Jul
19th
2016
Points of Canon: S5x19 - The One Where Pinkie Pie Knows · 12:27pm Jul 19th, 2016
You know the drill.
There are few far-reaching things in this one, but lots of useful little tidbits for characterization of Twilight and Shining Armor.
- Pinkie cites 568 cupcakes, even though no more than 70 are actually visible. Either way, that’s a lot of cupcakes. I kind of doubt Sugarcube Corner goes through that much in a day, which implies a party of some sort that is not detailed later. And it’s not the birthday party for which Pinkie had to deliver later in the episode, because it takes a lot more children to consume 568 cupcakes.
- I think this is the first time Pound Cake and Pumpkin Cake appear without their nappies. In a really surprising fit of continuity, they are at least 20% smaller than they are when they appear in A Hearth’s Warming Tail.
- Anyone attempting to make an MLP timeline that does not swap episodes around needs to account for the fact that Pound and Pumpkin still don’t talk and continue to suck on pacifiers. If episodes are never swapped, they’re nearly four years old by this point.
- Princess Cadance’s personal train, referred to as “The Crystal Empire Train” here, is associated with official visits and is avoided for privacy reasons.
- Pinkie explicitly uses Pinkie Sense as an excuse and everypony accepts that. I wonder if there were any other similar incidents.
- The poster with Smash Fortune is interesting in that it is likely to refer to a fictional, pulp-era hero, but I can’t tell if it’s anyone specific. Some sources seem to think it’s Flash Gordon, but I’m not entirely sure why, since the outfit doesn’t match at all, though the name does have the same rhythmic structure. But if it is a pony equivalent of Flash Gordon, this is an example of pony fiction about outer space…
- The list of things Shining Armor liked as a colt includes the abovementioned Smash Fortune, numerous pieces of armor, toy trains, an ant farm, comics, a ball, a model of a castle, a drum, a bucket of crystalline objects, and a
dollaction figure. - One thing to note is that “mint in bag” comics are valuable. And they they are among the list of things Shining Armor liked in his childhood. Comics only started getting packaged in plastic bags no earlier than Silver Age, when the whole comics collection became a thing, and everybody found out that, being considered worthless at the time of publication, old comics were nearly impossible to acquire in mint condition. Which suggests that comics were around for a substantial time in pony world, and had to claw their way to be considered a serious art form for decades just like they did with humans. That might be a conclusion based on nothing, though, because Spike immediately procures an empty plastic bag to hide the ashes in…
- Brutus Force is probably a fictional character too, isn’t he?
- I might be wrong, but I think this is yet another globe among the things collected for Shining Armor. At least, I don’t get what else it could be, and it’s too small to be a bowling ball.
- The portrait of a guy in Royal Guard armor is probably Shining Armor’s uncle he mentioned in The Canterlot Wedding, if it is anyone specific.
- Sugarcube Corner does deliveries. Because no phones show up in Ponyville, they’re probably pre-orders…
- Pinkie’s flashback about making the promise of being the backup delivery pony implies that either all her flashbacks are suspect, or that she had a very specific premonition about this entire situation and didn’t even realize it.
- CMC sport their cutie marks, limiting the timeline positions for this episode.
- Shining Armor likes “baby carrots,” which is kind of surprising, but at least it’s not cake, right?
- There’s an albino squirrel Fluttershy calls “Albert,” who, apparently, doesn’t visit often, enough to get Fluttershy excited.
- Pinkie uses the word “hyperhoof” where we would use “hyperdrive.”
- Pinkie uses an explicit crossbow to send an arrow through Rarity’s window. Crossbows exist.
- Lots of pony children are seen having what appears to be a pool/lake party, complete with presents and party hats, under the supervision of somepony who is too small to be a full adult in a nurse cap and with a life preserver vest. Next to a filly in some variation of a girl scout uniform. The scene involves numerous inflatable objects, and Pinkie with a diving mask and a snorkel, all of which set certain technological requirements for pony civilization. Seeing as how it’s Shady Daze who gets the cake, it’s probably his birthday, and if the number of candles is indicative, he just turned five.
- Balloon animals are a thing.
- I question the logic of setting the table when Shining Armor and Cadance might “not arrive until Saturday”. Also, this is a rare post-EG mention of weekdays.
- There is no visible indication of pregnancy on Cadance whatsoever. Either you can’t really see it on ponies at all until very late, or this is very early in the pregnancy – and the latter is somewhat more likely.
