Afterthoughts: A Hearth's Warming Tail · 1:48pm May 21st, 2016
art by Akuama
I usually enjoy the puns in the episode titles. This time, it just seemed unnecessary. That aside, the episode itself was delightful.
The episode started us off with an absolutely wonderful song, then presented us with a ponified telling of the holiday classic Christmas Karol by Edmund Wells.
It also didn't leave me with a whole lot to talk about. Since the episode it a retelling of such a well-known classic, and virtually all of the story elements and character development are derived from that story, "A Hearth's Warming Tail" presents us with something adorable, charming and fun... but not really with anything new.
Of course, when it comes to Christmas stories, we don't often see truly new ones. And while some, like "A Charlie Brown Christmas" do manage to become modern classics, rarely do new stories have the resonance to last. By far, it is more common to see familiar holiday tales retold with new characters and/or in alternate settings. In that respect, "Hearth's Warming Eve" was really impressive in that it crafted an entirely new, Equestrian story that gave the world of My Little Pony its own holiday, analogous to Christmas without actually being Christmas. Equestria's Hearth's Warming Eve largely embraces a holiday spirit comparable to Christmas (or, at least, the non-religious spirit of the holiday) while also having a unique nation-founding aspect. And having given us that, I am more than fine seeing the writers (re)tread very familiar territory for Christmas-themed episodes. While not new, "A Hearth's Warming Tail" was definitely an enjoyable watch.
That said, I do have a few comments on the episode, which I will discuss below the break.
art by Underpable
I find the most interesting food for thought here is in how "A Hearth's Warming Tail" echoes elements of past episodes enough that Charles Dicken's story does not feel out-of-place in the setting of Equestria. The most significant of these is how Snowfall Frost's motivations are grounded in emotional scars from childhood.
Then some distress, words so careless,
Standin' there, you don't know what to do.
Feelin' helpless. You can't make it hurt less,
So you go and change your point of view.
And in that moment, though you didn't know it
Your defenses set up walls you built to last,
Leading to the pony you've become today.
And the spell you're about to cast
It all comes from your past.
In my Afterthoughts for the previous episode, I noted how reaching goals and facing the difficulties of transition has been a common theme in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. This has been another: how emotional wounds from childhood still haunt us as adults.
"A Hearth's Warming Tail" may not have offered much that was new, but it did change up the story a bit by giving Snowfall Frost a few shades of The Grinch with her plan to eliminate the holiday entirely. And I liked how the pony version of Dickens invoked the windigos for the story's bleak future act.
And much of the fun in these iterations is seeing characters we know and love taking on the roles. For me, at least, the best part of any telling of "A Christmas Carol" is always the future sequence, and I eagerly anticipate seeing how the Spirit of Christmas Future is depicted. Halfway through Pinkie Pie's song, I was fervently trying to guess who would get to play that role. Princess Luna was actually the first to come to mind, but I quickly dismissed the idea since the writers seemed to be going all-mane-seven for the major roles.
But it was indeed Luna... and she was perfect. Chilling, mournful, poetic... and they gave her a stylistic design that I found breathtaking.
art by Raikoh-illust
The writers told an old story well, with very nice songs and a great deal of wonderful little touches. Snowfall Frost's villain song was impressive, hitting all the right notes. Seeing that Twilight was actually singing the songs and doing "her Pinkie Pie voice" provoked genuine laughter. Spike's commercial break was excellently played. There were wonderful visual touches, such as Snowfall's reaction to having the first spirit walk through her. All the cameos, both in Ponyville and in the "Victorian" Equestria were a delight. And seeing Equestria in the motif of Victorian England was quite the spectacle. The episode was pure eye and ear candy.
I particularly loved seeing the Victorian versions of these two.
