Crusaders of the Lost Mark Review [Spoilers] · 12:50am Oct 11th, 2015
Well, you did it, Hasbro. You really did it this time.
You made me feel sorry for Diamond Tiara. Congratulations.
All joking aside, this episode is one of the greatest in my book. We've got the Crusaders finally get their marks, and they remain the Cutie Mark Crusaders, for life, it seems! I honestly wasn't expecting this from a CMC episode. I find it interesting that Hasbro has the Crusaders remain together, and I look forward to seeing the industrialization of CMC Inc. We've also got some character development from Diamond Tiara, and a complete turnaround, to boot! I'll be honest, I expected the turnaround from Diamond Tiara to be immediate, and was happily surprised when Tiara's turnover took longer than a few seconds. When I saw DT way, way, waaayyyyyy back in Call of the Cutie, I saw her as just another schoolyard bully, and not really an all-out bad guy, like SilverQuill does. Here, however, her redemption is satisfying to me, as limited as a villain as she is. Her parents, Filthy Rich and- I don't know, what's her mother's name? Diamond Ring? Diamond something? Whatever, anyway- her parents are revealed to have incredibly high standards, and as such, she's been 'groomed' to see blank flanks objectively, as part of her upbringing, rather than opinionated, as I've assumed. I didn't expect Filthy Rich to be part of the problem. We haven't really seen much of him, aside from "Do Princesses Dream of Magic Sheep", and even that didn't contribute towards giving a hint at his relationship with DT. And besides some very few fanfictions, we've never seen even a hint of her mother. So I guess the official canon that she's the way she is because of a broken home is out... *ducks*.
Their cutie marks weren't what I expected at all, either. I expected them to just have the basic music note, wing, and appletree...but instead, all of their marks correlate and intertwine. Also, I should point out that Scootaloo's mark is of a wing, so it's possible the canon of her being flightless forever is also being put to rest.
One last thing I feel that should be addressed, is that DT's turnover seems a bit hastily done, but even if it's hasty, I still enjoyed it immensely. The trope is overused, but they added enough of a spin on it, in my opinion. Also, was it just me, or were some of the facial expressions from Diamond seem akin to Ms. Harshwhinny? Maybe to show she was on the verge of becoming so uppity like her mother and father?
All in all, it was a fantastic episode, and we had some great character development. This episode really just blew my mind
DT's mom's name was, believe it or not, "Spoiled Rich". And her cutie mark was a diamond-and-gold wedding ring. Basically, her raison d'etre was... marrying into money. No wonder she was such a spoiled bitch...
3462538 That makes sense, I swore I never heard her name mentioned 0.o