- Twilight likes scavenger hunts with a book at the end, and Shining Armor used to set those up for her.
- To get the second clue into Foal Free Press, either Shining Armor and Cadance arranged for a special printing, or Pinkie somehow held out for an entire extra day. I find the latter quite impossible.
- Birth certificates exist. And they contain pictures of the newborn, which no human equivalents do. I suppose it makes sense when coat and mane colors are important distinguishing characteristics for ponies, though… It’s also interesting that since Pinkie was permitted to manipulate them, (When Mayor Mare asked her for help) they’re likely a matter of public record and the originals are kept in the town hall. In most human nations, registering officials keep registration books, while parents get the originals of the actual document.
- Pinkie Pie can apparently effortlessly read upside down.
The most culture-defining and somewhat unusual thing in this episode is actually the birth certificate, particularly how ponies don’t seem to keep their own originals of the document. Still, it’s one of the few well-defined instances of pony paperwork.
Paperwork always exists.
Derpibooru suggests that Smash Fortune might be based on Doc Savage in whole or in part.
4100934
They probably have a point:
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/49/Manofbronzebama.jpg
When in doubt, look for paperwork n_n
" To get the second clue into Foal Free Press, either Shining Armor and Cadance arranged for a special printing, or Pinkie somehow held out for an entire extra day. I find the latter quite impossible."
Well, Pip is the editor, clearly knew about it and is the only one seen selling it during a suspiciously well-timed appearance, it is quite likely that it was the only one printed. Looks like a special order, like the arrangements with Mayor Mare and the bed seller.
...All of whom look to be worse than Pinkie for keeping secrets.
4101282
I just thought the scale of the conspiracy needs to be pointed out. :) Notice also that neither Cadance not Shining Armor live in Ponyville and have a lot of opportunities to get to know the participants. I suspect Mayor Mare was involved with setting up all the clues, not just her own.
Myself, I'm not at all surprised that ponies like carrots.
Oof, you've got a really good point there. To brainstorm possibilities:
* Ponies take a really long time to grow up.
* Compress the timeframe; S1-3 really did happen in one normal-length year, and they're 2-3. (This, of course, introduces other problems.)
* Some special magic has caused their growth to be delayed - a good story idea!
4101364
It's more the fact that anyone admits to liking anything but cake, really. How many carrots do you remember seeing on screen? Me, not a whole lot. Cake shows up in almost every episode.
Me, I think a heavily swapped compressed timeline is the least horrifying option. It does make pony lives feel frantic, but at least they become continuous.
But whatever floats a particular story's boat.
4101384 By the way, you mentioned a couple weeks back that you'd actually put together a chronology for rearranged episodes... any possibility of writing that up and posting it?
4101407
I didn't put it together so much as I found someone else's work which I mostly agree with. But it is only continuous up until the end of season 4 and it's a thick Excel table.
Right now I'm thinking of how to make this work less cumbersome to discuss, and the best idea so far is a piece of JavaScript allowing you to visually swap episodes around while conforming to a set of strict rules - like "every appearance of wingless Twilight must precede every appearance of winged Twilight." As this gets discussed, more strict rules based on various observed phenomena could be introduced, and eventually one least crazy timeline would appear.
Thanks for pointing that out, I'd always wondered about that guy!
Even if today is the biggest holiday of the year, that still suggests Ponyville has a population in the thousands, if not the tens of thousands.
Maybe, maybe not. After all, Twilight Sparkle said it, and just today she's been confirmed as a plagiarist, so can we trust anything she said?
Ponies will do anything for a Princess, even one they barely know.
4102256
~4000 is the best estimate I've seen so far. But ponies eat a lot of cupcakes... Alternatively, Pinkie hasn't been counting the cupcakes she finished today, but a running tally since she first learned the recipe. Which would explain the ~70 visible ones.
Trump doesn't exist and you can't convince me otherwise. :)
Oh, there's no issue with that at all, it's the problem of finding the ponies that can do what she needs in a town where the princess never had a chance to spend any significant time in. Mayor Mare would be the one telling them whom to ask, I expect.
4101407
Oh, and muahahahaha. I wrote it. It's a bit primitive (the only rules it understands is "episode X must follow/precede episode Y) and I need a lot of work to get the data and my commentary in any semblance of order. But it works. :)
And I need a correction: The reordering I have is only complete to the end of season 3. Everything else is still in the airing order.
4102385
So excited for when this is ready!
She spends a lot of time upside down. And certainly the human brain is good at flipping things over.