As a final note, I must say that I really appreciated how the episode started. Everyone is blissfully in the holiday spirit except Starlight Glimmer, who finds the holiday silly and just plans to skip it. There is no malice in her mindset. She bears no hatred of the holiday, nor discouragement of those who do enjoy it. It just isn't a holiday she has any appreciation of.
There is an interesting contrast here with Fluttershy and Nightmare Night. Fluttershy finds Nightmare Night actively unpleasant, makes an attempt to join in anyway, and finally decides that the holiday simply isn't for her. There are plenty of things she can enjoy with her friends, and it is okay for Nightmare Night not to be one of them. Starlight Glimmer has no such active antipathy, merely apathy. Twilight diagnoses this as having never had Hearth's Warming Eve put in the proper light. Through the story that Twilight reads, Starlight Glimmer gains an appreciation of the holiday and decides to join in.
And it is worth noting that Twilight does not pressure Starlight Glimmer to do so, merely thanking her for allowing Twilight to read her the story, then heading back to the party herself. She doesn't try to make a Friendship Lesson out of this; she leaves whether or not the story altered Starlight Glimmer's perception of Hearth's Warming Eve entirely to Starlight herself.
art by NCMares
Season 7 of the pony show Kkat, not really expecting much this far out of the gate meself. That said, the scribes may yet surprise.
Potato, and maybe a non sequitur
Riiiiiiggggghhhhttttt.... My mind went here before this was a thing
i.imgbox.com/WyLeefOD
That's what she should have done in the first place. This wasn't a Moondancer situation remotely, Starlight merely didn't want to participate in a, what she felt, was a silly festival. She has every right to the that opinion, but no.... it also wouldn't have helped to have made attendance mandatory. I think this is more of a Cranky Doodle circumstance... that its okay to have friends who don't want to do all the things you do, but its okay to make the invitation.
And now the nitty gritty....
Fuck. Like,,, really. First off... when you have more musical numbers then the Christmas Carol musical ( the one with tat dude from Seinfield and that guy from Frasier respectively) you find yourself being in an assault on ones ears. They weren't bad, but geez, give us at least a few minutes of solid normal dialogue.
Also, these dummies are entirely dependent on every single individual being all chummy cheery cherry cream puff buddies at all times lest they all recieve a metaphorical reaming by ice horses? Or worse, having to engage in all celebrations at all times or meeting the same fate? Good lord... I CAN see where they're going with this, but heaven forbid anyone have a disagreement? That's a little too...
I guess it really boils down to me being a fan of the source material since childhood, but no, I didn't like this one.
Okay...
How does that justify her actions, Snowfall, Starlights or anyone else who brings harm on another person? I'm going to speak now as a person who was abused and to my shame abused others (not sexual or anything, but definitely physically and emotionally, you know name calling and intimidation) and hold onto your hats because this great truths might very well blow your mind: santa claus isn't real, tooth fairy is a lie, and your parents are flesh and blood people who make mistakes like everyone else. i am in no way trying to belittle or, again, justify anyone here, but life sucks, get a helmet.
But being scarred and hurt does not give anyone license to hurt others, at all. In fact, you're a bigger salty cunt for doing then the ones who did it to you, because you know what its like.
Victorian Vinyl and Luna as the reaper are the two awesome things I saw in this episode. Re rest is "merely" kick-ass. I'm not much much abaut holiday meaning but it's feels, so it didn't translate all too well. And in my cultural cricle this story is unegzistant, with it's role playing the Tale of Orphan Marisia so I didn't had much connection with this even if I know the story. Westerners propably have a wave of nostalgia from this.
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When I realized this episode was going to be a retelling of "A Christmas Carol" I immediately groaned internally, as I'm not a huge fan of the Dickens tale. The episode was surprisingly good considering.
I went a bit nuts at Luna's first solo, enjoyed most of the songs, and particularly enjoyed the subtler nods to the Dickens story (Featherweight's cameo was well placed in my opinion).
