples were still being eaten I knew it was Fluttershy and yet from the summary and from the start of the episode I'd have never predicted it to go down the route it did. Flutterbats design was great, sinister and yet adorable. It fit in well with the atmosphere and scenery which I could praise to no end as it was amazing. The Apple Farm, at night, with the tree's devastated, was chilling. Even with jokes being thrown forth from a top notch hilarious Pinkie it was never undermined.
The moral was brilliant executed and prior gripes I had with the episode was softened to neutrality when I learnt of how they led to the morals given. These season 4 episodes have been great in dishing out two morals, often really good and important ones, even if in some prior episodes of this season they may not have been as well executed as they could have been.
All in all this was a Fantastic episode. I'm hoping we will see more of Flutterbat, it's too fun and interesting of a concept to not wish to see more of it within canon.
Well, they are FRUIT vampires so they're Aunt and Uncle Orange's problem now.