3960887
While I can appreciate what you're trying to say, I feel like you're ignoring the main point of the original statement. Things that happen to you as a child can affect you throughout your life in ways beyond wanting to inflict that same pain on other people. I myself can't eat strawberries because of my past (weird story from my time in foster care. I won't bore you with the details).
I think the point Kkat was trying to make was that sometimes old wounds never fully heal. Snowfall Frost didn't know how to react to an adult, her teacher no less, essentially telling her that she wouldn't amount to anything if she celebrated a holiday. She wasn't trying to hurt anypony with her actions, just skip Hearth's Warming Day.
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Ah, I misunderstood then. I apologize
This episode was instantly my favorite of the season so far (after today's episode I'm not so sure anymore). There wasn't all that much to the story (I don't know the original though, so I didn't get the references and changes), but that didn't really matter, because the songs and the music were awesome and visually it was also great. No cringe-humor, no stupid characters, it was perfect.
3960990
Annnndddd.... that's not neccessarily true. People say that all the time, or at least use an excuse. Or something else like "I'm tired" or "Trouble at work" or some other tripe folks use in order to invalidate whatever half assed apology they just made for their bad behavior and the hard time they've just given others. But, hey, sometimes it is justified, and even when its not, nobody's perfect as they say. As you've mentioned your job is dealing with that sort of thing, so you've probably seen folks at less then their best in situations poised to go down in flames.
I just don't care for bullies and brutes using that to shut up any questioning or try to avoid consequence by doing that is all
It was a nice episode, but as you said nothing really new.
I'm biased as an Applejack fan, but I loved her song as the ghost of hearth's warming past, directly yet artfully outlining the theme of old wounds holding Snowfall back.
I agree on all points about Luna. That was my favorite part of the episode just for how perfectly she played that role! The fact that I never would have guessed her adds a bit of shock value
Luna's depiction of Christmas Future is tied with seeing the Victorian versions of Vinyl and Octavia for my favorite scene. I wish I had someone take a picture of how big my smile was when I saw both scenes.
Overall, I really don't have much else to say except that I will be re-watching this episode again soon.
I also heard that Discord was originally supposed to be the first spirit that Snowfall Frost encountered. I don't know about you, but I would have loved to have seen that.
The thing that I love about A Christmas Carol is the fact, that it is great to interpret not only in spirit of of Christmas or just a holiday. You can actually use it to different meanings, as reminders to be had. For Example Littlepip's vision in the mirror in Fillydelphia could have been considered an apparition of the Third Ghost, showing her the imminent and dark future she needed to change in order for it not to happen.
3960887
About the hurting others. There is a difference between motivation and reasoning and between it being justified. I came from a pathological background. I was angry, hurt and wanted the world to feel the same, because people around me didn't understand my feelings of hurt and sadness.
Hurt clouds one's judgement and people brought with wrong morals will take those wrong morals as the good ones. They aren't justified in the least for hurting others, but the motivation and reasoning is there. They were hurt and were taught that hurting other is the way in life. Simply telling them to get a helmet is also not really the right way. People are weary and weak when being left for themselves. Take for example Diamond Tiara which was devastated when she lost her one true friend.
Helping the hurt ease their pain and showing them the love and acceptance, or another, better way they need in life is what makes everything good. Snowfall Frost needed that, and Starlight needed that in the Season 5 finalle.
I stand by KKat's words here ^_-\
Cheers.
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And I understand all that. My assertion is it doesn't matter. Not that a persons pain doesn't matter, but that it doesn't justify hurting others. Again, people make bad choices if they're hurt, or scared, on in a bad situation, and that's okay. But we should draw a line.
Actually bringing physical, lasting harm is never okay, and it annoys me how so many, under the banner of empathy and being a good person, try to twist this basic rules or suggest we take a lighter hand with bullies and thugs. Gather around children, its grand story time:
On this site, there is a fellow who spent part of his youth under bullies. They tormented him endlessly, to the point he stayed inside and began to lose weight because of the stress. He eventually moved away. A couple of years later, the lesson had been well learned: there were to be no consequences for their actions. They raped a young girl and stuffed her into a drain pipe. More then likely, these little fucks are out on the streets by now, doing God knows what.
There are people, right now, talking about these assholes inner pain. They'll blow smoke about how that poor girl is a tragedy, but then will bloviate and condescend to us little people about how these boys were really the end result of patriarchy or mommy didn't hug them enough or daddy never supported their special snowflakiness or some such rot and how punishing them would only worsen the tragedy, they need counseling and lots of love. Feh.
I don't know if I'm framing this right, I'm not the smartest guy, you know? All I know is what I've seen and done, and all to often this idea of childhood scars does more harm then good and to often causes folks to sympathize with the perpetrator while forgetting the scars they've left on others, and thats not good. In short, yes, we should make considerations, but there should also be consequence.
You'll probably read this Kkat, and feel free to delete it if I've been to harsh or an insufferable prick on this matter, but that's my thoughts for what they're worth
3963014 I'm not going to delete the post. While I feel your anger is seeping into the argument enough to harm reasonable discussion, what you have said is a fair final word on the matter. In fact, as you can see from some of my other blogs, I share several of the same sentiments.
However, as we have all acknowledged, this conversation originated from your misinterpreting what was said. What your are saying now has a lot of value, but it is also off-topic. I encourage you to make a blog post of your own about this if you want to continue the discussion. But I ask that you and everyone else cease arguing this particular matter here.
Thank you.
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thank you
I guess so... if you haven't I am a fairly irate fellow, but there are some things that people should be angry over. I'll say I'm sorry if that's upsetting, but I wont apologize for it or my stance.
Can do.
You're welcome
Maybe this is just me, but what this episode got me thinking about was something that it passed over (for reasons that'll probably be obvious). The overall gist of the episode being that holidays are about spending time with friends and family, I couldn't help but start to realize that many holidays are indeed about people important to us, including those who aren't around anymore. I can't speak for outside the US, but here we have quite a few holidays commemorating individuals of great importance who have died (Martin Luther King Jr. Day, various holidays for presidents), along with a couple more for those who have died in military service (Memorial and Veteran's Days, and the 4th of July to a lesser extent). Heck, Halloween is rooted in the idea of communing with those who have passed on, regardless of if you believe it to have originated with pagan worship or purely from Christian traditions.
Kinda fair to call it morbid but I couldn't help but think of it as oddly touching.
i greatly enjoyed it myself. it took a familiar formula but did put a few equestria spcific twists. for example, snowfall did not question a spirit's existenced, just why it was there. and the spiritas answer of her actions attracting powerful forces actually made me think.
it makes since that in equestria, there are forces beyond even the likes of alicorns and dsicord. things that seek the world to be in harmony, or maybe some seeking chaos.
it kinda makes me think of fallout equestria and the idea that there are such negative entities. yet that would bring the question of what happened to the positive ones? Were they weakened, did their plans fail and that is why equestria became that world?
....v Hmmm. And perhaps one could think of the windigos as, in reality, a force for the positive. Tey are drawn to hatred and suffocate it in winter snow, till love appears to burn them away.
Perhaps the reason why the windigos did not apepar during that war, is because something kept them from it.
I like to think that Starlight and Snowfall were easily redeemed because they're ponies an have some inherent goodness to them, to some extent. Some might end up on the wrong side of the track like Professor Sna- I mean, Flintheart. Or Sombra. Or Luna, for that matter, but all ponies seem to have at least some shred of decency to them.
Uh... #headcanon.
Anyway, this episode was quite enjoyable. Applejack and Pinkie played the part of the ghost of Chri- i mean, Hearth's Warming past and present. Luna as the spirit of the yet-to come was seriously frightening.
There were a few funny moments, like this.
I didn't watch it, but I wish Marley was in there....